Political and Social Change in Modern Egypt: Historical Studies from the Ottoman Conquest to the United Arab Republic, by P. M. Holt

Abstract

This collection of twenty-four articles, based on papers prepared for a conference at School of Oriental and African Studies in University of London, makes as coherent and useful a volume of this kind as it has ever been this reader's good fortune to find. The authors are from West and Middle East. The participation of Egyptian scholars in such a conference and publication is welcome, more so as Egyptian international intellectual cooperation has declined so far in recent years that it has been virtually confined to sort of quasi-official and vacuous meetings often sponsored by UNESCO. Professor Holt, editor, has by his excellent introduction left almost nothing to be said in a brief review. As he points out, there are three groups of papers. The first deals with sources. The second includes only four papers but they range over much of Egyptian history from Ottoman conquest in 1517 to Napoleonic conquest in 1798. The third group, most numerous, is on nineteenth and twentieth centuries; some of these papers deal with broad periods while others focus on political or social processes within shorter time-spans. Professor Holt also rasies several interesting questions concerning various aspects of contributors' approach to Egyptian Uniformly they see modern Egypt beginning with Napoleonic conquest or a few years later when Muhammad Ali took power. He warns, however, that first event, ominous as it was, did not itself bring enduring changes, while second event was in a sense a throwback to an older pattern of rule. Such periodization, while perhaps helpful and inevitable, thus neglects the underlying continuity of Egyptian history. The editor warns also that so narrow a focus on Egypt may prevent us from seeing its history, at least until British occupation in 1882, in relation to Ottoman empire. He points out, further, that in discussion of papers question arose as to significance and validity of such concepts as military elite, feudalism, and political party. It is important to think carefully about last term especially, not only in one-party Egypt today but also in previous decades, which three papers deal with rather extensively. Professor Holt also asks whether Egyptian history has been so considerably determined by its individual political rulers as much of volume implies. Finally he makes us wonder whether emphasis on foreign control of Egypt is not misleading.