Description
Book SynopsisIn
Markets of Civilization Muriam Haleh Davis provides a history of racial capitalism, showing how Islam became a racial category that shaped economic development in colonial and postcolonial Algeria. French officials in Paris and Algiers introduced what Davis terms “a racial regime of religion” that subjected Algerian Muslims to discriminatory political and economic structures. These experts believed that introducing a market economy would modernize society and discourage anticolonial nationalism. Planners, politicians, and economists implemented reforms that both sought to transform Algerians into modern economic subjects and drew on racial assumptions despite the formally color-blind policies of the French state. Following independence, convictions about the inherent link between religious beliefs and economic behavior continued to influence development policies. Algerian president Ahmed Ben Bella embraced a specifically Algerian socialism founded on Islamic princ
Trade Review“Markets of Civilization makes for a fascinating addition both to the literature on Algeria and also to the broader literature on racial formations and racialization. . . . Well worth the read.”
-- Marc Lynch * Marc Lynch *
“Markets of Civilization is a much needed scholarly intervention into the connections between race, capital and economics, and enables us to think about racial capitalism outside of, but very much connected to, a Euro-American framework. An essential read for anyone interested in the story of capitalism as others experienced it.” -- Usman Butt * Middle East Monitor *
“Davis’s intervention brings our attention to an underappreciated historiographical domain of racial capitalism’s inception, evolution and contestation (i.e., the late French empire). . . . Davis subtly adds the dimension of religion to a conversation that has been dominated by ethnic- and colour-based understandings of racial capitalism’s historical origins and contemporary realities.” -- Jacob Mundy * Ethnic and Racial Studies *
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Markets of Civilization makes a significant contribution to the field of Algerian history through its explication of the entanglements of racial, economic, and colonial imperatives. . . . I recommend the book to scholars and students interested in the study’s widely-ranging themes, including racial capitalism in the Middle East, the connections between economic and intellectual histories, the enduring nature of colonial, racial thinking, and how post-independence Arab regimes negotiated and remade older colonial ideas and policies." -- Sara Rahnama * International Journal of Middle East Studies *
"A grounded and challenging effort to revive an older Third-Worldist scholarly tradition on Algeria. ... Davis’s Markets of Civilization is a must-read for those interested in Algerian history, colonialism, and contemporary debates on Islam and Islamophobia, as well as scholars examining the twin social theories of race and political economy."
-- Mohammed Salih * SAW Reviews *
Table of ContentsAcronyms ix
Transliteration Note xi
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction 1
1. Settling the Colony 19
2. A New Algeria Rising 43
3. Decolonization and the Constantine Plan 69
4.
Fellahs into Peasants 96
5. Communism in a White Burnous 119
6. Today's Utopia Is Tomorrow's Reality 144
Epilogue 167
Notes 177
Bibliography 227
Index 259
