Overview

Hezbollah provides a new, grounded analysis of the controversial and misunderstood Lebanese party. Where previous books have focused on aspects of the party’s identity, the military question or its religious discourse, here Joseph Daher presents an alternative perspective, built upon political economy. Drawing on extensive fieldwork in Lebanon and dozens of interviews, as well as new archival and other primary sources, Daher’s analysis confidently positions Hezbollah within socio-economic and political developments in Lebanon and the Middle East. He emphasises Hezbollah’s historic ties with its main sponsor, the Islamic Republic of Iran, its media and cultural wings and its relationship with Western economic policies. Further chapters examine the party’s policies towards workers’ struggles and women’s issues, and its orientation towards the sectarian Lebanese political system. Hezbollah is a well informed and fresh analysis of a topic which remains central to our understanding of one of the world’s most tumultuous and politically unstable regions.

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9780745336930

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Reviews

Most appraisals of Hezbollah from a left-wing perspective have focused, often solely, on its role in the fight against the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, thus serving the party's own mythology. This merit of this iconoclastic book is that it endeavours to analyse Hezbollah from a historical materialist perspective. -- Gilbert Achcar, SOAS, University of London Daher has written an insightful and timely analysis of Hezbollah, situating the party within a fascinating account of the wider Lebanese political economy. An important contribution that sheds much light on contemporary politics in the Middle East. -- Adam Hanieh, SOAS, University of London

Most appraisals of Hezbollah from a left-wing perspective have focused, often solely, on its role in the fight against the Israeli occupation of Lebanon, thus serving the party's own mythology. This merit of this iconoclastic book is that it endeavours to analyse Hezbollah from a historical materialist perspective. -- Gilbert Achcar, SOAS, University of London Daher has written an insightful and timely analysis of Hezbollah, situating the party within a fascinating account of the wider Lebanese political economy. An important contribution that sheds much light on contemporary politics in the Middle East -- Adam Hanieh, SOAS, University of London

Author Information

Joseph Daher teaches at Lausanne University, Switzerland and is a part time affiliate professor at the European University Institute, Florence (Italy). He is the author of Syria after the Uprisings (Pluto, 2019) and Hezbollah: The Political Economy of the Party of God (Pluto, 2016). He is the co-editor of Penser l'emancipation (La Dispute, 2013) and founder of the blog Syria Freedom Forever.

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