Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Collection
Publication
W. W. Norton & Company (2007), Edition: Reprint, 320 pages
Description
Considers the ways in which struggles between the Shia and Sunni in the Middle East will affect the region's future, offering insight into the power conflicts between Iran and Saudi Arabia for political and spiritual leadership of the Muslim world.
User reviews
LibraryThing member ablueidol
Conflict and instability in Iraq have shaken the delicate balance of power between Sunni and Shia throughout the wider region. In Shia Revival, Professor Nasr’s account begins with a cogent, engrossing introduction to the history and theology of Shia Islam, encapsulating the intellectual and
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political trends that have shaped the faith and its relations with the dominant Sunni strain. He argues that the Shia Crescent—stretching from Lebanon and Syria through the Gulf to Iraq and Iran, finally terminating in Pakistan and India—is gathering strength in the aftermath of Saddam's fall. This wave of Shia strength is cementing linkages that transcend political and linguistic borders and could lead to a new map of the Middle East. Show Less
LibraryThing member PointedPundit
Every once in a while an author writes a book that challenges the foundation of all of one’s thinking.
Vali Nasr is such an author. “The Shia Revival” is such a book. Reading it will leave you questioning the value taxpayers have reaped from the billions invested in diplomacy and intelligence.
Nasr, a professor at the Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey, CA argues convincingly that Saddam Hussein’s removal from power in Iraq has changed the Mid-east, but in ways never conceived by President Bush and his neo-con advisors. By removing Iraq’s Sunni dominated dictatorship, he argues, and replacing it with the Shiite majority, the United States has destroyed the buffer that has held the Shia in Iran in check.
This will play out, he argues, with increasing confrontations between Sunnis and Shiites throughout the region starting in Iraq and then spreading from Lebanon, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
This divide will have serious consequences for United States’ foreign policy. By creating the first Shiite-led state in the Arab world since the rise of Islam, we have ignited hopes among the region’s 150 million Shiites. Yet, our policy still operates under the old assumptions of Sunni dominance.
It never fails that actions often lead to unintended consequences. In this case, however, Nasr clearly lays out a case that there will be no quick fixes.
This is a book you owe it to yourself to read. Individuals who can look at the same set of facts and come up with a unique insight and analysis of them are to be celebrated.
Too bad no one in the diplomatic and intelligence bureaucracy had heard of him before 2001.
Penned by the Pointed Pundit
August 5, 2006, 10:12:35 AM
Vali Nasr is such an author. “The Shia Revival” is such a book. Reading it will leave you questioning the value taxpayers have reaped from the billions invested in diplomacy and intelligence.
Show More
His thesis is clear and obvious; yet, it pales one’s imagination that it never exposed before this.Nasr, a professor at the Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey, CA argues convincingly that Saddam Hussein’s removal from power in Iraq has changed the Mid-east, but in ways never conceived by President Bush and his neo-con advisors. By removing Iraq’s Sunni dominated dictatorship, he argues, and replacing it with the Shiite majority, the United States has destroyed the buffer that has held the Shia in Iran in check.
This will play out, he argues, with increasing confrontations between Sunnis and Shiites throughout the region starting in Iraq and then spreading from Lebanon, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia.
This divide will have serious consequences for United States’ foreign policy. By creating the first Shiite-led state in the Arab world since the rise of Islam, we have ignited hopes among the region’s 150 million Shiites. Yet, our policy still operates under the old assumptions of Sunni dominance.
It never fails that actions often lead to unintended consequences. In this case, however, Nasr clearly lays out a case that there will be no quick fixes.
This is a book you owe it to yourself to read. Individuals who can look at the same set of facts and come up with a unique insight and analysis of them are to be celebrated.
Too bad no one in the diplomatic and intelligence bureaucracy had heard of him before 2001.
Penned by the Pointed Pundit
August 5, 2006, 10:12:35 AM
Show Less
LibraryThing member bluebyrd
A must read book for those interested in understanding more about the conflicts in the Middle East, including the Iraq War, and politics in Muslim countries. Nasr provides an succinct yet nuanced analysis of the differences between Shi'ism and Sunnism and how conflicts between these two Muslim
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groups have affected politics in the past. In addition, he explains how the rise of a Shia ruling majority in Iraq will likely produce conflict and controversy in other Muslim countries. Show Less
LibraryThing member jaygheiser
Interesting start, but petered off
LibraryThing member hhornblower
I bit dated at this point, but still a highly readable basic background of the conflicts between Shia and Sunni branches of Islam. I hadn't realized the level of enmity between the two branches and Vali Nasr's suggestions on how to frame US policy towards the region are interesting. Perhaps it is
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due to my being raised with Western media, but I left with the impression that Mr. Nasr was a bit to optimistic concerning the rise of the Shia following decades of Sunni oppression. I don't think the region would transform to the model of peace and prosperity if the Shia were allowed escape the domineering Sunni. Show Less
Subjects
Language
Original language
English
Original publication date
2006-08-05
Physical description
320 p.; 5.6 inches
ISBN
0393329682 / 9780393329681
Local notes
DS Gift of Don Simpson.