To reflect on the historical period covered in this volume is to be struck by the paramount role that the Arab Left, broadly defined, played in shaping it. By 1970, the vast majority of Arab peoples lived in states that officially advocated anti-colonialism, regional unity and socialism. The largest and most consequential political formations – the Communist parties, the Baath and the Movement of Arab Nationalists (MAN) – were openly revolutionary in orientation and had either originally been Marxists or had initiated a transition, with uneven results, to Marxism and other varieties of socialism. All of these formations were transnational, simultaneously operating in multiple Arab countries. Tendencies and currents splitting from them or arguing against them embraced a range of radical world views, drawing on Maoism, Trotskyism, the New Left and other schools of thought. The transistor radio ensured that most Arab households were exposed, through the broadcasts of Sawt al-Arab (Voice of the Arabs), to the political discourse of Nasserism. The settler-colonial zones of Algeria and Palestine gave rise to two of the most influential liberation struggles on the global stage, mobilising millions of people in these countries and far beyond. Cairo, Algiers, Beirut became prominent revolutionary hubs on the global solidarity map, hosting movements and figures from across the world and affording them diplomatic, material and military support.

The left – understood in the chapters of this volume as encompassing movements and figures that were anti-colonial in orientation, non-aligned or pro-Eastern Bloc in Cold War allegiance, secular in approach, reformist or revolutionary in social outlook and economically redistributive, promoting agendas ranging from social democratic welfarism to outright communist seizure of the means of production – played a defining role in social struggles. It established women's organisations, promoted feminist thought, and pushed for personal status reforms – through the eff orts of such figures as Naziha al-Dulaymi, a communist and the Arab world's first female Arab cabinet minister. The left also formed trade unions, mobilised workers and organised labour agitation; it launched student uprisings, and carried out agrarian resistance at the hands of resolute organisers like Shahinda Maqlad.