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Sami Zubaida's Law and Power in the Islamic World is a fascinating politico-social history of the relations between Islamic law and the procession of political masters who have ruled the Middle East since the Prophet's death. One message is clear: the notion of an omnipotent shariءa, passed from caliph to caliph for fourteen centuries, is a myth held by both Islamist radicals and their Western critics.

The question, "When is the nation?" ranks second in importance only to the related query, "Why is the nation?" in the contemporary social science & humanities literature on nationalism. This issue is confronted by this essay, which considers Anthony Smith's important perennialist-modernist dichotomy through the lens of the American experience. Along the way, it will address the related but independent question of whether nations are "top-down" artifacts constructed by the modern state, or "bottom-up" social formations generated by ethnic groups within civil society. The importance of this theoretical question lies not merely with the antiquarian interest in how our world system of nations emerged, but with the more pressing question of why it is persistently recreated, &, for idealists, how it may be superseded. 1 Table. Adapted from the source document.

Debate in the field of historical sociology on the subject of American citizenship and nationality tends to support one of two theories. The exceptionalist argument holds that American nationalist discourse has historically been based on the universal ideals of liberty enshrined in the Constitution, and has been inclusive in character. Critics contend that this was not the case – arguing that the narrative of American national identity has typically been grounded on exclusive ethno‐cultural criteria like race, religion or language. This essay attempts to demonstrate that the truth encompasses, yet transcends, both positions. This is not because there were conflicting parties in the nineteenth century nationality debate – indeed, there was a great deal of elite consensus as to the meaning of American nationhood prior to the twentieth century which simultaneously affirmed both the universalist and particularist dimension of Americanism. How to explain this apparent contradiction, which Ralph Waldo Emerson termed "double‐consciousness?" This paper suggests that the nineteenth century popularity of dualistic statements of American nationhood, and the eclipse of such conceptions in the twentieth, is a complex sociological phenomenon that can only fully be explained by taking into account the development of institutional reflexivity in the United States.

The traditional perception of the US as a cosmopolitan civilization based upon liberal doctrine is repudiated. After discussing the differences between cosmopolitanism & particularism, it is claimed that the US possesses an American ethnicity that evolved from English Protestant settlers; moreover, it is argued that this American ethnicity was preserved by forcing immigrant populations into the national ethnic group while maintaining strict ethnic boundaries. It is contended that colonial statespersons' connection of the US with the Anglo-Saxon movement in the late medieval UK served to promote the perception of the US as a cosmopolitan nation. The influence of anti-Catholic sentiment during the 1830s & of populist movements during the late 19th century in attempting to assimilate immigrant populations is discussed. In addition, the problems posed by early-20th-century immigrant groups for preserving American ethnicity & the subsequent delineation of the Southern Appalachian region as representative of authentic American ethnicity are addressed. It is concluded that the US's historical treatment of immigrants should be viewed similarly to other Western nations. 5 Figures. J. W. Parker