Eqbal Ahmad: Confronting Empire

Rating:
Summary: Open your eyes to the reality
Review: "Might is right", or a version in my native language "whoever owns the stick, owns the cow". At the dawn of the 21st century, the world is the same as it was centuries ago. The greed to be powerful is as vicious as ever. Civilization can be so uncivil! Imperialism is as alive as it ever was. Only the mechanics have changed. Eqbal fights back with the weapon of today, powerful argument.

Eqbal Ahmad speaks so factually and clearly that it is hard to defy his argument. In this book, he talks about the imperial designs of those who own the stick. One of the most profound books i've ever read.

A must read for anyone from (or interested in) the Asian Subcontinent as well as the middle east.

Rating:
Summary: A good man, a good book
Review: Confronting Empire is a well-done piece of work. I see a great amount of sympathy on Eqbal's part, and his ideas are life affirming. He discusses Pakistani and Indian poetry as well as geopolitics, and focuses on many areas where conflict is prevalent. Ahmad is asked how he would define his politics. "Socialist and democratic. Those have been my two lasting commitments. By democratic, I mean genuine commitment to equality, freedom of association, critical thought, and the accountability of rulers to citizens. By socialism, I mean control of the wealth by people rather than by the state or by corporations." He holds Edward Said and Antonio Gramsci in high esteem. One of many good things about Ahmad, he is always hopeful.

Rating:
Summary: Simple yet hard-hitting. A must read
Review: I read this book in 3 hours on a long haul flight and then talked my neighbouring passenger into following suit. It's that good.

A stirring page turner with simple unawashed straight-talk about politics, religion, world order, even the vagaries of corporatization. Really, I hesitate to make this into a long intellectual review but you will find themes ranging from the opportunism of Gandhi, to the seeds of discord that US itself sowed in the middle east and south east asia (and what the future holds), to the after-effects of blatant commercialization on our social lives, to.... Wait, what am I doing. There is no way you will regret the 11 dollars that go into this incredibly eye-opening insight, so stop wasting your time reading these reviews and just buy it!

Quite simply as close to an intelligent thriller as a work of non-fiction can come. Required reading.

Rating:
Summary: A must read
Review: It is hard not to like Ahmad as you read these interviews. First, he is a thoughtful critic of international politics and economic systems. He is as tough on the Soviet left as he is on the capitalist right. And in the process he is engaged by such thinkers as Edward Said, Albert Camus and Antonia Gramsci. Like many leftists, however, Ahmad offers more criticism than solutions. He is not as rabidly anti-American as Chomsky, but he does embrace some of the third-world cliches about the West and the US that grow tiresome after a while. I, for one, am not convinced that the rest of the world is trapped in an American economic construct from which there is no possibility of liberation or advancement. The tough work of building a civil society, of opening the doors of debate and freedom, of embracing a reasonable economic policy that allows for some human ingenuity, none of this is prevented by a US power structure. On the contrary, the US generally has only blocked -- on a few occasions -- forays into Stalinist systems hostile to both local and international interests. On the other hand, some of his observations are keen -- his conclusion, for example, that non-violent resistance can only be effective against oppression that is morally founded, such as British colonialism (bringing enlightenment to the rest of the world). It would not work against Stalin or Hitler (or Saddam). He is also a valuable guide through some of the India/Pakistan issues that are confusing to many of us. Like William Appleman Williams, another US critic, Ahmad has some interesting things to say, but they must be weighed against the total evidence of history.

Rating:
Summary: The Eye of the Storm
Review: It is the work of Eqbal Ahmad as a remarkable public intellectual that has earned him a pedestal among the dissidents of our generation. This is the first book-length treatment on the ideas of Eqbal Ahmad as compiled in these masterful interviews by David Barsamian. The subject matters range from a radical analysis of middle east politics, south asian history, Western non-intervention in Bosnia, American complicity in the emergence of the Taliban-disorder, a poignant description of how he met his life-long friend Edward Said, the ideas of Fanon (whom he worked for) to a fascinating historical analysis on the syncretic tradition of Urdu poetics. This book captures Eqbal Ahmad's genius, his charisma, his urbane cosmopolitan wit - in short the "sweetness and light" of Eqbal Ahmad. Highly, highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: Open your eyes to the reality
Review: The late,lamented Eqbal Ahmad was one of the more original thinkres of our time. Friend of the oppressed,opponent of oppresors anywhere left or right, Mr. Ahmad was a clear voice of conscious and sanity in an ever increasingly insane time. The writings,taken from radio interviews on aletrnative radio,are wide ranging{from the Indian subcontinent, to Vietnam, Israel, Bin Ladin, the Cia, Gandhi, sufism.poetry,terrorism,nuclear testing etc.} Mr. Ahmad is so eriudite,so clear in his perceptions devoid of rantings of right or left, that he is, was a cool stream in this desert of factionalism. His perceptions on Jinnah are very interesting, and on Gandhi,well, you have to read them. Or better yet,these tapes are available,and then you get to hear the man speak in his beautiful,lyrical voice. A nice tribute to a seminal thinker of our age.

Rating:
Summary: Eye-opening book, especially in light of current events.
Review: This book is very well written and an easy read (not tedious at all). Barsamian does a great job in his interviews as always (I have his interviews with Chomsky & Zinn). The first interview in this book, done in 1996, accurately predicts Islamic fundamentalism & terrorism working their way across the Middle East and their ability to topple fragile ME gov'ts and fight against the US. Eqbal also pointed out the dangers of the US (Reagan/Bush) helping out the Afghan "freedom fighters" in '81-'88 and the support of the Clinton gov't for the Taliban in order to get a safe oil pipeline.

Eqbal claims that the notion of a Middle East "jihad" was reinvented by the CIA for the Afghani/Russian war to help promote Islam fundamentalists into good little holy warriors against Communism. He claims that the term "jihad" hadn't been used much since 10th C Islam but was revived for that purpose and subsequently handed down after America abruptly pulled out of supporting Afghan & Pakistan after the Cold War. And of course now we have what is called "CIA blowback" with the WTC/Pentagon jet bombings. While I haven't fully investigated his claim on the CIA bringing up the "jihad" to fire up the "holy warriors," a search on the web shows that there are quite a lot of articles on "jihads" post-Afghan war than before (say 1980).

It's a shame that people like Eqbal Ahmad were ignored by Pakistani leaders and Palestinian leaders as well as western leaders. Eqbal was like Cassandra crying out the truth and accurately predicting the future -- but nobody listened.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent, clear-eyed reasoning, and very humane.
Review: This book was written by a man whose greatest committment appears to be NOT to a political party, his own self-interest, or some other more or less selfish and narrow agenda, but rather to seeing clearly, reasoning fairly, and calling a spade a spade. If you want to get the point of view of someone who is as non-brainwashed as possible, look no further. This man, at least, is sane.

It is interesting to note that he is also off the radar screens of the right-wing gang-bangers. Otherwise they would be here saying nothing and pulling the rating down.