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priorities from every point of view. Two terms occur frequently in publications of the 1973: turath (heritage) and asalah (authentically to one’s historical roots). A whole series of distinguished Arab intellectuals devoted themselves to a complete revision of ideas concerning the relationship of the Arab present to the past and the implication for the future. 80 A brief listing of such intellectuals would include Abdallah Laroui (from whom we have already quoted), Sadiq al-Azm, Hasan Hanafi, Muhammed Abid al-Jabiri, Husayn Muruwwah, and Tayyib Tizzini. 81A further significant factor in many Arab societies has been the emergence of the women’s voice, expressing the desire for profound changes in attitude, behaviour and opportunity, and doing so with particular effectiveness in the realm of fiction. 82
While these intellectual currents have formed the backdrop to much debate about principles in the Arab world during the last two decades, it is clearly the revival of Islam as a popular religious phenomenon that continues to be a predominant feature of most of the countries of the region; indeed it would appear that the process is rapidly expanding and intensifying. Adopting to different local situations, the leaders of these movements have been extremely successful in exploiting a number of social factors to their own advantage: most importantly the availability of the Islamic heritage as a newly contemporary way of combating the general intellectual and moral malaise of the community; the diminish role of socialism as a guiding ideology and the resulting secularist tendencies; and resentments over the influence of Western values and the crass consumerism and inflation that they engender. These are, of course, just a few of the many factors governing the emergence of a powerful force in the contemporary Arab world, one that will clearly continue to play a major role in the social and intellectual life of Arab countries.
This brief survey of events and trends in the Middle-East since the Second World War ca