Translation starts here: Jassim Al-Helfi, ‘The Social Movement in Iraq: Diverse approaches towards a single goal’, al-thaqafa al-jadida, 380/2, 2016. Introduction The broad protests, which erupted on the 25th February 2011, have continued, via various ups and downs, until they took on the form of a wide popular momentum from the 31st July 2015. The
This is the final par of my translation of an article by independent leftist Iraqi intellectual and social psychologist Faris Kamal Nadhmi (Part I, and Part II can be found by following the links). In this final concluding section, Nadhmi critiques the notion of the Sadrists as ‘blind’ followers of their religious leader. This question
The Sadrists’ 30 day hiatus from participation in the protests for reform continues (details of this can be found in an earlier post). One reason Muqtada al-Sadr gave for the 30 day withdrawal was to allow space for other groups to participate in the movement, and especially those in the civil-trend who have previously stayed
On the 30th of July a conference was held in Baghdad, facilitated by the Iraqi Communist Party, and attended by around 600 young civil society activists (al-shabaab al-madani) from the city (quite an impressive turnout). The conference was interesting in that it sheds light on the role of the Iraqi Communist Party (ICP) as the
Last Saturday (July 30th, 2016) Muqtada al-Sadr released a statement in which he announced that the Sadrist trend would not participate, for a period of 30 days, in ongoing protests against corruption in Baghdad’s Tahrir square. In his statement Sadr said that: ‘There are those who do not attend the protests because of the presence
Translation, Part I: Faris Kamal Nadhmi, ‘The Civil Trend-Sadrist Convergence in the Arena of Protest: A psychological vision in the dynamics of the social left’
I recently posted a translation of an article by the independent Iraqi leftist intellectual and social psychologist Faris Kamal Nadhmi. Nadhmi wrote the article back in 2010 and it argued that the Iraqi leftist-civil trend and the Sadrist movement should come together to produce a ‘historical bloc’ in Gramscian terms. This post features my
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