ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the writing and life of Ibn Khaldun as a modest step towards broadening IR to account more fully for those alternative conceptions that actually constitute the emerging world order. Writing in a period that saw the basic structure of medieval Islamic civilization unravel, Ibn Khaldun experienced first-hand the shifting fortunes of Muslim political authority and material conditions. Ibn Khaldun posits the rationality of historical processes. Extending Islamic metaphysics, he sees reason as the distinguishing mark of human beings. A central concern for Ibn Khaldun is the tripartite relationship between the rise of civilization, economic prosperity and social disintegration. Ibn Khaldun repudiates the notion of culture as a primordial substance. The significance of Ibn Khaldun's thoughts on universal history becomes pronounced against the background of rethinking the relation of the Islamic world to the emerging world order.
