Reviews
"Provides a wealth of detail for the scholar of Sudan's colonial era."
--International Affairs
"One of the virtues of Abdllahi Gallab's A CIVIL SCIETY DEFFERED lies in the author's mastery of a wide variety of theorists of historical causation and colonial constraint. The wealth of their insights has allowed him to rearrange largely familiar information about the Sudan into an original and impressive interpretive architecture… The book consciously joins and illuminates an extended ongoing discussion."
"Looking toward the future, perhaps the recognition of the deep historical roots of some longstanding and distinctively Sudanese governmental practices that have now become controversial will allow a thoroughgoing reconsideration and possible revision of civil rights and obligations in the new century. The invaluable insights of Abdullahi Gallab will certainly stimulate and faciliate the process."
--Dr. Jay Spaulding, African Arguments
"Gallab's approach to the subject matter is interdisciplinary, and he demonstrates a deep knowledge of the historical, economic, and theological elements that produced contemporary Sudan's state-society. Gallab also brings to the foreground long-neglected oral histories embedded in local folklore, which provide the reader unique insight into the sentiments of those who experienced the many wars that led to the emergence of modern Sudan."
"Gallab's book offers a panoramic view, at times dizzying in its detail, of the varios local traders known as jallaba as well as the regional and international middlemen and brokers known as Khartoumers…"
--Ruth Iyob, International Journal of Middle East Studies