Ibn Khaldun’s asabiyya and the rise and fall of states
The central concept of the Muqaddimah is asabiyya, usually translated "group feeling" or "solidarity". Ibn Khaldun argues that groups living hard lives on the margins of civilisation, often nomadic or tribal, develop strong solidarity. That solidarity lets them conquer settled states. Once in power, they adopt luxury and settled life, solidarity weakens, and within about three or four generations the dynasty becomes vulnerable to a new group with stronger asabiyya.
As a history teacher in Fes, I see the pattern in our own history: the Almoravids, the Almohads, the Marinids, each rising from the margins, each declining. But I wonder whether the theory applies outside the medieval Maghreb. Do modern states have asabiyya? Does nationalism replace it?