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From two seasoned strategic advisers, a withering critique of the West's chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, looking to the future in that country and beyond

A lavishly illustrated history of diplomatic gifts, from the infamous Trojan Horse to the much-loved Christmas tree at Trafalgar Square.

At a time when policies are increasingly against it, international migration has become the subject of great public and academic attention. This book departs from the dominant approach of studying international migration at macro level, and from the perspective of destination countries. The contributors here seek to do more than ''scratch the surface'' of the migration process, by foregrounding the voices and views of Ethiopian youth--potential migrants and returnees--and of their sending communities.The volume focuses on the perspective and agency of these young people, both potential migrants and returnees, to better understand migration decision-making, experiences and outcomes. It brings together rarely documented cases of young men and women from several communities across Ethiopia, migrating to the Gulf and South Africa. Explaining the agency of local actors--prospective migrants, brokers and sending families--Youth on the Move illuminates the pervasive, persistent failure of state attempts to regulate migration. Moreover, it examines the financing of migration and the sharing of remittances, within a culturally situated moral economy. While accounts centred on economics and political violence are important, the contributors demonstrate compellingly that these factors alone cannot provide a full understanding of migration''s complexity, nor of its social realities.

As Critical Muslim celebrates ten years of insight and thought, the theme of biography fittingly challenges its readers: to reflect on our past, our memories and our stories, and to look ahead towards what we may leave behind for the stories yet to be told. Stories have always been an essential aspect of human societyΓÇô from the cave paintings in Sulawesi, dating back over 43,000 years, and oral tales conveyed from bard to audience, to the written word, and now the projected image, on screens large and small. As memory and history become increasingly important for a deeper understanding of the present and our emerging futures, this issue explores how biography allows for something more personalΓÇôfor the myths and fables of childhood to come to lifeΓÇôand offers snapshots of history to be opened up. We explore a rich historical tradition of biography in Islamic societies, and explore the ways biographies have influenced Muslim thought and culture. Through biography, we can learn much about ourselves, by stepping out of our own worlds and taking on the lives of others.

The entwined histories of Blacks and Indians defy easy explanation. From Black Lives Matter protests against Gandhi statues to Kamala Harris''s historic election, this relationship--notwithstanding moments of common struggle--seethes with conflicts that reveal important lessons about race in the modern world. Shobana Shankar''s groundbreaking intellectual history tackles the controversial question of how Africans and Indians see their differences. Drawing on archival and oral sources from seven countries, she traces how economic tensions surrounding the Indian diaspora in East and Southern Africa collided with the twentieth century''s widening Indian networks in West Africa and the Black Atlantic. Decolonisation brought a reckoning with Euro-American racial hierarchies, as well as discord over caste, religion, sex and skin colour, simmering beneath the rhetoric of Afro-Indian solidarity. This book illuminates how postcolonial peoples remade race by reinvigorating cultural movements, from Pan-Africanism to popular devotionalism, in Africa, India and the United States. This new race consciousness was meant as a redemption from the moral dangers of economic rivalry. Yet rising wealth and nationalist amnesia now threaten this postcolonial ethos. Calls to dismantle statues, from Accra to Washington DC, are not merely symbolic. They seek to preserve dissenting histories, and the possibility of alternative futures.

It is a tragedy that we only appreciate what has already been lostΓÇöthis is where the concept of a ΓÇÿworld orderΓÇÖ first arises in historical memory. The ordering of the world has been a notion observed by historians and thinkers throughout the ages and around the globe. Rises and falls have provided incentives for the categorisation of civilisations, and other forms of global ordering. The WestΓÇÖs control of history, its power over the present, and its attempts to colonise the future are coming to an end, and a new narrative is about to emerge. Amidst environmental apocalypse, the end of Western dominance and unbridled technological advancement, this issue of Critical Muslim analyses the terms of world order, exposing its problems and limitations, and asks what will define it next, as the world begs for something truly new.About Critical Muslim: A quarterly publication of ideas and issues showcasing groundbreaking thinking on Islam and what it means to be a Muslim in a rapidly changing, interconnected world. Each edition centers on a discrete theme, and contributions include reportage, academic analysis, cultural commentary, photography, poetry, and book reviews.

This book traces three decades of securitisation in Angola. As a governing strategy during war and peacetime, it muted the aspirations of those on opposing sides, distorted the state, emboldened elites and redefined the identity of Angolans. Through this lens, Paula Cristina Roque provides an original account of Angola''s post-conflict state-building.Securitisation protected the interests of President dos Santos, the ruling MPLA party and the elites supporting the regime. Angola''s array of security forces and infrastructure provided an alternative to a fully functioning executive, at national, provincial and local levels. The intrusive way in which any form of dissent or activism was crushed allowed the presidency to control the direction and narrative of the post-war years. But the facade of democracy, development and stability hid a very different reality for the majority of Angolans, who remained poor, disenfranchised and marginalised.Roque explores the inner workings of the intelligence services, army and presidential guard, explaining the trajectory of a survivalist and fearful regime presiding over scarcities and injustices. She shows that the survival of national security and governing elites was the highest priority. The ''shadows'' held far more power than institutions, and weakened them-widening the gap between government and governed.

What does liberal order actually amount to outside the West, where it has been most institutionalised? Contrary to the Atlantic or Pacific, liberal hegemony is thin in the Indian Ocean World; there are no equivalents of NATO, the EU or the US-Japan defence relationship.Yet what this book calls the ΓÇÿGlobal Indian OceanΓÇÖ was the beating heart of earlier epochs of globalisation, where experiments in international order, market integration and cosmopolitanisms were pioneered. Moreover, it is in this macro-region that todayΓÇÖs challenges will face their defining hour: climate change, pandemics, and the geopolitical contest pitting China and Pakistan against the USA and India. The Global Indian Ocean states represent the greatest range of political systems and ideologies in any region, from Hindu-nationalist India and nascent democracy in Indonesia and South Africa, to the GulfΓÇÖs mixture of tribal monarchy and high modernism.These essays by leading scholars examine key aspects of political order, and their roots in the colonial and pre-colonial past, through the lenses of state-building, nationalism, international security, religious identity and economic development. The emergent lessons are of great importance for the world, as the ΓÇÿglobalΓÇÖ liberal order fades and new alternatives struggle to be born.

This is the first in-depth, English-language history of modern Serbia in nearly half a century. It covers the period from the Serbian state’s revolutionary rebirth in the early nineteenth century, under the rebel leaders Karađorđe Petrović and Miloš Obrenović; its turbulent history of wars, uprisings and dynastic rivalries; the triumph of Yugoslav unification in 1918; and the catastrophe of occupation by Nazi Germany in 1941. It shows how the birth of the modern nation-state involved the creation of a new elite–dynasty, army and bureaucracy–whose rule over the peasantry generated a popular resistance that would ultimately take form in Nikola Pašić’s mighty People’s Radical Party. The resulting struggle between elitist Westernisers and pro- Russian populists became entwined with the struggle for pan-Serb and Yugoslav liberation and unification. These causes came together with the Sarajevo assassination of 1914, which triggered the First World War.Existing histories of the Yugoslav kingdom that emerged from that war focus on the national conflict between Serbs, Croats, Bosnian Muslims and others, but Marko Attila Hoare challenges this narrative. He shows how the new kingdom’s politics continued to be dominated by the ongoing internal Serbian power struggle, bringing renewed disaster to Yugoslavia and its peoples.

A scintillating history of one of EuropeΓÇÖs most alluring cities. Granada is a deceptive city, concealing a layered past and a complex character. The last Muslim capital in Western Europe, over the centuries it has captured hearts and imaginations, inspiring countless myths and legends. Yet its history reveals even more fascinating tales: secrets and follies, victory and failure, poetry and art. City of Illusions brings together GranadaΓÇÖs many storiesΓÇöthe archaeological forger, the renegade French general, the garrotted liberal heroine, the Jewish poet who served two Muslim rulers. This colourful cast of characters takes us from the founding eleventh-century dynasty and the building of the Alhambra, through the Reconquista, French occupation and Spanish Civil War, right up to the present day. GranadaΓÇÖs history has long been fought over, rewritten, idealised or buried. This rich, elegant book sets the record straight on a beautiful, elusive city, with all its quirks, mysteries, intrigues and triumphs.

The Sahel is the borderland of 3 million square kilometres between the Sahara Desert and the African savannah and forest lands further south. Much of this huge area is inhospitable. Insurgencies are common, as are migration and smuggling, jobs being as rare here as effective government intervention–state power extends only fitfully, and the region resists attempts to subdue militants, people-traffickers, nomadic herders or anyone excluded from power.The Western Sahel’s fragile states face growing popular discontent, complicated by both climate change and military intervention by France and other powers. Mali is the epicentre of the Sahel crisis: Morten Bøås charts the history of Mali and its fragile neighbours, identifying their current frailty as unsettled states, without legitimate social contracts or political consensus. This in turn has generated competing identities and economic interests, which spill over into resource conflicts over grazing, water, mineral reserves or smuggling routes. Such local contests have been manipulated by elites intent on their own preservation, and appropriated by jihadi insurgents eager to integrate into local communities.What will happen if all the ingredients of this perfect storm coalesce? What are the ramifications for the Sahel, its neighbours, Europe and the wider world?

Narendra Modi has been a hundred years in the making, and this book provides the backstory. It begins with the creation of Hindu nationalism, moves on to the 1980 formation of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and ends with its first national administration, from 1998 to 2004. By revisiting these events, we can trace the Modi governmentΓÇÖs current dominance of Indian politics all the way back to its origins.Vinay Sitapati follows this journey through the entangled lives of the partyΓÇÖs founding fathers: Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Lal Krishna Advani. Over their six-decade-long relationship, Vajpayee and Advani worked as a team, despite differences in personality and beliefs. Bound together by RSS discipline and shared ambitionΓÇôfor a Hinduised Indian polityΓÇô their partnership explains the nature of the BJP before Modi, and why it won power.In supporting roles are a colourful cast of characters, from the wardenΓÇÖs wife who made room for Vajpayee in her family to the billionaire grandson of PakistanΓÇÖs founder, who happened to be a major early BJP benefactor. Based on private papers, party documents, newspapers and over 200 interviews, this is a must-read for all those interested in the Hindu nationalist ideology that now rules India.

During the June 2020 territorial dispute over Kalapani, India blamed tensions on a newly assertive NepalΓÇÖs deepening relations with China. But beyond the accusations and grandstanding, this reflects a new reality: the power equations in South Asia have been redrawn, to make space for China.Nepal did not turn northwards overnight. Its ties with China have deep historical roots built on Buddhism, dating to the early first millennium. While IndiaΓÇÖs unofficial 2015 blockade provided momentum to the rift with Delhi, Nepal has long wanted deeper ties with Beijing, to counteract IndiaΓÇÖs oppressive intimacy. With ChinaΓÇÖs growing South Asian and global ambitions, Nepal now has a new primary bilateral partnerΓÇôand Nepalis are forging a path towards modernity with its help, both in the remote borderlands and in the cities.All Roads Lead North offers a long view of NepalΓÇÖs foreign relations, today underpinned by ChinaΓÇÖs world-power status. Sharing never- before-told stories about Tibetan guerrilla fighters, failed coup leaders and trans- Himalayan traders, Nepal analyst Amish Raj Mulmi examines the histories binding mountain communities together across the Sino-Nepali border. Part history, part journalistic account, MulmiΓÇÖs is a complex, compelling and rigorously researched study of a small country caught between two neighbourhood giants.

Winner of the 2022 Shaughnessy Cohen Prize for Political WritingAs the world''s second-largest economy, China is extending its influence across the globe with the complicity of democratic nations.Joanna Chiu has spent a decade tracking China''s propulsive rise, from the political aspects of the multi-billion-dollar "New Silk Road" global investment project to a growing sway on foreign countries and multilateral institutions through "United Front" efforts.For too long, Western societies have mishandled or simply ignored Beijing''s actions out of narrow self-interest. Decades of willful misinterpretation have over time become complicity in the toxic diplomacy, human rights abuses and foreign interference seen from China today, Chiu argues.Engaging chapters transport readers to a frozen lake in Russia, protests in Hong Kong, underground churches in Beijing, and exile Uyghur communities in Turkey, exposing Beijing''s high-tech surveillance and aggressive measures resulting in human rights violations against those who challenge its power.The new world disorder documented in China Unbound lays out the disturbing implications for global stability, prosperity, and civil rights everywhere.

Religion is often seen as a conservative force in contemporary Africa. In particular, Christian beliefs and actors are usually depicted as driving the opposition to homosexuality and LGBTI rights in African societies. This book nuances that picture, by drawing attention to discourses emerging in Africa itself that engage with religion, specifically Christianity, in progressive and innovative ways--in support of sexual diversity and the quest for justice for LGBTI people. The authors show not only that African Christian traditions harbour strong potential for countering conservative anti-LGBTI dynamics; but also that this potential has already begun to be realised, by various thinkers, activists and movements across the continent. Their ten case studies document how leading African writers are reimagining Christian thought; how several Christian-inspired groups are transforming religious practice; and how African cultural production creatively appropriates Christian beliefs and symbols. In short, the book explores Christianity as a major resource for a liberating imagination and politics of sexuality and social justice in Africa today. Foregrounding African agency and progressive religious thought, this highly original intervention counterbalances our knowledge of secular approaches to LGBTI rights in Africa, and powerfully decolonises queer theory, theology and politics.

This book may offer a cautionary tale in the age of Covid-19. The narratives we shape around disease in society are so often about politics, and the competing versions of leprosy eradication''s story are no exception.In one telling, the extra-budgetary funding for anti-leprosy work came with unwarranted interference in the WHO programme, resulting in an over-hasty, acrimonious and ultimately unsuccessful elimination campaign. In another interpretation, a great work of twentieth-century disease control was accomplished, through extraordinary philanthropy, visionary courageousness, and wily and pragmatic diplomacy. In yet another, experienced, self-sacrificing anti-leprosy experts refused to abdicate their professional responsibilities to populist campaigns more concerned with statistics than people, which were risking patients'' health with under-trialled drug therapies and irresponsibly entrusting medication to patients without supervision.None of these bureaucratic, triumphalist or elitist narratives exists independently of the others. None is without credit, and none is to the complete credit of all involved. These competing stories offer uncanny resonances in the ongoing politics of public health, which have only intensified since both the emergence of M. Leprae millennia ago, and the concerted campaign against it in the last seventy years. What could the ''stories of leprosy'' tell us about our pandemic response?

If not for the famous Indian mutiny-rebellion of 1857, the Santal ''Hul'' (rebellion) of 1855 would today be remembered as the most serious uprising that the East India Company ever faced. Instead, this rebellion-to which 10 per cent of the Bengal Army''s infantry was committed and in which at least 10,000 Santals died-has been forgotten. While its memory lived among Santals, British officers published little about it, and most of the sepoys involved died in 1857. In the words of one British officer, the Hul was ''not war ... but execution'', and perhaps thus was dismissed as unworthy of attention by military historians.Drawing for the first time on the Bengal officers'' voluminous reports on its suppression, Peter Stanley has produced the first comprehensive interpretation of the Hul, investigating why it occurred, how it was fought and why it ended as it did. Despite the Bengal Army virtually inventing counterinsurgency operations in the field (and the Santals improvising their first war), the Hul came to an end amid starvation and disease. But between its bloody outbreak, its protracted suppression and its far-reaching effects, Stanley demonstrates that the Hul was more than just ''execution''-it was indeed a war.

In the summer of 2020, China and India came near to war. The nuclear-armed adversaries both massed troops and equipment along their disputed border in eastern Ladakh. The two sides slugged it out with fists, stones and clubs, next to a fast-flowing Himalayan stream, resulting in dozens of deaths and injuries, many from hypothermia.The entire 4,000-kilometre Sino-Indian boundary is disputed. In 1962, the two countries fought a short and vicious war that went badly for India, and from which Nehru never recovered. The border, called the Line of Actual Control, is not marked on any map agreed upon by the two sides; it runs through the largely unpopulated and inhospitable high mountains of the Himalayas. From the 1990s, as Beijing and New Delhi sought to resolve their seemingly intractable border dispute, an elaborate system of agreements kept the situation akin to a kettle on a slow boil.But the kettle is now boiling over. The two rising Asian giants, both led by strongly nationalistic regimes, neither of which wishes to blink first, are seeking geopolitical and strategic advantage. This timely book explains what is happening on ΓÇÿthe roof of the worldΓÇÖ; and why that matters for us all.

Hints on the Art and Science of Government was the first treatise on statecraft produced in modern India. It consists of lectures that Raja Sir T. Madhava Rao delivered in 1881 to Sayaji Rao Gaekwad III, the young Maharaja of Baroda. Universally considered the foremost Indian statesman of the nineteenth century, Madhava Rao had served as dewan (or prime minister) in the native states of Travancore, Indore and Baroda. Under his command, Travancore and Baroda came to be seen as ''model states'', whose progress demonstrated that Indians were capable of governing well.Rao''s lectures summarise the fundamental principles underlying his unprecedented success. He explains how and why a Maharaja ought to marry the classical Indian ideal of raj dharma, which enjoins rulers to govern dutifully, with the modern English ideal of limited sovereignty. This makes Hints an exceptionally important text: it shows how, outside the confines of British India, Indians consciously and creatively sought to revise and adapt ideals in the interests of progress.This landmark edition contains both the newly rediscovered, original lecture manuscripts; and an authoritative introduction, outlining Rao''s remarkable career, his complicated relationship with Sayaji Rao III, and the reasons why his lectures have been neglected-until now.

An incisive history revealing BritainΓÇÖs conquest of the Kingdom of Benin and the plunder of its fabled Bronzes. The Benin Bronzes are among the British MuseumΓÇÖs most prized possessions. Celebrated for their great beauty, they embody the history, myth and artistry of the ancient Kingdom of Benin, once West AfricaΓÇÖs most powerful, and today part of Nigeria. But despite the BronzesΓÇÖ renown, little has been written about the brutal imperial violence with which they were plundered. Paddy DochertyΓÇÖs searing new history tells that story: the 1897 British invasion of Benin. Armed with shocking details discovered in the archives, Blood and Bronze sets this assault in its late Victorian context. As British power faced new commercial and strategic pressures elsewhere, it ruthlessly expanded in West Africa. Revealing both the extent of African resistance and previously concealed British outrages, this is a definitive account of the destruction of Benin. Laying bare the EmpireΓÇÖs true motives and violent means, including the official coverup of grotesque sexual crimes, Docherty demolishes any moral argument for Britain retaining the Bronzes, making a passionate case for their immediate repatriation to Nigeria.

The Indian sage Ramana Maharshi (1879- 1950) is perhaps the most widely known Indian spiritual figure of the last century, second only to Gandhi. This new book offers a fresh introduction to the MaharshiΓÇÖs life and teachings, intending to situate him within the non-dualistic traditions of Hinduism. It also delves into themes and questions particularly relevant to the spiritual crisis and search for meaning that have characterised, in various ways, both the modern and postmodern outlooks.While the MaharshiΓÇÖs background and frames of reference were traditional, the spiritual resonance of his teachings in todayΓÇÖs world must also be recognised. The sageΓÇÖs message lies at the intersection of the contemporary search for Self-knowledge, and todayΓÇÖs critical reflections on the foundations and limits of religion. Thus, the book comprises seven chapters that touch upon such central issues as the role of religion in Self-inquiry; the relationship between devotion and knowledge; the role and limitations of traditional forms; and the implications in our postmodern era of both the MaharshiΓÇÖs emphasis on surrender, and his basic question: ΓÇÿWho am I?ΓÇÖPublished in collaboration withGEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY Center for International and Regional Studies, School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

Though the Arab Spring has reverberated through the Middle East, largely leaving a path of destruction, the relative calm in the United Arab Emirates has offered a regional roadmap for stability. Domestic changes since 2000 have significantly altered the country''s dynamics, firmly cementing power within Abu Dhabi. While Khalifa bin Zayed succeeded his father as emir of Abu Dhabi and UAE president in 2004, the Emirates'' evolution has largely been accredited to Abu Dhabi''s crown prince, Mohammed bin Zayed. His reign has been characterised by the rise of the security apparatus and a micromanaged approach to governance.Mohammed bin Zayed''s strategy of fortification has focused on pre-empting threats from the UAE''s native population, rather than from expatriates or foreign actors. As a result, he has consolidated power, distributing its administration among his tribal and kinship allies. In essence, Mohammed bin Zayed has driven modernisation in order to strengthen his grasp on power.This book explores Mohammed bin Zayed''s regime security strategy, illustrating the network of alliances that seek to support his reign and that of his family. In an ever-turbulent region, the UAE remains critical to understanding the evolution of Middle Eastern authoritarian control.

The Nature of Tyranny was written and published at the dawn of the twentieth century by Abdul Rahman Al-Kawakibi, one of the pioneering thinkers of the Arab world. More than a century later, another Arab awakening exploded, led by a new generation of youth who chanted Al-Kawakibi''s words in revolutionary cries from Aleppo, his hometown, to Cairo''s Tahrir Square.Today this seminal text appears in English for the first time, with a foreword from Leon T. Goldsmith offering an overview of Al-Kawakibi''s intellectual contributions. The first chapter of the text provides a definition of tyranny, presenting it as akin to a sickness or malaise that seeps into all classes of society, leaving behind decay. The following seven chapters apply this conception of tyranny to what Al-Kawakibi sees as society''s crucial elements: religion, knowledge, honour, economy, ethics and progress. Having laid a theoretical framework for understanding the centrality of tyranny, its characteristics and its devastating effects, Al-Kawakibi concludes by setting forth a brief programme for remedying the ''disease'' of tyranny. The final chapter outlines another book in which he had planned to elaborate upon his ideas-but, ultimately, his fate arrived too soon.

We no longer inhabit a world governed by international coordination, a unified NATO bloc, or an American hegemon. Traditionally, the decline of one empire leads to a restoration in the balance of power, via a struggle among rival systems of order. Yet this dynamic is surprisingly absent today; instead, the superpowers have all, at times, sought to promote what Jason Pack terms the ''Enduring Disorder''.He contends that Libya''s ongoing conflict--more so than the civil wars in Yemen, Syria, Venezuela or Ukraine--constitutes the ideal microcosm in which to identify the salient features of this new era of geopolitics. The country''s post-Qadhafi trajectory has been moulded by the stark absence of coherent international diplomacy; while Libya''s incremental implosion has precipitated cross-border contagion, further corroding global institutions and international partnership.Pack draws on over two decades of research in and on Libya and Syria to highlight the Kafkaesque aspects of today''s global affairs. He shows how even the threats posed by the Arab Spring, and the Benghazi assassination of US Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, couldn''t occasion a unified Western response. Rather, they have further undercut global collaboration, demonstrating the self-reinforcing nature of the progressively collapsing world order.

Foreword by Bruce Riedel

In this volume, Michael Llewellyn-Smith sets the Greek occupation of Smyrna and the war in Anatolia against the background of Greece's 'Great Idea' and of great power rivalries in the Near East.

Seventy years on, the Partition of India fades from memory. Can it be restored?

A deeply personal tale of young life in a superpower haunted by its past.