Rule of Experts
Subtitle: Egypt, Techno-Politics, Modernity
Edition: 1 edition
Publisher: University of California Press
Published: November 4, 2002
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 423
ISBN-13: 9780520232617
Subjects: African studies; POLITICS & GOVERNMENT; Political economy; Political Science; Egypt; Development - Economic Development; Politics / Current Events; Peasantry; Politics/International Relations; General; Political Science / General; Customs & Traditions; Politics - Current Events; Middle East - General; 1919-1952; 20th century; Economic conditions; Economic policy; History
Description: "Can one explain the power of global capitalism without attributing to capital a logic and coherence it does not have? Can one account for the powers of techno-science in terms that do not merely reproduce its own understanding of the world? Rule of Experts examines these questions through a series of interrelated essays focused on Egypt in the twentieth century. These explore the way malaria, sugar cane, war, and nationalism interacted to produce the techno-politics of the modern Egyptian state; the forms of debt, discipline, and violence that founded the institution of private property; the methods of measurement, circulation, and exchange that produced the novel idea of a national "economy," yet made its accurate representation impossible; the stereotypes and plagiarisms that created the scholarly image of the Egyptian peasant; and the interaction of social logics, horticultural imperatives, powers of desire, and political forces that turned programs of economic reform in unanticipated directions."