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A luncheon colloquium with BC Political Science faculty member, Marsin Alshamary
 

There are not many beliefs that are shared jointly by Saddam Hussein, by the British occupiers of Iraq in the 1920s, and by later American policymakers. One of these beliefs is the fear that the Shi’a religious establishment in Iraq would mount a revolution and seek political leadership in the state. In this presentation, Alshamary will rely on years of fieldwork in Iraq (including interviews with political elites, protestors, and clerics) as well as archival research in the Ba’ath Party Archives, to first explain why political elites feared the power of Shi’a clerics and, secondly, to document the interactions between political elites, clerics, and protestors in Iraqi history. She will demonstrate that despite the fears of government elites, Shi’a clerics are not driven by an ideological inclination to protest nor a hunger for power, but rather are invested in protecting their centuries-old religious establishment.