First hypothesis 1

 Socio-economic reasoning

Here we will discuss three points to test the validity of this hypothesis. These points are: Ibn Khaldun’s assessment of the role played by lifestyle, division of labor and specialization, and finally the role of work in social relations.

1- Ibn Khaldun used lifestyle as a fundamental criterion for distinguishing between the two basic societal forms he observed during his extensive travels: nomadic society and settled urban society. The former is a society whose members expend their energy in satisfying basic needs for food and shelter through hunting, raising livestock, or agriculture. Once members of such a primitive society transition from their difficult nomadic (i.e., primitive) life to the easier life of the city, and their lifestyle changes, all their characteristics and traits consequently change. Given the importance of this methodological premise, we will record Ibn Khaldun’s opinion in detail:

“Know that the differences between generations in their circumstances are due to the differences in their means of livelihood. The Bedouin are those who pursue a natural livelihood of farming and tending livestock, and they are limited to the necessities of food, clothing, housing, and all other conditions and customs, and they fall short of anything beyond that in terms of necessities or luxuries. These are the inhabitants of cities, villages, and mountains… the settled people, meaning the people of cities and towns. Among these are those who pursue crafts for their livelihood, and some of them pursue trade. Their earnings are more abundant and luxurious than those of the Bedouin, because their circumstances exceed the necessities and their livelihood is in proportion to their means… so they build palaces and houses, and they bring water to them… so the harshness of the Bedouin precedes the refinement of civilization. This is why we find that civilization is the goal towards which the Bedouin strives, and his efforts lead him to its attainment. And when he obtains the wealth that brings him the conditions of luxury and its customs, he hastens to ease, and he enables himself to lead the city .

This demonstrates that the means of subsistence employed by humans play a crucial role in Ibn Khaldun’s distinction between nomadic and settled societies. The simple, primitive means employed by people in the desert or hills lead to a rudimentary form of life, while more advanced means result in a complex and sophisticated way of life. The existence of primitive people in the deserts and hills predates the existence of villages and cities. Similarly, customs arise as a result of widespread prosperity, following the spread of customs typically produced by a society suffering from hardship or focused solely on satisfying basic needs. Ibn Khaldun’s subject of study here is people in their connection to specific forms of production within their observable, real lives, and the measurement of their level of development, not in abstract, imaginative isolation. Their level of development, therefore, depends on how they obtain their livelihood. Indeed, Ibn Khaldun was not content with a simple comparison between one advanced mode of human life and another; rather, he was interested in tracing the effects of the transition from one mode to another on different forms of civilization and the distinctive character of human groups.

2- Before discussing Ibn Khaldun’s view on the means by which individuals cope with their inability to satisfy their daily needs—or what later came to be known as the division of labor—we note that he possessed a profound understanding of the economic life of his time and the role of influential forces in social development. This is evident in the three points we are now examining. What is astonishing, given the level of development in the fourteenth century, is his complete grasp of these influential forces, which manifest themselves in the productive forces of society , whether nomadic or urban, and in the relationships that develop among people to obtain necessities or luxuries. In the first chapter of his Muqaddimah, “On Human Civilization in General,” Ibn Khaldun explains .