Empire of chaos challenged Who can explain the chaotic affairs of today's world? Samir Amin for one. Fatemah Farag interviews Egypt's most famous Marxist theorist As the world prepares itself for an imminent American/British military onslaught against Iraq, the "clash of civilisations" paradigm continues to hold sway. Be it Samuel Huntington or predominant Islamist discourse the message is one of the inevitable conflict between Arabs and Muslims on the one hand, and the West on the other. 9/11, Israel's brutal occupation and repression in Palestine, the mess in Afghanistan, which has spread into south and east Asia, the ongoing devastation of Iraq and its promised destruction, the rise of political Islam and the fundamentalist Christian right all play their part. It is all nonsense, and Professor Samir Amin is the man who will tell you in great detail how and why; the current state of the world is not about culture, national identity and religion but about imperialism, capitalist development and underdevelopment and, ultimately, class. ...