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1. Malik Mufti, Sovereign Creations: Pan-Arabism and Political Order in Syria and Iraq (Cornell University Press, 1996)
Mufti provides one of the best overviews of Syria prior to the rise of Hafiz al-Assad. It importantly shows Syria’s central role in the contest for political influence and identity in the region in the 1950s and 1960s, and why Syria was at the centre of the Arab Cold War. His analysis is essential for understanding why the Assads created such a regime in Syria, and how fragile Syria’s sovereignty was before the 1970s. The competition by Iraq, Egypt, and Turkey to gain influence in Syria in the 1950s and 1960s potentially foreshadows what is to come if the Assad regime were to fall or if Syria goes into civil war.
2. Patrick Seale, Asad of Syria: the Struggle for the Middle East (University of California Press, 1990)
This is the seminal work on the life and presidency of Hafiz al-Assad. Written by Patrick Seale who was one of the few western journalists to spend time with the late President, Seale charts the emergence of the modern nation state in Syria in the 1970s and the central role Syria played in the region’s affairs in the 1970s and 1980s.
3. David Lesch, The New Lion of Damascus: Bashar al-Asad and Modern Syria (Yale University Press, 2005)
Leading American scholar on Syria, Lesch spent hours with Bashar al-Assad in the year after the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. Similar to Seale who profiled the late President, Lesch profiles his successor by providing both a personal portrait of the President and an insight into his thinking and outlook. This work demystifies to some degree the inner-workings of the Assad regime.
4. Andrew Tabler, In the Lion's Den: An Eyewitness Account of Washington's Battle with Syria (Lawrence Hill Books, 2011)
The founding editor of the Assad regime’s only sanctioned English publication, Syria Today, who later fell out with the regime writes a trenchant account of Bashar al-Assad’s rule after 9/11 and Syria’s interactions with its neighbors and the United States. Tabler, similar to Seale and Lesch, had unique access to the regime in Damascus. This work is also a strong account of US-Syrian relations after 9/11.
5. Roger Owen, The Rise and Fall of Arab Presidents for Life (Harvard University Press, 2012)
One of the longest observers of the Middle East, Harvard professor, Roger Owen provides a systemic analysis of the creation of the modern republican presidential state system in the Middle East. He shows importantly how these Presidents sustained their rule and used their power in this authoritarian system. He crucially shows the internal contradictions within these regimes, which created the conditions for the Arab Awakenings of 2011. It’s essential to read because the underlying conditions that sustained the Assads’ rule of Syria will for the foreseeable future be part of the fabric of this state with or without the Assads.
