Rating: 
Summary: It is also an excellent history book
Review: Ibn Khaldun was not always remembered as a historian, but anyone who reads Muqaddimah will surely be surprised.I recommend this book for those who are starting to explore the halls of Islamic legacy since it gives a solid foundation on the philosophy of history itself. He will recite numerous historical events around Ifriqiyyah (Northern Africa) and Andalus (Islamic Iberian Peninsula) in the medieval era. What's more is that each event will be given a socio-scientific comments that add up to his unique historical framework. The historical details are termed to be the first with encyclopedia-scope and his approach is considered multi-disciplinary in time where speciality is rare. Buy it and you'll be amazed by how much you didn't know about Ibn Khaldun.
Rating: 
Summary: Guess What?
Review: If you are an economist you should know about Arthur Laffer, who invented the Laffer Curve for taxation. After reading Ibn Khaldun, I found that in fact it was he who came up with theory four centuries before Mr. Laffer. I believe all the economics text book should make necessary changes to acknowledge Ibn Khaldun's work. This book remarkably illustrates the Islamic philosophy behind the State Management and Decision-Making. Ibn Khaldun's original work in over 1200 pages. He has also written the Islamic History which I dont believe is available in English.
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Summary: State Management
Review: If you want to read on the Islam's philosophical stance on state and its management than this is probably the best source. Ibn Khaldun has also written Islamic History, which would be another good thing to read if you like the style of this one. Original Muqaddimah is about 1200 pages long. I would recommend that if the reader is interested in detailed analysis of the human behavior in the state making and its management. Ibn Khaldun also views many historians with a critiques eye, which is an excellant act in itself becasue he shows why some have flaws.
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Summary: One of the foundational and greatest works in world history
Review: It is difficult to avoid overusing superlatives when thinking of or reviewing this work. 'Muqaddimah' means 'introduction'; this was ibn Khaldun's introduction to his volumes of world history. The introduction, however, is what has been entered into the library of the world's greatest written works. By those who read more than western books, he is called the father of sociology (westerners grant Weber that title). In addition to groundbreaking and still-relevant sociological ideas, his muqaddimah is filled with major contributions to political science as well. He includes his thoughts on the supposed 'state of nature' and goes on to describe the workings of civilizations, in Braudel's longue duree view. The book is worth reading for two reasons. First, it is a historical monument -- the birthplace of many important ideas. Second, the ideas are still not common knowledge. His ideas provide a useful and accurate representation of the world, suitable (after adaptation to the time period) to examining Chingis Khan's empire or the position of the United States in global political and economic regime. One caveat: I read the three-volume, unabridged version. This 300 page paperback version comprises only a small fraction of the complete (and compleat) work. Another reviewer mentioned the dated scientific theories in this book. In a three-volume 'introduction' to a seven-volume (if memory serves) 'history of the world', ibn Khaldun covered a wide array of topics, including both the social and the natural sciences. The dated natural science is kept strictly seperate from the more lastingly-relevant social science; this makes it an easy job to seperate the wheat from the chaff. Obviously, I HIGHLY recommend the Muqaddimah to anyone with an interest in political science, anthropology, sociology, or history.
Rating:
Summary: One of the foundational and greatest works in world history
Review: It is difficult to avoid overusing superlatives when thinking of or reviewing this work. 'Muqaddimah' means 'introduction'; this was ibn Khaldun's introduction to his volumes of world history. The introduction, however, is what has been entered into the library of the world's greatest written works. By those who read more than western books, he is called the father of sociology (westerners grant Weber that title). In addition to groundbreaking and still-relevant sociological ideas, his muqaddimah is filled with major contributions to political science as well. He includes his thoughts on the supposed 'state of nature' and goes on to describe the workings of civilizations, in Braudel's longue duree view. The book is worth reading for two reasons. First, it is a historical monument -- the birthplace of many important ideas. Second, the ideas are still not common knowledge. His ideas provide a useful and accurate representation of the world, suitable (after adaptation to the time period) to examining Chingis Khan's empire or the position of the United States in global political and economic regime. One caveat: I read the three-volume, unabridged version. This 300 page paperback version comprises only a small fraction of the complete (and compleat) work. Another reviewer mentioned the dated scientific theories in this book. In a three-volume 'introduction' to a seven-volume (if memory serves) 'history of the world', ibn Khaldun covered a wide array of topics, including both the social and the natural sciences. The dated natural science is kept strictly seperate from the more lastingly-relevant social science; this makes it an easy job to seperate the wheat from the chaff. Obviously, I HIGHLY recommend the Muqaddimah to anyone with an interest in political science, anthropology, sociology, or history.
Rating:
Summary: Can't Blame it all on the Turks
Review: This book is very interesting. An Arabic language instructor at Georgetown University, Mr. Hakim from someplace in Syria, first told me who Ibn Khaldun was, which got me reading this. Written in the 14th Century, it reflects that interesting combination of great learning, mixed with some scientific limitation. For instance, Khaldun says it's a fact that the sun is cooler, the closer you get to it, based on his obsevations that it gets colder the higher up you go in the mountains. He says there's some kind of reflection thing that happens when the sun's rays hit the surface of the Earth, to make heat. He's right, but he's not. This same thing comes thru in Calvin's commentaries on the Bible, in one of which he soberly states the well known fact that vermin spontaneously appear from nothing if you leave a pile of rags in the corner, or that the continents float on the seas. In other topical areas, Khaldun hits more timeless chords. His observations about families rising and falling, and on peoples' need to be led, are very incisive. His writing reflects well on the great learning that once permeated the parts of the world controlled by the Arabic-speaking peoples. In that respect, this book conveys a more positive message than a modern critique of the Arab world, found in a book like "The Closed Circle" by David Pryce-Jones. Khaldun has not much good to say about the Bedouins, which is a cross-current to some of the good things Lawrence of Arabia had to say about them in books like "The Seven Pillars of Wisdom" and "Revolt in the Desert." Because they inhabit flat area, according to Khaldun, they are cowardly nomads who just destroy everything. He says they are inherently inferior to urban people. Arabs of all kinds tend to lament their fall into relative desuetude after the Turkish rise in the 10th century. This is a rare self-analysis by Khaldun, then, inasmuch as he points the finger at some part of Arab society as containing destructive elements. He is also critical of Jews in some ways, but again, so are a lot of writers from this time period, and not only Arabs. So Mr. Hakim recommeds this, and I agree.
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Summary: The father of social sciences...
Review: This is a gem of a book that is not well enough known in the West. It is a brilliant account of the ordinary, things that take place around us that we often take for granted. Ibn Khaldun notices these things and explains them in an organized manner. His theory of 'asabiya' describes the rise and fall of tribes and nations as a very natural process, one that occurs and will occur repeatedly throughout history. His is perhaps the most coherent theory that I know of. It's perhaps a bit simplistic but sometimes Occam's razor, the simplest explanation being the correct one, is true. Many accuse Ibn Khaldun of leaving God out of the picture but, as a devout Muslim, God was the very being of everything he wrote. Just because nations rise and fall in a natural progression doesn't mean that God is not a part of the picture. God has given us free will and allows the world to operate on this free will, one side effect on a collective scale being the rise and fall of nations. This notion underpins his work. He also catelogues in great detail all kinds of events, both natural and human, in a very interesting fashion. It is a treasure trove of a book, one that you can revisit in bits and pieces and always come away with a feeling of having learned something you already knew. This book needs more recognition as it has influenced far more people than may be realized. The kicker is that this book was written over 600 years ago, long before the notion of 'science' as we know it today as an independent and 'objective' approach to the study of reality really existed.
Rating:
Summary: Dated in ways, but nonetheless carries some core truths
Review: You can chisel out the sections on temperature and race, temperature and behavior, for these are silly and offensive. He compares Sub-Saharan Africans as just a hair above dumb animals, and he slams Arabs and Bedouin in other ways. However, his sections on economics and social politics are still valid, and he was a pioneer in areas that other Westerners tend to get credit for. Before Adam Smith outlined the need for "Specialized labor" in a commercial society, there was Ibn Khaldun. Khaldun wrote of the pivotal role of "crafts" and specialization of crafts in a functioning human society. He even suggests that skills in crafts are limited, that is, if you're a master shoe-maker you in all likelihood won't be a master farmer. Therefore, master shoe-makers should make as many shoes as they can and farmers should farm as they can, so as to produce as many goods between the two of them than if they shared their time doing both. Before there was Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig Von Mises, Ibn Khaldun implied the need for Rule of Law. Khaldun chastized the Bedouin who disrupted the social order through their raids, and sent the craftsmen packing. Some sort of consistent legal standard and social order is needed to ensure that specialized labor has the ability to perform its "crafts". Before there was Reaganomics and Arthur Laffer, there was Ibn Khaldun. You want more tax revenue? Cut taxes, which provides incentive for people to work harder and expand their enterprises. More business, more economic growth, more tax revenue. High taxes deter enterprise and shrinks tax revenue. Arthur Laffer? Yes, but Ibn Khaldun 300+ years earlier. The issue Khaldun is most known for is "squadness", Group Feeling, Group Narcissism, Tribalism, whatever you wish to call it. Governments and regimes come and go based on the strength of the leaders to appeal to group cohesion. This could be religious, blood, nationalist, whatever, but regimes need ideological cohesion in order to survive. Once that group feeling is lost, the regime becomes weak and conquerable if not self destructive. Multiculturalism and Postmodernism would be signs of cultural disorder and eventual social crumbling to Ibn Khaldun. Crane Brinton, Erich Fromm, Erik Hoffer all touched on the "Group Feeling" themes in their own works, in different ways and emphases, and in many ways did it better (they had more historical examples to pull from, since history has dramatically accelerated since Khaldun's time), nonetheless, Khaldun was the one who first articulated this concept of political and social (dis)order.
Rating:
Summary: Dated in ways, but nonetheless carries some core truths
Review: You can chisel out the sections on temperature and race, temperature and behavior, for these are silly and offensive. He compares Sub-Saharan Africans as just a hair above dumb animals, and he slams Arabs and Bedouin in other ways. However, his sections on economics and social politics are still valid, and he was a pioneer in areas that other Westerners tend to get credit for. Before Adam Smith outlined the need for "Specialized labor" in a commercial society, there was Ibn Khaldun. Khaldun wrote of the pivotal role of "crafts" and specialization of crafts in a functioning human society. He even suggests that skills in crafts are limited, that is, if you're a master shoe-maker you in all likelihood won't be a master farmer. Therefore, master shoe-makers should make as many shoes as they can and farmers should farm as they can, so as to produce as many goods between the two of them than if they shared their time doing both. Before there was Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig Von Mises, Ibn Khaldun implied the need for Rule of Law. Khaldun chastized the Bedouin who disrupted the social order through their raids, and sent the craftsmen packing. Some sort of consistent legal standard and social order is needed to ensure that specialized labor has the ability to perform its "crafts". Before there was Reaganomics and Arthur Laffer, there was Ibn Khaldun. You want more tax revenue? Cut taxes, which provides incentive for people to work harder and expand their enterprises. More business, more economic growth, more tax revenue. High taxes deter enterprise and shrinks tax revenue. Arthur Laffer? Yes, but Ibn Khaldun 300+ years earlier. The issue Khaldun is most known for is "squadness", Group Feeling, Group Narcissism, Tribalism, whatever you wish to call it. Governments and regimes come and go based on the strength of the leaders to appeal to group cohesion. This could be religious, blood, nationalist, whatever, but regimes need ideological cohesion in order to survive. Once that group feeling is lost, the regime becomes weak and conquerable if not self destructive. Multiculturalism and Postmodernism would be signs of cultural disorder and eventual social crumbling to Ibn Khaldun. Crane Brinton, Erich Fromm, Erik Hoffer all touched on the "Group Feeling" themes in their own works, in different ways and emphases, and in many ways did it better (they had more historical examples to pull from, since history has dramatically accelerated since Khaldun's time), nonetheless, Khaldun was the one who first articulated this concept of political and social (dis)order.
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