Sectarianism in Iraq

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Viewing Iraq from the outside is made easier by compartmentalising its people (at least the Arabs among them) into Shi'as and Sunnis. But can such broad terms, inherently resistant to accurate quantification, description and definition, ever be a useful reflection of any society? If not, are we to discard the terms 'Shi'a' and 'Sunni' in seeking to understand Iraq? How are we to view the common Iraqi injunction that 'we are all brothers' or that 'we have no Shi'as and Sunnis' against the fact of sectarian civil war in 2006?

Fanar Haddad provides the first comprehensive examination of sectarian relations and sectarian identities in Iraq. Rather than treating the subject by recourse to broad-based categorisation, his analysis recognises the inherent ambiguity of group identity.

"Sectarianism in Iraq" explores the salience of sectarian identities – how they are negotiated in relation to Iraqi national identity and what role they play in the social and political lives of Iraqi Sunnis and Shi'as – focusing particularly on the two most significant turning points in modern Iraqi sectarian relations: the uprisings of March 1991 and the fall of the Ba'ath in 2003.