| This study attempts to reinterpret Ibn Khaldun's conception of politics on the basis of his theory of asabiya. The significance of Ibn Khaldun's theory of asabiya comes from the fact that it reveals the possibility of developing a holistic framework outside of a mechanical, particularistic, or positivist political outlook. Ibn Khaldun's conception of politics regards the relationship between power and virtue as the key issue in political phenomena. Accordingly, the dynamism of human nature and the average level of morality come to be the central parameters of politics. In this model change is not considered simply as a succession of discrete moments or static sociopolitical modes one after another. Rather, for Ibn Khaldun, change - particularly socio-political change - has ontological significance. As such, politics, in Ibn Khaldun's mindset, turns out to be history.;The main contention of this study is that Ibn Khaldun's theory of asabiya can be considered neither "pre-modern" nor "modern." Rather, given the epistemological and metaphysical assumptions it relies upon and the cosmological background it takes for granted, the theory of asabiya is to be regarded as a "non-modern" or "supra-modern" conception of politics.;This argument has been pursued through a comparative analysis between the theory of asabiya and social contract theory. The theory of the social contract formulated by Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau in the 17 th and 18th centuries and re-animated in the last quarter of the 20th century by Rawls, Gauthier, and others, has been considered the major political embodiment of modern conceptions of the self, society, and nature. Despite the differences between them, therefore, the proponents of social contract theory formulated and defended their ideas against Aristotelianism. Thus, in this picture, Aristotelianism constitutes the historical antagonist of social contract theory and represents, as such, the pre-modern approach to politics. Although it looks Aristotelian in terms of its political principles, the theory of asabiya is distinguished from it by both the cosmological background it relies upon and the empirical and demonstrative method it adopts. |
