First published in French as Pensée et politique dans le monde arabe: contextes historiques et problématiques: XIXe-XXIe siècle by Editions La Découverte, 2015.

"Published in association with the Aga Khan University Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilisations (AKU-ISMC)"--Title page.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 339-347) and index.

Does Arab thought exist? -- A barely visible cultural richness and complexity -- A new 'fascination with Islam' -- A journey into contemporary Arab thought -- The diversity and dynamism of Arab culture -- The distinction between Islamic civilisation and Arab culture -- The poetic and musical mode in Arab culture -- Rhetoric and prose -- Arab philosophy -- The nineteenth-century renaissance of Arabic and Arab thought -- The complex question of religious and national identity -- The need for distinction between Arab and Islamic thought -- Encumbered by a fascination with the past -- Attempts to create an irreducible Islamic otherness -- The need to contextualise the development of thought -- The sources of authoritarianism in the Arab world that have been ignored -- Choosing an epistemological framework and a model for understanding Arab thought -- The otherness of the Arab mind : Orientalisms and counter-Orientalisms -- The problematic trap of authenticity vs. modernity -- Is Islam really indivisible? -- The conditions of cultural and intellectual production in the Arab world since the end of the twentieth century -- Albert Hourani's 1962 pioneering overview of Arab thought -- More recent overviews -- Misinterpreting the role of Arab Christian thinkers -- The shifting political contexts of Arab societies -- The dismantling of the Ottoman Empire and the three afflictions of the Arab world -- The factor of petroleum in the major upheavals of the Arab world -- The impact of the Iranian 'religious' revolution -- The development of a rentier economy -- The consequences of the fragmentation of Arab societies in the face of the European challenge -- The sources of political and intellectual conflict -- The creation of the State of Israel and its impact on Arab thought -- The complex issue of the lack of unity among Arabs -- The six contemporary historical factors of Arab conflict -- An enigma of history : the Arab abandonment of power in the ninth century -- The factors that led to a renaissance of thought identities and historical decline? -- The problem of identity and its complexities -- The first generations of intellectuals and their relationship to Europe Arab thought in the face of colonial expansion : the failure of Ottoman patriotism -- The first steps of modern Arab nationalism Awareness of historical decline and underdevelopment -- The flourishing of the Arab renaissance, 1850-1950 : The desire for modernity -- The pivotal role of the Azharis in an Islam of Enlightenment Taha Husayn, an exceptional individual -- The emergence of a rich Arab feminist movement -- Other major figures of the Arab renaissance -- Questioning the European development model -- Arab and Russian thought : the same contradictions -- Does Arab Shi'i reformist thought exist? -- The theories and political parties of Arab nationalism (1940-1980) -- Revisiting Arab military weakness and its impact -- The blossoming of secular and anti-imperialist Arab nationalism (1919-1967) -- The post-Second World War generation of Arab nationalist thinkers -- Factors that led to the radicalisation of nationalist thought -- The main nationalist thinkers -- The main political currents adhering to Arab nationalism -- The Arab nationalist doctrine of the Baath Party -- The Nasserist mode of Arab Nationalism -- The Arab Nationalist Movement -- Other forms of nationalism in the Arab world -- The Syrian People's Party : A distinct nationalist movement -- The nationalisms of the Maghreb -- Other forms of identity-based nationalisms in the Arab world -- The Arabic language : a reservoir of collective culture -- Two privileged spaces of Arab nationalist thought -- The Centre for Arab Unity Studies -- The Institute for Palestine Studies, a place for preservation of memory -- Arab thought the face of successive political and military failures since 1961 -- The growing complexity of the Arab political landscape -- Reflexive thought on the failure experienced by the Arab world -- Yasinal-Hafizand radical revolutionary thought of as secular nature -- Sadiq Jalal al-Azm and Adonis : their fight against religious obscurantism -- The original and enlightening work of Abdallah Laroui -- National thought through the prism of Marxist critical reflection -- Samir Amin's Marxist internationalist humanism -- Mahdi Amil's critical deconstruction -- The important works of Tayyeb Tizini and Elias Morcos -- Islamic nationalisms as anti-nationalist Arab thought -- A return to the context in which 'anti-national' Islamist thought emerged -- A pocket guide to the thought of modern Islamic movements : Wahhabism and the Muslim Brotherhood -- 'Islam is the solution' : the triumph of a slogan in the 1980s -- Intensification of the struggle for power in Arab societies -- The role of foreign influence on the elites -- The harmful effects of confining thought within the dilemma between Islam and Arab identity -- The major controversies generated by Islamic nationalism -- Islamic heritage : the controversy over an open or closed universe -- Al-Jabri's three modes of operation of Arab thought -- Tarabichi's deconstruction of al-Jabri's work -- The comparative status of philosophy in Islam and Christianity -- The impact of European Islamic studies and Ernest Renan's thought on al-Jabri -- The artificial opposition between the gnostic Islam of the Orient and the rational Islam of the Occident -- The dispute between partisans and adversaries of secularism : A religious McCarthyism? -- The tribulations of Nasr Hamid Abu Zayd -- The assassination of Mahmoud Taha and Farag Foda -- The debate between al-Azmeh and al-Messiri -- Secularism as the source of all the woes of the modern world in the work of al-Messiri -- Secularisation of the Arab world 'from another angle' in the work of al-Azmeh -- Intellectual attempts at ideological conciliation -- The new 'liberal' Arab thought -- The silent continuation of the critique of formal 'Islamic reason' -- Many other overshadowed contemporary critical thinkers -- Reflections on serious tensions within Arab thought -- Mohammed Jaber al-Ansari's critique of the spirit of conciliation -- Muhammad Dahir : on the need to return to the modernist, secular experiment of Muhammad 'Ali and Nasser -- Wasatiyya : An attempt to counter radical and fanatical Islamic thought -- Thought that claims to be rooted in Arab Christianity -- An overview of contemporary Arab thought in the human and social sciences -- Philosophical and anthropological thought -- Abdel Rahman Badawi, a prolific 'go-between' -- The innovative thought of Nassif Nassar -- A broad diversity of contemporary thinkers -- Arab thought in sociology and history -- The shortcomings of Arab thought in economics and technology -- Arab economists who have made substantial contributions -- Youssef Sayegh's premonitory analysis of the failure of Arab development -- Numerous other useful economic contributions -- Antoine Zahlan's analysis and the causes of Arab technological powerlessness.

Translated from French.