Tariq Ali
Ali at Imperial College, London (2006)
Born	(1943-10-21) 21 October 1943 (age 68) Lahore, British Raj (now Pakistan)
Occupation	Military historian Novelist Activist
Alma mater	University of the Punjab Exeter College, Oxford
Genres	Geopolitics History Postcolonialism
Subjects	Historical criticism
Literary movement	New Left Review
Spouse(s)	Susan Watkins

Tariq Ali (Punjabi, Urdu: طارق علی), (born 21 October 1943), is a British Pakistani military historian, novelist, journalist, filmmaker, public intellectual, political campaigner, activist, and commentator.^[1][2] He is a member of the editorial committee of the New Left Review and Sin Permiso, and regularly contributes to The Guardian, CounterPunch, and the London Review of Books.

He is the author of several books, including Pakistan: Military Rule or People's Power (1970), Can Pakistan Survive? The Death of a State (1991), Pirates Of The Caribbean: Axis Of Hope (2006), Conversations with Edward Said (2005), Bush in Babylon (2003), and Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity (2002), A Banker for All Seasons (2007), The Duel (2008) and The Obama Syndrome (2010).

Early life[link]

Ali was born and raised in Lahore. The city was part of British India at the time of his birth in 1943, but became part of the newly independent nation of Pakistan four years later. He is the son of journalist Mazhar Ali Khan and activist mother Tahira Mazhar Ali Khan (daughter of Sir Sikandar Hyat Khan who led the Unionist Muslim League and was later Prime Minister of the Punjab from 1937–1942).

Ali's parents "both came from a very old, crusty, feudal family".^[3] His father had broken with the family's conventions in politics when he was a student, adopting communism and atheism. Ali's mother also belonged to the same family, and became radicalized upon meeting his father. However, Ali was taught the fundamentals of Islam in order to be able to argue against it.^[3] He stated in Islam, Empire, and the Left: Conversation with Tariq Ali: "I grew up an atheist. I make no secret of it. It was acceptable. In fact, when I think back, none of my friends were believers. None of them were religious; maybe a few were believers. But very few were religious in temperament."^[4]

Emerging activism[link]

While studying at the Punjab University, he organised demonstrations against Pakistan's military dictatorship^{[citation needed]}. Ali's maternal uncle was chief of Pakistan's Military Intelligence^{[citation needed]} and he warned Ali's parents that if he didn't stop criticising the government, he'd be in deep trouble soon. His parents therefore decided to get him out of Pakistan, and sent him to England to study at Exeter College, Oxford, where he studied Philosophy, Politics, and Economics.^[5] He was elected President of the Oxford Union, in 1965. Ali's tenure at the Union included a meeting with Malcolm X in December 1964 during which Malcolm X expressed deep consternation about his own risk of assassination.^[6]

Career[link]

His public profile began to grow during the Vietnam War, when he engaged in debates against the war with such figures as Henry Kissinger and Michael Stewart. He testified at the Russell Tribunal over US involvement in Vietnam. As time passed, Ali became increasingly critical of American and Israeli foreign policies. He is also well known for his satirical work. He was also a vigorous opponent of American relations with Pakistan that tended to back military dictatorships over democracy. He was one of the marchers on the American embassy in London in 1968 in a demonstration against the Vietnam war.^[7]

Active in the New Left of the 1960s, he has long been associated with the New Left Review. Drawn into revolutionary socialist politics through his involvement with The Black Dwarf newspaper, he joined a Trotskyist party, the International Marxist Group (IMG) in 1968. He was recruited to the leadership of the IMG and became a member of the International Executive Committee of the (reunified) Fourth International. He also befriended influential figures such as Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael, John Lennon, and Yoko Ono.^[8]

In 1967 Ali was in Camiri, Bolivia, not far from where Che Guevara was captured, to observe the trial of Régis Debray. He was accused of being a Cuban revolutionary by authorities. Ali then said "If you torture me the whole night and I can speak Spanish in the morning I'll be grateful to you for the rest of my life."^[9]

During this period he was an IMG candidate in Sheffield Attercliffe at the February 1974 UK general election and was co-author of Trotsky for Beginners, a cartoon book. In 1981, the IMG dissolved when its members entered the Labour Party: the IMG was promptly proscribed. Ali then abandoned activism in the revolutionary left and supported Tony Benn in his bid to become deputy leader of the Labour Party that year.

In 1990, he published the satire Redemption, on the inability of the Trotskyists to handle the downfall of the Eastern bloc. The book contains parodies of many well-known figures in the Trotskyist movement.

His book Bush in Babylon criticizes the 2003 invasion of Iraq by American president George W. Bush. This book has a unique style, using poetry and critical essays in portraying the war in Iraq as a failure. Ali believes that the new Iraqi government will fail.

His previous book, Clash of Fundamentalisms, puts the events of the September 11 attacks in historical perspective, covering the history of Islam from its foundations.

Ali has remained a critic of modern neoliberal economics and was present at the 2005 World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, Brazil where he was one of 19 to sign the Porto Alegre Manifesto. He is a fan of the Bolivarian Revolution in Venezuela.^[10]

He has been described as "the alleged inspiration" for the Rolling Stones' song "Street Fighting Man", recorded in 1968.^[11] John Lennon's "Power to the People" was inspired by an interview Lennon gave to Ali.^[12]

In an article published in CounterPunch, he responded to the Pope Benedict XVI Islam controversy and said, "The Bavarian is a razor-sharp reactionary cleric. I think he knew what he was saying and why. In a neo-liberal world suffering from environmental degradation, poverty, hunger, repression, a ‘planet of slums’ (in the graphic phrase of Mike Davis), the Pope chooses to insult the founder of a rival faith. The reaction in the Muslim world was predictable, but depressingly insufficient."^[13]

Screenplay[link]

Tariq Ali's The Leopard and The Fox, first written as a BBC screenplay in 1985, is about the last days of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto. Never previously produced because of a censorship controversy, it was finally premiered in New York in October 2007, the day before former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto returned to her home country after eight years in exile.^[14]

in 2009, Ali, alongside Mark Weisbrot wrote the screenplay to the Oliver Stone documentary South of the Border.^[15] This gave a favourable account of Hugo Chavez and other left wing Latin American leaders.

Personal life[link]

He currently lives in Highgate, London with his wife Susan Watkins, editor of the New Left Review. He has three children: Natasha, Chengiz, and Aisha.

Works (partial)[link]

• Pakistan: Military Rule or People's Power (1970) ISBN 978-0-224-61864-9
• The Coming British Revolution (1971) ISBN 978-0-224-00630-9
• 1968 and After: Inside the Revolution (1978) ISBN 978-0-85634-082-6
• Chile, Lessons of the Coup: Which Way to Workers Power (1978) ISBN 978-0-85612-107-4
• Trotsky for Beginners (1980) ISBN 978-0-906495-27-8
• Can Pakistan Survive?: The Death of a State (1983) ISBN 978-0-8052-7194-2; (1991) ISBN 978-0-86091-260-6
• Who's Afraid of Margaret Thatcher? In Praise of Socialism (1984) ISBN 978-0-86091-802-8
• The Stalinist Legacy: Its Impact on 20th-Century World Politics (1984) ISBN 978-0-931477-56-0
• An Indian Dynasty: The Story of the Nehru-Gandhi Family (1985) ISBN 978-0-399-13074-8
• Street Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties (1987) ISBN 978-0-00-217779-5
• Revolution from Above: Soviet Union Now (1988) ISBN 978-0-86091-268-2
• Iranian Nights (1989) ISBN 978-1-85459-026-8
• Moscow Gold (1990) ISBN 978-1-85459-078-7
• Redemption (1990) ISBN 978-0-7011-3394-8
• Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree (1992; 1st in the 'Islam Quintet') ISBN 978-0-7011-3944-5
• Necklaces (1992)
• Ugly Rumours (1998) ISBN 978-1-85459-426-6
• 1968: Marching in the Streets (1998) ISBN 978-0-7475-3763-2
• Fear of Mirrors Arcadia Books (4 Aug 1998) ISBN 978-1-900850-10-0; University of Chicago Press (10 Aug 2010) ISBN 978-1-906497-15-6
• The Book of Saladin (1998; 2nd in the 'Islam Quintet') ISBN 978-1-85984-834-0
• Snogging Ken (2000) ISBN 978-1-84002-163-9
• The Stone Woman (2000; 3rd in the 'Islam Quintet') ISBN 978-1-85984-764-0
• Masters of the Universe: NATO's Balkan Crusade (2000) ISBN 978-1-85984-752-7
• Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity (2002) ISBN 978-1-85984-679-7
• Bush in Babylon (2003) ISBN 978-1-85984-583-7
• Street-Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties (2005) ISBN 978-1-84467-029-1
• Speaking of Empire and Resistance: Conversations with Tariq Ali (2005) ISBN 978-1-56584-954-9
• Rough Music: Blair, Bombs, Baghdad, London, Terror (2005) ISBN 978-1-84467-545-6
• Conversations with Edward Said (2005) ISBN 978-1-905422-04-3
• A Sultan in Palermo (2005; featuring Muhammad al-Idrisi and Roger II of Sicily; 4th in the 'Islam Quintet') ISBN 978-1-84467-025-3
• The Leopard and the Fox (2006) ISBN 978-1-905422-29-6
• Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope (2006) ISBN 978-1-84467-102-1; revised ed. (2008) ISBN 978-1-84467-248-6
• A Banker for All Seasons: Bank of Crooks and Cheats Incorporated (2007) ISBN 978-1-905422-65-4
• The assassination: Who Killed Indira G? (2008) ISBN 978-1-905422-85-2
• The Duel: Pakistan on the Flight Path of American Power (2008) ISBN 978-1-84737-355-7
• The Protocols of the Elders of Sodom: and other Essays (2009) ISBN 978-1-84467-367-4
• The Idea of Communism (Non-fiction) (2009) ISBN 978-1-906497-26-2
• Night of the Golden Butterfly (2010; 5th in the 'Islam Quintet') ISBN 978-1-84467-611-8
• The Obama Syndrome: Surrender at Home, War Abroad (2010) ISBN 978-1-84467-449-7
• On History: Tariq Ali and Oliver Stone in Conversation (2011) ISBN 978-1-60846-149-3

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Tariq Ali

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Tariq Ali

• Tariq Ali Official webpage
• On History
• Appearances on C-SPAN
• Tariq Ali at the Internet Movie Database
• Column archive at The Guardian
• Articles authored at Journalisted
• Works by or about Tariq Ali in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Tariq Ali: The Night of the Golden Butterfly - Shimmering Prose against the Clash of Civilisations

Interviews and speeches

• A Clash of Civilizations of Fundamentalisms? A Conversation with Tariq Ali on pg. 115
• Tariq Ali speaks at Harvard Law School on U.S. foreign policy and Afghanistan
• Tariq Ali: Neoliberalism and Protectorate States in the post-Yugoslav Balkans (ZNet)
• Tariq Ali transcript & video of Conversations with History - Islam, Empire, and the Left
• "Media Matters" interview with Robert McChesney, 14 November 2004
• "We live, after all, in a world where illusions are sacred and truth profane" (essay) - Tariq Ali
• 12-19-02 "On the Verge of War" talk - Noam Chomsky, Tariq Ali, Gilbert Achcar and Isin Elicin
• "Seven Oaks Magazine" interview with Charles Demers
• "Naked Punch Review" interview
• A Life in Writing: Tariq Ali by The Guardian
• 10-26-06 "The Latin American Challenge: Chavez, Morales, Castro" (audio recording)
• 10-01-06 W.B.A.I. Behind The News interview with Doug Henwood
• Audio recording of Tariq Ali speaking on his book Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope
• "The Ideas of Tariq Ali" on CBC Radio One’s Ideas
• Desert Island Discs Tariq Ali's choices for Desert Island Discs
• Ali: "Obama’s Afghan-Pak Syndrome" - video report by Democracy Now!
• Ali on his book The Obama Syndrome: Surrender at Home, War Abroad - video report by Democracy Now!

Profiles

• Tariq Ali at Contemporary Writers
• Biography from the international literature festival berlin

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