Extremism and Orientalism

This book is a collection of thoughts on a region that has long suffered from colonialism, neo-colonialism, authoritarianism, foreign military intervention and regional wars while, at the same time, being a very important region for geopolitical and economic reasons. It is also the birthplace of three important religions and a key region in the development of human civilisation over the past 10,000 or so years. Although often the subject of casual stereotypes, it is a complex region socially, economically, politically and culturally. This book is not an attempt to analyse this complexity. Rather it is a small collection of essays on some important aspects of Middle Eastern politics and on the workings of Orientalism in one Western liberal democracy.