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In 1951, Libya became an independent state, a federal monarchy. In 1969, a military coup overthrew the Sanusi monarchy and brought Muammar el-Qaddafi to power. Since that time, Libya has become politically and socially invisible, the least known of the North African states compared with Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia. Continuing conflict with the United States over terrorism and the question of Palestine have made Libya irascible to foreign scholars. In the absence of serious scholarship, competence in Arabic, and reliable knowledge of Libyan society and politics, Western mass media and many academics have reduced Libyan politics to the persona of Qaddafi, who is frequently characterized as a "mad dog" ruling a "rogue regime." This study by a female Libyan political scientist, Amal Obeidi, is therefore an especially welcome contribution to Libyan studies.
Obeidi is one of few scholars, such as Lisa Anderson, Dirk Vandewalle, Monte Palmer, Omar El-Fathaly, and John Davis, who have actually done research inside Libya since 1969. Obeidi's book is based on the Ph.D. dissertation she presented to the University of Durham in England, and she is currently a professor of political science at Garyounis University in Benghazi, Libya.
Obeidi's text is based on the study of political socialization and culture as analyzed by structural-functionalist American political scientists, especially Gabriel Almond, Bingham Powell, and Sidney Verba. Her main concern is to "understand the influence of state ideology on the young generation in Libya, since the revolutionary regime has made substantial effort to create a 'jamahirian citizen', by employing the main agents of political socialization, namely media and education. It has targeted the younger generation, in particular students" (p. 2). The author sets her task as assessing the influence of state ideology on a group of Libyan students by asking how effective Qaddafi's regime has been in creating politically active and motivated students who believe in...