The social organization of industrial work in Turkey provides us with an interesting case for the examination of the relationship between established social forms and meanings and the technological ad organizational exigencies of economic production. The organization of Turkish industrial production is, on the one hand, clearly an outgrowth of the technological apparatus that was imported from the Vest in the process of development since the nineteenth century. On the other hand, it is also deeply rooted in an indigenous social structure and culture. In this paper I hope to outline the interrelationship between these diverse factors.

The very nature of colonialism—the extension of authority by one nation over another people—precludes any valid consideration of the system within a mere examination of its political and economic exploitative elements. The primary of these motives, however, has often overshadowed other traditional emphases of the colonizer himself in seeking advancement of his corrosive system. Reference to the mission civilisatrice, the cultural and moral mission of the colonizer, preoccupied and prejudiced continued justification for the colonial institution. Yet, the fallacy of the major objectives of the system revealed the untenable character of its moral, humanitarian, and cultural aspects.

In 1970, I published in Mélanges de l'Institut Dominicain d'Etudes Orientales (MIDEO) a long article entitled ‘La civilisation musulmane dans l'æuvre du Professeur von Grunebaum’ which was part of a study in preparation for publication. This study although sympathetic was a very objective approach to the works of Gustave E. von Grunebaum. He appreciated it but urged me to make a personal critical evaluation of his work, without hesitating, if necessary, to contradict any of his opinions. As a close friend, I accepted willingly.I composed it under the form of 'some questions posited to M. Grunebaum'. He read my essay and found the questions provocative andinteresting enough to answer. But alas, death snatched him before the essay was published. As tribute to his memory and as a historical document I thought it would be interesting to publish it as is, without any recasting.

Before 1936 few Moroccans were concerned with or affected by French syndicalism. This condition was hardly modified by the promulgation of the dahir of 24 December 1936, under the impetus of the Front Populaire in the metropole, which accorded syndical liberties to the European populace of Morocco, nor was it changed by the dahir of 24 June 1938. These laws did not deter the French Congrès Général du Travail (CGT) from recruiting Moroccans, especially in the mining areas where it enjoyed considerable success. By the end of 1937 more than a thousand Moroccan miners had been enrolled at the Khouribga phosphate mines; but a series of rather violent strikes led to the repressive dahir of 1938. Disturbed by the entry of Moroccans into unions, the French administration presented to the sultan, Mohammed Ben Youssef, a dahir forbidding his subjects to form unions and established penalties applicable to Europeans permitting Moroccans to join their labor organizations. The sultan was only too ready to sign, seeing in union membership a grave threat to the authority of the Makhzen. Fortunately for the Moroccan labor movement, the formal interdiction of the 1938 dahir was never seriously applied.

Over the past two decades scholars have become aware of the great importance of the so-called Cairo Geniza documents as a primary source for medieval Mediterranean socioeconomic history. This awareness is due principally to the indefatigable work of S. D. Goitein. The Geniza documents also provide an important source for one aspect of the art history of the period. The some 750 trousseau lists from the Cairo Geniza, in combination with ancillary Geniza records, offer a wealth of information—hitherto unexploited—on the attire of Jewish women in medieval Egypt, and by extension, the attire of Muslim women as well. The trousseau lists dating mainly from the Fatimid and Ayyubid periods (969–1250)—and to a lesser extent from the Mamluk (1250–1517)—contain the complete wardrobe of a medieval Egyptian bride.

The events that took place in Iraq in 1941, commonly called Rashid Ali al-Kaylani or the Revolution of 1941 by the Iraqis, were very important to the subsequent political development of that country. They led Iraq to war with Britain, and most of what happened after that date, including the July 14, 1958, Revolution, can be explained in one way or another as an extension of what happened in May 1941.