Sociology and Economic History: an Essay on Mediation

Abstract

Economic historians working on the Middle East — and particularly on its modern period — have been subject for a generation or a little more to the impact of a complexity of factors of change; these factors have reshaped fields of study hitherto as remote from one another as social science (including economic history) and regional studies (that is, the study of the underdeveloped Three Continents, including the Middle East). From the point of view of methodology — which must be scientific and generally valid, rather than limited to one region — we should question the uses and limits of economic history, not per se but within the framework of the social sciences. This analysis must be concerned with the field under study, with its specific features — the modern Middle East, with special reference to Egypt — yet at the same time be located within the broader framework of Asia, Africa and Latin America.