Alavi Contra Alavi: Towards a Conjunctural Awareness

Abstract

This chapter explores the writings of Pakistani sociologist Hamza Alavi, especially on the post-colonial state, ethnicity, peasantry and kinship relations. In contradistinction to most (partial) uptakes of Alavi, I evaluate his work as a whole in order to shed light on its continuities and discontinuities. I demonstrate both the strengths and pitfalls of Alavi's theorisation of the post-colonial state, mode of production and ethnicity by placing him in context of wider Marxist debates at the time. I then suggest that Alavi's other work (e.g. on the peasantry and kinship relations) may serve to complement the weaknesses of the former. Thus, by reading Alavi contra Alavi, I advocate for an ‘integral’ perspective on the relations between civil and political society, arguing for a conjunctural awareness of mediations between the same, and their imbrications with differentiated relations of class, ethnicity and kinship.

Citation

Mallick, A. (2023), "Alavi Contra Alavi: Towards a Conjunctural Awareness", Plys, K., Priyansh and Goonewardena, K. (Ed.) Marxist Thought in South Asia (Political Power and Social Theory, Vol. 40), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 29-45. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0198-871920230000040004