This study deals with an unusual and absorbing topic: how the Arabs see and deal with reality and the implications this has for the nature of power in the Arab world. "Tents" and "pyramids" are, metaphorically, opposed mental images; the first signifies the absence of hierarchy and graded authority, the second the presence of both, Khuri argues that the Arabs perceive both social and physical reality as a series of discrete, non-pyramidal structures that are inherently equal in value - much like a Bedouin encampment composed of tents scattered haphazardly on a flat desert surface with no visible hierarchy. Authority is not built into a hierarchial arrangement where roles are subordinated to one another in a graded system (as in the West); it is, rather, derived from the use of sheer physical power, with one person dominating the others - a first among "equals". Strategy, manoeuvrability and tactics take precedence over office and structure. The strategy is to act in groups - the isolat