Fear and Anxiety in the Arab World

Abstract

The title is certainly catchy, as not much has been written on fears and anxietiesin the Arab world. Much, however, has been written on Muslims andIslam post-9/11. While some writers genuinely try to understand the variousIslamic ideologies and Muslim cultures, others seek to paint a rather dim anddepressing picture of Muslim societies. This book attempts to describeArabs, as well as their fears and anxieties, in the garb of “interdisciplinaryresearch.” It is divided into seven chapters and contains a section on notes,a bibliography, and an index. The chapters address issues related to Arabpolitics (e.g., political identity, nationalism, and minority issues) and moregeneral areas (e.g., religion and Arab culture). The author is a professor ofpolitical science and diplomacy at the Notre Dame University in Lebanon.In the preface and opening chapter, Nehme introduces the growingfield of political psychology, which draws upon various psychological theoriesto interpret human political behavior. Although he admits that thebest results can be obtained through collaborative research betweenexperts in each discipline, he dares to make an independent attempt to analyzeArab fears and anxieties from a Freudian perspective.The book’s first few pages are quite a turn-off, as many preposterousstatements are made. Playing psychologist, Nehme asserts that worldevents are themselves natural experiments and, therefore, his assumptionsare “empirically based” (p. 2). He diagnoses the problem of violenceamong Arabs as resulting from a “built-in consistency of anxiety” (p. 3),“most Arabs no longer appeal to God … instead, they call on their governmentsfor relief” (p. 4), “they are afraid of everything” (p. 7), “Arab menare afraid that their wives will be sexually attracted to other men if theyleave home to work” (p. 8), and so on. He goes on to characterize suicidaltendencies among Arabs as a “death wish” that is not new in Arab history,as it develops their inner power … through acquiring weapons, and states ...