Contributor(s): Professor Fred Halliday | No area of the globe so challenges the contemporary social scientist or the ordinary citizen as do the twenty-five countries of the Middle East. At the same time, none generates as much public controversy and unease. From its multiple wars and inter-ethnic conflicts, and the rise of religiously defined ideologies, to the enduring place it occupies in world energy markets this region is of central concern to all who seek to analyse, or formulate policies for, the world of today. In this lecture, Professor Fred Halliday examines the difficulties, analytic and normative, that beset study of the Middle East, and argue that a programme of sustained research and teaching on this area is essential for comprehending the world today.