Clash of Civilizations Between the Western and Muslim World - Essay Example

Is there a clash of civilizations between the Western and Muslim world? Part A: Introduction Samuel P. Huntington (1993), controversially, predictedthat there were irredeemable divisions amongst civilization, and that the gap, specifically between Western and Islamic civilizations was increasing, and would be unalterable. He posited that the chasm was caused by six factors: globalization (which intensified cultural consciousness as awareness of differences became more conspicuous); economic and social change (which impelled religion to occupy the gap, hence fundamentalism); western domination and power; traditionally and historically-entrenched differing views that are less mutable to change and less easily resolved than political views (since they are taken as essential for society’s continuity); and, finally, increasing economic regionalism that promotes civilization consciousness and cultural genotypes. The differences are dual: military characteristics and cultural values. The struggle, he offered, would become more frequent, more violent, and more sustained. Huntington’s treatise was published before 2011. Events seem have borne him out. Nevertheless, critics, such as Esposito (2002), argue that Huntington was incorrect; that he misunderstood Islamic civilization, operating with westernized stereotypes, consequently forming, in part, incorrect conclusions. This essay takes that view. Before proceeding with the body of essay we need to define the terms, ‘Western’, ‘Moslem’ and ‘civilization’. We will then see that the struggle exists between modernity and certain individuals (who call themselves ‘Islamists’, but whom the world sees as ‘fundamentalists’) rather than between Islam per se and the West; reducing the term ‘modernity’ to its primary elements, will show us that religious Moslems have scruples with Western morals rather than with Western tradition; that perceiving ‘modernity’ in a different way, Muslims can be just as ‘modern’ (in their own way) as the West. Finally, analysis of the term ‘civilization” nullifies existence of the concept. Consequently, to conclude – as many do – that distinct and ineffable differences exist between western and muslin civilizations is to commit oneself to too simplistic an analysis. Matters are more complex – far more complex, and at the end of the day one will see that the question needs to be redefined: no longer should it be whether differences exist between Western and Muslim regimes, but, rather, whether differences exist between modernity and Islamism (or between certain Muslim factions), and whether these differences can be reconciled. As to whether differences exist between the western world (or what one calls the western world) and Arab nations, the answer is: perhaps, but there are more commonalities then differences, and the differences lessen with each passing day. Part B: Concepts The West The non-Western world, opined Huntington (1993; 1997), sees the West as militarily, politically, and economically dominant, and as a patronizing bully. Western efforts to propagandize produce reactions. Western attempts to form a “universal world” with a “universal religion” anger Islam, for it does not want a “universal religion”. It wants its own. The ‘West’, by the way, primarily signifies America. These are some of America’s ‘sins’: America, hoping to avoid revolution in Egypt, attempted to modernize and reform Iraq, Libya, and Iran. Later, the Eisenhower administration, with British assistance, attempted to reform the Hashemite monarchy. In Tripoli, Kennedy attempted to modernize King Idris, while Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon assisted the Shah’s “White Revolution”. Bush invaded Kuwait. Throughout, the Arabs remained ungrateful and, using their religion, reacted by bloody means. The North African ‘interference’ resulted in the Persian Gulf War. Attempts to reform the Hashemites impelled Hussein’s bloody coup. The West’s endeavors to modernize King Idris led to the insurgence of Muammer al-Quaddafi, whilst the Shah’s revolution beckoned the Ayatollah Khomeini. Finally, Bush resulted in Ibn Laden. In each case, Islam showed its offense by blowing-up American ‘generosity’ with bombs. Unwanted inference and detested westernization, allegedly, propelled Islamic reaction. Many correlate westernization with modernity. Yet whose definition of modernity? Moslems have many of the trappings of modernity such as Internet, cellular phones, TV, and so forth (Humphreys, 1999) . We might think that Moslem illiberalism, undemocratic government, oppression of women, and shoddy secular learning contradict modernity, but, in the past both Shiites and Sunnis had accepted a separation of religion and state, and at one time, Islam had equated modernity or secularism with John Locke’s conception as a new and better way of being religious. It has been only recently - and due to contemporary western reformulation of ‘modernization - that secularism has come to be perceived as a brutal attack upon anything sacred. This doesn’t mean that Moslems are against ‘modernization’ or ‘secularism’ or ‘Westernization’ per se, but rather that they oppose contemporary Western morals (Abdo, 2006; Armstrong, 2002). (As per democracy, the West’s conception of government as being “of the people, by the people, and for the people” is problematic to a Muslim perspective, for it is God, and not the people, who grants government legitimacy (Armstrong, 2002) As Paul Kennedy pointed out: What would it be like if our places in the world were reversed.. Suppose there existed today a powerful, unified Arab-Muslim state that stretched from Algeria to Turkey and Arabia... Suppose the Colossus state was bombarding us with cultural messages, about the status of women, about sexuality, that we found offensive. Suppose it was always urging us to change, to modernize, to go global, to follow its example. Hmm… in those conditions, would not many Americans steadily grow to loath that Colossus, wish it harm? And perhaps try to harm it? I think so.” (Quoted in Esposito, 2002, p.156). And on the book’s page scrawled in the margin, a reader, evidently (from other comments) devoutly Moslem, had scrawled in capitalization’s: “Yes! This is sooo very very true!” When considering it like that, not only does modernity not exist, but also Islam provides its own version of modernity merging as America does its set of values with technology. Its morals are definitely different, and, arguably, in part faulty – but aren’t those of the West too? Huntington (1993, 1997) concludes that the clash partially subsists in the theorem of the West being modern and the non-West endeavoring to become modern. The non-West, such as the Arab nations, achieved the trussing: the wealth (at least parts of the Arab world), technology, skills, machines, and weapons. But, according to Huntington (ibid.), they ultimately failed. It seems to me that Huntington is incorrect; that one needs to redefine ‘modernity’ as consisting of technology and a set of contemporary values, and when doing so, it will be seen that parts of the Arab world are as modern as the west, or rather that modernity is a nebulous term. Muslim The ‘label’ Muslim is another incoherent term since the Muslim religion is split into many sects (Humphreys, 1999), its followers, generally, representing one of the following categories: externalists, moderates, and internalists (Lapidus, 2003) 1. Externalists – externalists generally advocate mergence into and assimilation with western society. An extreme externalist might, arguably, be Sadiq Jalal al-‘Azm who totally rejected religious thought, which, he said, prevented social and political liberation. More representative of externalism was the Tunisian Hisham Djat who advocated humanizing social institutions and laws and wholly separating them from religion; “the individual citizen should be free to abandon his inherited faith if he so wished” (Houdini, p.444). It is externalists that produce these spaces of liberalization: civil associations, women’s groups, free press, and TV debates that openly grapple with issues such as democracy and the death penalty. Also existent are the omnipresent political talk shows, satellite stations, opinion essays, trans-national radio, Internet, DVDs, dissemination of uncensored newspapers, and TV networks. True that the voice emanating from these instruments has been criticized as illiberal and as falling far short from Habermas’s ideal of rational discourse in its rhetorical style, fixed mindset (Abed al-Jabiri and Ghalyoun, for instance, suggest that the Arabs have a long tradition of prejudice against rational- critical discourse (Lynch, 2006), and media control by state and compromised intelligentsia. Nevertheless, the reality is more optimistic than the Western popular media portrays it to be. Both al-Jazeira and its imitator al-Arabya are, at essence, markets engaged in an open-ended argument with a global audience (very different from the ‘Voice of the Arabs’, Egypt’s radio service in the 50’s and 60’s that sought to promote a political, strategic agenda. On al-Jazeira, unveiled beautiful women serve as anchor-people, steamy music plays, chat rooms and viewable and audio news clips offer their wares. Their shows (such as “Opposite Direction”. “No Limits”, and “Open Dialogue” showcase problems in the Arab world, and demand that Arabs formulate solutions. Their most religious show “Sharia and Life’ is like al-Qaradawi, is as moderate as is its moderator (who criticizes Ibn Laden) (Lynch, 2006). 2. Moderates – These are those who grapple with nationalistic problems whilst using religions as their solution. They demonstrate a return to roots that is still compatible with society on more or less secular lines. The Sufis or conservatives of the Wahhabi school could serve as example. Voices here represent the Egyptian economist Galal Amin who argued that a healthy Arab political and economic life should be derived from Islamic moral values, which could have only one basis: religion. Hashan Hanafi wrote about the relationship between Arab heritage and the need for renewal. Reformation of religious thought and national culture would positively influence modes of collective behavior, consequently rehabilitating the Arab people. Sadiq al-Mahdi reasoned that it was necessary to have a new kind of religious thought that, whilst remaining true to the sprit of Islam, would still provide for the needs of modern life (Hourani, 2003). 3. Internalists – who believed that Islamic heritage alone, being the Word of God, should and could control human national and personal existence. The Muslim Brothers, and Wahhabiyism, for instance, represent this approach. Some, such as Sayyid Qutb, voiced total rejection of all forms of society except the wholly Islamic one that operated according to Koranic law. All other societies were societies of jahiliyya (ignorance of religious truth). “The Western age is finished” it could not provide the values which upheld moral civilization. “The turn of Islam has come” (Qutb quoted in Hourani, 2003, p.446). Mawdudi (founder of the Jamaat-I-Islaami innovated universal Jihad as a duty to combat the jahiliyyah of the West. Internalists are often equated with Islamic fundamentalists, but there are diverse strands of Islamic fundamentalisms, some more extreme than others (Armstrong, 2002). Summarily: The Moslem world is more heterogeneous than is glibly stated. Teasing out the strands reveals the picture to be more complex. The main problem might be that the Koran can be seen in duplicitous ways. One reads according to one’s agenda (Burgat, 2003) and the end result is inevitably hegemony of Moslems who are different one from the other. The conflict hence is not so much between a supposedly existent western world and Muslims, but between those who adopt so-called western values and those who insist upon strict law of their religions as they read it. (And when you come to that conclusion, you will see that the se problems exist in America too, and in fact throughout the westernized world, for religious fundamentalism is common today. And religious fundamentalism is marked by strife between their own values and between Western morals of world around them. America, too, has these problems, all the more so rendering the question about whether Muslims in themselves are so different to the West meaningless). Civilizations So what is civilization? Let us take the American nation: at one time, when the Pilgrim Fathers founded the State, the same Protestant value system existed; there was a similar ideology and belief system. There was a common religion; you could argue that there was, more or less, one civilization. With the passing of time, America represented itself increasingly more as a melting pot and today boasts that it contains various nations each of whom direct its life by its own culture, ideology, and mores. America, one could paraphrase, is a nation of civilizations. And Islam? Shortly after it became a religion (the second phase according to Lapidus, (2003), Islam, too, spread all over the globe introduced, by its conquerors, to various parts of the world where it interacted with its host countries to form two parents cultures: Moslem and local. Hence the Moslems living in America seem very different from those in Yugoslavia, who, in turn, seem quite different from those in E. Africa, Iraq, Lebanon and so forth. Furthermore, each unit of Moslems, depending on conditions within its host country, had its own encounter with European imperialism, economy, power, and cultural influence causing each to respond accordingly. In some countries, where economic conditions were particularly challenging, their citizens reacted by reaffirming their religious and cultural heritage. Although Islam attempted a global Muslim identity, the existence of Islamist hybrids remained. There always were, and, conceivably, always will be, disparate pockets of Muslim people that to a greater or lesser extent were formed by their host culture (Humphreys, 1999). One undifferentiated Moslem nation is non-existent. Furthermore, consider the 25 million Muslims who live, work, and study in the West (Burgat, 2003) and simplistic division are rendered invalid. Moslem civilization, in its literal sense, is a non-entity. Today the term ‘civilization’ has eroded even more due to globalization. Globalization threatens families, tribes, and religion itself. Whatever was left of ‘civilization, be it Western or Islamic, has long diffused or, at least, become corrupted due to intermingling and encounter with an infinite other worldviews and cultural traditions. Part C: Response to Huntington A Western socio-economic analysis of Western- Islamic divergence (or of characteristics of the Arab world) is insufficient. Islam is a different way of life with a cultural tradition that is beyond western perception. The Western pre-1945 images of Moslems, have according to Little (2002) , remained and influenced our perception of Islamic civilization. These stereotypes seemed to have influenced Huntington too. In his 1997 follow up book, Huntington argued that “Islam’s borders are bloody and so are its innards.” ‘Oriental’ American Moslems were regularly depicted as backwards, decadent, and untrustworthy (amongst other racial stereotypes) (Esposito, 2002; Little, 2002). Jews had been demonized too, yet W.W II and Israel (and perhaps America’s approval of Israel) ‘normalized’ and ‘westernized’ the Jews, whilst the Arabs retained and magnified their demonized character with each new anti-west outbreak and terrorist insurrection (Little, 2002). And Islamaphobic tendencies are common (Burgat, 2003). Certainly the phobia – or fear – has been warranted, but analysis will indicate that it is isn’t Muslims, per se, that are to blame for the heinous acts of terrorism and anti-West diatribe, but Islamists or, in the Western erroneous term, fundamentalist Moslems who aggrandize through their own selective reading of the Koran. There have always been, and always will be Muslims, who are in love with the West (Armstrong, 2002) The Iranian intellectual Mulkum Khan and Aqa Khan Kirmani urged Moslems to acquire a western education and to replace the Sharia with a secular legal code. Sheikh Muhammad Husain opined that Western style, constitutional government was the next best thing to the return of the Hidden Imam, whilst the Egyptian writer Rifah al-Tahawi and the Indian Sayid Ahmad Khan, variously, lauded the Enlightenment and tried to adapt Islam to modern Western liberalization. Western hostility towards Islam springs from ignorance. It is not necessarily true that there is a clash, or at least not on the level that Huntington described it to be. Furthermore, not all Moslems hate the west as is popularly thought (Armstrong, 2002). Liberalists maintain that dialogue and understanding is essential. As this essay points out, wariness of simplistic conclusions is also needed. The question is more complex than it initially appears. There are definite divisions, it is true, but these appear and are maintained solely by so-called Islamists or fundamentalists who endeavor to curb the encroaching westernization, modernization, or secularization - call it what you will - of the various pockets of Islamic society scattered throughout the world. And all religious people, in any age and any country, have problems with the Western conception of modernity. Part D: Summary and Conclusions. The contrast between Muslim and Western civilizations is so notorious that it little begs to be specified: the economic gap, educational gap, treatment of women, and democratic concerns are simply a few of the differentials. And yet, often ignored, there are commonalities too. Although always under the primacy of men, conditions are looking up for women. The degree of literacy amongst women, although still lower than men, is increasing. The range of work available to women has broadened too (Humphreys, 1999). The veil is voluntarily donned; often many middle class affluential women to use it to define their own identity (Abdo, 2006). There are well-known polemical writers whose work is widely diffused, not only in the outside world but in the Arab countries to. The Moroccan Fatimia Menissi is one of these (Hourani, 2003). In the 50’s and 60’s, Egypt’s ‘The Voice of the Arabs’ led the people; al- Jazeira, in a quintessential western manner, succeeds by giving voice to the public opinion, rather than leading it. It challenges audiences to question even the most sensitive red lines, and has, in fact, been criticized for undermining Islam (Lynch, 2006). Many Islamic countries also experience free circulation of newspapers; there is the Internet; and there are blogs (although several are politically radical and anti-Semitic). As recently as the first Gulf War, there were no Arab satellite broadcasts. By 1994, there were at least twenty different regional satellites, and by the late 1990s the plethora of satellites and stations and occasional availability of European –based Arab press led to a public sphere that was independent of state (Lynch, 2006). On a macro level, each has its own construct of meaning. The West has its particular symbols, narrative, and history. The East also possesses its symbols (nationalistic and religious) and, similarly, utilizes those to craft its identity and to achieve its own ends. The symbols might alter one from the other, but their objectives are alike: to wield a narrative that would give meaning to its people and country, whilst making sense of the past in order to give hope to the future. Rituals serve a purpose. A country, like an individual, needs symbols and rituals in order to keep itself alive. Islam might, arguably, be more dramatic in its cultural and symbolic connotations, but it isn’t the only nation to flaunt such an identity. The West does too. And just as Islamic discourse differs from its historical discourse and is in fluctuation of change, so too with the West. The symbols of either ‘civilization’ have been transformed, and perhaps delineated by its differential economy and present pattern of discourse. Their present differs from the past in both points: America was not always so aggrandizing (although Tocqueville might differ there), and its values have certainly altered; Islam, likewise was ‘top dog’ at one time, whilst its theoretical or cultural perspectives too transformed with time. For both East and West, historical circumstances heralded a radically transformed discourse. Although contemporary Islam reminds many (e.g. Burgat, 2003) of early Islamic nationalism, it could, however, be more correctly described as resembling a totally ‘new type of Islam (Burgat, 2003); one that, in its most radical form, merges politics with religion (arguably preempting the former to the latter), neglecting many religious rites, and attenuating the Islamic spirit, modesty, devotion, and deflection away from the spirit of the religion. The West has also radically transformed its views, and dialogue might reveal this. Ultimately, in fact, dialogue might be one of the most important factors to reconcilement (Burgat, 2003). Not that all would be reconciled – internalists, a.k.a., Islamists or fundamentalists might forever remain opposed, but the alleged chasm might lessen between East and West, and differences, potentially, come to seem not only negotiable but also less so than originally appeared. The panorama is complex, and dialogue might tease out that complexity for what it is. Sources Armstrong, K. Islam: a Short History, New York: The Modern Library, 2002. Abdo, G., No God But God, New York: Random House Trade Paperbacks, reprint edition, 2006. Burgat, F. Face to Face with Political Islam, London I.B Taurus, 2003. Esposito, J.A. Unholy War, Oxford University Press, 2002. Hourani, A. History of the Arab Peoples, New York, Belknap, Revised Edition, 2003. Humphreys, S. Between Memory and Desire: The Middle East in a Troubled Age, University of California Press, 1999. Huntington, S. P., “The Clash of Civilizations?” Foreign Affairs (1993): 22, 39. - The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997. Lapidus, I.M. A History of Islamic Societies, 2nd Edition, New York, Cambridge University Press, 2002. Little, D. American Orientalism, Chapel Hill, University of North Carolina Press, 2002. Lynch, M. Voices of the New Arab Public, New York: Columbia University Press, 2006. Sabini, J. Islam: A Primer, Washington, D.C., Amideast, 1997. Saeed, A. Islamic Thought, London and New York: Routledge, 2006. Read More