View source for Understanding Arab Protest Movements

The title is an article by Edmund Burke<ref>Edmund Burke ill is Professor of History, University of California, Santa Cruz. An earlier version of this article was presented to the conference on Islamic fundamentalist movements, Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies, University of Exeter, September 1984.  It has also appeared in the Maghreb Review  11,  no.  1   (1986):  27-32.</ref> published in “Arab  Studies  Quarterly”,   Vol.  8,  No.  4 (Fall   1986),   pp.  333-345. The following is the article.<ref>http://www.jstor.org/stable/41857851</ref>

==The textual approach  to protest movements==

The role of Islam in Middle Eastern politics has received a lot of recent scholarly attention.  Nevertheless, much remains to be done. In particular, the connections between  the social history  of the Middle  East and its cultural  history  need to be more fully integrated.  The study of social movements  is an especially  promising area to trace out the connections between economic and political forces and popular culture,  because  it necessarily  involves  the study  of both.  Indeed,  I would  contend  that  the  study  of social  movements,   because  it  focuses  attention  on  the historical  praxis of protest and not just on its ideology,  has the potential  radically to subvert  the dominant  Orientalist  interpretative framework of the relationship between  politics  and religion  in the Middle  East.  This  article,  which  is derived from  ongoing  research  into the comparative history of collective  action  in the Arab world between  1750 and  1950,  outlines  an approach  to the study of social movements.  It makes no claims  to being exhaustive  in its treatment. While  the empirical  data  upon which  this  study  is based  is restricted to the  Arab  world, its findings  may be of interest  to  students  of other  parts  of the  Middle  East.
Whether  inscribed  in the fiqh of the 'ulama', or the learned  writings  of European  Orientalists, the dominant  views  about  the  role  of religion  in the politics of the Arab world derive from a profoundly textual approach  to culture and human behavior. In both, authoritative texts shape an understanding  of how things happen, and ultimately  even of how history  is written.  In both the classical  theory  of the Islamic state and in European  scholarship,  the role of religion  in politics  is held to be primordial.  In both,  despite certain  divergences among  individual  authors, Islam is presented  as the social cement  which keeps society  together. Moreover, both  agree  that  encoded  in Islamic  doctrine  is the  form  of the  state.

For  Muslims  this is generally  presented  as follows.  Both  Sunnis  and  Shiites look to the origins of Islam, especially  the early Islamic ummah  which flourished at Medina  in the lifetime  of the Prophet  and the reign  of the first four Rashidun caliphs  which  followed,  as establishing  the normative basis  of Islamic  govern ment. In particular,  the Rashidun model of government for Sunnis and the imama te for Shiites took on special status as models for the governance of Muslim societies. This  doctrine   of the  state  is enshrined  in such classics  as  al-Mawardi's  theory of the caliphate. 1     According  to this theory,  all Muslim  societies  require  an amir or imam to keep them on the straight path; and it is better  that there be an amir, even a corrupt  one, than no amir at all.  Despite the emergence of minority  views (especially  after  1500),  most  scholars  continued  to hold  that rebellion  was not sanctioned  within  the  tradition.

Western   scholars  have  tended  to echo  this consensus. 2  They  have  tended  to see social quietism  and the support  of existing governments (and more  generally of traditional  values)  as all flowing  from this theory.  The  result,  they claim,  is a discourse which  is impermeable to outside  influences,   and which  drastically restricts  the  range  of potential  discussion  about politics.  The  doctrinal  basis  of "Oriental despotism"  is thus well grounded  in theories  of the Islamic  state.  The major Westem interpretations of the relations between  religion,  power, and the state  in Islamic  societies  conceive  of Muslim  societies  as dominated   by rulers and bureaucracies that, theoretically at least, deploy power  on a vast scale. The followers  of both  Max  Weber  (for  whom  Islamic  states  are  almost pure  types of patrimonialism) and Karl  Marx  (for whom Islamic  societies  are examples  of the Asiatic mode of production) employ essentially this model.  Only the segmentation of society  into smaller  self-contained units (tribes,  clans,  guilds,  turuq for Weberians, villages  for Marxists)  prevents the domination  of the state from being absolute.  The   image   of the  mosaic  has  often  been  invoked   to  explain   the peculiarities of Middle  Eastern societies.  Because  the theory  is an equilibrium model,  questions  of legitimacy  are irrelevant, and real change  is impossible. According  to this theory,  elites  in the Middle East are small,3  politics  is a game,4 and manipulation and  corruption are central  features  of the political  system.  In such a social  landscape, by definition  revolts  are infrequent and of little  importance.  It  is hard  to  see  how  it could  be otherwise,   given  the theory.

But if this is so, it is difficult  to understand  why in moments  of popular  protest in Arab societies  over the course  of the period  1750 to 1950 so many delegations were dispatched  and letters  of grievance  drafted by protesters, or why rulers took such  elaborate measures to disinculpate  themselves  and  to blame  their  agents. Yet an examination of the historical praxis  of protest and resistance  in the Arab world  over the  "long nineteenth  century"  (1750-1925)  reveals  that protest  was far  from  insignificant and  that  the demands  of the protesters were  often  taken seriously  by the authorities. Were  these  states  really  Oriental  despotisms, then according to the theory there would have been no need for delegations or demands, since  the  ruler  would  govern  by  fiat, and all would  be  required   to  bow  down before  his implacable will.  In fact,  as the existence  of these delegations  implies, Middle Eastern  societies were governed in accordance with tacit moral understandings  between  rulers  and  ruled  about how much  was  too  much.
At the heart  of these  understandings was the  concept  of justice as  it existed in the Shari 'ah and in the society  at large.  For  Muslims,  the search  for justice in an unjust world is a central  social mission.  The struggle  for justice is incumbent not only upon individuals,  but also upon society  at large  (which  is to say, in the final analysis,  the state).  This  struggle  is called jihad.  It was  actualized through the application  of the well-known  Quranic  injunction Amr  bi-al-ma'ruf wa-nahi  'an  al-munkar  ("Ordain  the good,  and flee from  that which  is evil"). The best assurance  that  this  injunction  would be carried  out  was  the presence of an amir to guide the community,  preventing  chaos and regulating  the smooth functioning of the society. Without an amir, society would constantly  be exposed to danger.

In practice,  justice in society  was assured  through  the existence of the  office of the muhtasib.  This was  an official  appointed  by the government to oversee the marketplace  (especially  prices,  weights  and measures)  and more  generally to safeguard public morals.  It was he who was responsible for keeping close watch on the price  of grain  in the  marketplace, and for preventing  hoarding. s  Given the opportunities for peculation and the weaknesses of human nature, the muhtasib did not always perform  his duties to the fullest; indeed there  was often complaint about his behavior.  My point, however, is not whether  or  not the muhtasib  actually carried  out his duties;  we may even assume that he often did not.  Rather, it is that the mere existence  of such a position was in effect  a public trust.  It constituted an implicit social compact according to which the amir, through his agents, guaran teed that justice would be carried  out and the Islamic lifestyle  safe-guarded. The burden  of the  foregoing  is that there  was  indeed  an  Islamic  analogue  to the West European Christian  notion of moral economy,  and that it centered  upon the application of the Shari' ah by a vigilant  Muslim ruler.  In particular,  according to the Shari'ah, the government was obligated to enforce  a series of measures of direct economic  relevance  to the inhabitants.  These  included  the prohibition on usury and the insistence  that only  Quranically  sanctioned  taxes  be imposed, that only Quranically  approved  coinage  be permitted  to circulate  officially,  and that non-Muslim  minorities  and foreigners  accept their subordinate positions  in society.  In addition,  there  was the further  general  understanding that  it was the duty of governments  to ensure  the supply of grain  to the market  at reasonable prices. Taken together  these obligations  amounted  to an Islamic  social compact which provided  the moral  basis  of society.
The patrimonial  nature  of these obligations  will not have  escaped  the careful reader. They  were  recognized  by the ruler  in conformity  to the  dictates  of the Shari'ah rather than imposed by the people. The eighteenth-century  English crowds who  rioted  similarly  invoked  their  religiously  sanctioned  right  to  rebel  when economic justice was flagrantly  violated. 7  Like their Muslim  cousins,  they were upheld in this action by higher  authorities.  As Edward  Thompson has shown  in the case of the eighteenth-century English crowds, this paternalistic  ideology  was manipulated both by the rioters  and by those in command for their own interests. It was, in short, a bundle of symbols to be struggled  over,  not a set of principles to be applied. As we shall see, much the same was true of the way in which Arab rebels sought to manipulate the symbols of what I would call the "Islamic moral economy.''
Edward Thompson  argues that conservative  English historians give us rebels without ideas, only empty stomachs that automatically propel them to violence. Western Orientalists,  by contrast,  where they deal with protest movements at all, have given us rebels with ideas but no material needs; with full heads,  but no stomachs at all. In neither case are the contents ofboth heads and stomachs taken seriously enough to be subjected to analysis. What kind of ideas, we might ask, led people to risk their lives in challenging the authorities? How hungry did people have to be, before they were willing to rebel? These questions frame a basic difference of approach in the study of social movements in the Middle East. I have traced their intellectual  origins elsewhere."



==Patterns of Arab protest,  1750-1925==

The period under  study can be called the long nineteenth century. 9 For purposes of analysis it breaks into three segments of unequal length: (1)  1750-1839, the period  of economic  incorporation and political conflict  between  regional political leaders, the central state apparatus, and the urban crowd; (2)  1840-1880, marked by major  governmental reform  efforts  (the Tanzimat reforms)  and the economic  incorporation of the  countryside   into the  world  market,  with  the numerous adjustments which these changes necessitated between the state, landlords,   and peasants;  and  (3)  1880-1925,  the  "liberal age,"  which  was characterized by the consolidation  of the state, the establishment  of European dominance,  and the emergence  of a broadly  based resistance  effort.

The movements of the first wave of protest,  which continued until the 1820s, were predominantly urban. They were centered primarily  in Egypt and Syria. These movements represented a change from the older style of grain riots (about which  Lapidus  has  written)'°   to  more  politically  focused  challenges  to  the Mamluk  system.'  After  the landing  of the Napoleonic expeditionary  force in
1798, these protests evolved in the direction  of a patriotic resistance  movement to French  dominance,  before culminating  in the intense popular struggle  which preceded  the rise to power  of Muhammad  'Ali in 1805. It is no accident  that these outbreaks were most important  in Egypt,  where the oppressiveness of the Mamluk regime and the openness of Egypt to the world economy were particularly marked.Although less well known,  similar urban rebellions occurred  in Syria in this period, particularly at Aleppo and Damascus. There were important revolts in Damascus  in 1725,  1730,  1738,  1743,  1757,  1771, and 1831, and in Aleppo in 1730,  1750,  1814, and 1815. These urban popular movements have been studied extensively.3

The second sequence  of rebellions  occurred  about mid-century.  These  were great peasantjacqueries, and were directed primarily against the remnants of the old agrarian regime, but also against the increasing fiscal pressures  of reformminded governments.  These  include  the great  Kisrawan  peasant  rebellion  in Lebanon (1858-61), the Tunisian revolution of 1864, and the Muqrani rebellion in Algeria of 1871. Other, lesser outbreaks occurred in Palestine ( 1852 and 1854), Syria (1852, 1854,  1862-64,  1865-66), Algeria (1864-67), and Morocco. These rebellions can be seen as responses to the gradual commercialization of agriculture and the increasingly effective extension of government power into the countryside. In Lebanon, where the grievances were most intense and the weaknesses of the old system most evident, the resulting upheaval culminated in the end of feudalism and the beginnings of modern Lebanese history.' In Tunisia,  the  1864  revolt of b. Ghadhihim represented a response to the brutal fiscal impositions  of the reform-minded government and the opening of the Tunisian economy.  After its defeat the reforming beylical government was able to compel the acceptance of the new taxes.15  In Algeria,  following the suppression of the Muqrani rebellion in 1871,  the French settlers were able to destroy the remnants  of the Muslim rural elite in eastern Algeria, and to impose the oppressive fiscal and legal system know collectively as the  Code de l'indig~nat." The principal  result  of these rebellions was to consolidate in power a new coalition of forces in the countryside, in which urban-based landowning interests and moneylenders  in collaboration with local wielders of power assumed local dominance, and old agrarian and tribal forces were suppressed.  The crushing of the mid-century  rebellions  permitted the rapid extension of new legal arrangements  into the countryside.'

The social movements of our third period,  1880-1925, were of a more varied character, and reflect the tightening grip of state authorities,  the heightened pace of economic change, and the looming shadow of the West. The construction  of railroads and telegraph lines into distant provinces,  the spread  of commercial agriculture,  and the general  speeding up of social change  gave  rise to social movements throughout the Arab world.  One of their chief features  was the experimentation with new forms and ideologies of protest,  as increasingly the old society was by-passed by the emergence of new social groups with distinctively different  economic bases, social experiences,  and cultural reference  points.  In the countryside, peasantjacqueries had begun by 1914 to give way to strikes and attacks upon local estate agents and usurers. In the cities, as the old social forms and economic structures came to be supplemented by new ones, the old styles of urban protests, which had been linked to the mosque as a gathering point and the 'ulama'  as key spokesmen and intermediaries,  gave way to forms of collective action linked to the European working class movement:  strikes,  boycotts, and other forms of worker militancy. Most importantly, as portions of the Arab world came under European domination, experiments with new forms of social identity and political cohesion, notably secular nationalism, began to develop.' The end of World War I, and with it of the Ottoman Empire, marked the beginning of a new style of politics and new forms of popular  movements.  The old political framework,  based upon Muslim supremacy in the Ottoman Empire under the Sultan-Padishah,  whose existence had helped to channel the forces of change, was definitely  shattered. Old assumptions  about  politics  and identity  no longer pertained.  The  mass  anti-colonial  risings  which  immediately  followed  the war signaled at once the end of an era and the start of something new. These included the  1919 thawrah in Egypt,  the Iraqi  uprisings  of 1920, the Druze  rebellion  in Syria  (1925-27), the resistance  of 'Umar Mukhtar  in Libya,  the  'Abd  al-Krim rebellion  in Morocco  (1921-25),  and the Palestinian  general  strike and uprising of 1936-39.  Distinguishing features  of these movements  were that they involved not regions  but entire  countries,  not just  rural  or urban groups  but coalitions  of elite and popular  forces, and that they embodied new organizational and ideological methods.  While their suppression  led to the strengthening  of colonial rule in the short  run,  they pointed  toward  the new constellations of political  forces  which were  to emerge  in post-war  nationalism.

From  this rapid  review,  three  main points  should be noted.  First,  contrary  to the vulgate  image of Arab  society,  with  its all-powerful   rulers  and submissive fellahin, there was no shortage of popular protest and resistance in the Arab world. Throughout  the period we find social movements,  although the patterns into which these movements  fall are discontinuous  over time and space.  While the study of Arab  social  movements  is just  beginning,   it is already  clear  that old notions  of the passivity  and  resignation   of the  Arab  masses  are  due  for re-examination.

A second point to be emphasized  is that not only were there traditions  of protest  and  resistance  in the Arab  world,  but also  it seems  increasingly  clear  that protest  could  and  often  did play  a significant  role  in the trans formation  of the old agrarian  structures  in the area.  The outcomes  of these conflicts were of differing character  and results,  leadin g to the strengthening of the old system in some places,  and  its weakening  elsewhere.  Nowhere  did  the  rebels  achieve  the  unequivocal  dismantling  of the old system,  but this does  not diminish  the importance  of their  role.

Finally, it is important to stress that significant changes occurred in the ideology, organization, and strategy  of protest  and resistance  in the Middle East over the course of the period under study.  Moreover,  the changing patterns of protest were connected  to the transformation of Arab  society  itself: the incorporation of the Middle  East  into the world  economy,  the transformation of the agrarian  structures of the Ottoman  empire, and the onset of European  hegemony. The collision of interests  produced  by these changes  set in motion  far-reaching movements  of protest  and  resistance  which  have  still  not  run  their  course.

==The actions of the Arab  crowd,  1750-1925==

In this  section,  I shall  examine  the changing  patterns  of protest, paying  particular attention  to the  actions  of the crowd.  As  we shall  see,  what  the  rebels did  and  what  their  actions  signified  changed  over  the course  of the period.

For our purposes,  attention will be focused  upon a few movements: the several Cairo  and  Damascus  urban  protest  movements of the  period   1750-1830,  the Tunisian uprising of 1864, the Moroccan  rebellions  of 1907-12, and finally, more generally,  the rebellions  of the post-World War  I period.  In each instance,  what concerns us is what the crowd did. In the interests  of space,  it will not be possible to provide  the sort of fine-grained  detail  that  alone  would  be fully convincing. Nonetheless,   it  is  hoped  that  the  approach   outlined   here will  at  least  prove suggestive.

The social movements  that rocked  the cities  of Egypt  and Syria in the second half of the eighteenth  century  (and to a degree  other  parts  of the region)  appear to have differed but little in their morphology and symbolic  language  from those that occurred  several centuries  earlier. However, unlike the earlier  movements, which  had  their  roots  in subsistence  crises  in the  society,  the post-1750  urban riots  were  directed  against janissary/Mamluk fiscal  abuses.  Thereafter,  as the following  review of social movements  will show,  there  was a gr#al  shift over time in both the targets  of the crowd's wrath,  and the forms  its anger  assumed. The  subtle changes  in the cultural  forms  in which  protest  was expressed in the Arab  world  as well as the causal  agents  which  prompted its appearance seem tied to the slow transformation  of Arab society itself. In order accurately to understand the nature of the changing patterns  of protest, it is necessary  to have a firm idea of the genre and repertoire of crowd  actions.  For  this reason  the following detailed  discussion  of the riots  which  shook  Cairo  at the  end of the eighteenth century  is offered.

Andre Raymond  describes  a typical  scenario:



The crowd rushes to the Grand Mosque, occupies the minarets from which inflamatory appeals to resistance are heard, to the rhythm  of the beating of drums, forces the souqs and shops to close, gathers in the great court and in front of the gates, calls forth the shaykhs and vigorously demands that they intervene with the authorities so that the wrongs of which they complain are redressed; a procession is formed; the ulama are placed at its head often more dead than alive, and it heads for the Citadel to present the situation to the authorities. If a favorable response is given, the shaykhs are made its guarantors, and it is upon them that the task, sometimes delicate, of calming the demonstrators and getting them to disperse falls. Difficult moments for the ulama , who risk being blamed by the population for betraying its interests, and of being suspected by the emirs of exciting the fever of the people secretly."

Like  Paris,  Cairo  had  a  well  established   insurrectionary  tradition.   In  such moments, the large stone benches that stood in front of the shops were overturned and placed  in the narrow  streets  of the market  as barricades.  To the Frenchmen who accompanied the Napoleonic expedition,  the popular disturbances that rocked Cairo in 1798,  1800,  and  1805 recalled  the great journ~es of the French  Revolution and the actions  of the Paris  mob.  "One  sees the same enthusiasm  reign  as in France  in the first moments  of the Revolution.' '20 If we approach  the Egyptian and Syrian  protest  movements from this angle,  a symbolic  world  opens up. The least gestures  are heavily  freighted  with meaning.  We can  see the moral  frame of reference  in terms of which the Egyptian  and Syrian demonstrators acted.  The theater  in which this ritual  drama  unfolded  was the principal  mosque.  The long brass  horns  used  in  summoning   the  crowd  were  utilized  otherwise   chiefly  at Ramadan,  while the drums  were used in religious  processions. Significantly, the crowd  assembled  and  sought  first  to convince  members  of the  higher  'ulama' of the justice of their  claims.  The bargaining  session  which  ensued  was often  a lengthy  one,  and could  lead to violence  as Raymond's scenario  suggests.  Eventually  a list of grievances was drawn up.  It was couched  in religious  language, and represented  the consensus  of the different  groups which composed the crowd. The lesser 'ulama' - Quran school teachers,  students,  and petty mosque officials often played  a determining role in this phase.'  Gabriel  Baer is correct  in insisting on the distinction between the higher  'ulama', whose interests often intersected with those of the wealthy merchants  and janissary /Mamluk establishments, and the lesser  'ulama', the muta'mimi n (the turban ed ones), whose interests tended to coincide  more  with those  of the popular  classes.  Only once  this was accomplished  did the crowd  move  in solemn  procession through  the narrow  streets  to the Citadel (or the local  seat of power).  The drums and banners  of the Sufi turuq were  much  in evidence. Accounts  of the Egyptian  disturbances suggest  that the crowd was drawn  from the neighborhoods and was composed  chiefly of artisans , craftsmen,  and  other groups. 22   Their  grievances   were  then  presented   to  the authorities  by  the  members  of the  'ulama'  who  accompanied the  procession.

I have concentrated on this incident  at some length  because  it provides  a particularly  detailed  example  of the forms  of urban  protest  at the beginning  of our period.  As will be seen,  many of the patterns  visible in these Egyptian  and Syrian social  movements occurred again  and again,  though  often  in somewhat  altered forms,  in other  movements throughout our  period.

In 1864, following the doubling and redoubling  of the chiefland tax, the mejba, a major rebellion broke  out in central  Tunisia.Known  locally  after  its leader as the  revolt of b.  Ghadhihim , it came  as the culmina tion  of a half century  of governmental reforms,  increased  European   interventionism, and  the commercialization  of agriculture.  The rebellion  originated  among the pastoralists of the interior  steppes,  but  within  a few  months  it had  spread  to  include  most  of the cities  and towns  of the  Sahel and the Medjerda valley,  including  Kairouan  and Sfax.  The  rural  rebels  made  common  cause  with  the  urban  populations   as the movement  spread.  Popular  insurrections occurred  in the cities, and the authorities were unable to maintain  control.  The insurrection lasted for nine months and was put  down  only  after  a European show  of force  and  brutal  repression.

The demands  and actions  of the rebels  were  similar  to those  of the Cairo  and Damascus crowds.  In each city, the rebellion appears to have been precipitated by the arrival of bands of pastoralists and nearby villagers at the city walls. They called for the town to join forces with them, and a large and unruly crowd gathered at the chief mosque to decide on what to do.  At this meeting,  the  religious authorities, and in some instances the civil ones as well, were compelled by the crowd to reject the authority of the Bey, and to establish an interim governing committee.  Symbolically signifying this, the keys to the city  were presented to the committee for safekeeping. The committee was composed of leading members of the 'ulama'  and turuq, together with several of the leading insurgents. Their mandate was to maintain order and to serve as the spokesmen of the rebels.

Initially the demands of the insurgents focused upon ending the hated new taxes, including the mejba, maks,  and other impositions, and abolishing the constitution and the mixed courts. But within a few months they had escalated to include the Thirteen Demands, which in addition to the above included amnesty, the abolition of foreign extraterritorial rights, the application of the Shari'ah, and the return of various taxes to their former levels and administrative practices to their former state.

These demands bear  witness to the increasing threat posed to both urban and rural ways of life by governmental  reform programs,  as well as the looming European menace. Other rural rebellions in greater Syria, Egypt, and North Africa in the mid-century period which cannot be discussed in this essay were also prompted by government reform policies. In them as well, blatant European involvement begins to appear as a persistent grievance. For the most part the ideology of the mid-century rebels appears not to have changed much, although the increasing ability of rebels to forge larger and larger coalitions beyond the limits of kin, clients, and confederates testifies to important advances in organizational abilities.

The formation of insurgent counter-governments can also be found in Morocco, as can the presentation of formal lists of grievances by the rebels. In both respects, it resembles the Tunisian case.The crowds who gathered in Fez in December 1907 were motivated less by the price of bread than by the weight of fiscal exactions and the usurious business dealings of certain merchants over the preceding decade. They were also alarmed by the apparent complicity of many wealthy officials and merchants with French efforts to secure a protectorate over Morocco. Thus they pillaged the government post at the entrance of the city where the hated maks (market tax) was assessed and burned it to the ground. They also attacked the shops of merchants in the qissaria  part of the suq who were European prot~g~s, and the office of the French telegraph company. We have similar evidence of the selective and ritual violence of Arab crowds from other cities. No more than for European crowds, therefore,  was the behavior of Arab crowds random aimless violence. By their actions, at least implicitly, it is possible to derive their grievances, their social program.

This aspect of Arab popular movements has yet to be well studied.  There is no doubt that in the future it will be possible to recover much more of the history of the actions of Arab crowds. Symbolic acts, which were often recorded because they made a vivid impression on contemporary observers,  can help us to decode the protesters' behavior.  One way of telling that a popular revolt in eighteenthcentury Damascus or Cairo was of particular  importance was whether or not the crowd  created a counter-divan  to the official governing divan of the pasha.  If it did, the insurrection  had widespread  support,  and required serious attention. A similar institution existed  in Moroccan  cities,  where during times of major popular unrest a kind of revolutionary government,  the shwyukh al-rabi'a,  was named by the crowd to govern the city. A similar pattern can be detected in rural popular movements,  which could throw up a kind of counter-government drawn not from the government-sanctioned leadership  of the village or tribe, but from more popular elements. Known by a variety of names -jawqah, shartiyah,  mi 'ad, or the mashayikh al-shabab of the Lebanese  rebellion of 1858-61,  these were not only ritually  important,  but effective  revolutionary  governments.
Fortunately  we do not have to content ourselves  with a study of the acts of Arab rebels alone. The sources contain,  at least for the more important popular movements, records of their demands,  statements of their grievances, their social programs. The Lebanese rebellion has left the greatest number of such documents, which make it possible to trace in detail the insurrection's phases.° As we get closer  to  the twentieth  century  we  often  find  proclamations,   handbills,  and brochures  in European diplomatic  and colonial archives which make the task of following  their course  an easier  one.  The investiture  document  (or bay 'ah of Mawlay 'Abd al-Hafiz signed by the notables and a'yan of Fez in January 1908, the culminating phase of the Fez insurrection which began with the riots just mentioned) amounts to a virtual cahier de dol~ances. Its provisions include the conditions set by the crowd for their support. 26  The more we study documents like this and others emanating from Arab popular movements, the clearer it becomes that there was at least an implicit moral economy underlying the actions of Arab crowds.  This  moral  economy  generally  expressed  itself in Islamic  language, although especially in rural areas (and among non-Muslim populations,  it goes without saying) it could also take on other colorations.  It was particularly  connected to the popular  enactment  of Islamic notions of justice  according  to the classic doctrine of hisba:  the commanding  of good and the forbidding  of evil.

The evolution of Arab protest  over the course of the long nineteenth century is one of the most striking features of investigation. During our first two periods (1750-1839 and 1840-1880), the behavior and ideology of Arab protesters  were clearly linked to earlier social movement patterns and ideologies.  By the 1880s, however, things had begun to change as Arab societies themselves responded to the unprecedented changes with which they were confronted. Given the often sharp local and regional variations in development throughout the region, this timetable was of course not hard and fast.  Perhaps  not surprisingly,  the changes in style and ideology of protest  occurred  first in Egypt,  where by the 1880s  Egyptian peasants  had abandoned  the tactics  of their  fathers  for those  of the  rent  strike and the land invasion.  By World War I, which appears to have been a major watershed,  important  changes could be observed  everywhere. Thus  by the  1920s the Moroccan  peasants  who  supported   'Abd  al-Krim  employed   the  tactics of the European battlefront (in contrast to the millenarian  resistance  of Ahma d al-Hayba in 1912,  which was easily crushed  by the French).  They did so, moreover, with a skill much remarked  by European  military  experts.   The  Syrian  and  Druze rebels of 1925 fought in the name not of Islam,  but of secular  nationalism, and according  to modem  tactics.28 The Palestinian  peasants  who joined Shaykh  'Izz al-Din al-Qassam may have been inspired by an Islamic critique  of their society, but how much distance  separates  them from the Algerians who were  drawn  by the  millenarian   ideology  of  Amir   'Abd   al-Qadir!29   In  sum,   the  world   had revolved  in the  interim.

All of this is to say that over the course of the last two centuries major changes have occurred in the organization,  strategy and ideology of protest and resistance in the Arab world.  An examination  of the language  of protest and of the actions of insurgents  shows clearly  the extent of these changes. The  foregoing  analysis suggests that if there  was a moral  economy  of protest  in the  Arab  world,  then it was expressed  not only in the language  of the 'ulama' and  works  offiqh,  but also in the language of Islamic notions ofjustice  freely available  to all, and extraIslamic forms of legitimation  drawn  from customary  practice.  Although  subject to co-optation by the authorities,  what the rebels did and said expressed  a populist defense of age-old liberties threatened by the twin forces of government centralization and incorporation  in the world  market:  the rights  of the  quarter,  the tribe, and other social groups against encroachment  on their subsistence: Within  each movement  the struggle  for  control  over  the symbols  of legitimacy was  waged fiercely.  We are presented  then with not just one,  but a variety  of symbols  of legitimacy  which  were  constantly  the  subject of  competition among  different groups  in the society.  Finally,  the modernization  of protest  in the  Arab  world cannot be separated  from  the modernization  of the Middle East.  The  changing forms of protest must therefore be seen in the context of the changing  social structures  of the  area.  In tum,  the  study  of Arab protest  and  resistance  cannot  be separated from the study of social movements elsewhere. What such a study might yield  in practice  is something  I have  tried  to suggest  here.

==References==

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==Notes==