Peaceful Wars and Unlikely Unions: The Azhar Strike of 1909 and the Politics of Comparison in Egypt

Abstract In January 1909, the students of Azhar, Islamic world’s most prestigious university, went on strike. Protesting recent curricular and administrative changes introduced by Egyptian Khedive, they demanded increased material support asserted university’s right to govern itself. After several weeks demonstrations that drew thousands supporters into streets Cairo, Khedive suspended reforms first caused Azharis walk out. Oddly, this remarkable mobilization has nearly vanished obscurity. Drawing reporting from press intelligence memoranda Ministry Interior, article argues apparent incongruity strike was no mistake. Their willful rejection ascribed categories helps explain both why movement unionized seminarians speaking a language self-government proved so striking for contemporary critics alike event slipped through cracks historiography still framed those very categories. Long forgotten in histories nationalism organized labor, Azhar represented pivotal moment emergence mass politics Egypt. invoking “union,” engaged multiple, overlapping acts comparison. Inspired modular repertoires militant simultaneously hailed constitutional revolution Ottoman Committee Union Progress as model political transformation. Rooted self-conscious critique colonial comparativism, their struggle thereby furnished new materials with which elaborate telescopic series anti-colonial solidarities were themselves fundamentally comparative.