Reviews for Handbook of Political Science Research on the Middle East and North Africa

The average rating for Handbook of Political Science Research on the Middle East and North Africa based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-09-28 00:00:00 John Demeza Through a quantitatively detailed analysis of the administration and exploitation of southwest Germany's forest resources from the late 16th through the early 18th centuries, Paul Warde presents a convincing argument for the early-modern state's formative dependence upon the negotiation and contestation of rights between centralized bureaucracy and communal powerbrokers, the not-always incompatible economic interests of peasants and the duke, as well as the sometimes arbitrary managerial decisions of officials at all levels of government. Power relations among these economic and political agents were often mediated by the flows of material resources which they regulated, and which contributed to both stability and transformation of ecologies and economies across geographical scales of analysis from the village to the subcontinent.

Review # 2 was written on 2020-07-06 00:00:00 Lemur Lemurov The organization leaves much to be desired and the writing style is exceedingly dry. Despite the importance of the subject, it rests on broad conclusions and assumptions about societal perceptions rather than citing evidence from the era's policymakers and their aims, which would be exceedingly useful to policymakers today. The narrative is ungrounded, jumping from decade to decade and back again, with no recall to previous passages to drive any central thesis home. Perhaps my biggest gripe is the blatant disregard for social liberal/ democratic socialist constructs, with a rigid adherence to the "sanctity" of free markets, as if the West v East German perspective put an end to the debate between the only two available options. If you're one of the unfortunate students forced to read this book, I highly recommend reading only the beginning sections of each chapter and part. It will be the best way to lift any kind of consistent narrative from these pages.