Political Philosophy of Ibn-e-Khaldoon

Ibn-e-Khaldoon seems to be the only great thinker who not only saw the problems of the relation of
the history and the science of society to traditional political philosophy but also made full endeavors to
develop a science of society with the framework of political philosophy as based on its principles.
According to Ibn-e-Khaldoon, traditional philosophy demands the study of man and society as they really
are, and supplies the frame work of directing such a study and utilizing its results. Rosenthal was of the
view that importance of Ibn-e-Khaldoon was not recognized in his own time, and until the seventeenth
century did Muslims writers take any notice of him, while Europeans scholars discovered him only in the
last century. Ibn-e-Khaldoon’s importance consists in a number of novel insights of permanent value and
significance:

1. In his distinction between rural and urban life and the necessity of the latter for the emergence of
civilization and a state in the strict sense of the term.

2. In his postulating the Asabiya as the principal driving force of political action.

3. In his projection of Islam into a universal human civilization, thus standing on the social and in the
climate of Islam and looking out towards humanity at large.

4. In his realization of the casual interdependence of the several factors of social life in the power state;
economic, military, cultural and religious.

5. In the concept of the parallel existence of the state founded by a prophetic law-giver, as distinct from the
state built on power in response to the human need for political association and the desire of strong
personalities for domination.

6. Arising from the last point, in his definition and analysis of the Islamic country, as a composite structure
whose law is a mixture of Shariah and political law.

7. In his basic recognition of the vital part which religion should play in the life of the state, especially if it
transforms the Asabiya into a durable, cohesive and spiritual motive power.

Stages in the Development of Society and the State

During the period of establishment, solidarity based upon familiarities and religion continues to be
essential for the preservation of the state. This is the period during which the ruler forces the ruled to build
the institution necessary for a civilized culture. There are new activities to be carried out and new political
relations to be created. When aided by religion, solidarity becomes more effective in establishing the state,
since the subjects will then obey the ruler and his directives more willingly convinced that in doing so they
are praying to God. The stages in the development of the society and the state are following:
Stage 1. During the first stage, solidarity is still largely based on a community of sentiments, and the ruler
owes his position to his noble ancestry and the respect of his fellow tribesmen. His role is dependent on their
number, power and assistance. He is still their chief rather than their master and king. He has to
accommodate their sentiments and desires and to share his power with them. The same is true of religion.
The ruler who is establishing a state with the aid of a religious passage cannot act as a master and a king,
since religion means the obedience of all to God and the religious Law.

Stage 2. The second stage in the development of the period of consolidating the ruler’s power is to create
absolute kingship. Natural solidarity and religion are checked so far as they mean the sharing of power, and
are used at the discretion of the absolute ruler. Solidarity is replaced by a paid army, and an organized
administrative bureaucracy, that carry out his wishes. Natural solidarity becomes increasingly superfluous.
The people generally acquire the habit obeying their new ruler. The impersonal organization of the army
and bureaucracy take care of the protection of the state and the development of the various institutions of a
civilized culture.

Stage 3. As the ruler’s lust and aggrandizement for attaining absolute power is satisfied with the full
concentration of authority in his hands, he begins to use his authority for the satisfaction of his other desire
in other words; he starts to collect the fruits of authority. Thus a third stage of luxury and leisure follows.
The ruler concentrates on the organization of the finances of the state and goes on increasing his income. He
spends lavishly on public works and one beautifying the cities in imitation of famous civilized states. He
enriches his followers who start living a luxurious life. Economic progress and prosperity usher a new era of
development, which satisfy the increasing desires of the ruler. The crafts, the fine arts and the sciences are
greatly patronized to be flourishing for the satisfaction of the new ruling class. The state has finally reached
the stage where it is able to satisfy man’s craving fro luxuries and his pride in possessing them. This is a
period of rest and self-indulgence in which men enjoy the comforts and pleasures of the world.

The first three stages are powerful, independent and creative, they are able to consolidate their authority and
satisfy the subjects becoming the slaves of these desires.

Stage 4. Having reached its zenith, the next stage is a period of contentment in which the ruler and the ruled
are satisfied and complacent. They imitate their predecessors in enjoying the pleasures of life, how their
predecessors struggled to achieve them. They think that their luxurious life and the various advantages of
civilization have always been existed and will continue to exist for ever. Luxury, comfort and the
gratification of their desires become a habit with them. The length of this period depends upon the power
and extent of the achievements of the founder of the state.

Stage 5. During fifth stage, the state is already starting to decline and disintegrate. The fifth and last stage of
waste and prodigality is setting in. the state has reached old age and is deemed to be slow or nearing death.
The very process of establishing it had destroyed the vital forces of solidarity and religion that were
responsible for its existence. The ruler had destroyed the communal pride and loyalty of their kinsmen, who
humiliated and impoverished have lost the drive to conquer. Their successes, having known only the life of
luxury and surrounded by a prodigal entourage, continue to spend more and more on their pleasure. They
increase taxes and these in turn discover economic activity and lead to a decline in the income of the state
which makes it impossible for the ruler to support his new followers.

Rosenthal was of the view “The fifth phase is one of extravagance and waste. In this phase the ruler
destroys what his ancestors have brought together, for the sake of lust and pleasure. For he is
generous towards his intimates and liberal at his banquets in order to win the scum of the people, to
whom he entrusts great tasks which they are unable to undertake. In this way, he spoils (his chances)
with the noble and distinguished among his people and with the followers of his predecessors, so that
they are filled with hatred against him and agree among themselves to desert him. Moreover, he loses
point of his troops because he spends their pay on his pleasure and prevents them from getting to
know him personally. In this phase, the natural ageing of the dynasty (that is the decay) sets in and a
chronic disease gets hold of it without remedy or release until it collapses.”

Further, the habits of comforts and luxury generate physical weakness and moral vices. The elite and
the aristocrats forget the courageous manners of primitive life. They are powerless before an outside
invasion by a strong civilized state or by united primitive people. Excessive taxes and fear of invasion
weakens the hopes of ruled. Despondency becomes so common and it reigns the day and consequently it
freezes all economic activities. The entire population physically weakens and living in large crowded cities
become subject to disease and plague. With the decrease of economic activity and the depopulation of cities,
the state begins to disintegrate; starting form the outlying regions, princes, generals and the discontented
kinsmen of the ruler become independent.

In the capital of the state, the mercenary troops and civil bureaucracy begin intriguing to wrest the
actual power from the ruler, leaving him but the insignia and the name. Finally an external invasion puts an
end to the life of the state, or it may continue to decline until it withers away like a wick dying out in the
lamp of which oil is gone or goes under the subjugation of foreign power.

Ibn-e-Khaldoon as a Father of Political Economy

Ibn-e-Khaldoon has rightly been claimed as the forerunner of a great many Western scholars such as
Machiavelli, Boding, Gibbon, Montesquieu, and many other notable thinkers. There is hardly any other
thinker with whom he might not be compared. Long before Adam Smith, Ibn-e-Khaldoon foresaw the
interconnection of political and economic institutions. The Muslim genius made an enquiry into the various
aspects of economic activities and recorded their political significance in respect of their good and bad
effects on the state. Stefan Colosio said, “The great Muslim historian was able to discover in the Middle
Ages the principles of social justice and political economy before Considerant, Marx and Baconine.
He was an original economist who understood the principles of political economy and applied it
skillfully and intelligently, long before it was known to Western research. He thus talks about state’s
work in economic field, and its bad effects about political forces and social classes, the methods and
kinds of property, the social task of labor, and its division into free and paid labor, and about law of
supply and demand.”
Role of capital and labor in Economy:

Ibn-e-Khaldoon depicts a vivid picture of the role of capital and labor in an economy. He devotes
special chapters to the question of Government finances and other business affairs. His theory of labor, in
which he defines profit and sustenance and the role of labor in the fixation of the values of the commodities,
exerted a marked influence on the writings of classical economists. Ibn-e-Khaldoon defines the term
sustenance and profit as, “The part of the income that is obtained by a person through his own effort
and strength is called profit. When a particular person enjoys its fruits by spending it upon his
interest and need, it is called sustenance. Thus it is the part of the profit that is utilized. If the profit
results from something other than a craft, the value of the resulting profit and acquired (capital) must
also include the value of the labor by which it was obtained; without labor it would not have been
acquired. A portion of the value whether large or small, comes from the labor.”

Ibn-e-Khaldoon praises Islamic economic system which prescribes Zakat, Kharaj and Jizya. To
establish the superiority of Islamic economic system, he quotes the saying of Holy Prophet (P.B.U.H.):
“The only thing you possess of your property is what you ate, and have thus destroyed; or what you
gave as charity, and have thus spent.” Ibn-e-Khaldoon severely condemns the engagement of rulers in the
commercial activity because it creates hurdles in the development of a free competition in economic field,
which is most essential for the circulation of wealth in the society as a whole. If the rulers indulge in trade
activities, they would be I an advantageous position in the selling and purchasing of the commodities, by
virtue of their political control on the commercial activities. Thus injustice would be brought about in the
society which is disastrous for the dynasty.

Taxation Policy:

Among the economic problems his discussion first elaborately starts with taxation. As a practical
politician he had full knowledge of the ways and means to collect the Government revenues. He was of the
view that taxation must be equitable and just. When justice and equity are lacking in taxation policy of a
Government, it is inviting its own ruin. He said, “In the beginning of dynasty taxation yields large revenue
from assessments. At the end of the dynasty, taxation yields small revenue from large assessments.”

A balanced budget is essential for sound economy and is the key to stability of the political order.
Ibn-e-Khaldoon said, “In the beginning of the state, taxes are light in the distribution but considerable
in their total and vice versa. The reason is that the state, which follows the ways of religion, only
demands the obligation imposed by the Shariah, namely Zakat, Kharaj and Jizya, which are light in
their distribution and these are the limits beyond which one must not go.”

A rural economy based on agriculture, with a simple standard of living and light taxes, provides an
incentive to work hard, with prosperity as the prize. But as soon as autocrats assume power and urban life,
with a much higher standard of living, makes greater demands, heavier taxes are levied upon farmers,
craftsmen and merchants. Production and profits decline, since the incentive has been taken away from all
those engaged in the economic life of the state.

Salaries and Allowances:

The deductions in services and allowances decrease expenditures of those affected which ultimately
affects the incomes of so many others from whom they used to buy things. This involves a decrease in a
business activity and monetary transactions and thus leads to diminishing tax revenues of the state. He
disapproves such procedures by a state. Ibn-e-Khaldoon extensively deals with the injustice to the people
and is of the view that it brings about the ruin of civilization, because attacks on people’s property remove
the incentive to acquire or gain property.

The great injustice which he mentions is buying the people’s property at cheaper rates and selling it
at higher rates. It is most destructive to civilization. This involves taking the capital of the people and this
making them unable to do the cultural enterprise. When capital is decreased, profits are diminished, people’s
incentive slackens and thereby the business dwindles. Ultimately this proves to be a death blow to the state.

Standard of Living:

The prosperity and business activity in different cities differ in accordance with the difference in the
size of their population. As labor is the fundamental source of profit or income, larger the labor, the higher
the profit. The extra labor works for luxuries and luxury goods and crafts etc. Production thrives income and
expenditure of the inhabitants multiply and more and more population pours into the city. All the strata of
the society in the large city is affected. As profit is the value realized from labor, larger the labor the more
will be the value realized from it, which leads to prosperity. In less populated cities or remote towns,
villages and hamlets, people are equally poor because their labor does not pay for their necessities and does
not yield them a surplus which they can accumulate as profit. Even beggars and poor differ in large and
small cities.

Income and expenditure balance each other in every city. If both are large, the inhabitants are
prosperous and the city grows. Ibn-e-Khaldoon concludes that the favorable conditions and much prosperity
in civilization are the result of its large size. As is the case in cities, so it is with the countries. He gave the
examples of the populated countries such as Egypt, Syria, India, and China as being more prosperous as
compared to the less populated regions which were less prosperous.

It should be noted that Ibn-e-Khaldoon’s thesis is that higher population brings much labor and much
value is realized from it, which causes profit and prosperity. Apparently it may sound strange today, that
more populated countries are poor and less populated ones are advanced. But as far as cities in a given
country are concerned, his construction is as valid as it was in his time. Technological changes were not
occurring in his time, he does not explicitly elucidate the role of productivity of labor.
 Ibn-e-Khaldoon was of the view that the wages of the teachers and religious officials are lower,
because demand for their services is not high. His remarkable exposition of labor, value, profit, population
and their correlation with prosperity and civilization has stood the test of time. He gives the definition of
profit as the value realized from human labor. He said, “With the decrease of population sustenance of a
country disappears, springs stop flowing because they require labor, they flow only if dug out and
water drawn. He compares this process with the udders of cattle.”

Livelihood:
His derivation of livelihood is interesting, he said, “It should be known that livelihood means the
desire for sustenance and the efforts to obtain it. Livelihood is information from Ashe life. The idea is
that Ashe life obtained only through the things (that go into making a living) and that they are
considered with some exaggeration, the place of life.”

Among productive activities he included medical services, education and musical etc. whereas Adam
Smith excluded services from his definition of real national product. But Ibn-e-Khaldoon excludes activities
such as based on fraud, exploitation or ignorance i-e, astrology, alchemy, search for buried treasure and the
various public servants who receive their shares from public receipts vitiated by injustice, oppression and
fiscal pressure. While dealing with comparative wages, he has very intelligently analyzed the reasons for the
low wages of dealing with religious matters, teachers, mufti, prayer leaders, preacher, muezzin etc. as profit
is value realized from labor, the value of labor profits differs according to the needs or particular kind of
labor. He said, “Now the common people have no compelling need for the things that the religious officials
have to offer.” So their share is in accordance with the general need and demand of the population for them.
It is meager as compared with others. Besides he deals with various other and economic problems such as
high and low prices, crafts, agriculture, prices of food stuff and hoarding etc. in all these matters, Ibn-e-
Khaldoon showed the depth of great thinker and political economist.