The document reproduced above—Minutes No. 34 of the Iraqi Scientific Academy, dated 3 May 1987—constitutes an intellectually significant archival record. It captures a meeting of the Committee on History and Civilization, attended by some of the most eminent Arab and Iraqi scholars of the twentieth century: historians, philologists, editors of classical texts, and guardians of Arabic intellectual heritage. Figures such as Dr. Jawād ʿAlī, Dr. Ṣāliḥ Aḥmad al-ʿAlī, Muḥammad Bahjat al-Atharī, and others represented a generation deeply rooted in the classical tradition yet attentive to modern intellectual crises.
What is striking about this document is not merely the stature of those present, but the foresight of their concern. As early as 1987—more than thirty-nine years ago—the committee identified a dangerous intellectual trend in the Arab world: the emergence of regionalist tendencies inclined toward self-glorification and the fragmentation of Arab thought. Their discussion reveals an acute awareness that the rise of regional ideological frameworks could erode the historically universal character of Arab-Islamic intellectual production.
Today, the concerns articulated in that session appear almost prophetic.
The Problem of Regionalization and the Fragmentation of Heritage
The committee’s warning regarding “regional tendencies inclined toward self-glorification” anticipated what we now witness across much of the Arab world: the transformation of cultural identity into a narrowly political instrument. Sub-identities—local, regional, tribal, or national—are not in themselves problematic. On the contrary, they enrich civilizational diversity. However, when such identities are mobilized within restrictive political frameworks, they cease to function as cultural expressions and instead become tools of exclusion.
The modern Arab states that emerged after the First and Second World Wars were largely products of European geopolitical decisions. Borders were drawn, sovereignties defined, and national narratives constructed within the framework of international power politics rather than organic intellectual continuity. Over time, these political boundaries began to retroactively reshape cultural memory itself.
Thus, figures whose intellectual production belonged to a transregional Arabic sphere were reclassified according to contemporary state boundaries. Imruʾ al-Qays becomes “Saudi” or “Yemeni.” Al-Mutanabbī becomes “Iraqi” because he was born in Kūfa and died in Iraq. Entire bodies of poetry, philosophy, and scientific writing are assigned national labels that would have been conceptually alien to their authors.
Such retroactive nationalization fragments a civilizational heritage that historically transcended political frontiers. It reduces a shared intellectual universe to administrative categories defined in the twentieth century. In doing so, it transforms heritage into a competitive resource among states rather than a collective civilizational inheritance.
Baghdad as a Civilizational Paradigm
The 1987 committee explicitly invoked Tārīkh Baghdād by al-Khaṭīb al-Baghdādī as an exemplar of Arab intellectual thought. This reference is not incidental. Baghdad during its classical period was not merely a capital city; it was a civilizational center whose intellectual life operated beyond ethnic, sectarian, or territorial confines.
Arabic functioned as a language of knowledge, not a national marker. Scholars of Persian, Turkic, Arab, and other backgrounds contributed to a shared intellectual field. The “Baghdadi imprint” referred to in the document symbolized a cosmopolitanism rooted in language and scholarship rather than territorial nationalism.
The universal character of Arab-Islamic thought did not imply uniformity; it implied intellectual permeability. Baghdad, Córdoba, Cairo, Damascus, Nishapur, and other centers were interconnected nodes within a wider epistemic geography. Knowledge circulated; scholars traveled; texts migrated. Intellectual identity was defined by participation in discourse rather than by passport.
From Intellectual Production to Intellectual Consumption
One of the most consequential implications of the committee’s concerns is visible today: the Arab region has largely ceased to function as a primary producer of globally influential intellectual paradigms. Instead, it often operates as a site of reception, adaptation, and repetition of ideas formulated elsewhere—primarily in Western academic and political centers.
This is not merely a matter of institutional weakness. It reflects a deeper epistemological contraction. When cultural heritage is fragmented into state-based narratives, intellectual energy becomes inward-looking and competitive rather than outward-looking and generative. Regional self-glorification may produce symbolic pride, but it rarely produces new universal frameworks.
The irony is profound: a civilization once characterized by translation movements, philosophical synthesis, scientific innovation, and legal creativity now struggles to transcend the confines of narrowly politicized identity discourses.
Identity: Cultural Plurality vs. Political Instrumentalization
Identity, in its cultural sense, is cumulative and layered. One may be Iraqi, Arab, Muslim, Kurdish, urban, tribal, modern, or traditional simultaneously. Civilizations historically flourished when identities coexisted without collapsing into mutually exclusive categories.
The crisis emerges when identity is transformed into a political instrument of exclusivity. In many contemporary Arab states, identity discourse is increasingly mobilized to assert state sovereignty, differentiate national narratives, and consolidate internal legitimacy. Cultural figures and historical achievements are selectively appropriated to reinforce national distinctiveness.
This instrumentalization produces three consequences:
Epistemic fragmentation – Knowledge traditions are divided along political lines, limiting transregional collaboration.
Symbolic competition – Cultural heritage becomes a site of rivalry rather than shared custodianship.
Intellectual stagnation – Energy is expended on ownership claims rather than innovation.
In such an environment, the question posed by the 1987 committee—“What role should Iraq assume in guiding Arab intellectual orientations?”—acquires renewed urgency. The deeper question today might be: can any single state guide a civilizational orientation, or must intellectual renewal transcend state frameworks altogether?
Reclaiming the Universal Without Erasing the Local
The challenge is not to abolish national identities. Modern states are political realities. Rather, the task is to prevent the state from redefining the totality of cultural belonging. A poet like al-Mutanabbī can be celebrated within Iraqi cultural memory without being confined to it. Imruʾ al-Qays can belong to Arabian geography without being reduced to a national emblem.
To reclaim the universal dimension of Arab intellectual heritage is not nostalgia; it is a strategic necessity. It requires:
Re-centering Arabic as a language of knowledge rather than merely identity.
Reviving transregional academic collaboration.
Teaching heritage as a shared civilizational archive rather than a competitive national trophy.
Encouraging intellectual production that addresses universal human questions rather than state-bound narratives.
Conclusion
The 3 May 1987 minutes of the Iraqi Scientific Academy represent more than administrative documentation. They capture a moment of intellectual self-awareness at a critical juncture in modern Arab history. The scholars gathered there recognized early the dangers of regional ideological fragmentation and the erosion of universal intellectual horizons.
Nearly four decades later, their concerns resonate with greater intensity. The transformation of identity into narrow political currency has contributed to cultural fragmentation and diminished global intellectual presence. Yet the very existence of this archival document reminds us that alternative frameworks were envisioned—and remain possible.
The task before contemporary scholars is not merely to preserve heritage but to restore its civilizational scale. Only then can the Arab intellectual tradition move from defensive preservation to creative renewal.