Breakneck: China's Quest to Engineer the Future

The Center for Arab Unity Studies issued the fifth edition of the book Cultural Authority and Political Authority by Dr. Ali Umlil. The subject of this book is the authority of “intellectuals”; There is a claim that Arab intellectuals claim for themselves that they are “thought leaders,” and that they have a decisive role in the process of leadership and social and political change... In fact, the talk of Arab intellectuals about themselves carries two dissonant tones: On the one hand, they see themselves as pioneers, that they have a “message,” and that they are makers of awareness of change. But their talk also carries, on the other hand, and at the same time, a tone of bitterness, as they usually lament that this role is not recognized for them, that they do not have a significant impact on the reality of matters, and that they are not an effective element in influencing political decisions, nor public opinion. The question here remains: What is the self-support of the Arab intellectual in his cultural heritage when he claims a role for himself or when he aspires to it? Whose scientific authority was and in the name of what? What are its limits? What are the mechanisms for controlling the relationship between the two authorities, scientific and political? Arab writers have wasted a lot of time when they ignored the issue of democracy or drowned it in something that is not of it, or when they gave priority to other slogans such as unity, socialism, and fighting imperialism. These are goals that still exist, of course, if the matter means building an integrated and liberated Arab entity. However, our committed writers have become attached to everything except the thing that guarantees the practice of the “profession” of writing, that is, democracy, the basis of which is personal and public freedoms. The book includes twelve chapters divided into three sections, in addition to the introduction, references, and index.