To Merge Or Not to Merge A Survey of Arab Movements Toward Socio-political Union

The movement towards Arab unity is not a recent phenomenon. The conditions and circumstances under which it has taken many of its modern forms change from day to day; nevertheless, the concept of Arab unity is based on a socio-historical rationale as old as the Arab people. Arab unity today reflects this rationale as a historical imperative and symbolically represents a desire to recreate the links to a past which many believe has never been broken. In the broadest sense, this study seeks to clarify the socio-historical rationale upon which the ideological superstructure of Arab unity rests and to show how its unifying thread runs through a seemingly unintelligible diversity of events. Insofar as recent happenings in the Middle East have contributed to the revival of the Arab unit movement, a discussion of its historical genesis cannot be avoided. Still, history itself does not provide the only answers because Arab unity is a response to the heartfelt psychological needs of a historic people. (Author).