Arabic Thought beyond the Liberal Age: Towards an Intellectual History of the Nahda

Hanssen, Jens, and Max Weiss (eds.). Arabic Thought beyond the Liberal Age: Towards an Intellectual History of the Nahda. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2016. 458 pages. Hardback $210.00

Hourani and Palestine

In her book, Men of Capital: Scarcity and Economy in Mandate Palestine, Palestinian historian Sherene Seikaly writes that "it is necessary to move beyond indictment and vindication" in her analysis of the commercial class she examined (272). I read that as an invitation for all scholars to problematize the impulse of viewing our research subjects-and perhaps each other as well-simply as individuals to either be lauded or reproached.

I thought of this compelling invitation throughout my reading and re-reading of Jens Hanssen and Max Weiss' co-edited volume, Arabic Thought beyond the Liberal Age: Towards an Intellectual History of the Nahda. The reflections by Seikaly appear in the first chapter of her book, which was reproduced as chapter 10 of 13 stand-alone chapters in the Hanssen and Weiss text. Their volume also includes a separate Introduction by the co-editors and a 14th chapter, or Epilogue, by Palestinian historian Rashid Khalidi.

Arabic Thought beyond the Liberal Age is a synthesis of papers from a conference in 2012 on Albert Hourani's work at Princeton University. It was heartening to learn that the editors dedicated the book to Christopher Bayly and Thomas Philipp, both of whom passed away in 2015, and whose chapters are included in the text.

Since this volume brings together works by historians of the Modern Middle East who celebrate and critique the scholarship and legacy of the Lebanese-British historian Hourani-one of the leading intellectual fathers of their field-Seikaly's contribution is a natural fit. Hanssen and Weiss' volume considers the reach, and limits, of Hourani's seminal book, Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age, 1798-1939, which traces the salient ideas of "Nahda" writers of this period.

The term liberal is deployed throughout the volume. Seikaly, for example, demonstrates that the Palestinian businessmen she researched from British Mandate Palestine "understood themselves as part of a broader Arab project of enlightenment. For them, Arab liberalism was not just a political and cultural project. It also involved envisioning a new rational economic subject" (296). Seikaly provides a portrait of both the Palestinian merchants' resistance and acquiescence to British rule...