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The Society of the Muslim Brothers in Egypt: The Rise of an Islamic Mass Movement 1928-1942
Provides an understanding of the influence of contemporary Islamism by presenting the history of the meteoric rise of the mother organization of all modern Islamist movements, the Society of the Muslim Brothers. This book examines the socio-economic and cultural factors which facilitated the movement's expansion.
328 pages, Paperback
First published March 1, 1997
About the author
Brynjar Lia
12 books8 followersBrynjar Lia (born July 14, 1966) is a Norwegian historian and professor of Middle East Studies at Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages at the University of Oslo. He is also an adjunct research professor at the Norwegian Defence Research Establishment (FFI) where he headed FFI's research on international terrorism and global jihadism between 1999 and 2011. Lia is viewed as one of Norway's foremost experts on terrorism and is much cited in Norwegian and international media in connection to Al-Qaeda and international terrorism. Lia's last book is about Abu Musab al-Suri, which has been reviewed in publications like Newsweek, The Economist, London Review of Books, and The New York Review of Books.
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
September 20, 2025
An important book if you are interested in Hasan al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood. Brynjar Lia does an in depth analysis of the organization and its formative years, how the MB from being a social welfare community to huge political group with branches all over Egypt.
There is a focus on the structural development of the MB as well as its leadership, development of ideology during the 1930s and insights into various campaigns and political issues that the MB was involved with. I would highly recommend this book as it is an un-biased telling of the rise of an Islamic movement that has changed a lot since its modest beginnings in Ismailiyya. However, the book is written in a very academic style and can be quite dry in places, but it is worth reading if you're interested in Hasan al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood during his time.
There is a focus on the structural development of the MB as well as its leadership, development of ideology during the 1930s and insights into various campaigns and political issues that the MB was involved with. I would highly recommend this book as it is an un-biased telling of the rise of an Islamic movement that has changed a lot since its modest beginnings in Ismailiyya. However, the book is written in a very academic style and can be quite dry in places, but it is worth reading if you're interested in Hasan al-Banna and the Muslim Brotherhood during his time.
January 26, 2013
Informative but quite dry read (more like a series of journal articles). Breaches new ground by focusing on the practices, organization, and activities of the Brotherhood rather than ideological tracts.
December 27, 2015
Brynjar Lia’s The Society of the Muslim Brothers in Egypt aims to fill a gap in Richard P. Mitchell’s similarly-titled and seminal work on the Muslim Brotherhood. Arguing that Mitchell’s account did not elaborate sufficiently on the organization’s founding and early expansion, the author’s objective is to compliment that narrative through the use of new sources and personal contacts. He credits two factors for the Brotherhood’s transformation into a mass movement: its willingness to diversify and engage areas that other Islamic societies would not, and the way in which catered to the needs of the new Egyptian educated middle class and gave them access to the political processes that had been barred to them by the country’s elites.
Lia’s first part consists of one relatively brief chapter that recapitulates and expands upon Mitchell’s account of the founding of the Muslim Brotherhood. He delves deeper into founder Hasan al-Banna’s relatively affluent family and demonstrates that socio-economic changes at the turn of the century had a significant impact in shaping his outlook. His background also provided him with contacts in both nationalist and Sufi circles and suggests that he was not as anti-western as he has been portrayed. In fact, his novel ideas about spreading Islam engendered conflict with more traditional milieus and led him to be more tolerant to new ideas and to focus on practical aims rather than theological disputes. The author then proceeds to part two, which examines the question of how the movement expanded through 1936, and he credits the Muslim Brotherhood’s success in this regard to its differences from traditional Islamic welfare societies, particularly the Young Men’s Muslim Association. The most crucial of these differences was that Hasan al-Banna sought to add a political dimension to his movement, which in turn required him to focus on developing the society’s organization and ideology. While this vision led to a split, those that remained focused on an action-orientated strategy that engaged the needs of the poorer and middle classes, emphasized Islamic unity, and constructed a complex, albeit sometimes inconsistent, ideological bridge between traditionalism and modernism.
Lia extrapolates further on the organizational aspect in his next chapter, examining the movement’s increasingly hierarchical structure and emphasis on ensuring financial independence. This allowed it to pursue educational and social justice objectives that increased its popularity. He rejects the theory that the Muslim Brothers were driven by Hasan al-Banna’s charismatic leadership, arguing that while this was a factor, the movement’s success cannot be explained without taking into account its highly developed bureaucracy. Furthermore, its foundations in the Sufi tradition instilled obedience and authority into its members, which meant that the reverence for Hasan al-Banna was more incidental than the product of a concerted attempt to inculcate such feelings. The author’s final chapter in this section examines the ways in which branch visits, networking, and patronage helped strengthen the movement by garnering support from multifarious corners of society and even forces outside of Egypt.
Lia’s final part discusses how this expanding organization transformed through 1942 to become a genuinely mass movement, beginning with the idea that it was willing to move into physical and ideological areas that were untouched by similar movements. As its diversified activities led to a broader appeal, it began to focus more on its systems of recruitment and internalization and eventually created a cadre of young propagandists. The organization’s scouting arm performed a similar function, in addition to maintaining order and providing security, while the creation of a new “Battalion” in 1937 signified a turn towards a more militant outlook. Yet even the explicitly militant Special Apparatus remained mostly dormant through World War II and did not become active on a regular basis until the postwar conditions engendered its radicalization. In his penultimate body chapter, the author argues that the Muslim Brotherhood was attractive not because Islam is inherently political, but because the organization’s policies were directed towards the new educated middle class and it helped these individuals participate in politics. Its ideology rejected the contemporary Egyptian system of political parties, rather than democracy itself, and engaged reforms that were based in a non-elite perspective. These ideas extended beyond the religious concerns of Islam, as they contained a comprehensive program of social justice and economic reform.
In his final chapter, Lia examines how the Palestinian Revolt transformed the Muslim Brotherhood’s operational nature and drew the public closer to its ideology. He argues that this issue was not as critical to the organization’s expansion as has been suggested previously, but simply radicalized it and solidified its politicization. Despite the presence of martial law during World War II, the movement was able to survive and continue working towards its aims by taking advantage of its history as an Islamic welfare society to advance its agenda in non-confrontational ways and in protected spaces. Overall, The Society of Muslim Brothers in Egypt accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do in filling that gap left by Mitchell. Its accessible and well-signposted prose makes it approachable for specialists and non-specialists alike, and it is immensely valuable for any academic seeking to gain a more in-depth understanding of one of Egypt’s most important mass political movements.
Lia’s first part consists of one relatively brief chapter that recapitulates and expands upon Mitchell’s account of the founding of the Muslim Brotherhood. He delves deeper into founder Hasan al-Banna’s relatively affluent family and demonstrates that socio-economic changes at the turn of the century had a significant impact in shaping his outlook. His background also provided him with contacts in both nationalist and Sufi circles and suggests that he was not as anti-western as he has been portrayed. In fact, his novel ideas about spreading Islam engendered conflict with more traditional milieus and led him to be more tolerant to new ideas and to focus on practical aims rather than theological disputes. The author then proceeds to part two, which examines the question of how the movement expanded through 1936, and he credits the Muslim Brotherhood’s success in this regard to its differences from traditional Islamic welfare societies, particularly the Young Men’s Muslim Association. The most crucial of these differences was that Hasan al-Banna sought to add a political dimension to his movement, which in turn required him to focus on developing the society’s organization and ideology. While this vision led to a split, those that remained focused on an action-orientated strategy that engaged the needs of the poorer and middle classes, emphasized Islamic unity, and constructed a complex, albeit sometimes inconsistent, ideological bridge between traditionalism and modernism.
Lia extrapolates further on the organizational aspect in his next chapter, examining the movement’s increasingly hierarchical structure and emphasis on ensuring financial independence. This allowed it to pursue educational and social justice objectives that increased its popularity. He rejects the theory that the Muslim Brothers were driven by Hasan al-Banna’s charismatic leadership, arguing that while this was a factor, the movement’s success cannot be explained without taking into account its highly developed bureaucracy. Furthermore, its foundations in the Sufi tradition instilled obedience and authority into its members, which meant that the reverence for Hasan al-Banna was more incidental than the product of a concerted attempt to inculcate such feelings. The author’s final chapter in this section examines the ways in which branch visits, networking, and patronage helped strengthen the movement by garnering support from multifarious corners of society and even forces outside of Egypt.
Lia’s final part discusses how this expanding organization transformed through 1942 to become a genuinely mass movement, beginning with the idea that it was willing to move into physical and ideological areas that were untouched by similar movements. As its diversified activities led to a broader appeal, it began to focus more on its systems of recruitment and internalization and eventually created a cadre of young propagandists. The organization’s scouting arm performed a similar function, in addition to maintaining order and providing security, while the creation of a new “Battalion” in 1937 signified a turn towards a more militant outlook. Yet even the explicitly militant Special Apparatus remained mostly dormant through World War II and did not become active on a regular basis until the postwar conditions engendered its radicalization. In his penultimate body chapter, the author argues that the Muslim Brotherhood was attractive not because Islam is inherently political, but because the organization’s policies were directed towards the new educated middle class and it helped these individuals participate in politics. Its ideology rejected the contemporary Egyptian system of political parties, rather than democracy itself, and engaged reforms that were based in a non-elite perspective. These ideas extended beyond the religious concerns of Islam, as they contained a comprehensive program of social justice and economic reform.
In his final chapter, Lia examines how the Palestinian Revolt transformed the Muslim Brotherhood’s operational nature and drew the public closer to its ideology. He argues that this issue was not as critical to the organization’s expansion as has been suggested previously, but simply radicalized it and solidified its politicization. Despite the presence of martial law during World War II, the movement was able to survive and continue working towards its aims by taking advantage of its history as an Islamic welfare society to advance its agenda in non-confrontational ways and in protected spaces. Overall, The Society of Muslim Brothers in Egypt accomplishes exactly what it sets out to do in filling that gap left by Mitchell. Its accessible and well-signposted prose makes it approachable for specialists and non-specialists alike, and it is immensely valuable for any academic seeking to gain a more in-depth understanding of one of Egypt’s most important mass political movements.
June 3, 2017
I could have given this book 4 stars instead of 3, but the author's overt sympathetic tone towards the Muslim Brothers and his attempt to equate the violence that was administered by all political contenders before 1952 without highlighting the religious dimension the Muslim Brothers brought into the political fray, is a grievous mistake.
Having said that, the book still makes excellent use of primary and secondary resources and sheds light on the turbulence of the 1950s which Mitchell's masterpiece lightly touches on.
Having said that, the book still makes excellent use of primary and secondary resources and sheds light on the turbulence of the 1950s which Mitchell's masterpiece lightly touches on.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews