SECTION 1: HISTORY 1. Introduction. The Islamic world: the religious and political facets. The sources of knowledge of the Islamic world. The foundations: the geopolitical context of Arabia and its environment in the 6th Century PART 1. THE BIRTH OF THE ISLAMIC WORLD: UNIT, EXPANSION, CULTURE 2. Muhammad: his life and his work. His religious principles. His problems in Mecca. Hegira. The Constitution of Medina. The first religious and political organization of the Arabs. 3. Religious and legal principles of Islam: the five pillars of the Muslim believer and Sharia in their initial organization. The legal schools and their in- fluence on the evolution of the obligations of the Muslim believer. 4. The succession of Mohammed: Sunni and Shiite. The Umayyad dynasty and the Abbasid caliphate. 5. Economy, society and culture. PART 2. POLITICAL EVOLUTION: UNION AND DESIGN AS LEIVMOTIV OF THE GEOPOLITICAL HISTORY OF THE ISLAMIC WORLD 6. A model of state: the caliphate of Al Andalus (929-1031). 7. The internal fragmentation of Arab peoples and their consequences 8. The Mongols and the Ottomans. SECTION 2: POLITICS 9. Political culture in the Islamic world 10. Institutional variation in the Islamic world 11. Modernization and Arab nationalism 12. Islamic radicalism and the phenomenon of Yihadist violence 13. The Islamic world in international politics