in kinship or tribal lineage, it is not reduced to ‘blood relations’. On the contrary, for Ibn Khaldun asabiya refers to a ‘capacity for collective will-formation and commitment to sustained action’, which is not necessarily linked with one’s family ties but can also include a sense of attachment that resembles blood relations (Arnason and Stauth, 2004: 34; Ibn Khaldun, 2005: 264). As Gellner (1981: 27) emphasises, ‘“blood” is neither a necessary nor sufficient condition of cohesion; it is merely a way of talking about it’. This is explicitly stated in The Muqaddimah: ‘The affection everyone has for his clients and allies results from the feeling of shame that comes to a person when one of his neighbours, relatives, or a blood relation is in any way humiliated’ (Ibn Khaldun, 2005: 273). Asabiya is expressed as the intense, mutual interdependence, affection and willingness to help one’s comrades. It involves a close-knit group solidarity, unity and determination to sacrifice for one’s tribe, clan or a circle of friends and neighbours. As such it generates particular group dynamics often articulated as a superior organisational might: ‘Group feeling produces the ability to defend oneself, to protect oneself and to press one’s claims. Whoever loses his group feeling is too weak to do any one of these things’ (p. 289). Moreover, strong asabiya, often created and reinforced in war and military struggle, is the principal source of political power and authority.
As Ibn Khaldun makes clear in one of his most quoted sentences, ‘Leadership exists only through superiority and superiority only through group feeling.’ In other words, social cohesion generated on the battlefields and in the harsh living conditions of North African deserts fosters a unique form of solidarity, which is an essential prerequisite for political power. Ibn Khaldun identifies the strength of asabiya as a crucial reason why the various imperial armies had difficulty in conquering Maghreb lands. In contrast to the Spain and Egypt of his times, which provided little resistance as ‘they are now free of tribes and group feelings’ (p. 334), the Maghrebian Berber tribes who possess a high degree of asabiya were able to repel the imperial powers. Asabiya provided a mechanism for social cohesion, and hence military prowess, that no conqueror could easily destroy.
In this context, intense group feelings also tended to overpower other sources of identification, including religion. Although nearly all of the fourteenth-century North African tribes were pious Muslims, when directly confronted to choose between their tribal solidarity and the Islamic universalism of umma, the tendency was to opt for the former over the latter. Whereas the cities were the cradle of this civilising universalism, the countryside, was the beacon of diversity and civil virtue.
For Ibn Khaldun the tribal warrior vs. urban dweller dichotomy is at the heart of historical change. The urban centres generate economic growth, prosperity, civilisational refinement, religious and cultural development, but none of these advancements would be possible without the political stability and military protection provided by the tribal warrior groupings. Furthermore, unlike the tribal countryside, which is characterised by a defence-intensive egalitarianism of frugal and uncertain living, urban life is more comfortable but also deeply stratified and hierarchical. Paradoxically, the origins of this social stratification are to be found in the previous conquests of tribal warriors.
It is no coincidence that the cities were regularly established, conquered and ruled by dynasties of militarised tribes and clans. The rulers establish their legitimacy through lineage with the particular tribes, and maintain their power through their tribal links and group solidarities. In other words, asabiya is not only a form of group cohesion but also a means of political power exercised by the tribal chiefs. Relying on this social device of group unity, the rulers impose their power in the cities. Nevertheless, as social hierarchies develop and grow in the urban environment, they undermine the egalitarian principles that underpin tribal social cohesion. It is a strong asabiya that allows the warrior tribes to acquire military might and it is this same cohesive quality that fosters political domination. However, as social solidarity is built in the harsh conditions of the countryside, once the tribal warriors settled permanently in the cities, the building blocks of social cohesion gradually erode. As the ruling groups embrace a life of luxury, stability, certainty and abundance their moral principles tend to change. Once the rulers lose their tribal ties and become highly corrupt, their political and ideological power is destabilised, leading to internal dissent and ultimately providing conditions for those new tribal invaders who are eager to establish their own dynasty.
Contemporary Relevance and Applications
There is no doubt that Confucius’s teachings had much more impact on the state policies and the social behaviour of millions of people, than those of Ibn Khaldun. For one thing Confucianism was an official state doctrine of China for more than 2,000 years. From the second century bce (during the Han dynasty) until 1948, Confucian teachings were institutionalised as the principal state narrative and as such were integral to the system of education that reproduced the civil service structure of Mandarin bureaucrat scholars who were crucial for the shape of the Chinese state for centuries.
For another thing, in much of East Asia, Confucianism gradually developed into something akin to a religious doctrine and as such it has deeply influenced the behaviour of ordinary individuals for many generations. Even though the Chinese communists were initially hostile to what they regarded as a profoundly conservative ideology, recent years have witnessed a major re-evaluation of Confucius in communist China. The consequence of this top-down revision within the Communist Party of China is much more space being given to Confucius’s teachings in the mass media, educational system, cultural diplomacy and even popular culture. The fact that Confucianism has a large and strong following throughout East Asia and continues to influence the behaviour of hundreds of millions of people would indicate that its contemporary relevance is enormous.
Sociology, Modernity and Eurocentrism
The critique of Eurocentrism reflects the need to go beyond established sociological perspectives in pursuit of a truly cosmopolitan sociology suited to contemporary globalised societies. That classical sociology was justified in assigning world historical significance to specific developments in European societies is not disputed. Instead, the critique of Eurocentrism problematises the generalisation of Western perspectives over other forms of knowing, with its implicit assumption of cultural superiority and exaggeration of difference. This is perhaps most pernicious in the postulates of modernisation theory, as it was developed in the 1950s. With the contemporary field of post-colonialism spearheading movements to ‘decolonise’ the literature and enable the voice of the subaltern to be heard, sociology may yet embrace non-European forebears.
However, while Confucian teachings have a substantial impact, as a form of state policy and society-wide cultural practice, these ideas had less impact on the development of social science in general and sociological analysis in particular. Although scholars have utilised Confucian concepts and principles to articulate a neo-Confucian sociological tradition (Seok-Choon et al., 2011; Cho, 1996); the deeply normative character of Confucius’s writings has prevented development of an original and vibrant sociological school of thought.
In contrast, Ibn Khaldun’s contributions have inspired generations of scholars to use and refine his original proto-sociological models and apply them to a variety of social contexts in the contemporary world. Hence scholars have made use of his theories of state formation to analyse the rise and fall of civilisations in Africa, Asia, the Middle East and further afield (Alatas, 1993, 2007, 2014; Arnason and Stauth, 2004; Ortega y Gasset, 2000 [1976]; Gellner, 1981). Furthermore, Ibn Khaldun’s concept of asabiya has retained much of its sociological relevance throughout the centuries and as such has been deployed to explain the dynamics of social cohesion in North Africa, the Ottoman Empire, Safavid Iran, Syria and Saudi Arabia among others (Abir, 1987; Alatas, 1990, 2014; Gellner, 1969, 1981) as well as to analyse the transformation of micro-level solidarities through time (Al-Azmeh, 1997; Lacoste, 1984; Malešević, 2015). More recently scholars have applied Khaldunian arguments to specific contemporary contexts ranging from issues such as the political legitimacy
