The invention of nations

The concepts of the modern state, identity, and religion have always posed a dilemma for many in understanding the nature of the post-colonial era, let alone the interrelations and connections of these concepts with understanding the dynamics of the modern nation-state. And because the Arab library is very poor in this field; we have gathered within the pages of this book, issued by the Namaa Center, a collection of Arab and translated studies, within a series of publications that attempt to discuss the phenomenon of the modern nation-state from three dimensions: social, political, and international. The editor tried through these studies to explore several focal points in the phenomenon of the state, most notably the social condition for the emergence of the state in its modern form. The entire question of contemporary politics perhaps revolved around the question of the state; how it functions, how it began, and the mechanisms of exercising its authority. But the more difficult question, which occupied the minds of us as contemporary Arabs, during the era of revolutions on one hand, and in the era of the aging post-colonial state on the other, is: why do ordinary people cling to the old forms of their governments voluntarily and refuse any path to change? Even if they are convinced of the corruption and authoritarianism of their states? And how did it happen that people who have no interest in the existence of this authority beg for its positions, adopt its orders, and seek crumbs of bread from it? Nothing anymore can be explained by dichotomies such as modernity/tradition, religion/secularism, socialism/capitalism, or other dichotomies inherited by Arab thought since the seventies of the last century. Nor do these dichotomies have any capacity to fully explain the nature of conflict or oppression filling the corners of Arab countries, nor their ability to explain the relationship of voluntary acts that characterize the behavior of ordinary people in their relationship with the positions of the state. Therefore, these studies aim to answer the sociological question of the modern state.