Sudan: State and Society in Crisis

This edited volume provides a panoramic view of both historical and contemporary Sudan from a variety of different academic disciplines. Employing the 1964 October Revolution and the 1989 military coup as points of departure, anthropologists, political scientists, and historians provide unique and complimentary explanations for why Sudan continues to oscillate between pluralistic reconciliation and deadly sectarianism. Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban offers a particularly interesting interpretation of the 1983 September Laws which institutionalized Islamic state-structures, arguing that once adopted, these laws became nearly impossible to repeal due to latent sectarian tension, problems of national unity, and the rise of the Muslim Brotherhood.