The Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution: The Jama'at-i Islami of Pakistan (Comparative Studies on Muslim Societies) [Paperback]

Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 23, 1994 | ISBN-10: 0520083695 | ISBN-13: 978-0520083691

In this groundbreaking study, Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr examines the origins, historical development, and political strategies of one of the oldest and most influential Islamic revival movements, the Jama'at-i Islami of Pakistan. He focuses on the inherent tension between the movement's idealized vision of the nation as a holy community based in Islamic law and its political agenda of socioeconomic change for Pakistani society.
Nasr's work goes beyond the exploration of a single party to examine the diverse sociopolitical roots of contemporary Islamic revivalism, challenging many of the standard interpretations about political expressions of Islam.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Seyyed Vali Reza Nasr is Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of San Diego.

Product Details

• Paperback: 324 pages
• Publisher: University of California Press (September 23, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0520083695
• ISBN-13: 978-0520083691
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #133,887 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #19 in Books > History > Asia > Pakistan
  • #95 in Books > History > Asia > India

More About the Author

Vali Nasr is Senior Advisor to Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, Ambassador Richard Holbrooke and Professor of International Politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy of Tufts University. Previously he served as an Adjunct Senior Fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a specialist on Middle East and South Asia politics and political Islam. He is the author of Forces of Fortune: The Rise of a New Muslim Middle Class and What it Means for Our World (2009): The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam Will Shape the Future (2006); Democracy in Iran (2006); and The Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution: The Jama`at-i Islami of Pakistan (1994). and the author of numerous articles in academic journals and encyclopedias. His works have been translated into several languages.

Nasr has briefed the White House and the Congress on Middle East and South Asia issues. He has written for the New York Times, Washington Post, Time, Los Angeles Times, Christian Science Monitor, The New Republic, La Repubblica, Suddeutsche Zeitung, and was profiled on the front page of the Wall Street Journal. His interviews and expert commentary have also been used in newspapers and new programs around the world, including Al-Jazeera, Der Spiegel, CNN, BBC, and 60 Minutes. He has appeared as a guest on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, The Charlie Rose Show, Meet the Press, Larry King Live, The Colbert Report, and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.

He was named a 2006 Carnegie Scholar by the Carnegie Corporation. He has also been the recipient of grants from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, and the Social Science Research Council. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Nasr was born in 1960 in Tehran. He received his early education in Iran and England, and got his BA from Tufts University in international relations. He earned his MA from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in international economics and Middle East studies in 1984 and his PhD in political science from the Massachusetts Institute for Technology in 1991.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution, July 22, 2001

By 

Daniel Pipes, Middle East Forum, Philadelphia (Philadelphia, PA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution: The Jama'at-i Islami of Pakistan (Comparative Studies on Muslim Societies) (Paperback)

With the exception of the much-studied Muslim Brethren of Egypt, few fundamentalist Islamic groups have been subjected to book-length investigations in English. And if any one deserves such attention, it's the Jama`at-i Islami (Islamic Party) of Pakistan, founded in 1941 by Sayyid Abul A`la Mawdudi (1903-79). Nasr, professor of political science at the University of San Diego, does his important subject justice in an excellent history of the founder and of his movement.

Throughout its existence, the Jama`at-i Islami has suffered from a tension between an intention to create a holy community of the righteous and the (frustrated) desire to attain power through the political process. Mawdudi himself bounced from one unattainable goal to another: in the mid-1930s he rejected the Pakistan movement, arguing that Muslims should seek to rule the whole of India. By 1940 he accepted the inevitability of a Pakistan and began a decades-long effort to dominate that state.

All that's missing from Nasr's fine study is a consideration of Mawdudi's profound influence on the fundamentalist movement outside Pakistan, and specifically on Ayatollah Khomeini; in other words, how exactly was the Jama`at-i Islami "the vanguard of the Islamic Revolution"? That's such an important and large subject, it's surely worthy of another volume by the same author.

Middle East Quarterly, December 1994

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fundamentalism explained, December 10, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Vanguard of the Islamic Revolution: The Jama'at-i Islami of Pakistan (Comparative Studies on Muslim Societies) (Paperback)

A superb analysis of the causes of Islamic fundamentalism. Also has much about Pakistan politics. A must read. Readable and erudite.