‘Abd al-Ģamīd al-Zahrāwī and His Thought Reconsidered: An Intellectual Portrait of the Arab Nationalist as an Ottoman Politician

Abstract

‘Abd al-Ģamīd al-Zahrāwī, an Ottoman-Arab MP, has been studied exclusi- vely from the perspective of Arab nationalism. In fact, he highly evaluated the imperial framework and deduced that the only possible way of resisting the Western invasion was by means of power. Zahrāwī espoused the political unity of Ottomans, based on communities and not individuals. He advocated the need for political education in or- der to realize this desirable political unity, without inviting the ethno-religious conflicts. His elitist mentality led him to rely on, if necessary, disciplinary coercion and educate the “ignorant” masses and the “barbarous” nomads. His theoretical contributions not- withstanding, Zahrāwī could not persuasively introduce a pragmatic alternative to realize his ideas in the context of Ottoman constitutional politics. His preference of com- munitarian over individual egalitarianism contradicted the legal as well as institutional reality of Ottoman constitutionalism. From the viewpoint of Ottoman intellectual history, Zahrāwī had much in common with his non-Arab colleagues.