Videos by mark farha
Brief Interview at Century Foundation, 2019
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Books, Chapters and Journal Articles by mark farha
Cambridge University Press, 2019
Interview on New Books Network on "Lebanon: Rise and Fall of a Secular State Under Siege":
htt... more Interview on New Books Network on "Lebanon: Rise and Fall of a Secular State Under Siege":
https://newbooksnetwork.com/lebanon
Why has secularism faced such challenges in the Middle East and in Lebanon in particular? In light of dominating headlines about the spread of sectarianism and the so-called death of Arab secularism, Mark Farha addresses the need for a thorough examination of the history of secular thought and practice in the region. By offering a comprehensive, systematic account of the underlying ideological, socio-economic, and political factors involved, Farha provides a new understanding of the historical roots of secularism as well as the potential causes for the continued resistance a fully deconfessionalized state faces both in Lebanon and in the region at large. Drawing on a vast corpus of primary and secondary sources to examine the varying political parties and ideologies involved, this book provides a fresh approach to the study of religion and politics in the Arab world and beyond.
https://www.amazon.com/Lebanon-Secular-State-under-Siege/dp/1108458017/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1564954308&sr=1-1
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Citizenship and Its Discontents: The Struggle for Rights, Pluralism, and Inclusion in the Middle East, 2019
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Constitution Writing, Religion and Democracy, 2017
A widely accepted and oft repeated narrative of the drafting of the constitution of the Lebanese... more A widely accepted and oft repeated narrative of the drafting of the constitution of the Lebanese Republic in 1926 has placed the onus for its confessional articles on the French Mandate authorities who were allegedly acting to preserve Christian, and more particularly Maronite predominance. This historiography resonates well with those who might identify the European colonial project as the chief “culprit” for sectarianism. Closer inspection of the critical period of the drafting of the constitutive 1926 document however reveals a more complex bargaining process amongst the Lebanese Christian and Muslim members of the constitutional committee jockeying for prerogatives on the one hand, and the French mandatory powers on the other. This contribution analyzes the competing – and often contradictory - loyalties prior, during and after the debate between key contributors to this drafting process. Relying on the minutes of the meetings, this paper contextualizes the explicit references to the French, Swiss and Belgium constitutions which were discussed as a possible paradigm for the Lebanese multi-confessional society. Such a push to emulate or even carbon copy European blueprints was resisted by a “pull” of arguments centering on the oft-regretted alleged “exceptionalism” of Lebanese confessional pluralism. At the end of their deliberations, the deputies conceded to a mid-way compromise solution between the secular, republican ideal most espoused emotively and the “inveterate” communal reality they were confronted with on the ground. Yet the debate on confessional quotas and personal status guarantees instituted in Lebanon’s “consociational democracy” then continued to echo during the major revision of the constitution at Taif in 1989 and present day reform discussions. This chapter provides the critical historical, political and demographic backdrop necessary to understand the divergent arguments and ultimate outcome.
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The serial collapse of regimes in wake of the Arab Spring was followed by aftershocks of ubiquito... more The serial collapse of regimes in wake of the Arab Spring was followed by aftershocks of ubiquitous sectarianism. How can we account for its upsurge? On the one end of the debate, we find a “primordial” penchant to ascribe sectarian conflict to ostensibly inextricable, sociological roots. On the other end, we find a desire to pin the blame for sectarianism on external, (neo)colonial actors pursuing an all too familiar “divide and rule” strategy. What is the historical evidence supporting each of these two narratives? Is sectarianism (ta¯ ’ifı¯ya) really the product of external interventionism or inborn instincts? Or is it, as is more commonly claimed, indicative of a continuing malaise in authoritarian Arab states seeking to leverage tribal and religious communalisms? What policies have been devised by states, both within and outside of the region, to instrumentalize or contain the spread of sectarianism and what preemptive strategies can be pursued in the future to stem this extremely costly contagion? Tracing the trajectory of sectarian discourse from its ostensible origins down to the present day, this chapter weigh the indigenous and extraneous factors which have shaped the morphology of sectarianism. The article makes the case that only a nuanced analysis blending considerations of past and present confessional ideologies and class interests, as well as political instrumentalization of sectarian identity by both external and internal actors, may allow us to better comprehend the vigor of communalism in the present day.
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"From Anti-imperial Dissent to National Consent: the First World War and the Formation of a Trans-sectarian National Consciousness in Lebanon", 2015
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The unfolding uprisings across the Arab world have been viewed through a regional prism. Politica... more The unfolding uprisings across the Arab world have been viewed through a regional prism. Political scientists particularly were predisposed to view the "Arab Spring" as a long overdue culmination of pent-up popular frustrations with corrupt and autocratic regimes. Such an exclusive focus on the democracy deficit long besetting political systems in the Arab world however begs the question of the particular historical moment of the outburst of 2011 and as such may not capture the full scope of the underlying dynamic. While political repression by praetorian states served as a crucial catalyst for massive street demonstrations, it is increasingly apparent that the parabolic rise of commodity prices may have kindled a politically and demographically charged situation. In its first segment, this chapter thus attempts to draw the links between monetary and fiscal policies in the United States and Europe, the ensuing contagion of global inflation and its role in destabilizing certain Arab States, while leaving others largely insulated from the wave of revolt. I argue that the likelihood of a revolution in any given Arab state must be weighed against a multiplicity of local and global factors, chief of which is the exposure of a critical mass of a vulnerable segment in a given society to price increases in essential commodities. While gulf rentier states – with the exception of a particularly bifurcated Bahrain – thusfar were able to stave off major street protests with direct and indirect subsidies, even seasoned autocrats such as Mubarak in Egypt or Ben Ali in Tunisia – bereft of rentier revenue - were unable to withstand the popular pressures.
Finally, the chapter examines to what degree the socio-economic imbalances which fomented the revolutions have aggravated religious sectarianism in pluralistic Arab states such as Lebanon and Syria, thereby undermining the uprisings’ declared drive for civil rights, political accountability and social justice.
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With the spectre of post-Spring Islamist rule looming, Christians in Syria and Egypt were forced ... more With the spectre of post-Spring Islamist rule looming, Christians in Syria and Egypt were forced to choose between quasi-secular autocracy and sectarian populism. The status quo ante under al-Assad and Mubarak, though democratically deficient, temporarily contained civil hostilities and afforded Christians with a modicum of secular protection and even prosperity, the degree of which sheds light on the relative absence of Syrian Christian protestors and the salient Coptic presence during the Egyptian revolution. This article explores how socio-economic and religious peripheral designations intersected with state policy to determine political (in) action amongst Christian minorities in two crucial countries of the region.
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Many are the scholars and pundits who have raised the clarion call for a Reformation in the Arab ... more Many are the scholars and pundits who have raised the clarion call for a Reformation in the Arab and Islamic worlds. According to this popular paradigm, the European Reformation is held out as a talisman with which the ugly specter of fundamentalism is to be exorcised, leading an entire region onto the primrose path of enlightened modernity. This preoccupation with an Eastern emulation of the European pre-modern precedent boasts a long legacy, having propelled the imagination of Bostonian missionaries setting sail to the Middle East at the very moment that reform-minded Muslim sheikhs and Arab intellectuals pondered the same prospect of a Reformation in 19th century Cairo and Beirut. The soundness of this recurring historical comparison with pre-modern Europe, and the potential consequences an emulation of the European Reformation might entail for the Middle East, warrant a closer (re) examination.
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Moyen-Orient, 2012
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Despite recurrent efforts to introduce a civil personal status code since 1926, personal status l... more Despite recurrent efforts to introduce a civil personal status code since 1926, personal status laws in Lebanon remain regulated by the confessional codices of the country’s eighteen denominations. This article examines how efforts at secularization were repeatedly thwarted due to veto rights accorded to sectarian heads in the Lebanese Constitution. The codification of sectarian marriage and inheritance laws is related to Lebanon’s confessional political system and to the attendant perpetuation of kinship ties and fluctuating confessional attitudes. The latter are measured and compared diachronically with a series of surveys. Paradoxically, the chronic weakness of the Lebanese state would render top-down reform measures an exceedingly difficult task even as it opened the space for increasingly effective civil society activism aimed at dismantling the juridical hegemony of the sects.
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Lebanon, 2007
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Lebanon’s educational system has been marked by a bifurcation into a network of state-sponsored i... more Lebanon’s educational system has been marked by a bifurcation into a network of state-sponsored institutions and a mosaic of private, confessional schools. It is often held that the latter are prone to entrench and further fortify communal cocoons and class hierarchies which impede the formation of a civic, national identity. As such, Lebanon’s difficulties in transcending sectarian identities should not be viewed as symptomatic of this unusually pluralistic nation. Rather, the attempts to promote national unity via the establishment of a public schooling system deserve proper contextualization as this project was part and parcel of the agenda of a host of Western and Middle Eastern states since the nineteenth century. This chapter places the ramified these historical reform efforts in Lebanon and the Middle East their proper, global context.
I then probe the significant attempts in post-independence Lebanon to promote national cohesion via a state supervision of curricula, particularly in the field of history and religion. All of these state-sponsored initiatives were withstood by a bulwark of conservative and confessional stakeholders. The latter exerted a particularly powerful challenge to state centralization and curricular standardization in a highly pluralistic Lebanon. Finally, this chapter tracks the trajectory of private and public schools, and gauges their effect on national, trans-confessional civic identities, demonstrating how Lebanon’s sectarian diversity and long tradition of confessional schools need not be at odds national cohesion if complemented by multi-pronged governmental initiatives designed to lessen demographic, ideological and socio-economic polarization.
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In engaging with heterogeneous societies, states have oscillated between three modes of dealing w... more In engaging with heterogeneous societies, states have oscillated between three modes of dealing with social diversity: accommodation, segregation and eradication. Accordingly, this article cross-examines three typologies of secularism: Consociational secularism (Lebanon), communal partition (India and Pakistan) and coercive secularization (China and Turkey). The article argues that while each state shared the challenge of establishing state sovereignty in pluralistic societies, the central authorities’ attempt to impose homogenization varied according to the strength of state institutions, the hold of communal ideologies and the degree of disparate socio-economic interests. The legitimacy of regimes hinged on the perceived impartiality of the state in meeting the demands of diverse socio-economic and ethno-religious constituencies. The article argues that the potential for fragmentation was particularly high when socio-economic fault-lines overlapped with, and reinforced ethno-religious fissures. When sectarian solidarity trumped loyalty to the state, partition along communal lines unfolded within the caldron of civil war, as was the case in Lebanon in 1975 and the Indian Subcontinent in 1947 and 1971. By contrast, the authoritarian states of Maoist China and Kemalist Turkey could enforce, albeit violently and at great human cost, a rigidly secular, cultural homogenization in part because they were perceived to be lessening socio-economic inequalities despite their assault on traditional identities. In all cases, and regardless of whether or not a dominant majority existed or not, sovereignty and state legitimacy was ultimately predicated not so much on the absence or presence of democracy or diversity, but on the provision of a critical measure of justice for all citizens irrespective of origin or identity.
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Interview by mark farha
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Videos by mark farha
"Lebanon: Rise and Fall of a Secular State Under Siege" (Cambridge 2019)
https://www.amazon.com/Lebanon-Secular-State-under-Siege/dp/1108458017/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1564954308&sr=1-1
Books, Chapters and Journal Articles by mark farha
https://newbooksnetwork.com/lebanon
Why has secularism faced such challenges in the Middle East and in Lebanon in particular? In light of dominating headlines about the spread of sectarianism and the so-called death of Arab secularism, Mark Farha addresses the need for a thorough examination of the history of secular thought and practice in the region. By offering a comprehensive, systematic account of the underlying ideological, socio-economic, and political factors involved, Farha provides a new understanding of the historical roots of secularism as well as the potential causes for the continued resistance a fully deconfessionalized state faces both in Lebanon and in the region at large. Drawing on a vast corpus of primary and secondary sources to examine the varying political parties and ideologies involved, this book provides a fresh approach to the study of religion and politics in the Arab world and beyond.
https://www.amazon.com/Lebanon-Secular-State-under-Siege/dp/1108458017/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1564954308&sr=1-1
Finally, the chapter examines to what degree the socio-economic imbalances which fomented the revolutions have aggravated religious sectarianism in pluralistic Arab states such as Lebanon and Syria, thereby undermining the uprisings’ declared drive for civil rights, political accountability and social justice.
I then probe the significant attempts in post-independence Lebanon to promote national cohesion via a state supervision of curricula, particularly in the field of history and religion. All of these state-sponsored initiatives were withstood by a bulwark of conservative and confessional stakeholders. The latter exerted a particularly powerful challenge to state centralization and curricular standardization in a highly pluralistic Lebanon. Finally, this chapter tracks the trajectory of private and public schools, and gauges their effect on national, trans-confessional civic identities, demonstrating how Lebanon’s sectarian diversity and long tradition of confessional schools need not be at odds national cohesion if complemented by multi-pronged governmental initiatives designed to lessen demographic, ideological and socio-economic polarization.
Interview by mark farha
"Lebanon: Rise and Fall of a Secular State Under Siege" (Cambridge 2019)
https://www.amazon.com/Lebanon-Secular-State-under-Siege/dp/1108458017/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1564954308&sr=1-1
https://newbooksnetwork.com/lebanon
Why has secularism faced such challenges in the Middle East and in Lebanon in particular? In light of dominating headlines about the spread of sectarianism and the so-called death of Arab secularism, Mark Farha addresses the need for a thorough examination of the history of secular thought and practice in the region. By offering a comprehensive, systematic account of the underlying ideological, socio-economic, and political factors involved, Farha provides a new understanding of the historical roots of secularism as well as the potential causes for the continued resistance a fully deconfessionalized state faces both in Lebanon and in the region at large. Drawing on a vast corpus of primary and secondary sources to examine the varying political parties and ideologies involved, this book provides a fresh approach to the study of religion and politics in the Arab world and beyond.
https://www.amazon.com/Lebanon-Secular-State-under-Siege/dp/1108458017/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1564954308&sr=1-1
Finally, the chapter examines to what degree the socio-economic imbalances which fomented the revolutions have aggravated religious sectarianism in pluralistic Arab states such as Lebanon and Syria, thereby undermining the uprisings’ declared drive for civil rights, political accountability and social justice.
I then probe the significant attempts in post-independence Lebanon to promote national cohesion via a state supervision of curricula, particularly in the field of history and religion. All of these state-sponsored initiatives were withstood by a bulwark of conservative and confessional stakeholders. The latter exerted a particularly powerful challenge to state centralization and curricular standardization in a highly pluralistic Lebanon. Finally, this chapter tracks the trajectory of private and public schools, and gauges their effect on national, trans-confessional civic identities, demonstrating how Lebanon’s sectarian diversity and long tradition of confessional schools need not be at odds national cohesion if complemented by multi-pronged governmental initiatives designed to lessen demographic, ideological and socio-economic polarization.
https://www.srf.ch/sendungen/tagesgespraech/mark-farha-libanon-in-der-krise