Political parties and social networks in Iraq, 1908-1920

Abstract

Sakai, Kelko; Political Parties and Social Networks in Iraq, 1908-1920; submitted for M.A. in Faculty of Social Sciences. C.M.E.I.S.; 1994 This study is to analyze the principal patterns of proto-nationalism as they emerged in the anti-colonial movement in the first two decades of twentieth century. The earliest party political activities were based on notions of Arab separatism from the Ottoman Empire and on anti-Western attitudes on the part of some religious Shi'i. On the eve of the award of the mandate for Iraq to Britain, two major political parties were actively opposed to the British occupation, and this opposition found expression in the country-wide uprising in 1920.At this stage Iraqi nationalism, in the sense of both qawmiya and wataniya. was only at a very early stage of development. The popularity and breadth of the uprising was largely due to its being based on a combination of existing social networks, and the way in which it acted as a focus for proto-national and anti-colonial sentiments. Haras al-Istiqlal succeeded in mobilizing 'traditional society' and managed at least in part to overcome tribal, religious, sectarian and urban/ rural differences, especially with a support it attracted from Shi'i "ulama and sada'. al-'Ahd al-'Iraqi. on the other hand, originally established as an 'Arabist' society by former Ottoman officers, also tried to mobilize tribal society, mainly in northern Iraq, after becoming separated from its Syrian- based founders. This caused antagonisms between the organization’s headquarters in Damascus and tribal and other local political forces in Iraq. Both parties attempted to mobilize sentiments which can be described loosely as 'Iraqist'. Although the idea of Iraqi wataniya was still vague in 1920, this early expression of Iraqism as a proto-nationalist force has functioned as a source for reproduction and the imagining of Iraqi national identity.