Critical perspectives on global power

Nermeen Shaikh’s scholarly work of non-fiction The Present As History: Critical Perspectives on Global Power is probably not intended for non-scholars like me. The book is a selection of interviews with 13 leading contemporary thinkers from the social sciences... discussing how the social sciences affect global power. The interviews are erudite and require much concentrated reading. Moreover, the reader is expected to be (already) well-versed in subjects as varied as Islam, Economics, International Affairs, Anthropology, Human Rights, Feminism and Post-Colonial History. As you can guess, I’m struggling with it.

Meanwhile, on YouTube, I came upon a short interview of Nermeen Shaikh on News Weakly - a TV programme from Pakistan hosted by Sami Shah. The interview, while introducing Ms Shaikh’s book The Present As History: Critical Perspectives on Global Power, presents a perspective on how the United States and the West view a concept like ‘war on terror’... and how foolish and dangerous that view can be for the rest of the world.