ABSTRACT
This chapter is intended to argue against the presuppositions underlying a view, as well as to question the validity of the assumptions of economic primacy and structural-functionalism that shape a number of apparently antithetical perspectives. In this instance, the states of the Middle East and North Africa will form the chief focus of examination, but the suggestion is not that they are unique or exceptional. Rather, it may be supposed that theories with universal pretensions that demonstrate gaps or inadequacies in one region will also need revision elsewhere. The reality of Islamist movements and governments has been somewhat at odds with these claims and it becomes apparent that the power of the state as an imaginative construct in the Middle East remains a formidable one. Economic resources and the structures which allow for their exploitation and distribution play a role - sometimes a very important one.
