MARGINALIZATION OF MUSLIM POPULATION IN US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
(DRAFT FOR THE ARTICLE TO BE PUBLISHED ONSUNDAY THE 2ND NOVEMBER 2008)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former
Secretary and ambassador)
Lepers, untouchable, politically radioactive—Muslim Diaspora in the US presently describe themselves during the Presidential election to be held very soon. McCain camp reportedly tried to portray Barack Obama as a Muslim to scare away his supporters. Perhaps this was the reason for Obama to reveal that his middle name is Stevens and not Hussein as was his father’s . He was brought up as a Christian. It is sad that in a multi-religious, multi-cultural nation of immigrants about 6 million Muslims have to prove their loyalty to a country where they are born and bred. According to American Muslim Council( AMC) there are three categories of Muslims: immigrants, American converts/reverts to Islam, and those born to first two groups as Muslims. California has about 20% Muslim population while New York 16% of the total Muslim population. It is sadder that President Bush’s first Secretary of State General Colin Powell who broke with his party by endorsing Barak Obama for the Presidency was greatly disturbed by this anti-Muslim feeling. He told NBC’s Meet the Press: “Is there something wrong being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no, that’s not America”. Powell apparently felt very srongly about the canard about Muslims because he saw a photo he saw in The New Yorker magazine of a mother of a Muslim soldier embracing her son’s grave at Arlington Cemetery. If Bush doctrine of preemption shocked the Europeans it shook the seemingly peaceful foundation of the Islamic world. Yet the entire Muslim world stood alongside the Americans in their grief after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. So when the Talibans were decimated and driven out of Afghanistan the Islamic world supported the NATO actions against the Talibans. But when Iraq was invaded on what now appears to be on untenable and illegal grounds the Muslims as no less the Europeans and the less xenophobic part of the American people refused to sanction Anglo-American misadventure. Colin Powell’s assertion of Bush administration’s belief in a strategy of global partnership for the war on terror failed to calm the fear of a disbelieving world. Equally President Bush’s West Point address of June 2002 urging the governments of the Islamic countries to listen to the hopes of their citizens for the same freedoms and opportunities as available in the West did not elicit uniform enthusiasm. Historian Bernard Lewis interpreted the “Muslim Rage” in terms of millennial rivalry between the two world religions caused by the sense of humiliation felt by the Muslims over being defeated by the “inferior Christians and the Jews”. Lewis’ interpretation of inter-faith tension, despite his outstanding intellect, was criticized by Edward Said who accused Lewis of advancing political agenda under the cloak of scholarship .The Muslim point of view has been reflected in the recently published Arab Human Development Report (AHDR2003) which observed that the adoption of extreme security measures and policies by a number of western countries exceeded their original goals and led to the erosion of civil and political liberties diminishing the welfare of the Arabs and Muslims living in those countries. These freedom-constraining policies have also encouraged the adoption of THE ARAB CHARTER AGAINST TERRORISM allowing censorship, detention and torture. It is therefore not surprising that the American advocacy of redressing democracy deficit in the Islamic world is taken with a pinch of salt. Yet the second Bush administration is expected to press on with the Greater Middle East Initiative because it is believed that: - (a) US support for democracy is extended as a matter of principle, (b) US will prosper more in a world of democracies than in a world of authoritarian or chaotic regimes, (c) history testifies that democracies do not wage wars against other democracies, (d) quantitative increase in democracy leads to qualitative improvement in diplomacy, and (e) democracy is closely linked with prosperity for which peaceful and predictable transition of power is essential. It is further surmised that the US will no longer tolerate “democratic exceptions” in parts of the Muslim world for the sake of its self-interest. But the most recent decision of President Parvez Musharraf to continue as the head of Pakistan army violating the agreement he had concluded with the opposition parties that he would relinquish the post of army head at the end of this year does not speak very highly of American determination to bring about democracy in the Islamic world. Given Pakistan’s close partnership with the US in the war on terror it is inconceivable that President Musharraf could have taken this decision without US blessings. It is therefore quite possible that one democratic exception could lead to many other autocrats to seek a way out of the American imposed pluralism.
It is generally accepted that one-size-fit-all cannot be a sustainable foreign policy option for any major power. However moralistic a policy can be it can never be purely altruistic and must always be self-interested. Therefore it is unlikely that the second Bush administration would push on with its mission of Greater Middle East Initiative if it were found to be in conflict with the war on terror. It is unfortunate but true that in the eyes of the ordinary Westerners al=Qaedist terrorism is seen as being inspired by Islamists. Religious profiling of the Muslims in the US, reported job discrimination, verbal and sometimes physical abuse suffered by the Muslims living in the West are undeniable facts fuelling “spiraling progressive alienation” of the Muslims from the mainstream western society. This has prompted some Western intellectuals to conclude that Huntington’s clash of civilization has already materialized. While another school of thought would deny that there is any clash of civilizations between Islam and the West. They argue that the real battle is being fought within the Muslim civilization between ultra-conservatives and moderates and democrats for the soul of the Muslims who are caught in the crossfire between a westernized elite but oligarchic in character who hold effective power and the oppressed political opposition who take the form of apocalyptic nihilism striking out violently to expel the “infidels” who they believe are sustaining the oligarchs. That there is a crying need to democratize these islands of autocracy is to state the obvious. This need has been reinforced by the findings of the Freedom House survey (2001-2002) of free countries around the world that while the number of “free” nations increased by nearly three dozens over the past 20 years not one of them was a Muslim majority state. Since lack of democratic pluralism has been identified as the primary cause behind Islamic extremism it is possible that the second Bush administration would not abandon its mission to bring meaningful freedom to the Muslim states whose population is still denied a voice in the governance in their own countries.
The Islamic world today is undeniably passing through a critical time in its history fuelled by prejudice, bigotry and various other forms of discrimination used by Western societies against Muslims worldwide. To blame the West for this kind of behavior will not be helpful. After all the Western response has been caused in order to confront al-Qaedist terrorism in the US, Europe, Africa and in several Islamic countries as well. A small venal group spreading lethality in the name of Islam has stigmatized Muslims. The depth of Western anger can be gauged by the fact that Senator Kerry is accused of waffling on Iraq and American public do not appear to see another Vietnam in Iraq yet despite increasing casualties of coalition forces. It is unlikely that the West would relent on the freedom-constraining regulations imposed on the Muslims or that Western society would feel comfortable with Muslims as neighbors and working in their societies along side them. It took Europeans almost fifty years to get comfortable with the Germans though Nazism was physically annihilated by the allied victors and totally rejected by the Germans in 1945. Despite German membership of NATO it took the Kosovo crisis for the NATO allies to invite Germany to participate in the Kosovo campaign.
One wonders whether Western rejection would not force the Islamic world, regardless of its lack of monolithic character and housing divergent philosophies, to be introverted and a part of it intuitively adopting violence as an expression of frustration. This grim scenario can become more terrifying if the West were to increase their violence, because the degree of violence is proportional to the instruments of violence used and the West has a surfeit of such instruments, by expanding their “area of operation” by including Iran, Syria and who knows which other country would be the next. The US has not fared well in Afghanistan and Iraq and is not expected to do so in future. What is essential to regain the lost confidence is to have inter-faith dialogue or something like the South African Truth Commission and opening doors to people of all races and religions and not to shut the door only because a few non-covenanted would sneak in through the open door.
POLITICAL LEFT AND ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM
(FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 11TH MARCH 2007)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud (former Secretary and ambassador)
With the end of the cold war and the demise of the Soviet Union the appeal for communist ideology has diminished the world over. Even China practicing capitalism in its economy would be called revisionist if the “purists” among the practicetioners of communism had their way. It would, however, be a hasty conclusion that the wave of left philosophy, defined as “that current of thought, politics and policy that stresses social improvements over macroeconomic orthodoxy, egalitarian distribution of wealth over its creation, sovereignty over international cooperation, democracy over governmental effectiveness”, has lost its appeal completely in the world. Former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda discerns two types of left in Latin America today: the first being modern, open minded, reformist and internationalist while the other is nationalist, strident and close-minded. In his view the disappearance of the USSR has led to a surge of leftism in Latin America because its supporters could no longer be accused by the United States as being lackeys of the Soviet Union. Extreme inequality, poverty, dispossession of power gave the majority of the poor people their voting right as the only instrument left to register protest and also to regain some role in the process of decision making. Brazil’s Lula, Chile’s Michelle Bachelet, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega are examples of growing leftist power in America’s backyard. It would be erroneous to lump them together as cohabitants of Castro-Chavez trail of the left strand in the region. But nonetheless they all represent a no-confidence vote against the unrestrained capitalism raging in the globalized world ruled by the West whose power lies, according to political analyst Ziauddin Sardar, not “in its economic muscle and technological might (but) in its power to define what is, for example, freedom, progress, civil behavior... The non-Western civilization has simply to accept these definitions or be defined out of existence”.
The silent revolution taking place in many countries of the East, once described by late Edward Said as the colonies of the West yet its cultural contestant, can be compared with those taking place in Latin America. The reason for this opposition to the Western model of economic development while embracing its open and pluralistic political system is because the benefits from economic progress have eluded the great majority of the people, barring some vertical movement of fortunate few from destitution to opulence giving rise to debate on the immorality of their acquisition of wealth, remain mired in ultra-poverty with little light at the end of the tunnel. Low growth rates, writes Castaneda, have meant the persistence of dismal poverty, inequality, and high unemployment. “Democracy” he continues, “although welcomed and supported by broad swaths of Latin American societies did little to eradicate the region’s secular plagues: corruption, a weak or nonexistent rule of law, ineffective governance, and concentration of power in the hands of the few”. This kind of scenery, common in the Third World, is no exception to Bangladesh where the ferocious rapacity of the four party alliance government in plundering the wealth of the people and the Orwellian tyranny let loose on the opposition and the minority community have induced in the people a craving for a government which yet remains to be given a proper constitutional form. But the people are happy that the extremely high possibility of the now displaced gang of politicians’ coming back to power through a manipulated election has become an impossibility and the corrupt who felt themselves to be above the law are being brought to account.
Democracy without the rule of law and more importantly without food on the table is meaningless. One has to decide whether the privilege of casting one’s vote once every five years while remaining ill-fed and ill-clad for the entire period carries the full meaning of democracy. But then again the fourth surge of democratization in former Eastern Europe following the disappearance of the Soviet empire strengthens anew the premise that deep down people, however poor they may be, is averse to be governed by an authority not of their own choosing. Consequently we, in Bangladesh, are in a quandary. We do not know whether to press for an early election and risk electing a group of politicians, some of whom are likely to be corrupt, or to wait for a longer period for the Augean stable to be cleared up and then go for an election through which we can elect people who we can believe to deliver the goods.
In this race, whenever it may take place, the political left has aligned itself with the progressive and secular elements in the country. If neighboring West Bengal is any example to be held aloft then one can safely say that unlike the Islamists who believe in one man- one vote- one time the political left is unlikely to abandon pluralism. But the stark reality is that the political left could not gain enough votes in elections to become a credible voice in the country’s politics. The reasons are not difficult to find. While India after partition in 1947 chose to be non-aligned Pakistan in search of security against a powerful India chose to bind itself to US led military pacts (SEATO, CENTO etc) and consequently blindly followed American cold war dictates including ban on left political parties and persecution of left party leaders. In addition the rightists were able to convince the people that the left, particularly the Communists, were Godless people and should be abjured. Only after the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 that the left political parties were allowed free participation in the political process. Jamat-e-Islami, the standard bearer of the fundamentalists, on the other hand, except for a brief period of ban due to their collaboration with the occupying Pakistani army, had a free hand in politics and through religious schools, now thought to number sixty four thousand, continued to profess political Islam aimed at establishing an Islamist nation to be ruled according to the dictates of the Holy Quran and Sunnah. Under the present global context Bangladeshis would have to be careful while casting votes that they do not mix the professed benefits of the post-death world with the assuredly disadvantages that go with an Islamist rule in the present day world.
RELIGION AND POLITICS (FOR PUBLICATION ON
SUNDAY THE 23RD OCTOBER 2005)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Perhaps both the great Arab historian Ibn
Khaldun and Scottish philosopher David Hume (who greatly influenced Skepticism
and Empiricism school of thought) shared oscillation theory in their
observation of religion. While Ibn Khaldun believed that popular religion in
Muslim societies tended to oscillate between periods of strict religious
observance and of devotional laxity; David Hume believed that men changed from
polytheism to monotheism, not in a continuous unilineal change, and back again because “men have a natural
tendency to rise from idolatry to theism and sent again from theism to
idolatry”. This oscillation, argues Hume, is not caused by thoughtful and
considered reasoning but by politics of fear, uncertainty and a “kind of
competitive sycophancy”. Hume was, therefore, not surprised that Hercules,
Thesus, Hector and Romulus were replaced by Dominic, Francis, Anthony and
Benedict. Hume was a protestant and a skeptic at that. His distance from
Catholic philosophy, however interesting, does not form the core of our
discussion. What is important is the relevance of the commonality in the
perception of Hume and Ibn Khaldun of oscillating devotion of human beings
between monotheism and polytheism and also differences in the character of
devotees in both creeds which have plunged the world today into a black hole
of holocaust because a minuscule part of
the adherents of one creed would repeatedly inflict upon the world their
weapons of hatred. It has been surmised that Christianity’s urging of its
followers to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s is because it initially
flourished among the politically disinherited, among those who were persecuted
for their belief in a monotheistic religion when “competitive sycophancy”
obliged most people to practice idolatry because Caesar had both gold and sword which an unseen God
in His wisdom did not chose to use to save His followers from the jaws of
death. It took the Christians thousand years to get relief till Emperor Constantine converted himself to
Christianity and Emperor Charlemagne converted Europe to Christendom. Before
that time a faith born without political power could hardly had been expected
to preach otherwise. By contrast the initial success of Islam was so rapid that
it did not have to give anything unto Caesar and it spread its wings often at
point of sword and grew into a rich civilization dominating a large part of
Europe. By the eighth century Muslims
had conquered North Africa, the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, most of
Spain, established bases in Italy, substantially reduced the size of the
Eastern Roman Empire and besieged its capital Constantinople. The Ottoman
Empire’s assault on the gates of Vienna could perhaps provide a background to
the stringent Austrian opposition, though mellowed down temporarily, to start
European Union’s talks for Turkey’s entry into the EU. If historian Bernard
Lewis’ clash of civilization denoting those between Muslims and Christians and post-Christians, rigid
theocratic hierarchy vs. permissive secular modernism is to be given credence
then one could imagine that the seat of non-Catholic Christianity has now taken
residence in the White House combining both temporal and spiritual powers( how
can one forget President Bush’s communion with God ordering him to attack
Afghanistan and Iraq and to establish the State of Palestine). Whether the
Americans have reelected an evangelist and fundamentalist as President could
have been ignored by the world had not that person also at the same time been
the most powerful man in the world presiding over a country described by some
as one which has so much economic, cultural and military power not accrued by
any nation since the days of the Roman Empire. One hopes that despite the
horrific terrorist transgression into America—both physical and
psychological—President Bush would not be totally converted to Bernard Lewis’
perception of the Muslim world’s “downward spiral of hate and spite, rage and
self-pity, poverty and oppression” having been caused by the defeat of the
Muslims at hands of the Judeo-Christian civilization but would retain his
belief in the conviction expressed by John F. Kennedy in his posthumously
published book A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS that Jefferson and Madison’s America
would not see immigrants as ethnically-hyphenated (e.g. Arab-American) or as
ethnicity of origin(e.g. a Bangladeshi). In reality, however, the Muslim
Diaspora in the West is seen through tinted glass by their predominantly white
neighbors (a recent survey shows that a majority of both whites and
African-Americans favor a decrease in the current level of immigration)
reminiscent of the internment of the Japanese-Americans during the Second World
War. In self-defense the Muslims have adopted, as Professor Kay Deaux points
out, many taxi drivers in New York city (immediately after 9/11) who by
appearance could be labeled as Arabs or Muslims pasted American flags on the
windscreen of their cars. Another tendency displayed by the Diaspora is to turn
inward, a tendency to “circle the wagon” in the face of unfriendly stares which
a western liberal values imbibed modern person would have been loathe to do
under ordinary circumstances. Yet the stigmata was generally stamped on the
Muslim community despite the realization that terrorism is not and had never
been a proprietorial element of Muslim
faith and had been and continues to be practiced by others in abandon. Undoubtedly
the current discontent prevalent in the Middle East has been a scapegoat as a
primary cause of global turbulence. A deeper analysis would reveal that the
present discontent of the Muslim youth
is primarily due to the failure of Pan Arab nationalism not only to deliver
basic political goods but also to hide their failure the leaders strangulated
the voice of dissent. Added to this was the acquiescence or blatant support
extended by the West to these despots due to the demands of the then Cold War
situation which fuelled Muslim anger. And of course a constant source of Muslim
frustration has been occasioned by the unqualified support given to the Israeli
genocidal and expansionist policies in the Middle East. While the expression of
this anger and frustration through terrorism can never be justified because
terrorism even in its most expansive definition can only be abhorred, one has
to address the root causes of this malignancy not in terms of “defeat” of one
civilization by another but to secure a coherent globalized society where prosperity
and poverty are not totally segmented. It is natural for the West as it for the
victims of terrorism in some developing countries to attack the terrorist where
ever they may be as Plato had advised centuries back that the price of
civilization is the need to defend its own material preconditions by force of
arms if necessary. Equally it is necessary to recognize that the Muslims of the
world differ substantially not only in their religious views but also in their
politico-cultural orientation. Islam is trans-ethnic, trans-social and
trans-national yet it is far from being homogenous as the simplistic view would
tend one to believe. Indeed as Professor Ernest Gellner points out Islam
provides “a scriptural faith; a completed one is available and there is no room
for further accretion or for new prophets; also, there is no warrant for
clergy, and hence for differentiation, and there is no need to differentiate
between the church and the state, between what is God’s and what is Caesar’s”.
But there are cleavages between the Sunnis and the Shiias(the current situation
in Iraq provides the most glaring example); between the Arab and non-Arab
Muslims; between those who believe in hereditary and hierarchical system as
Bernard Lewis put it “The Imam is central to the Ismaila system of doctrine…the
Imams were divinely inspired and infallible” and those who believe that no
intermediary is necessary between God and His devotees. These differences have
arisen with the passage of time and have caused both social and political
conflicts. The merchants of death today are exploiting these differences not
only to promote sectarian violence within the Islamic world but also to deny
the fruits of technological advancement to the Muslim subalterns of the
yesteryears. Our misfortune is that these ideologues of hatred, semi-literate
themselves, are convincing the illiterate( of secular education) madrasha
students of their inerrant moral and intellectual “superiority” over others to the extent that these “others”
being moral degenerates need to be physically eliminated to purify the earth of
apostates. This kind of Hitlerian menace( who believe in superiority of faith
in place of racial superiority) has now assaulted our shores. As it is according to Human Development Index, Growth
Competitive Index, Failed States Index and Transparency International’s
Corruption Perception Index Bangladesh has fared miserably. Unless our
authorities can free themselves from the vortex of being a politician who can
see only up to the next elections and graduate themselves to the statust of a
statesman who thinks of the next generation Bangladeshis may have to account
for their failure to the elders of the global village.
HOW REAL ARE EURO-US DIFFERENCES? 15th May 2003
By Kazi Anwarul Masud
(Retired Secretary to the Bangladesh
government and former ambassador)
Timothy Garten Ash of the Oxford University
echoing Robert Kagan (who provides the intellectual benchmark—reflecting the
views of the current administration and not inconsiderable part of the foreign
policy establishment and scholarship) said that in matters of strategy the
Americans were from the Mars and the Europeans are from the Venus. He saw no
“clash of civilizations” between Europe and America
As both belonged to the same historical roots and shared most of the values. The Kantian, internationalist, law based European approach to foreign policy, argued Timothy Ash, had been repeatedly advocated and embraced by the US since the end of the Second World War and therefore to call on the US to shun neo-conservatism and return to multilateralism based on international law was not a call for conversion to Europeanism but for a return of the US to its best traditions. A strong and united Europe compromising between neo-Atlanticism spearheaded by Britain and neo-Gaullism of France is in the best interest of the United States. It has been argued that Europeans must not abandon those diplomatic tools dismissed by neo-conservative Americans as ineffective e.g. Negotiations, multilateral institutions and engagements through economic development because the US despite its overwhelming military power vis-a vis the rest of the world does not have the capacity to follow through as demonstrated in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and almost inevitably in Iraq. The superiority of the European values have already been demonstrated in Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain who rose up from fascist or clerical rule; overwhelmingly rural based economies; and mired in incorrigibly corrupt administrations into what they are today because of the will of the European people to make them a part of the Union. In his most recent commencement address at the University of South Carolina President Bush informed his audience that the combined GDP of all Arab states was smaller than that of Spain. Many have rejected alleged attempts by the present US administration to undermine European coherence by proclaiming Europe’s division into two irreconcilable and hostile blocs—old Europe and new Europe—in order to forcefully project unrivalled American economic, political and military power to serve the narrow American national interests as depicted in the Bush Security Strategy to the detriment of the rest of the world. Such rejection was further fortified by former Irish Prime Minister John Burton when he pointed out the economic relationship was by far the most important in the entire world and that European investment in Texas alone was greater than all US investment in Japan. He recognized that the Bush doctrine of preemption/prevention war “ is a big and potentially dangerous departure from the existing norms of inter-state behavior”. So, he suggested that EU should establish a comprehensive and formalized dialogue with the US on linked questions of preemptive wars, WMD, and terrorism in order to develop a new, predictable, well understood and intellectually sustainable doctrine of managing the post- nine eleven world. Indeed if one were to listen to Colin Powell’s address to the American Foreign Policy Association (on May 7, 2003) one would come away with the impression that Euro-US differences were not only transient but also cosmetic. Powell reminded his audience that for more than half a century ties between the US and her European allies have been “ the sinews of security, democracy and prosperity in the transatlantic region” and praised the EU and NATO’s willingness to accept the concept of “out of the area” by accepting engagements from Kosovo to Kabul to Kirkuk (in Iraq). He conceded that sometimes the US and EU/NATO disagreed but mostly over means and not ends. Powell was at one with European prerogative to disagree with the US because the consensus sought by them should be forged in “honest, open, rigorous debate (as) all is free and sovereign nations” entitled to their own opinion. At this consultative stage US has another decisive advantage over Europe that it can project its views through a single agency, the Presidency bolstered by the Congress, a process in which America’s fifty odd states have no say at all whereas the diverse interest of the EU members are always reflected in foreign policy (e.g. British neo-atlanticism and French particularism).
While Colin Powell’s reassurances are
encouraging it would be imprudent to paper over EU-US differences. It is time
to stop pretending, wrote Robert Kagan, that Europeans and Americans share a
common view of the world or even occupy the same world. According to him
Europe” is entering a post-historical paradise of peace and relative
prosperity, the realization of Kant’s ‘perpetual paradise’. The United States,
meanwhile, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international
laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and defense and promotion
of liberal order still depend on the possession of military might. That is why
on major strategic and international questions today, Americans are from Mars
and Europeans are from Venus”. It is not difficult to find out the differences
in this prismatic variant. They differ as to when diplomacy should end and
bombs should start to fall. Europe largely remains unconvinced of the efficacy
of the doctrine of preemption/prevention; marginalization of the UN by the US
(Powell would ask the UN to play a vital role in Iraq while the major powers on
the UNSC, NATO and EU would have a special role to play in facing the
challenges of the new century); and assigning international law to a secondary
role to military power (which the Europeans find alien and appalling).
Do the Americans have a case in their favor?
Perhaps. Tomas Vaslek (Director, CDI, Brussels) argues that in the changed
world of post-nine the UN system set up to regulate inter-state relations is
now faced with the advent of globally organized terrorist groups or non-state
actors. These non-state actors taking advantage of failing and failed states
necessitated the adoption of UNSC resolution 748(1992) making states
responsible for the actions of the terrorists. So when the Talibans were driven
out of Afghanistan, in a way Law of War was revised, and the world concurred. Definition
of self-defense as given in the UN Charter, some feel, needs revision due to
change in technological nature of the threat. If the reaction time is too short
then should the “intended victim” wait till it is attacked so that self-defense
measures can be taken?Elihu Root, US Secretary of War(1899-1904) defined
self-defense as “the right of every sovereign state to protect itself by
preventing a condition of affairs in which it will be too late to protect
itself”. Defense of the doctrine of preemption/prevention war was germane to
Elihu Root’s definition as in the notes of Antonio Cassese; former President of
ICC for Yugoslavia that current justification of self-defense against has
become fuzzy because of the advent of non-state actors. Another factor was
added by the dissolution of Yugoslavia and consequent Bosnia, Croatia and
Kosovo crisis. The question arose whether state sovereignty should remain
inviolable if large-scale human rights violations/genocide occur. Despite
article 2(7) of the UN Charter relating to territorial integrity regardless of
what is happening within the territory; 1999 NATO bombings of Serbia into
submission established the principle that sovereignty does not allow waging war
against one’s own people. So Slovodan Milasovich is now being tried as a war
criminal by the Hague Tribunal This is breaking of new ground of the
“humanitarian war” doctrine.
Given European (Britain excluded) reservation
on Bush doctrine of preemption/preventive war coupled with their inability to
stop the Americans to do as they please; Europe is left with the option of
revising the Law of War in concert with those Americans who believe in the
multilateral system. As Harvard professor Joseph Nye concluded that while the
US was too powerful to be challenged by any nation state, it was not strong
enough to solve new transnational problems by itself. US would therefore have
to define its interests in congruence with those of other states particularly
of Europe. It would therefore be fallacious to assume that US-Europe
differences would be allowed to run deep to fracture the institutional and
structural bonds already existing between these countries. Economic ties are
too strong. Cultural ties are historical. Racially majority of the Europeans
and Americans are Caucasians and by religion Christians. Kalypso Nicolaides of
Oxford University advises both to learn to live together as they had been doing
for so long despite their current differences; define a constructive and
conscious division of labor; EU should not approach the US power in structural
terms—unipolar or multipolar, friends or rivals; Europe must recognize that the
world beyond Europe is closer to a pre-Kantian world with a great number if
Hobbesian islands in the form of rogue states, failed or failing states, and
local zones of conflict. Nicolaides feels that time has come to revisit the UN
Charter regarding the link of enforcement of its fundamental norms (human
rights, non-proliferation) and the use of force or coercive diplomacy which in
any case has been used repeatedly from Kosovo to Sierra Leone.
While the West without great efforts may find
consummation of their seemingly differing strands of behavior; the problem of
any forcible revision of the UN Charter and norms of international law so long
regarded as sacramental would be disastrous for the Third World. In a fluid and
inconstant world where the behavior of the rich and the powerful may not be
predictable and constrained by universal moral code of conduct, let alone
international law, the small and the weak may face enslavement of sorts by the
comparatively more powerful nations. In such situations North Korean aberrant
nuclear policy may appear to some as a sound logic for providing ultimate
defense against predator states. It is therefore necessary that people from
Mars be aware of their limitations and act in concert with the people from
Venus who have found over centuries the usefulness of compromise over
conviction.
DANISH CARTOONS AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION(
FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 12TH FEBRUARY 2006)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Unsavory characterization of Prophet
Mohammed(SM) in the cartoons published by a Danish newspaper and reproduced by
several European newspapers have brought to the fore the modern debate on
limits of freedom of expression and speech. It is generally accepted that
freedom of expression is circumscribed by its adverse fall out on the dignity
of the individual(libel) or the majesty of the divinity(blasphemy). Society by
definition being a conglomeration of diverse individuals societal
responsibility demands that rights of the members of the society not be
intruded upon. Libel laws exist in a variety of forms to safeguard the
individual honor. Similarly, blasphemy laws enacted in many countries, though
increasingly falling into disuse, are aimed at protecting the majesty of God.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines blasphemy as “ any oral or written reproach
maliciously cast upon God, His name, attributes or religion”. Catholic
Encyclopedia considers blasphemy as heretical when insult to God involves a
declaration that is against the faith; imprecatory when it would cry a
malediction upon Divinity; and contumacious when it is wholly made up of
contempt or indignation towards God. Interestingly British Criminal law
contains in its statute book law relating to blasphemy even today though it was
developed mainly during the 18th century to protect the Anglican
version of Christianity. As late as 1979 the House of Lords upheld a
prosecution on charge of blasphemy centering on the publication of an erotic
homosexual poem about Jesus Christ in a British weekly. When the decision was
challenged the European Court of Human Rights ruled that protection for
religious freedom was superior in this case to protection of freedom of
expression.
The arguments proffered in this essay are not
for enacting blasphemy laws. On the contrary the First Amendment to the US
Constitution insisting that “Congress shall make no laws respecting an
establishment of religion”, a declaration powerfully pursued by the US Supreme
Court to ensure separation of the Church from the State and generally emulated
by developed economies, should act as beacon light to ships sailing against the
tumultuous waves of the 21st century seas.
With the virtual disappearance of communism
from its European strongholds Karl Marx’s description of religion as opiate of
man has lost favor with majority of the
people of the world. Dethronement of atheism has, perhaps, resulted in peoples’
greater devotion to established religions than what would have otherwise been
expected to happen. Though an inverse relationship between wealth and
religiosity is believed to be axiomatic yet the description of the US, the
largest economy in the world, as “a poster child of super natural belief” is
profoundly telling. Supernatural belief, according to anthropologist Edward
Taylor, is the “minimum definition of religion”. Just about any American,
blessed with the material advantages of technological age, believe in God in
the biblical sense along with miracles, angels, devils and after life. This
belief in the super natural is not confined to Christian Conservatives, once
described by the Washington Post as “largely poor, the uneducated”, but for
example, embraces about half of the scientific community of the US .
There is nothing inherently wrong in being
wealthy and religious. Indeed some psychologists have concluded that belief in
God is “bred in the bone”, it is instinctive and natural and not necessarily
learnt. The problem is not in the contradiction between religiosity and
atheism/agnosticism but in the continuing war between religions. Historian
Webster’s description of the Thirty Years’ War as “the last great war of
religion” could not have been more misplaced if one were to chronicle the
persecution of the Jews at the hands of the Christians for centuries and the
current tension between the Islamic and the Judeo-Christian civilizations. The
terrorist attacks of 9/11 though carried out by a handful of renegades in the
name of Islam and condemned by the whole Islamic world (along with the rest of
the international community) have nonetheless reduced the Muslims, particularly
the Muslim Diaspora living in the West, to negotiating the parameters of
minority citizenship.
In Denmark the publication of the cartoons
and the consequent Muslim outrage in Europe and in some parts of the world has
increased the popularity of the populist anti-immigration Danish Peoples Party
which openly says that Islam is not a religion but a terrorist organization.
European antipathy towards Islam is grounded in history. The Crusades and the
domination by the Ottoman Turks over a large part of European lands had fuelled
anti-Islamic sentiments among the Europeans which had remained dormant as
Christians of different denominations fought among themselves( not religious
wars though) and in their struggle to colonize then pristine world unsullied by
European lust and greed, and engineered the death and destruction of millions
of people in the two Great Wars in the Twentieth century. Like infected blood
anti-Muslim feelings flowing in the sub-terranean veins has now found renewed
expressions. For example, when finally the issue of Turkey’s admission as a
member of the European Union could not be delayed any longer some European
nations have voiced opposition to Turkish membership. Austria which
historically served as bulwark against Ottoman expansionism in Europe has
suggested for a pan-European referendum on the question of Turkish membership. Former
French President Valerie Giscard d’Estaing expressed the fear that Turkey’s
membership would spell the end of Europe. Other opponents include Slovakia,
Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Malta and Cyprus. Prominent German politician
Wolfgang Schauble was skeptical about an EU with Turkey as a member would
continue to be able to build “an ever closer political union or speak with one
voice”, and suggested limiting the size of the European Union. Late last year
France witnessed religious-race riots between Muslim
youths and the French authorities and their escalation to other European
countries. Though apparently caused by the accidental death by electrocution of
two Arab Muslim youths fleeing from the pursuit of the French police , the
riots were basically caused by decades long socio-economic exclusion of Muslim
immigrants brought into France from North Africa to shore up the post-War
sagging French economy. Generally immigration is determined by the demands of
the advanced metropolitan capitalism weighed against the disadvantages of
socio-cultural asymmetry caused by the refusal/inability of the immigrants to
fully assimilate with the values of the host country. This gives rise to “us”
versus “them” feeling resulting in sharp division in society and consequent
violence in which the authorities tend to take the side of the host country
population against the immigrants
forgetting that the second or third generation immigrants are no less citizens
of the country as those belonging to the majority community. Additionally the
“failure” of the immigrants to fully integrate themselves with the mainstream
life results in gaining political territory by anti-immigration political
parties who play on the unfounded fear of the host country voters about the
immigrants.
In response to the Organization of Islamic
Countries’ condemnation of the “printing of blasphemous and insulting
caricatures of Prophet Mohammed(SM)” which the Organization thought to be a
“trap set up by fundamentalists and foster acts of revenge”; Danish Prime
Minister Rasmussen felt that “freedom of speech is absolute (and) not
negotiable” while a prominent Danish academic expressed the view that “people
are inclined to see Islam and political extremism as two sides of the same
coin”. His subsequent apology for the publication of the cartoons and his
description of Denmark as a country tolerant of different religions and having
an open society is too little too late.
One wonders whether the repeated onslaught on
Muslim sensibilities through cleverly disguised provocations are not aimed at
perpetuating Western minds along the views expressed by Bernard Lewis, among
others, of Islam being an intolerant religion. “Islam was never prepared”
writes Lewis “either in theory or in practice, to accord full equality to those
who held other beliefs and practiced other forms of worship”. Besides, adds
Bernard Lewis, there exists millennial rivalry between Islam and Christianity—a
competing world religion, a distinctive civilization inspired by that
religion.... the struggle between these rival systems has now lasted for some
fourteen centuries.. and has continued virtually to the present day”. The other
school of thought less severe on Islam for example, Samuel Huntington of Clash
of Civilization fame observes: “The West won the world not by supremacy of
ideas or values or religion but rather by superiority in applying organized
violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do”.
The whole episode about the cartoons’
portrayal of Prophet Mohammed_(SM) in unflattering terms appears to be more by
design than by accident. Had the Danish Prime Minister Rasmussen not refused to
see the Arab ambassadors when they sought a meeting with him to discuss about
the cartoons’ publication last September the current explosion in the Islamic
world could have been avoided. The situation deteriorated with the repeat
publication of the cartoons in January in a small evangelical Christian
newspaper in Norway and in other European countries and with the EU backing of
the Danish position on inviolability of freedom of expression at the cost of
hurting the religious sentiment of more than one billion Muslims all over the
world. This arrogant display of an “inerrant” interpretation of right to
expression leads one to look for other views.
“For a society to claim universal desirability” wrote Irish
anthropologist Vincent Tucker “while turning its back on others from whom it is
convinced it has nothing to learn, is not only cultural elitism, but cultural
racism”.
It
becomes difficult to comprehend the inherent contradictions in making Woodrow
Wilsonian promises to democratize the world( made once again in Bush 2006 State
of the Union address) and lack of Western comprehension of Islamic
fundamentalism’s repeated attempt to transcend the boundary of quietism. The
West, unless it opts to retreat into some fortified areas of affluence to
escape the contagion of religious extremism( a doubtful venture in this age of
globalism and fraught with risk to its own security), would be better advised
to cooperate with the moderate elements in the Muslim world engaged in their
struggle with those imbibed with absolutist, “ inerrant” and arrogant
confidence in the supremacy of their belief, for the soul of Islam.
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MARGINALIZATION OF MUSLIM POPULATION IN US
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
(DRAFT FOR THE ARTICLE TO BE PUBLISHED ONSUNDAY THE 2ND NOVEMBER 2008)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former
Secretary and ambassador)
Lepers, untouchable, politically radioactive—Muslim Diaspora in the US presently describe themselves during the Presidential election to be held very soon. McCain camp reportedly tried to portray Barack Obama as a Muslim to scare away his supporters. Perhaps this was the reason for Obama to reveal that his middle name is Stevens and not Hussein as was his father’s . He was brought up as a Christian. It is sad that in a multi-religious, multi-cultural nation of immigrants about 6 million Muslims have to prove their loyalty to a country where they are born and bred. According to American Muslim Council( AMC) there are three categories of Muslims: immigrants, American converts/reverts to Islam, and those born to first two groups as Muslims. California has about 20% Muslim population while New York 16% of the total Muslim population. It is sadder that President Bush’s first Secretary of State General Colin Powell who broke with his party by endorsing Barak Obama for the Presidency was greatly disturbed by this anti-Muslim feeling. He told NBC’s Meet the Press: “Is there something wrong being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no, that’s not America”. Powell apparently felt very srongly about the canard about Muslims because he saw a photo he saw in The New Yorker magazine of a mother of a Muslim soldier embracing her son’s grave at Arlington Cemetery. If Bush doctrine of preemption shocked the Europeans it shook the seemingly peaceful foundation of the Islamic world. Yet the entire Muslim world stood alongside the Americans in their grief after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. So when the Talibans were decimated and driven out of Afghanistan the Islamic world supported the NATO actions against the Talibans. But when Iraq was invaded on what now appears to be on untenable and illegal grounds the Muslims as no less the Europeans and the less xenophobic part of the American people refused to sanction Anglo-American misadventure. Colin Powell’s assertion of Bush administration’s belief in a strategy of global partnership for the war on terror failed to calm the fear of a disbelieving world. Equally President Bush’s West Point address of June 2002 urging the governments of the Islamic countries to listen to the hopes of their citizens for the same freedoms and opportunities as available in the West did not elicit uniform enthusiasm. Historian Bernard Lewis interpreted the “Muslim Rage” in terms of millennial rivalry between the two world religions caused by the sense of humiliation felt by the Muslims over being defeated by the “inferior Christians and the Jews”. Lewis’ interpretation of inter-faith tension, despite his outstanding intellect, was criticized by Edward Said who accused Lewis of advancing political agenda under the cloak of scholarship .The Muslim point of view has been reflected in the recently published Arab Human Development Report (AHDR2003) which observed that the adoption of extreme security measures and policies by a number of western countries exceeded their original goals and led to the erosion of civil and political liberties diminishing the welfare of the Arabs and Muslims living in those countries. These freedom-constraining policies have also encouraged the adoption of THE ARAB CHARTER AGAINST TERRORISM allowing censorship, detention and torture. It is therefore not surprising that the American advocacy of redressing democracy deficit in the Islamic world is taken with a pinch of salt. Yet the second Bush administration is expected to press on with the Greater Middle East Initiative because it is believed that: - (a) US support for democracy is extended as a matter of principle, (b) US will prosper more in a world of democracies than in a world of authoritarian or chaotic regimes, (c) history testifies that democracies do not wage wars against other democracies, (d) quantitative increase in democracy leads to qualitative improvement in diplomacy, and (e) democracy is closely linked with prosperity for which peaceful and predictable transition of power is essential. It is further surmised that the US will no longer tolerate “democratic exceptions” in parts of the Muslim world for the sake of its self-interest. But the most recent decision of President Parvez Musharraf to continue as the head of Pakistan army violating the agreement he had concluded with the opposition parties that he would relinquish the post of army head at the end of this year does not speak very highly of American determination to bring about democracy in the Islamic world. Given Pakistan’s close partnership with the US in the war on terror it is inconceivable that President Musharraf could have taken this decision without US blessings. It is therefore quite possible that one democratic exception could lead to many other autocrats to seek a way out of the American imposed pluralism.
It is generally accepted that one-size-fit-all cannot be a sustainable foreign policy option for any major power. However moralistic a policy can be it can never be purely altruistic and must always be self-interested. Therefore it is unlikely that the second Bush administration would push on with its mission of Greater Middle East Initiative if it were found to be in conflict with the war on terror. It is unfortunate but true that in the eyes of the ordinary Westerners al=Qaedist terrorism is seen as being inspired by Islamists. Religious profiling of the Muslims in the US, reported job discrimination, verbal and sometimes physical abuse suffered by the Muslims living in the West are undeniable facts fuelling “spiraling progressive alienation” of the Muslims from the mainstream western society. This has prompted some Western intellectuals to conclude that Huntington’s clash of civilization has already materialized. While another school of thought would deny that there is any clash of civilizations between Islam and the West. They argue that the real battle is being fought within the Muslim civilization between ultra-conservatives and moderates and democrats for the soul of the Muslims who are caught in the crossfire between a westernized elite but oligarchic in character who hold effective power and the oppressed political opposition who take the form of apocalyptic nihilism striking out violently to expel the “infidels” who they believe are sustaining the oligarchs. That there is a crying need to democratize these islands of autocracy is to state the obvious. This need has been reinforced by the findings of the Freedom House survey (2001-2002) of free countries around the world that while the number of “free” nations increased by nearly three dozens over the past 20 years not one of them was a Muslim majority state. Since lack of democratic pluralism has been identified as the primary cause behind Islamic extremism it is possible that the second Bush administration would not abandon its mission to bring meaningful freedom to the Muslim states whose population is still denied a voice in the governance in their own countries.
The Islamic world today is undeniably passing through a critical time in its history fuelled by prejudice, bigotry and various other forms of discrimination used by Western societies against Muslims worldwide. To blame the West for this kind of behavior will not be helpful. After all the Western response has been caused in order to confront al-Qaedist terrorism in the US, Europe, Africa and in several Islamic countries as well. A small venal group spreading lethality in the name of Islam has stigmatized Muslims. The depth of Western anger can be gauged by the fact that Senator Kerry is accused of waffling on Iraq and American public do not appear to see another Vietnam in Iraq yet despite increasing casualties of coalition forces. It is unlikely that the West would relent on the freedom-constraining regulations imposed on the Muslims or that Western society would feel comfortable with Muslims as neighbors and working in their societies along side them. It took Europeans almost fifty years to get comfortable with the Germans though Nazism was physically annihilated by the allied victors and totally rejected by the Germans in 1945. Despite German membership of NATO it took the Kosovo crisis for the NATO allies to invite Germany to participate in the Kosovo campaign.
One wonders whether Western rejection would not force the Islamic world, regardless of its lack of monolithic character and housing divergent philosophies, to be introverted and a part of it intuitively adopting violence as an expression of frustration. This grim scenario can become more terrifying if the West were to increase their violence, because the degree of violence is proportional to the instruments of violence used and the West has a surfeit of such instruments, by expanding their “area of operation” by including Iran, Syria and who knows which other country would be the next. The US has not fared well in Afghanistan and Iraq and is not expected to do so in future. What is essential to regain the lost confidence is to have inter-faith dialogue or something like the South African Truth Commission and opening doors to people of all races and religions and not to shut the door only because a few non-covenanted would sneak in through the open door.
POLITICAL LEFT AND ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM
(FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 11TH MARCH 2007)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud (former Secretary and ambassador)
With the end of the cold war and the demise of the Soviet Union the appeal for communist ideology has diminished the world over. Even China practicing capitalism in its economy would be called revisionist if the “purists” among the practicetioners of communism had their way. It would, however, be a hasty conclusion that the wave of left philosophy, defined as “that current of thought, politics and policy that stresses social improvements over macroeconomic orthodoxy, egalitarian distribution of wealth over its creation, sovereignty over international cooperation, democracy over governmental effectiveness”, has lost its appeal completely in the world. Former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda discerns two types of left in Latin America today: the first being modern, open minded, reformist and internationalist while the other is nationalist, strident and close-minded. In his view the disappearance of the USSR has led to a surge of leftism in Latin America because its supporters could no longer be accused by the United States as being lackeys of the Soviet Union. Extreme inequality, poverty, dispossession of power gave the majority of the poor people their voting right as the only instrument left to register protest and also to regain some role in the process of decision making. Brazil’s Lula, Chile’s Michelle Bachelet, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega are examples of growing leftist power in America’s backyard. It would be erroneous to lump them together as cohabitants of Castro-Chavez trail of the left strand in the region. But nonetheless they all represent a no-confidence vote against the unrestrained capitalism raging in the globalized world ruled by the West whose power lies, according to political analyst Ziauddin Sardar, not “in its economic muscle and technological might (but) in its power to define what is, for example, freedom, progress, civil behavior... The non-Western civilization has simply to accept these definitions or be defined out of existence”.
The silent revolution taking place in many countries of the East, once described by late Edward Said as the colonies of the West yet its cultural contestant, can be compared with those taking place in Latin America. The reason for this opposition to the Western model of economic development while embracing its open and pluralistic political system is because the benefits from economic progress have eluded the great majority of the people, barring some vertical movement of fortunate few from destitution to opulence giving rise to debate on the immorality of their acquisition of wealth, remain mired in ultra-poverty with little light at the end of the tunnel. Low growth rates, writes Castaneda, have meant the persistence of dismal poverty, inequality, and high unemployment. “Democracy” he continues, “although welcomed and supported by broad swaths of Latin American societies did little to eradicate the region’s secular plagues: corruption, a weak or nonexistent rule of law, ineffective governance, and concentration of power in the hands of the few”. This kind of scenery, common in the Third World, is no exception to Bangladesh where the ferocious rapacity of the four party alliance government in plundering the wealth of the people and the Orwellian tyranny let loose on the opposition and the minority community have induced in the people a craving for a government which yet remains to be given a proper constitutional form. But the people are happy that the extremely high possibility of the now displaced gang of politicians’ coming back to power through a manipulated election has become an impossibility and the corrupt who felt themselves to be above the law are being brought to account.
Democracy without the rule of law and more importantly without food on the table is meaningless. One has to decide whether the privilege of casting one’s vote once every five years while remaining ill-fed and ill-clad for the entire period carries the full meaning of democracy. But then again the fourth surge of democratization in former Eastern Europe following the disappearance of the Soviet empire strengthens anew the premise that deep down people, however poor they may be, is averse to be governed by an authority not of their own choosing. Consequently we, in Bangladesh, are in a quandary. We do not know whether to press for an early election and risk electing a group of politicians, some of whom are likely to be corrupt, or to wait for a longer period for the Augean stable to be cleared up and then go for an election through which we can elect people who we can believe to deliver the goods.
In this race, whenever it may take place, the political left has aligned itself with the progressive and secular elements in the country. If neighboring West Bengal is any example to be held aloft then one can safely say that unlike the Islamists who believe in one man- one vote- one time the political left is unlikely to abandon pluralism. But the stark reality is that the political left could not gain enough votes in elections to become a credible voice in the country’s politics. The reasons are not difficult to find. While India after partition in 1947 chose to be non-aligned Pakistan in search of security against a powerful India chose to bind itself to US led military pacts (SEATO, CENTO etc) and consequently blindly followed American cold war dictates including ban on left political parties and persecution of left party leaders. In addition the rightists were able to convince the people that the left, particularly the Communists, were Godless people and should be abjured. Only after the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 that the left political parties were allowed free participation in the political process. Jamat-e-Islami, the standard bearer of the fundamentalists, on the other hand, except for a brief period of ban due to their collaboration with the occupying Pakistani army, had a free hand in politics and through religious schools, now thought to number sixty four thousand, continued to profess political Islam aimed at establishing an Islamist nation to be ruled according to the dictates of the Holy Quran and Sunnah. Under the present global context Bangladeshis would have to be careful while casting votes that they do not mix the professed benefits of the post-death world with the assuredly disadvantages that go with an Islamist rule in the present day world.
RELIGION AND POLITICS (FOR PUBLICATION ON
SUNDAY THE 23RD OCTOBER 2005)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Perhaps both the great Arab historian Ibn
Khaldun and Scottish philosopher David Hume (who greatly influenced Skepticism
and Empiricism school of thought) shared oscillation theory in their
observation of religion. While Ibn Khaldun believed that popular religion in
Muslim societies tended to oscillate between periods of strict religious
observance and of devotional laxity; David Hume believed that men changed from
polytheism to monotheism, not in a continuous unilineal change, and back again because “men have a natural
tendency to rise from idolatry to theism and sent again from theism to
idolatry”. This oscillation, argues Hume, is not caused by thoughtful and
considered reasoning but by politics of fear, uncertainty and a “kind of
competitive sycophancy”. Hume was, therefore, not surprised that Hercules,
Thesus, Hector and Romulus were replaced by Dominic, Francis, Anthony and
Benedict. Hume was a protestant and a skeptic at that. His distance from
Catholic philosophy, however interesting, does not form the core of our
discussion. What is important is the relevance of the commonality in the
perception of Hume and Ibn Khaldun of oscillating devotion of human beings
between monotheism and polytheism and also differences in the character of
devotees in both creeds which have plunged the world today into a black hole
of holocaust because a minuscule part of
the adherents of one creed would repeatedly inflict upon the world their
weapons of hatred. It has been surmised that Christianity’s urging of its
followers to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s is because it initially
flourished among the politically disinherited, among those who were persecuted
for their belief in a monotheistic religion when “competitive sycophancy”
obliged most people to practice idolatry because Caesar had both gold and sword which an unseen God
in His wisdom did not chose to use to save His followers from the jaws of
death. It took the Christians thousand years to get relief till Emperor Constantine converted himself to
Christianity and Emperor Charlemagne converted Europe to Christendom. Before
that time a faith born without political power could hardly had been expected
to preach otherwise. By contrast the initial success of Islam was so rapid that
it did not have to give anything unto Caesar and it spread its wings often at
point of sword and grew into a rich civilization dominating a large part of
Europe. By the eighth century Muslims
had conquered North Africa, the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, most of
Spain, established bases in Italy, substantially reduced the size of the
Eastern Roman Empire and besieged its capital Constantinople. The Ottoman
Empire’s assault on the gates of Vienna could perhaps provide a background to
the stringent Austrian opposition, though mellowed down temporarily, to start
European Union’s talks for Turkey’s entry into the EU. If historian Bernard
Lewis’ clash of civilization denoting those between Muslims and Christians and post-Christians, rigid
theocratic hierarchy vs. permissive secular modernism is to be given credence
then one could imagine that the seat of non-Catholic Christianity has now taken
residence in the White House combining both temporal and spiritual powers( how
can one forget President Bush’s communion with God ordering him to attack
Afghanistan and Iraq and to establish the State of Palestine). Whether the
Americans have reelected an evangelist and fundamentalist as President could
have been ignored by the world had not that person also at the same time been
the most powerful man in the world presiding over a country described by some
as one which has so much economic, cultural and military power not accrued by
any nation since the days of the Roman Empire. One hopes that despite the
horrific terrorist transgression into America—both physical and
psychological—President Bush would not be totally converted to Bernard Lewis’
perception of the Muslim world’s “downward spiral of hate and spite, rage and
self-pity, poverty and oppression” having been caused by the defeat of the
Muslims at hands of the Judeo-Christian civilization but would retain his
belief in the conviction expressed by John F. Kennedy in his posthumously
published book A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS that Jefferson and Madison’s America
would not see immigrants as ethnically-hyphenated (e.g. Arab-American) or as
ethnicity of origin(e.g. a Bangladeshi). In reality, however, the Muslim
Diaspora in the West is seen through tinted glass by their predominantly white
neighbors (a recent survey shows that a majority of both whites and
African-Americans favor a decrease in the current level of immigration)
reminiscent of the internment of the Japanese-Americans during the Second World
War. In self-defense the Muslims have adopted, as Professor Kay Deaux points
out, many taxi drivers in New York city (immediately after 9/11) who by
appearance could be labeled as Arabs or Muslims pasted American flags on the
windscreen of their cars. Another tendency displayed by the Diaspora is to turn
inward, a tendency to “circle the wagon” in the face of unfriendly stares which
a western liberal values imbibed modern person would have been loathe to do
under ordinary circumstances. Yet the stigmata was generally stamped on the
Muslim community despite the realization that terrorism is not and had never
been a proprietorial element of Muslim
faith and had been and continues to be practiced by others in abandon. Undoubtedly
the current discontent prevalent in the Middle East has been a scapegoat as a
primary cause of global turbulence. A deeper analysis would reveal that the
present discontent of the Muslim youth
is primarily due to the failure of Pan Arab nationalism not only to deliver
basic political goods but also to hide their failure the leaders strangulated
the voice of dissent. Added to this was the acquiescence or blatant support
extended by the West to these despots due to the demands of the then Cold War
situation which fuelled Muslim anger. And of course a constant source of Muslim
frustration has been occasioned by the unqualified support given to the Israeli
genocidal and expansionist policies in the Middle East. While the expression of
this anger and frustration through terrorism can never be justified because
terrorism even in its most expansive definition can only be abhorred, one has
to address the root causes of this malignancy not in terms of “defeat” of one
civilization by another but to secure a coherent globalized society where prosperity
and poverty are not totally segmented. It is natural for the West as it for the
victims of terrorism in some developing countries to attack the terrorist where
ever they may be as Plato had advised centuries back that the price of
civilization is the need to defend its own material preconditions by force of
arms if necessary. Equally it is necessary to recognize that the Muslims of the
world differ substantially not only in their religious views but also in their
politico-cultural orientation. Islam is trans-ethnic, trans-social and
trans-national yet it is far from being homogenous as the simplistic view would
tend one to believe. Indeed as Professor Ernest Gellner points out Islam
provides “a scriptural faith; a completed one is available and there is no room
for further accretion or for new prophets; also, there is no warrant for
clergy, and hence for differentiation, and there is no need to differentiate
between the church and the state, between what is God’s and what is Caesar’s”.
But there are cleavages between the Sunnis and the Shiias(the current situation
in Iraq provides the most glaring example); between the Arab and non-Arab
Muslims; between those who believe in hereditary and hierarchical system as
Bernard Lewis put it “The Imam is central to the Ismaila system of doctrine…the
Imams were divinely inspired and infallible” and those who believe that no
intermediary is necessary between God and His devotees. These differences have
arisen with the passage of time and have caused both social and political
conflicts. The merchants of death today are exploiting these differences not
only to promote sectarian violence within the Islamic world but also to deny
the fruits of technological advancement to the Muslim subalterns of the
yesteryears. Our misfortune is that these ideologues of hatred, semi-literate
themselves, are convincing the illiterate( of secular education) madrasha
students of their inerrant moral and intellectual “superiority” over others to the extent that these “others”
being moral degenerates need to be physically eliminated to purify the earth of
apostates. This kind of Hitlerian menace( who believe in superiority of faith
in place of racial superiority) has now assaulted our shores. As it is according to Human Development Index, Growth
Competitive Index, Failed States Index and Transparency International’s
Corruption Perception Index Bangladesh has fared miserably. Unless our
authorities can free themselves from the vortex of being a politician who can
see only up to the next elections and graduate themselves to the statust of a
statesman who thinks of the next generation Bangladeshis may have to account
for their failure to the elders of the global village.
HOW REAL ARE EURO-US DIFFERENCES? 15th May 2003
By Kazi Anwarul Masud
(Retired Secretary to the Bangladesh
government and former ambassador)
Timothy Garten Ash of the Oxford University
echoing Robert Kagan (who provides the intellectual benchmark—reflecting the
views of the current administration and not inconsiderable part of the foreign
policy establishment and scholarship) said that in matters of strategy the
Americans were from the Mars and the Europeans are from the Venus. He saw no
“clash of civilizations” between Europe and America
As both belonged to the same historical roots and shared most of the values. The Kantian, internationalist, law based European approach to foreign policy, argued Timothy Ash, had been repeatedly advocated and embraced by the US since the end of the Second World War and therefore to call on the US to shun neo-conservatism and return to multilateralism based on international law was not a call for conversion to Europeanism but for a return of the US to its best traditions. A strong and united Europe compromising between neo-Atlanticism spearheaded by Britain and neo-Gaullism of France is in the best interest of the United States. It has been argued that Europeans must not abandon those diplomatic tools dismissed by neo-conservative Americans as ineffective e.g. Negotiations, multilateral institutions and engagements through economic development because the US despite its overwhelming military power vis-a vis the rest of the world does not have the capacity to follow through as demonstrated in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and almost inevitably in Iraq. The superiority of the European values have already been demonstrated in Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain who rose up from fascist or clerical rule; overwhelmingly rural based economies; and mired in incorrigibly corrupt administrations into what they are today because of the will of the European people to make them a part of the Union. In his most recent commencement address at the University of South Carolina President Bush informed his audience that the combined GDP of all Arab states was smaller than that of Spain. Many have rejected alleged attempts by the present US administration to undermine European coherence by proclaiming Europe’s division into two irreconcilable and hostile blocs—old Europe and new Europe—in order to forcefully project unrivalled American economic, political and military power to serve the narrow American national interests as depicted in the Bush Security Strategy to the detriment of the rest of the world. Such rejection was further fortified by former Irish Prime Minister John Burton when he pointed out the economic relationship was by far the most important in the entire world and that European investment in Texas alone was greater than all US investment in Japan. He recognized that the Bush doctrine of preemption/prevention war “ is a big and potentially dangerous departure from the existing norms of inter-state behavior”. So, he suggested that EU should establish a comprehensive and formalized dialogue with the US on linked questions of preemptive wars, WMD, and terrorism in order to develop a new, predictable, well understood and intellectually sustainable doctrine of managing the post- nine eleven world. Indeed if one were to listen to Colin Powell’s address to the American Foreign Policy Association (on May 7, 2003) one would come away with the impression that Euro-US differences were not only transient but also cosmetic. Powell reminded his audience that for more than half a century ties between the US and her European allies have been “ the sinews of security, democracy and prosperity in the transatlantic region” and praised the EU and NATO’s willingness to accept the concept of “out of the area” by accepting engagements from Kosovo to Kabul to Kirkuk (in Iraq). He conceded that sometimes the US and EU/NATO disagreed but mostly over means and not ends. Powell was at one with European prerogative to disagree with the US because the consensus sought by them should be forged in “honest, open, rigorous debate (as) all is free and sovereign nations” entitled to their own opinion. At this consultative stage US has another decisive advantage over Europe that it can project its views through a single agency, the Presidency bolstered by the Congress, a process in which America’s fifty odd states have no say at all whereas the diverse interest of the EU members are always reflected in foreign policy (e.g. British neo-atlanticism and French particularism).
While Colin Powell’s reassurances are
encouraging it would be imprudent to paper over EU-US differences. It is time
to stop pretending, wrote Robert Kagan, that Europeans and Americans share a
common view of the world or even occupy the same world. According to him
Europe” is entering a post-historical paradise of peace and relative
prosperity, the realization of Kant’s ‘perpetual paradise’. The United States,
meanwhile, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international
laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and defense and promotion
of liberal order still depend on the possession of military might. That is why
on major strategic and international questions today, Americans are from Mars
and Europeans are from Venus”. It is not difficult to find out the differences
in this prismatic variant. They differ as to when diplomacy should end and
bombs should start to fall. Europe largely remains unconvinced of the efficacy
of the doctrine of preemption/prevention; marginalization of the UN by the US
(Powell would ask the UN to play a vital role in Iraq while the major powers on
the UNSC, NATO and EU would have a special role to play in facing the
challenges of the new century); and assigning international law to a secondary
role to military power (which the Europeans find alien and appalling).
Do the Americans have a case in their favor?
Perhaps. Tomas Vaslek (Director, CDI, Brussels) argues that in the changed
world of post-nine the UN system set up to regulate inter-state relations is
now faced with the advent of globally organized terrorist groups or non-state
actors. These non-state actors taking advantage of failing and failed states
necessitated the adoption of UNSC resolution 748(1992) making states
responsible for the actions of the terrorists. So when the Talibans were driven
out of Afghanistan, in a way Law of War was revised, and the world concurred. Definition
of self-defense as given in the UN Charter, some feel, needs revision due to
change in technological nature of the threat. If the reaction time is too short
then should the “intended victim” wait till it is attacked so that self-defense
measures can be taken?Elihu Root, US Secretary of War(1899-1904) defined
self-defense as “the right of every sovereign state to protect itself by
preventing a condition of affairs in which it will be too late to protect
itself”. Defense of the doctrine of preemption/prevention war was germane to
Elihu Root’s definition as in the notes of Antonio Cassese; former President of
ICC for Yugoslavia that current justification of self-defense against has
become fuzzy because of the advent of non-state actors. Another factor was
added by the dissolution of Yugoslavia and consequent Bosnia, Croatia and
Kosovo crisis. The question arose whether state sovereignty should remain
inviolable if large-scale human rights violations/genocide occur. Despite
article 2(7) of the UN Charter relating to territorial integrity regardless of
what is happening within the territory; 1999 NATO bombings of Serbia into
submission established the principle that sovereignty does not allow waging war
against one’s own people. So Slovodan Milasovich is now being tried as a war
criminal by the Hague Tribunal This is breaking of new ground of the
“humanitarian war” doctrine.
Given European (Britain excluded) reservation
on Bush doctrine of preemption/preventive war coupled with their inability to
stop the Americans to do as they please; Europe is left with the option of
revising the Law of War in concert with those Americans who believe in the
multilateral system. As Harvard professor Joseph Nye concluded that while the
US was too powerful to be challenged by any nation state, it was not strong
enough to solve new transnational problems by itself. US would therefore have
to define its interests in congruence with those of other states particularly
of Europe. It would therefore be fallacious to assume that US-Europe
differences would be allowed to run deep to fracture the institutional and
structural bonds already existing between these countries. Economic ties are
too strong. Cultural ties are historical. Racially majority of the Europeans
and Americans are Caucasians and by religion Christians. Kalypso Nicolaides of
Oxford University advises both to learn to live together as they had been doing
for so long despite their current differences; define a constructive and
conscious division of labor; EU should not approach the US power in structural
terms—unipolar or multipolar, friends or rivals; Europe must recognize that the
world beyond Europe is closer to a pre-Kantian world with a great number if
Hobbesian islands in the form of rogue states, failed or failing states, and
local zones of conflict. Nicolaides feels that time has come to revisit the UN
Charter regarding the link of enforcement of its fundamental norms (human
rights, non-proliferation) and the use of force or coercive diplomacy which in
any case has been used repeatedly from Kosovo to Sierra Leone.
While the West without great efforts may find
consummation of their seemingly differing strands of behavior; the problem of
any forcible revision of the UN Charter and norms of international law so long
regarded as sacramental would be disastrous for the Third World. In a fluid and
inconstant world where the behavior of the rich and the powerful may not be
predictable and constrained by universal moral code of conduct, let alone
international law, the small and the weak may face enslavement of sorts by the
comparatively more powerful nations. In such situations North Korean aberrant
nuclear policy may appear to some as a sound logic for providing ultimate
defense against predator states. It is therefore necessary that people from
Mars be aware of their limitations and act in concert with the people from
Venus who have found over centuries the usefulness of compromise over
conviction.
DANISH CARTOONS AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION(
FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 12TH FEBRUARY 2006)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Unsavory characterization of Prophet
Mohammed(SM) in the cartoons published by a Danish newspaper and reproduced by
several European newspapers have brought to the fore the modern debate on
limits of freedom of expression and speech. It is generally accepted that
freedom of expression is circumscribed by its adverse fall out on the dignity
of the individual(libel) or the majesty of the divinity(blasphemy). Society by
definition being a conglomeration of diverse individuals societal
responsibility demands that rights of the members of the society not be
intruded upon. Libel laws exist in a variety of forms to safeguard the
individual honor. Similarly, blasphemy laws enacted in many countries, though
increasingly falling into disuse, are aimed at protecting the majesty of God.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines blasphemy as “ any oral or written reproach
maliciously cast upon God, His name, attributes or religion”. Catholic
Encyclopedia considers blasphemy as heretical when insult to God involves a
declaration that is against the faith; imprecatory when it would cry a
malediction upon Divinity; and contumacious when it is wholly made up of
contempt or indignation towards God. Interestingly British Criminal law
contains in its statute book law relating to blasphemy even today though it was
developed mainly during the 18th century to protect the Anglican
version of Christianity. As late as 1979 the House of Lords upheld a
prosecution on charge of blasphemy centering on the publication of an erotic
homosexual poem about Jesus Christ in a British weekly. When the decision was
challenged the European Court of Human Rights ruled that protection for
religious freedom was superior in this case to protection of freedom of
expression.
The arguments proffered in this essay are not
for enacting blasphemy laws. On the contrary the First Amendment to the US
Constitution insisting that “Congress shall make no laws respecting an
establishment of religion”, a declaration powerfully pursued by the US Supreme
Court to ensure separation of the Church from the State and generally emulated
by developed economies, should act as beacon light to ships sailing against the
tumultuous waves of the 21st century seas.
With the virtual disappearance of communism
from its European strongholds Karl Marx’s description of religion as opiate of
man has lost favor with majority of the
people of the world. Dethronement of atheism has, perhaps, resulted in peoples’
greater devotion to established religions than what would have otherwise been
expected to happen. Though an inverse relationship between wealth and
religiosity is believed to be axiomatic yet the description of the US, the
largest economy in the world, as “a poster child of super natural belief” is
profoundly telling. Supernatural belief, according to anthropologist Edward
Taylor, is the “minimum definition of religion”. Just about any American,
blessed with the material advantages of technological age, believe in God in
the biblical sense along with miracles, angels, devils and after life. This
belief in the super natural is not confined to Christian Conservatives, once
described by the Washington Post as “largely poor, the uneducated”, but for
example, embraces about half of the scientific community of the US .
There is nothing inherently wrong in being
wealthy and religious. Indeed some psychologists have concluded that belief in
God is “bred in the bone”, it is instinctive and natural and not necessarily
learnt. The problem is not in the contradiction between religiosity and
atheism/agnosticism but in the continuing war between religions. Historian
Webster’s description of the Thirty Years’ War as “the last great war of
religion” could not have been more misplaced if one were to chronicle the
persecution of the Jews at the hands of the Christians for centuries and the
current tension between the Islamic and the Judeo-Christian civilizations. The
terrorist attacks of 9/11 though carried out by a handful of renegades in the
name of Islam and condemned by the whole Islamic world (along with the rest of
the international community) have nonetheless reduced the Muslims, particularly
the Muslim Diaspora living in the West, to negotiating the parameters of
minority citizenship.
In Denmark the publication of the cartoons
and the consequent Muslim outrage in Europe and in some parts of the world has
increased the popularity of the populist anti-immigration Danish Peoples Party
which openly says that Islam is not a religion but a terrorist organization.
European antipathy towards Islam is grounded in history. The Crusades and the
domination by the Ottoman Turks over a large part of European lands had fuelled
anti-Islamic sentiments among the Europeans which had remained dormant as
Christians of different denominations fought among themselves( not religious
wars though) and in their struggle to colonize then pristine world unsullied by
European lust and greed, and engineered the death and destruction of millions
of people in the two Great Wars in the Twentieth century. Like infected blood
anti-Muslim feelings flowing in the sub-terranean veins has now found renewed
expressions. For example, when finally the issue of Turkey’s admission as a
member of the European Union could not be delayed any longer some European
nations have voiced opposition to Turkish membership. Austria which
historically served as bulwark against Ottoman expansionism in Europe has
suggested for a pan-European referendum on the question of Turkish membership. Former
French President Valerie Giscard d’Estaing expressed the fear that Turkey’s
membership would spell the end of Europe. Other opponents include Slovakia,
Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Malta and Cyprus. Prominent German politician
Wolfgang Schauble was skeptical about an EU with Turkey as a member would
continue to be able to build “an ever closer political union or speak with one
voice”, and suggested limiting the size of the European Union. Late last year
France witnessed religious-race riots between Muslim
youths and the French authorities and their escalation to other European
countries. Though apparently caused by the accidental death by electrocution of
two Arab Muslim youths fleeing from the pursuit of the French police , the
riots were basically caused by decades long socio-economic exclusion of Muslim
immigrants brought into France from North Africa to shore up the post-War
sagging French economy. Generally immigration is determined by the demands of
the advanced metropolitan capitalism weighed against the disadvantages of
socio-cultural asymmetry caused by the refusal/inability of the immigrants to
fully assimilate with the values of the host country. This gives rise to “us”
versus “them” feeling resulting in sharp division in society and consequent
violence in which the authorities tend to take the side of the host country
population against the immigrants
forgetting that the second or third generation immigrants are no less citizens
of the country as those belonging to the majority community. Additionally the
“failure” of the immigrants to fully integrate themselves with the mainstream
life results in gaining political territory by anti-immigration political
parties who play on the unfounded fear of the host country voters about the
immigrants.
In response to the Organization of Islamic
Countries’ condemnation of the “printing of blasphemous and insulting
caricatures of Prophet Mohammed(SM)” which the Organization thought to be a
“trap set up by fundamentalists and foster acts of revenge”; Danish Prime
Minister Rasmussen felt that “freedom of speech is absolute (and) not
negotiable” while a prominent Danish academic expressed the view that “people
are inclined to see Islam and political extremism as two sides of the same
coin”. His subsequent apology for the publication of the cartoons and his
description of Denmark as a country tolerant of different religions and having
an open society is too little too late.
One wonders whether the repeated onslaught on
Muslim sensibilities through cleverly disguised provocations are not aimed at
perpetuating Western minds along the views expressed by Bernard Lewis, among
others, of Islam being an intolerant religion. “Islam was never prepared”
writes Lewis “either in theory or in practice, to accord full equality to those
who held other beliefs and practiced other forms of worship”. Besides, adds
Bernard Lewis, there exists millennial rivalry between Islam and Christianity—a
competing world religion, a distinctive civilization inspired by that
religion.... the struggle between these rival systems has now lasted for some
fourteen centuries.. and has continued virtually to the present day”. The other
school of thought less severe on Islam for example, Samuel Huntington of Clash
of Civilization fame observes: “The West won the world not by supremacy of
ideas or values or religion but rather by superiority in applying organized
violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do”.
The whole episode about the cartoons’
portrayal of Prophet Mohammed_(SM) in unflattering terms appears to be more by
design than by accident. Had the Danish Prime Minister Rasmussen not refused to
see the Arab ambassadors when they sought a meeting with him to discuss about
the cartoons’ publication last September the current explosion in the Islamic
world could have been avoided. The situation deteriorated with the repeat
publication of the cartoons in January in a small evangelical Christian
newspaper in Norway and in other European countries and with the EU backing of
the Danish position on inviolability of freedom of expression at the cost of
hurting the religious sentiment of more than one billion Muslims all over the
world. This arrogant display of an “inerrant” interpretation of right to
expression leads one to look for other views.
“For a society to claim universal desirability” wrote Irish
anthropologist Vincent Tucker “while turning its back on others from whom it is
convinced it has nothing to learn, is not only cultural elitism, but cultural
racism”.
It
becomes difficult to comprehend the inherent contradictions in making Woodrow
Wilsonian promises to democratize the world( made once again in Bush 2006 State
of the Union address) and lack of Western comprehension of Islamic
fundamentalism’s repeated attempt to transcend the boundary of quietism. The
West, unless it opts to retreat into some fortified areas of affluence to
escape the contagion of religious extremism( a doubtful venture in this age of
globalism and fraught with risk to its own security), would be better advised
to cooperate with the moderate elements in the Muslim world engaged in their
struggle with those imbibed with absolutist, “ inerrant” and arrogant
confidence in the supremacy of their belief, for the soul of Islam.
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.MARGINALIZATION OF MUSLIM POPULATION IN US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
(DRAFT FOR THE ARTICLE TO BE PUBLISHED ONSUNDAY THE 2ND NOVEMBER 2008)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former
Secretary and ambassador)
Lepers, untouchable, politically radioactive—Muslim Diaspora in the US presently describe themselves during the Presidential election to be held very soon. McCain camp reportedly tried to portray Barack Obama as a Muslim to scare away his supporters. Perhaps this was the reason for Obama to reveal that his middle name is Stevens and not Hussein as was his father’s . He was brought up as a Christian. It is sad that in a multi-religious, multi-cultural nation of immigrants about 6 million Muslims have to prove their loyalty to a country where they are born and bred. According to American Muslim Council( AMC) there are three categories of Muslims: immigrants, American converts/reverts to Islam, and those born to first two groups as Muslims. California has about 20% Muslim population while New York 16% of the total Muslim population. It is sadder that President Bush’s first Secretary of State General Colin Powell who broke with his party by endorsing Barak Obama for the Presidency was greatly disturbed by this anti-Muslim feeling. He told NBC’s Meet the Press: “Is there something wrong being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no, that’s not America”. Powell apparently felt very srongly about the canard about Muslims because he saw a photo he saw in The New Yorker magazine of a mother of a Muslim soldier embracing her son’s grave at Arlington Cemetery. If Bush doctrine of preemption shocked the Europeans it shook the seemingly peaceful foundation of the Islamic world. Yet the entire Muslim world stood alongside the Americans in their grief after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. So when the Talibans were decimated and driven out of Afghanistan the Islamic world supported the NATO actions against the Talibans. But when Iraq was invaded on what now appears to be on untenable and illegal grounds the Muslims as no less the Europeans and the less xenophobic part of the American people refused to sanction Anglo-American misadventure. Colin Powell’s assertion of Bush administration’s belief in a strategy of global partnership for the war on terror failed to calm the fear of a disbelieving world. Equally President Bush’s West Point address of June 2002 urging the governments of the Islamic countries to listen to the hopes of their citizens for the same freedoms and opportunities as available in the West did not elicit uniform enthusiasm. Historian Bernard Lewis interpreted the “Muslim Rage” in terms of millennial rivalry between the two world religions caused by the sense of humiliation felt by the Muslims over being defeated by the “inferior Christians and the Jews”. Lewis’ interpretation of inter-faith tension, despite his outstanding intellect, was criticized by Edward Said who accused Lewis of advancing political agenda under the cloak of scholarship .The Muslim point of view has been reflected in the recently published Arab Human Development Report (AHDR2003) which observed that the adoption of extreme security measures and policies by a number of western countries exceeded their original goals and led to the erosion of civil and political liberties diminishing the welfare of the Arabs and Muslims living in those countries. These freedom-constraining policies have also encouraged the adoption of THE ARAB CHARTER AGAINST TERRORISM allowing censorship, detention and torture. It is therefore not surprising that the American advocacy of redressing democracy deficit in the Islamic world is taken with a pinch of salt. Yet the second Bush administration is expected to press on with the Greater Middle East Initiative because it is believed that: - (a) US support for democracy is extended as a matter of principle, (b) US will prosper more in a world of democracies than in a world of authoritarian or chaotic regimes, (c) history testifies that democracies do not wage wars against other democracies, (d) quantitative increase in democracy leads to qualitative improvement in diplomacy, and (e) democracy is closely linked with prosperity for which peaceful and predictable transition of power is essential. It is further surmised that the US will no longer tolerate “democratic exceptions” in parts of the Muslim world for the sake of its self-interest. But the most recent decision of President Parvez Musharraf to continue as the head of Pakistan army violating the agreement he had concluded with the opposition parties that he would relinquish the post of army head at the end of this year does not speak very highly of American determination to bring about democracy in the Islamic world. Given Pakistan’s close partnership with the US in the war on terror it is inconceivable that President Musharraf could have taken this decision without US blessings. It is therefore quite possible that one democratic exception could lead to many other autocrats to seek a way out of the American imposed pluralism.
It is generally accepted that one-size-fit-all cannot be a sustainable foreign policy option for any major power. However moralistic a policy can be it can never be purely altruistic and must always be self-interested. Therefore it is unlikely that the second Bush administration would push on with its mission of Greater Middle East Initiative if it were found to be in conflict with the war on terror. It is unfortunate but true that in the eyes of the ordinary Westerners al=Qaedist terrorism is seen as being inspired by Islamists. Religious profiling of the Muslims in the US, reported job discrimination, verbal and sometimes physical abuse suffered by the Muslims living in the West are undeniable facts fuelling “spiraling progressive alienation” of the Muslims from the mainstream western society. This has prompted some Western intellectuals to conclude that Huntington’s clash of civilization has already materialized. While another school of thought would deny that there is any clash of civilizations between Islam and the West. They argue that the real battle is being fought within the Muslim civilization between ultra-conservatives and moderates and democrats for the soul of the Muslims who are caught in the crossfire between a westernized elite but oligarchic in character who hold effective power and the oppressed political opposition who take the form of apocalyptic nihilism striking out violently to expel the “infidels” who they believe are sustaining the oligarchs. That there is a crying need to democratize these islands of autocracy is to state the obvious. This need has been reinforced by the findings of the Freedom House survey (2001-2002) of free countries around the world that while the number of “free” nations increased by nearly three dozens over the past 20 years not one of them was a Muslim majority state. Since lack of democratic pluralism has been identified as the primary cause behind Islamic extremism it is possible that the second Bush administration would not abandon its mission to bring meaningful freedom to the Muslim states whose population is still denied a voice in the governance in their own countries.
The Islamic world today is undeniably passing through a critical time in its history fuelled by prejudice, bigotry and various other forms of discrimination used by Western societies against Muslims worldwide. To blame the West for this kind of behavior will not be helpful. After all the Western response has been caused in order to confront al-Qaedist terrorism in the US, Europe, Africa and in several Islamic countries as well. A small venal group spreading lethality in the name of Islam has stigmatized Muslims. The depth of Western anger can be gauged by the fact that Senator Kerry is accused of waffling on Iraq and American public do not appear to see another Vietnam in Iraq yet despite increasing casualties of coalition forces. It is unlikely that the West would relent on the freedom-constraining regulations imposed on the Muslims or that Western society would feel comfortable with Muslims as neighbors and working in their societies along side them. It took Europeans almost fifty years to get comfortable with the Germans though Nazism was physically annihilated by the allied victors and totally rejected by the Germans in 1945. Despite German membership of NATO it took the Kosovo crisis for the NATO allies to invite Germany to participate in the Kosovo campaign.
One wonders whether Western rejection would not force the Islamic world, regardless of its lack of monolithic character and housing divergent philosophies, to be introverted and a part of it intuitively adopting violence as an expression of frustration. This grim scenario can become more terrifying if the West were to increase their violence, because the degree of violence is proportional to the instruments of violence used and the West has a surfeit of such instruments, by expanding their “area of operation” by including Iran, Syria and who knows which other country would be the next. The US has not fared well in Afghanistan and Iraq and is not expected to do so in future. What is essential to regain the lost confidence is to have inter-faith dialogue or something like the South African Truth Commission and opening doors to people of all races and religions and not to shut the door only because a few non-covenanted would sneak in through the open door.
POLITICAL LEFT AND ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM
(FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 11TH MARCH 2007)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud (former Secretary and ambassador)
With the end of the cold war and the demise of the Soviet Union the appeal for communist ideology has diminished the world over. Even China practicing capitalism in its economy would be called revisionist if the “purists” among the practicetioners of communism had their way. It would, however, be a hasty conclusion that the wave of left philosophy, defined as “that current of thought, politics and policy that stresses social improvements over macroeconomic orthodoxy, egalitarian distribution of wealth over its creation, sovereignty over international cooperation, democracy over governmental effectiveness”, has lost its appeal completely in the world. Former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda discerns two types of left in Latin America today: the first being modern, open minded, reformist and internationalist while the other is nationalist, strident and close-minded. In his view the disappearance of the USSR has led to a surge of leftism in Latin America because its supporters could no longer be accused by the United States as being lackeys of the Soviet Union. Extreme inequality, poverty, dispossession of power gave the majority of the poor people their voting right as the only instrument left to register protest and also to regain some role in the process of decision making. Brazil’s Lula, Chile’s Michelle Bachelet, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega are examples of growing leftist power in America’s backyard. It would be erroneous to lump them together as cohabitants of Castro-Chavez trail of the left strand in the region. But nonetheless they all represent a no-confidence vote against the unrestrained capitalism raging in the globalized world ruled by the West whose power lies, according to political analyst Ziauddin Sardar, not “in its economic muscle and technological might (but) in its power to define what is, for example, freedom, progress, civil behavior... The non-Western civilization has simply to accept these definitions or be defined out of existence”.
The silent revolution taking place in many countries of the East, once described by late Edward Said as the colonies of the West yet its cultural contestant, can be compared with those taking place in Latin America. The reason for this opposition to the Western model of economic development while embracing its open and pluralistic political system is because the benefits from economic progress have eluded the great majority of the people, barring some vertical movement of fortunate few from destitution to opulence giving rise to debate on the immorality of their acquisition of wealth, remain mired in ultra-poverty with little light at the end of the tunnel. Low growth rates, writes Castaneda, have meant the persistence of dismal poverty, inequality, and high unemployment. “Democracy” he continues, “although welcomed and supported by broad swaths of Latin American societies did little to eradicate the region’s secular plagues: corruption, a weak or nonexistent rule of law, ineffective governance, and concentration of power in the hands of the few”. This kind of scenery, common in the Third World, is no exception to Bangladesh where the ferocious rapacity of the four party alliance government in plundering the wealth of the people and the Orwellian tyranny let loose on the opposition and the minority community have induced in the people a craving for a government which yet remains to be given a proper constitutional form. But the people are happy that the extremely high possibility of the now displaced gang of politicians’ coming back to power through a manipulated election has become an impossibility and the corrupt who felt themselves to be above the law are being brought to account.
Democracy without the rule of law and more importantly without food on the table is meaningless. One has to decide whether the privilege of casting one’s vote once every five years while remaining ill-fed and ill-clad for the entire period carries the full meaning of democracy. But then again the fourth surge of democratization in former Eastern Europe following the disappearance of the Soviet empire strengthens anew the premise that deep down people, however poor they may be, is averse to be governed by an authority not of their own choosing. Consequently we, in Bangladesh, are in a quandary. We do not know whether to press for an early election and risk electing a group of politicians, some of whom are likely to be corrupt, or to wait for a longer period for the Augean stable to be cleared up and then go for an election through which we can elect people who we can believe to deliver the goods.
In this race, whenever it may take place, the political left has aligned itself with the progressive and secular elements in the country. If neighboring West Bengal is any example to be held aloft then one can safely say that unlike the Islamists who believe in one man- one vote- one time the political left is unlikely to abandon pluralism. But the stark reality is that the political left could not gain enough votes in elections to become a credible voice in the country’s politics. The reasons are not difficult to find. While India after partition in 1947 chose to be non-aligned Pakistan in search of security against a powerful India chose to bind itself to US led military pacts (SEATO, CENTO etc) and consequently blindly followed American cold war dictates including ban on left political parties and persecution of left party leaders. In addition the rightists were able to convince the people that the left, particularly the Communists, were Godless people and should be abjured. Only after the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 that the left political parties were allowed free participation in the political process. Jamat-e-Islami, the standard bearer of the fundamentalists, on the other hand, except for a brief period of ban due to their collaboration with the occupying Pakistani army, had a free hand in politics and through religious schools, now thought to number sixty four thousand, continued to profess political Islam aimed at establishing an Islamist nation to be ruled according to the dictates of the Holy Quran and Sunnah. Under the present global context Bangladeshis would have to be careful while casting votes that they do not mix the professed benefits of the post-death world with the assuredly disadvantages that go with an Islamist rule in the present day world.
RELIGION AND POLITICS (FOR PUBLICATION ON
SUNDAY THE 23RD OCTOBER 2005)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Perhaps both the great Arab historian Ibn
Khaldun and Scottish philosopher David Hume (who greatly influenced Skepticism
and Empiricism school of thought) shared oscillation theory in their
observation of religion. While Ibn Khaldun believed that popular religion in
Muslim societies tended to oscillate between periods of strict religious
observance and of devotional laxity; David Hume believed that men changed from
polytheism to monotheism, not in a continuous unilineal change, and back again because “men have a natural
tendency to rise from idolatry to theism and sent again from theism to
idolatry”. This oscillation, argues Hume, is not caused by thoughtful and
considered reasoning but by politics of fear, uncertainty and a “kind of
competitive sycophancy”. Hume was, therefore, not surprised that Hercules,
Thesus, Hector and Romulus were replaced by Dominic, Francis, Anthony and
Benedict. Hume was a protestant and a skeptic at that. His distance from
Catholic philosophy, however interesting, does not form the core of our
discussion. What is important is the relevance of the commonality in the
perception of Hume and Ibn Khaldun of oscillating devotion of human beings
between monotheism and polytheism and also differences in the character of
devotees in both creeds which have plunged the world today into a black hole
of holocaust because a minuscule part of
the adherents of one creed would repeatedly inflict upon the world their
weapons of hatred. It has been surmised that Christianity’s urging of its
followers to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s is because it initially
flourished among the politically disinherited, among those who were persecuted
for their belief in a monotheistic religion when “competitive sycophancy”
obliged most people to practice idolatry because Caesar had both gold and sword which an unseen God
in His wisdom did not chose to use to save His followers from the jaws of
death. It took the Christians thousand years to get relief till Emperor Constantine converted himself to
Christianity and Emperor Charlemagne converted Europe to Christendom. Before
that time a faith born without political power could hardly had been expected
to preach otherwise. By contrast the initial success of Islam was so rapid that
it did not have to give anything unto Caesar and it spread its wings often at
point of sword and grew into a rich civilization dominating a large part of
Europe. By the eighth century Muslims
had conquered North Africa, the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, most of
Spain, established bases in Italy, substantially reduced the size of the
Eastern Roman Empire and besieged its capital Constantinople. The Ottoman
Empire’s assault on the gates of Vienna could perhaps provide a background to
the stringent Austrian opposition, though mellowed down temporarily, to start
European Union’s talks for Turkey’s entry into the EU. If historian Bernard
Lewis’ clash of civilization denoting those between Muslims and Christians and post-Christians, rigid
theocratic hierarchy vs. permissive secular modernism is to be given credence
then one could imagine that the seat of non-Catholic Christianity has now taken
residence in the White House combining both temporal and spiritual powers( how
can one forget President Bush’s communion with God ordering him to attack
Afghanistan and Iraq and to establish the State of Palestine). Whether the
Americans have reelected an evangelist and fundamentalist as President could
have been ignored by the world had not that person also at the same time been
the most powerful man in the world presiding over a country described by some
as one which has so much economic, cultural and military power not accrued by
any nation since the days of the Roman Empire. One hopes that despite the
horrific terrorist transgression into America—both physical and
psychological—President Bush would not be totally converted to Bernard Lewis’
perception of the Muslim world’s “downward spiral of hate and spite, rage and
self-pity, poverty and oppression” having been caused by the defeat of the
Muslims at hands of the Judeo-Christian civilization but would retain his
belief in the conviction expressed by John F. Kennedy in his posthumously
published book A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS that Jefferson and Madison’s America
would not see immigrants as ethnically-hyphenated (e.g. Arab-American) or as
ethnicity of origin(e.g. a Bangladeshi). In reality, however, the Muslim
Diaspora in the West is seen through tinted glass by their predominantly white
neighbors (a recent survey shows that a majority of both whites and
African-Americans favor a decrease in the current level of immigration)
reminiscent of the internment of the Japanese-Americans during the Second World
War. In self-defense the Muslims have adopted, as Professor Kay Deaux points
out, many taxi drivers in New York city (immediately after 9/11) who by
appearance could be labeled as Arabs or Muslims pasted American flags on the
windscreen of their cars. Another tendency displayed by the Diaspora is to turn
inward, a tendency to “circle the wagon” in the face of unfriendly stares which
a western liberal values imbibed modern person would have been loathe to do
under ordinary circumstances. Yet the stigmata was generally stamped on the
Muslim community despite the realization that terrorism is not and had never
been a proprietorial element of Muslim
faith and had been and continues to be practiced by others in abandon. Undoubtedly
the current discontent prevalent in the Middle East has been a scapegoat as a
primary cause of global turbulence. A deeper analysis would reveal that the
present discontent of the Muslim youth
is primarily due to the failure of Pan Arab nationalism not only to deliver
basic political goods but also to hide their failure the leaders strangulated
the voice of dissent. Added to this was the acquiescence or blatant support
extended by the West to these despots due to the demands of the then Cold War
situation which fuelled Muslim anger. And of course a constant source of Muslim
frustration has been occasioned by the unqualified support given to the Israeli
genocidal and expansionist policies in the Middle East. While the expression of
this anger and frustration through terrorism can never be justified because
terrorism even in its most expansive definition can only be abhorred, one has
to address the root causes of this malignancy not in terms of “defeat” of one
civilization by another but to secure a coherent globalized society where prosperity
and poverty are not totally segmented. It is natural for the West as it for the
victims of terrorism in some developing countries to attack the terrorist where
ever they may be as Plato had advised centuries back that the price of
civilization is the need to defend its own material preconditions by force of
arms if necessary. Equally it is necessary to recognize that the Muslims of the
world differ substantially not only in their religious views but also in their
politico-cultural orientation. Islam is trans-ethnic, trans-social and
trans-national yet it is far from being homogenous as the simplistic view would
tend one to believe. Indeed as Professor Ernest Gellner points out Islam
provides “a scriptural faith; a completed one is available and there is no room
for further accretion or for new prophets; also, there is no warrant for
clergy, and hence for differentiation, and there is no need to differentiate
between the church and the state, between what is God’s and what is Caesar’s”.
But there are cleavages between the Sunnis and the Shiias(the current situation
in Iraq provides the most glaring example); between the Arab and non-Arab
Muslims; between those who believe in hereditary and hierarchical system as
Bernard Lewis put it “The Imam is central to the Ismaila system of doctrine…the
Imams were divinely inspired and infallible” and those who believe that no
intermediary is necessary between God and His devotees. These differences have
arisen with the passage of time and have caused both social and political
conflicts. The merchants of death today are exploiting these differences not
only to promote sectarian violence within the Islamic world but also to deny
the fruits of technological advancement to the Muslim subalterns of the
yesteryears. Our misfortune is that these ideologues of hatred, semi-literate
themselves, are convincing the illiterate( of secular education) madrasha
students of their inerrant moral and intellectual “superiority” over others to the extent that these “others”
being moral degenerates need to be physically eliminated to purify the earth of
apostates. This kind of Hitlerian menace( who believe in superiority of faith
in place of racial superiority) has now assaulted our shores. As it is according to Human Development Index, Growth
Competitive Index, Failed States Index and Transparency International’s
Corruption Perception Index Bangladesh has fared miserably. Unless our
authorities can free themselves from the vortex of being a politician who can
see only up to the next elections and graduate themselves to the statust of a
statesman who thinks of the next generation Bangladeshis may have to account
for their failure to the elders of the global village.
HOW REAL ARE EURO-US DIFFERENCES? 15th May 2003
By Kazi Anwarul Masud
(Retired Secretary to the Bangladesh
government and former ambassador)
Timothy Garten Ash of the Oxford University
echoing Robert Kagan (who provides the intellectual benchmark—reflecting the
views of the current administration and not inconsiderable part of the foreign
policy establishment and scholarship) said that in matters of strategy the
Americans were from the Mars and the Europeans are from the Venus. He saw no
“clash of civilizations” between Europe and America
As both belonged to the same historical roots and shared most of the values. The Kantian, internationalist, law based European approach to foreign policy, argued Timothy Ash, had been repeatedly advocated and embraced by the US since the end of the Second World War and therefore to call on the US to shun neo-conservatism and return to multilateralism based on international law was not a call for conversion to Europeanism but for a return of the US to its best traditions. A strong and united Europe compromising between neo-Atlanticism spearheaded by Britain and neo-Gaullism of France is in the best interest of the United States. It has been argued that Europeans must not abandon those diplomatic tools dismissed by neo-conservative Americans as ineffective e.g. Negotiations, multilateral institutions and engagements through economic development because the US despite its overwhelming military power vis-a vis the rest of the world does not have the capacity to follow through as demonstrated in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and almost inevitably in Iraq. The superiority of the European values have already been demonstrated in Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain who rose up from fascist or clerical rule; overwhelmingly rural based economies; and mired in incorrigibly corrupt administrations into what they are today because of the will of the European people to make them a part of the Union. In his most recent commencement address at the University of South Carolina President Bush informed his audience that the combined GDP of all Arab states was smaller than that of Spain. Many have rejected alleged attempts by the present US administration to undermine European coherence by proclaiming Europe’s division into two irreconcilable and hostile blocs—old Europe and new Europe—in order to forcefully project unrivalled American economic, political and military power to serve the narrow American national interests as depicted in the Bush Security Strategy to the detriment of the rest of the world. Such rejection was further fortified by former Irish Prime Minister John Burton when he pointed out the economic relationship was by far the most important in the entire world and that European investment in Texas alone was greater than all US investment in Japan. He recognized that the Bush doctrine of preemption/prevention war “ is a big and potentially dangerous departure from the existing norms of inter-state behavior”. So, he suggested that EU should establish a comprehensive and formalized dialogue with the US on linked questions of preemptive wars, WMD, and terrorism in order to develop a new, predictable, well understood and intellectually sustainable doctrine of managing the post- nine eleven world. Indeed if one were to listen to Colin Powell’s address to the American Foreign Policy Association (on May 7, 2003) one would come away with the impression that Euro-US differences were not only transient but also cosmetic. Powell reminded his audience that for more than half a century ties between the US and her European allies have been “ the sinews of security, democracy and prosperity in the transatlantic region” and praised the EU and NATO’s willingness to accept the concept of “out of the area” by accepting engagements from Kosovo to Kabul to Kirkuk (in Iraq). He conceded that sometimes the US and EU/NATO disagreed but mostly over means and not ends. Powell was at one with European prerogative to disagree with the US because the consensus sought by them should be forged in “honest, open, rigorous debate (as) all is free and sovereign nations” entitled to their own opinion. At this consultative stage US has another decisive advantage over Europe that it can project its views through a single agency, the Presidency bolstered by the Congress, a process in which America’s fifty odd states have no say at all whereas the diverse interest of the EU members are always reflected in foreign policy (e.g. British neo-atlanticism and French particularism).
While Colin Powell’s reassurances are
encouraging it would be imprudent to paper over EU-US differences. It is time
to stop pretending, wrote Robert Kagan, that Europeans and Americans share a
common view of the world or even occupy the same world. According to him
Europe” is entering a post-historical paradise of peace and relative
prosperity, the realization of Kant’s ‘perpetual paradise’. The United States,
meanwhile, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international
laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and defense and promotion
of liberal order still depend on the possession of military might. That is why
on major strategic and international questions today, Americans are from Mars
and Europeans are from Venus”. It is not difficult to find out the differences
in this prismatic variant. They differ as to when diplomacy should end and
bombs should start to fall. Europe largely remains unconvinced of the efficacy
of the doctrine of preemption/prevention; marginalization of the UN by the US
(Powell would ask the UN to play a vital role in Iraq while the major powers on
the UNSC, NATO and EU would have a special role to play in facing the
challenges of the new century); and assigning international law to a secondary
role to military power (which the Europeans find alien and appalling).
Do the Americans have a case in their favor?
Perhaps. Tomas Vaslek (Director, CDI, Brussels) argues that in the changed
world of post-nine the UN system set up to regulate inter-state relations is
now faced with the advent of globally organized terrorist groups or non-state
actors. These non-state actors taking advantage of failing and failed states
necessitated the adoption of UNSC resolution 748(1992) making states
responsible for the actions of the terrorists. So when the Talibans were driven
out of Afghanistan, in a way Law of War was revised, and the world concurred. Definition
of self-defense as given in the UN Charter, some feel, needs revision due to
change in technological nature of the threat. If the reaction time is too short
then should the “intended victim” wait till it is attacked so that self-defense
measures can be taken?Elihu Root, US Secretary of War(1899-1904) defined
self-defense as “the right of every sovereign state to protect itself by
preventing a condition of affairs in which it will be too late to protect
itself”. Defense of the doctrine of preemption/prevention war was germane to
Elihu Root’s definition as in the notes of Antonio Cassese; former President of
ICC for Yugoslavia that current justification of self-defense against has
become fuzzy because of the advent of non-state actors. Another factor was
added by the dissolution of Yugoslavia and consequent Bosnia, Croatia and
Kosovo crisis. The question arose whether state sovereignty should remain
inviolable if large-scale human rights violations/genocide occur. Despite
article 2(7) of the UN Charter relating to territorial integrity regardless of
what is happening within the territory; 1999 NATO bombings of Serbia into
submission established the principle that sovereignty does not allow waging war
against one’s own people. So Slovodan Milasovich is now being tried as a war
criminal by the Hague Tribunal This is breaking of new ground of the
“humanitarian war” doctrine.
Given European (Britain excluded) reservation
on Bush doctrine of preemption/preventive war coupled with their inability to
stop the Americans to do as they please; Europe is left with the option of
revising the Law of War in concert with those Americans who believe in the
multilateral system. As Harvard professor Joseph Nye concluded that while the
US was too powerful to be challenged by any nation state, it was not strong
enough to solve new transnational problems by itself. US would therefore have
to define its interests in congruence with those of other states particularly
of Europe. It would therefore be fallacious to assume that US-Europe
differences would be allowed to run deep to fracture the institutional and
structural bonds already existing between these countries. Economic ties are
too strong. Cultural ties are historical. Racially majority of the Europeans
and Americans are Caucasians and by religion Christians. Kalypso Nicolaides of
Oxford University advises both to learn to live together as they had been doing
for so long despite their current differences; define a constructive and
conscious division of labor; EU should not approach the US power in structural
terms—unipolar or multipolar, friends or rivals; Europe must recognize that the
world beyond Europe is closer to a pre-Kantian world with a great number if
Hobbesian islands in the form of rogue states, failed or failing states, and
local zones of conflict. Nicolaides feels that time has come to revisit the UN
Charter regarding the link of enforcement of its fundamental norms (human
rights, non-proliferation) and the use of force or coercive diplomacy which in
any case has been used repeatedly from Kosovo to Sierra Leone.
While the West without great efforts may find
consummation of their seemingly differing strands of behavior; the problem of
any forcible revision of the UN Charter and norms of international law so long
regarded as sacramental would be disastrous for the Third World. In a fluid and
inconstant world where the behavior of the rich and the powerful may not be
predictable and constrained by universal moral code of conduct, let alone
international law, the small and the weak may face enslavement of sorts by the
comparatively more powerful nations. In such situations North Korean aberrant
nuclear policy may appear to some as a sound logic for providing ultimate
defense against predator states. It is therefore necessary that people from
Mars be aware of their limitations and act in concert with the people from
Venus who have found over centuries the usefulness of compromise over
conviction.
DANISH CARTOONS AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION(
FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 12TH FEBRUARY 2006)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Unsavory characterization of Prophet
Mohammed(SM) in the cartoons published by a Danish newspaper and reproduced by
several European newspapers have brought to the fore the modern debate on
limits of freedom of expression and speech. It is generally accepted that
freedom of expression is circumscribed by its adverse fall out on the dignity
of the individual(libel) or the majesty of the divinity(blasphemy). Society by
definition being a conglomeration of diverse individuals societal
responsibility demands that rights of the members of the society not be
intruded upon. Libel laws exist in a variety of forms to safeguard the
individual honor. Similarly, blasphemy laws enacted in many countries, though
increasingly falling into disuse, are aimed at protecting the majesty of God.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines blasphemy as “ any oral or written reproach
maliciously cast upon God, His name, attributes or religion”. Catholic
Encyclopedia considers blasphemy as heretical when insult to God involves a
declaration that is against the faith; imprecatory when it would cry a
malediction upon Divinity; and contumacious when it is wholly made up of
contempt or indignation towards God. Interestingly British Criminal law
contains in its statute book law relating to blasphemy even today though it was
developed mainly during the 18th century to protect the Anglican
version of Christianity. As late as 1979 the House of Lords upheld a
prosecution on charge of blasphemy centering on the publication of an erotic
homosexual poem about Jesus Christ in a British weekly. When the decision was
challenged the European Court of Human Rights ruled that protection for
religious freedom was superior in this case to protection of freedom of
expression.
The arguments proffered in this essay are not
for enacting blasphemy laws. On the contrary the First Amendment to the US
Constitution insisting that “Congress shall make no laws respecting an
establishment of religion”, a declaration powerfully pursued by the US Supreme
Court to ensure separation of the Church from the State and generally emulated
by developed economies, should act as beacon light to ships sailing against the
tumultuous waves of the 21st century seas.
With the virtual disappearance of communism
from its European strongholds Karl Marx’s description of religion as opiate of
man has lost favor with majority of the
people of the world. Dethronement of atheism has, perhaps, resulted in peoples’
greater devotion to established religions than what would have otherwise been
expected to happen. Though an inverse relationship between wealth and
religiosity is believed to be axiomatic yet the description of the US, the
largest economy in the world, as “a poster child of super natural belief” is
profoundly telling. Supernatural belief, according to anthropologist Edward
Taylor, is the “minimum definition of religion”. Just about any American,
blessed with the material advantages of technological age, believe in God in
the biblical sense along with miracles, angels, devils and after life. This
belief in the super natural is not confined to Christian Conservatives, once
described by the Washington Post as “largely poor, the uneducated”, but for
example, embraces about half of the scientific community of the US .
There is nothing inherently wrong in being
wealthy and religious. Indeed some psychologists have concluded that belief in
God is “bred in the bone”, it is instinctive and natural and not necessarily
learnt. The problem is not in the contradiction between religiosity and
atheism/agnosticism but in the continuing war between religions. Historian
Webster’s description of the Thirty Years’ War as “the last great war of
religion” could not have been more misplaced if one were to chronicle the
persecution of the Jews at the hands of the Christians for centuries and the
current tension between the Islamic and the Judeo-Christian civilizations. The
terrorist attacks of 9/11 though carried out by a handful of renegades in the
name of Islam and condemned by the whole Islamic world (along with the rest of
the international community) have nonetheless reduced the Muslims, particularly
the Muslim Diaspora living in the West, to negotiating the parameters of
minority citizenship.
In Denmark the publication of the cartoons
and the consequent Muslim outrage in Europe and in some parts of the world has
increased the popularity of the populist anti-immigration Danish Peoples Party
which openly says that Islam is not a religion but a terrorist organization.
European antipathy towards Islam is grounded in history. The Crusades and the
domination by the Ottoman Turks over a large part of European lands had fuelled
anti-Islamic sentiments among the Europeans which had remained dormant as
Christians of different denominations fought among themselves( not religious
wars though) and in their struggle to colonize then pristine world unsullied by
European lust and greed, and engineered the death and destruction of millions
of people in the two Great Wars in the Twentieth century. Like infected blood
anti-Muslim feelings flowing in the sub-terranean veins has now found renewed
expressions. For example, when finally the issue of Turkey’s admission as a
member of the European Union could not be delayed any longer some European
nations have voiced opposition to Turkish membership. Austria which
historically served as bulwark against Ottoman expansionism in Europe has
suggested for a pan-European referendum on the question of Turkish membership. Former
French President Valerie Giscard d’Estaing expressed the fear that Turkey’s
membership would spell the end of Europe. Other opponents include Slovakia,
Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Malta and Cyprus. Prominent German politician
Wolfgang Schauble was skeptical about an EU with Turkey as a member would
continue to be able to build “an ever closer political union or speak with one
voice”, and suggested limiting the size of the European Union. Late last year
France witnessed religious-race riots between Muslim
youths and the French authorities and their escalation to other European
countries. Though apparently caused by the accidental death by electrocution of
two Arab Muslim youths fleeing from the pursuit of the French police , the
riots were basically caused by decades long socio-economic exclusion of Muslim
immigrants brought into France from North Africa to shore up the post-War
sagging French economy. Generally immigration is determined by the demands of
the advanced metropolitan capitalism weighed against the disadvantages of
socio-cultural asymmetry caused by the refusal/inability of the immigrants to
fully assimilate with the values of the host country. This gives rise to “us”
versus “them” feeling resulting in sharp division in society and consequent
violence in which the authorities tend to take the side of the host country
population against the immigrants
forgetting that the second or third generation immigrants are no less citizens
of the country as those belonging to the majority community. Additionally the
“failure” of the immigrants to fully integrate themselves with the mainstream
life results in gaining political territory by anti-immigration political
parties who play on the unfounded fear of the host country voters about the
immigrants.
In response to the Organization of Islamic
Countries’ condemnation of the “printing of blasphemous and insulting
caricatures of Prophet Mohammed(SM)” which the Organization thought to be a
“trap set up by fundamentalists and foster acts of revenge”; Danish Prime
Minister Rasmussen felt that “freedom of speech is absolute (and) not
negotiable” while a prominent Danish academic expressed the view that “people
are inclined to see Islam and political extremism as two sides of the same
coin”. His subsequent apology for the publication of the cartoons and his
description of Denmark as a country tolerant of different religions and having
an open society is too little too late.
One wonders whether the repeated onslaught on
Muslim sensibilities through cleverly disguised provocations are not aimed at
perpetuating Western minds along the views expressed by Bernard Lewis, among
others, of Islam being an intolerant religion. “Islam was never prepared”
writes Lewis “either in theory or in practice, to accord full equality to those
who held other beliefs and practiced other forms of worship”. Besides, adds
Bernard Lewis, there exists millennial rivalry between Islam and Christianity—a
competing world religion, a distinctive civilization inspired by that
religion.... the struggle between these rival systems has now lasted for some
fourteen centuries.. and has continued virtually to the present day”. The other
school of thought less severe on Islam for example, Samuel Huntington of Clash
of Civilization fame observes: “The West won the world not by supremacy of
ideas or values or religion but rather by superiority in applying organized
violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do”.
The whole episode about the cartoons’
portrayal of Prophet Mohammed_(SM) in unflattering terms appears to be more by
design than by accident. Had the Danish Prime Minister Rasmussen not refused to
see the Arab ambassadors when they sought a meeting with him to discuss about
the cartoons’ publication last September the current explosion in the Islamic
world could have been avoided. The situation deteriorated with the repeat
publication of the cartoons in January in a small evangelical Christian
newspaper in Norway and in other European countries and with the EU backing of
the Danish position on inviolability of freedom of expression at the cost of
hurting the religious sentiment of more than one billion Muslims all over the
world. This arrogant display of an “inerrant” interpretation of right to
expression leads one to look for other views.
“For a society to claim universal desirability” wrote Irish
anthropologist Vincent Tucker “while turning its back on others from whom it is
convinced it has nothing to learn, is not only cultural elitism, but cultural
racism”.
It
becomes difficult to comprehend the inherent contradictions in making Woodrow
Wilsonian promises to democratize the world( made once again in Bush 2006 State
of the Union address) and lack of Western comprehension of Islamic
fundamentalism’s repeated attempt to transcend the boundary of quietism. The
West, unless it opts to retreat into some fortified areas of affluence to
escape the contagion of religious extremism( a doubtful venture in this age of
globalism and fraught with risk to its own security), would be better advised
to cooperate with the moderate elements in the Muslim world engaged in their
struggle with those imbibed with absolutist, “ inerrant” and arrogant
confidence in the supremacy of their belief, for the soul of Islam.
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MARGINALIZATION OF MUSLIM POPULATION IN US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION
(DRAFT FOR THE ARTICLE TO BE PUBLISHED ONSUNDAY THE 2ND NOVEMBER 2008)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former
Secretary and ambassador)
Lepers, untouchable, politically radioactive—Muslim Diaspora in the US presently describe themselves during the Presidential election to be held very soon. McCain camp reportedly tried to portray Barack Obama as a Muslim to scare away his supporters. Perhaps this was the reason for Obama to reveal that his middle name is Stevens and not Hussein as was his father’s . He was brought up as a Christian. It is sad that in a multi-religious, multi-cultural nation of immigrants about 6 million Muslims have to prove their loyalty to a country where they are born and bred. According to American Muslim Council( AMC) there are three categories of Muslims: immigrants, American converts/reverts to Islam, and those born to first two groups as Muslims. California has about 20% Muslim population while New York 16% of the total Muslim population. It is sadder that President Bush’s first Secretary of State General Colin Powell who broke with his party by endorsing Barak Obama for the Presidency was greatly disturbed by this anti-Muslim feeling. He told NBC’s Meet the Press: “Is there something wrong being a Muslim in this country? The answer is no, that’s not America”. Powell apparently felt very srongly about the canard about Muslims because he saw a photo he saw in The New Yorker magazine of a mother of a Muslim soldier embracing her son’s grave at Arlington Cemetery. If Bush doctrine of preemption shocked the Europeans it shook the seemingly peaceful foundation of the Islamic world. Yet the entire Muslim world stood alongside the Americans in their grief after the terrorist attacks of 9/11. So when the Talibans were decimated and driven out of Afghanistan the Islamic world supported the NATO actions against the Talibans. But when Iraq was invaded on what now appears to be on untenable and illegal grounds the Muslims as no less the Europeans and the less xenophobic part of the American people refused to sanction Anglo-American misadventure. Colin Powell’s assertion of Bush administration’s belief in a strategy of global partnership for the war on terror failed to calm the fear of a disbelieving world. Equally President Bush’s West Point address of June 2002 urging the governments of the Islamic countries to listen to the hopes of their citizens for the same freedoms and opportunities as available in the West did not elicit uniform enthusiasm. Historian Bernard Lewis interpreted the “Muslim Rage” in terms of millennial rivalry between the two world religions caused by the sense of humiliation felt by the Muslims over being defeated by the “inferior Christians and the Jews”. Lewis’ interpretation of inter-faith tension, despite his outstanding intellect, was criticized by Edward Said who accused Lewis of advancing political agenda under the cloak of scholarship .The Muslim point of view has been reflected in the recently published Arab Human Development Report (AHDR2003) which observed that the adoption of extreme security measures and policies by a number of western countries exceeded their original goals and led to the erosion of civil and political liberties diminishing the welfare of the Arabs and Muslims living in those countries. These freedom-constraining policies have also encouraged the adoption of THE ARAB CHARTER AGAINST TERRORISM allowing censorship, detention and torture. It is therefore not surprising that the American advocacy of redressing democracy deficit in the Islamic world is taken with a pinch of salt. Yet the second Bush administration is expected to press on with the Greater Middle East Initiative because it is believed that: - (a) US support for democracy is extended as a matter of principle, (b) US will prosper more in a world of democracies than in a world of authoritarian or chaotic regimes, (c) history testifies that democracies do not wage wars against other democracies, (d) quantitative increase in democracy leads to qualitative improvement in diplomacy, and (e) democracy is closely linked with prosperity for which peaceful and predictable transition of power is essential. It is further surmised that the US will no longer tolerate “democratic exceptions” in parts of the Muslim world for the sake of its self-interest. But the most recent decision of President Parvez Musharraf to continue as the head of Pakistan army violating the agreement he had concluded with the opposition parties that he would relinquish the post of army head at the end of this year does not speak very highly of American determination to bring about democracy in the Islamic world. Given Pakistan’s close partnership with the US in the war on terror it is inconceivable that President Musharraf could have taken this decision without US blessings. It is therefore quite possible that one democratic exception could lead to many other autocrats to seek a way out of the American imposed pluralism.
It is generally accepted that one-size-fit-all cannot be a sustainable foreign policy option for any major power. However moralistic a policy can be it can never be purely altruistic and must always be self-interested. Therefore it is unlikely that the second Bush administration would push on with its mission of Greater Middle East Initiative if it were found to be in conflict with the war on terror. It is unfortunate but true that in the eyes of the ordinary Westerners al=Qaedist terrorism is seen as being inspired by Islamists. Religious profiling of the Muslims in the US, reported job discrimination, verbal and sometimes physical abuse suffered by the Muslims living in the West are undeniable facts fuelling “spiraling progressive alienation” of the Muslims from the mainstream western society. This has prompted some Western intellectuals to conclude that Huntington’s clash of civilization has already materialized. While another school of thought would deny that there is any clash of civilizations between Islam and the West. They argue that the real battle is being fought within the Muslim civilization between ultra-conservatives and moderates and democrats for the soul of the Muslims who are caught in the crossfire between a westernized elite but oligarchic in character who hold effective power and the oppressed political opposition who take the form of apocalyptic nihilism striking out violently to expel the “infidels” who they believe are sustaining the oligarchs. That there is a crying need to democratize these islands of autocracy is to state the obvious. This need has been reinforced by the findings of the Freedom House survey (2001-2002) of free countries around the world that while the number of “free” nations increased by nearly three dozens over the past 20 years not one of them was a Muslim majority state. Since lack of democratic pluralism has been identified as the primary cause behind Islamic extremism it is possible that the second Bush administration would not abandon its mission to bring meaningful freedom to the Muslim states whose population is still denied a voice in the governance in their own countries.
The Islamic world today is undeniably passing through a critical time in its history fuelled by prejudice, bigotry and various other forms of discrimination used by Western societies against Muslims worldwide. To blame the West for this kind of behavior will not be helpful. After all the Western response has been caused in order to confront al-Qaedist terrorism in the US, Europe, Africa and in several Islamic countries as well. A small venal group spreading lethality in the name of Islam has stigmatized Muslims. The depth of Western anger can be gauged by the fact that Senator Kerry is accused of waffling on Iraq and American public do not appear to see another Vietnam in Iraq yet despite increasing casualties of coalition forces. It is unlikely that the West would relent on the freedom-constraining regulations imposed on the Muslims or that Western society would feel comfortable with Muslims as neighbors and working in their societies along side them. It took Europeans almost fifty years to get comfortable with the Germans though Nazism was physically annihilated by the allied victors and totally rejected by the Germans in 1945. Despite German membership of NATO it took the Kosovo crisis for the NATO allies to invite Germany to participate in the Kosovo campaign.
One wonders whether Western rejection would not force the Islamic world, regardless of its lack of monolithic character and housing divergent philosophies, to be introverted and a part of it intuitively adopting violence as an expression of frustration. This grim scenario can become more terrifying if the West were to increase their violence, because the degree of violence is proportional to the instruments of violence used and the West has a surfeit of such instruments, by expanding their “area of operation” by including Iran, Syria and who knows which other country would be the next. The US has not fared well in Afghanistan and Iraq and is not expected to do so in future. What is essential to regain the lost confidence is to have inter-faith dialogue or something like the South African Truth Commission and opening doors to people of all races and religions and not to shut the door only because a few non-covenanted would sneak in through the open door.
POLITICAL LEFT AND ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM
(FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 11TH MARCH 2007)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud (former Secretary and ambassador)
With the end of the cold war and the demise of the Soviet Union the appeal for communist ideology has diminished the world over. Even China practicing capitalism in its economy would be called revisionist if the “purists” among the practicetioners of communism had their way. It would, however, be a hasty conclusion that the wave of left philosophy, defined as “that current of thought, politics and policy that stresses social improvements over macroeconomic orthodoxy, egalitarian distribution of wealth over its creation, sovereignty over international cooperation, democracy over governmental effectiveness”, has lost its appeal completely in the world. Former Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda discerns two types of left in Latin America today: the first being modern, open minded, reformist and internationalist while the other is nationalist, strident and close-minded. In his view the disappearance of the USSR has led to a surge of leftism in Latin America because its supporters could no longer be accused by the United States as being lackeys of the Soviet Union. Extreme inequality, poverty, dispossession of power gave the majority of the poor people their voting right as the only instrument left to register protest and also to regain some role in the process of decision making. Brazil’s Lula, Chile’s Michelle Bachelet, Bolivia’s Evo Morales, and Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega are examples of growing leftist power in America’s backyard. It would be erroneous to lump them together as cohabitants of Castro-Chavez trail of the left strand in the region. But nonetheless they all represent a no-confidence vote against the unrestrained capitalism raging in the globalized world ruled by the West whose power lies, according to political analyst Ziauddin Sardar, not “in its economic muscle and technological might (but) in its power to define what is, for example, freedom, progress, civil behavior... The non-Western civilization has simply to accept these definitions or be defined out of existence”.
The silent revolution taking place in many countries of the East, once described by late Edward Said as the colonies of the West yet its cultural contestant, can be compared with those taking place in Latin America. The reason for this opposition to the Western model of economic development while embracing its open and pluralistic political system is because the benefits from economic progress have eluded the great majority of the people, barring some vertical movement of fortunate few from destitution to opulence giving rise to debate on the immorality of their acquisition of wealth, remain mired in ultra-poverty with little light at the end of the tunnel. Low growth rates, writes Castaneda, have meant the persistence of dismal poverty, inequality, and high unemployment. “Democracy” he continues, “although welcomed and supported by broad swaths of Latin American societies did little to eradicate the region’s secular plagues: corruption, a weak or nonexistent rule of law, ineffective governance, and concentration of power in the hands of the few”. This kind of scenery, common in the Third World, is no exception to Bangladesh where the ferocious rapacity of the four party alliance government in plundering the wealth of the people and the Orwellian tyranny let loose on the opposition and the minority community have induced in the people a craving for a government which yet remains to be given a proper constitutional form. But the people are happy that the extremely high possibility of the now displaced gang of politicians’ coming back to power through a manipulated election has become an impossibility and the corrupt who felt themselves to be above the law are being brought to account.
Democracy without the rule of law and more importantly without food on the table is meaningless. One has to decide whether the privilege of casting one’s vote once every five years while remaining ill-fed and ill-clad for the entire period carries the full meaning of democracy. But then again the fourth surge of democratization in former Eastern Europe following the disappearance of the Soviet empire strengthens anew the premise that deep down people, however poor they may be, is averse to be governed by an authority not of their own choosing. Consequently we, in Bangladesh, are in a quandary. We do not know whether to press for an early election and risk electing a group of politicians, some of whom are likely to be corrupt, or to wait for a longer period for the Augean stable to be cleared up and then go for an election through which we can elect people who we can believe to deliver the goods.
In this race, whenever it may take place, the political left has aligned itself with the progressive and secular elements in the country. If neighboring West Bengal is any example to be held aloft then one can safely say that unlike the Islamists who believe in one man- one vote- one time the political left is unlikely to abandon pluralism. But the stark reality is that the political left could not gain enough votes in elections to become a credible voice in the country’s politics. The reasons are not difficult to find. While India after partition in 1947 chose to be non-aligned Pakistan in search of security against a powerful India chose to bind itself to US led military pacts (SEATO, CENTO etc) and consequently blindly followed American cold war dictates including ban on left political parties and persecution of left party leaders. In addition the rightists were able to convince the people that the left, particularly the Communists, were Godless people and should be abjured. Only after the liberation of Bangladesh in 1971 that the left political parties were allowed free participation in the political process. Jamat-e-Islami, the standard bearer of the fundamentalists, on the other hand, except for a brief period of ban due to their collaboration with the occupying Pakistani army, had a free hand in politics and through religious schools, now thought to number sixty four thousand, continued to profess political Islam aimed at establishing an Islamist nation to be ruled according to the dictates of the Holy Quran and Sunnah. Under the present global context Bangladeshis would have to be careful while casting votes that they do not mix the professed benefits of the post-death world with the assuredly disadvantages that go with an Islamist rule in the present day world.
RELIGION AND POLITICS (FOR PUBLICATION ON
SUNDAY THE 23RD OCTOBER 2005)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Perhaps both the great Arab historian Ibn
Khaldun and Scottish philosopher David Hume (who greatly influenced Skepticism
and Empiricism school of thought) shared oscillation theory in their
observation of religion. While Ibn Khaldun believed that popular religion in
Muslim societies tended to oscillate between periods of strict religious
observance and of devotional laxity; David Hume believed that men changed from
polytheism to monotheism, not in a continuous unilineal change, and back again because “men have a natural
tendency to rise from idolatry to theism and sent again from theism to
idolatry”. This oscillation, argues Hume, is not caused by thoughtful and
considered reasoning but by politics of fear, uncertainty and a “kind of
competitive sycophancy”. Hume was, therefore, not surprised that Hercules,
Thesus, Hector and Romulus were replaced by Dominic, Francis, Anthony and
Benedict. Hume was a protestant and a skeptic at that. His distance from
Catholic philosophy, however interesting, does not form the core of our
discussion. What is important is the relevance of the commonality in the
perception of Hume and Ibn Khaldun of oscillating devotion of human beings
between monotheism and polytheism and also differences in the character of
devotees in both creeds which have plunged the world today into a black hole
of holocaust because a minuscule part of
the adherents of one creed would repeatedly inflict upon the world their
weapons of hatred. It has been surmised that Christianity’s urging of its
followers to give unto Caesar what is Caesar’s is because it initially
flourished among the politically disinherited, among those who were persecuted
for their belief in a monotheistic religion when “competitive sycophancy”
obliged most people to practice idolatry because Caesar had both gold and sword which an unseen God
in His wisdom did not chose to use to save His followers from the jaws of
death. It took the Christians thousand years to get relief till Emperor Constantine converted himself to
Christianity and Emperor Charlemagne converted Europe to Christendom. Before
that time a faith born without political power could hardly had been expected
to preach otherwise. By contrast the initial success of Islam was so rapid that
it did not have to give anything unto Caesar and it spread its wings often at
point of sword and grew into a rich civilization dominating a large part of
Europe. By the eighth century Muslims
had conquered North Africa, the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, most of
Spain, established bases in Italy, substantially reduced the size of the
Eastern Roman Empire and besieged its capital Constantinople. The Ottoman
Empire’s assault on the gates of Vienna could perhaps provide a background to
the stringent Austrian opposition, though mellowed down temporarily, to start
European Union’s talks for Turkey’s entry into the EU. If historian Bernard
Lewis’ clash of civilization denoting those between Muslims and Christians and post-Christians, rigid
theocratic hierarchy vs. permissive secular modernism is to be given credence
then one could imagine that the seat of non-Catholic Christianity has now taken
residence in the White House combining both temporal and spiritual powers( how
can one forget President Bush’s communion with God ordering him to attack
Afghanistan and Iraq and to establish the State of Palestine). Whether the
Americans have reelected an evangelist and fundamentalist as President could
have been ignored by the world had not that person also at the same time been
the most powerful man in the world presiding over a country described by some
as one which has so much economic, cultural and military power not accrued by
any nation since the days of the Roman Empire. One hopes that despite the
horrific terrorist transgression into America—both physical and
psychological—President Bush would not be totally converted to Bernard Lewis’
perception of the Muslim world’s “downward spiral of hate and spite, rage and
self-pity, poverty and oppression” having been caused by the defeat of the
Muslims at hands of the Judeo-Christian civilization but would retain his
belief in the conviction expressed by John F. Kennedy in his posthumously
published book A NATION OF IMMIGRANTS that Jefferson and Madison’s America
would not see immigrants as ethnically-hyphenated (e.g. Arab-American) or as
ethnicity of origin(e.g. a Bangladeshi). In reality, however, the Muslim
Diaspora in the West is seen through tinted glass by their predominantly white
neighbors (a recent survey shows that a majority of both whites and
African-Americans favor a decrease in the current level of immigration)
reminiscent of the internment of the Japanese-Americans during the Second World
War. In self-defense the Muslims have adopted, as Professor Kay Deaux points
out, many taxi drivers in New York city (immediately after 9/11) who by
appearance could be labeled as Arabs or Muslims pasted American flags on the
windscreen of their cars. Another tendency displayed by the Diaspora is to turn
inward, a tendency to “circle the wagon” in the face of unfriendly stares which
a western liberal values imbibed modern person would have been loathe to do
under ordinary circumstances. Yet the stigmata was generally stamped on the
Muslim community despite the realization that terrorism is not and had never
been a proprietorial element of Muslim
faith and had been and continues to be practiced by others in abandon. Undoubtedly
the current discontent prevalent in the Middle East has been a scapegoat as a
primary cause of global turbulence. A deeper analysis would reveal that the
present discontent of the Muslim youth
is primarily due to the failure of Pan Arab nationalism not only to deliver
basic political goods but also to hide their failure the leaders strangulated
the voice of dissent. Added to this was the acquiescence or blatant support
extended by the West to these despots due to the demands of the then Cold War
situation which fuelled Muslim anger. And of course a constant source of Muslim
frustration has been occasioned by the unqualified support given to the Israeli
genocidal and expansionist policies in the Middle East. While the expression of
this anger and frustration through terrorism can never be justified because
terrorism even in its most expansive definition can only be abhorred, one has
to address the root causes of this malignancy not in terms of “defeat” of one
civilization by another but to secure a coherent globalized society where prosperity
and poverty are not totally segmented. It is natural for the West as it for the
victims of terrorism in some developing countries to attack the terrorist where
ever they may be as Plato had advised centuries back that the price of
civilization is the need to defend its own material preconditions by force of
arms if necessary. Equally it is necessary to recognize that the Muslims of the
world differ substantially not only in their religious views but also in their
politico-cultural orientation. Islam is trans-ethnic, trans-social and
trans-national yet it is far from being homogenous as the simplistic view would
tend one to believe. Indeed as Professor Ernest Gellner points out Islam
provides “a scriptural faith; a completed one is available and there is no room
for further accretion or for new prophets; also, there is no warrant for
clergy, and hence for differentiation, and there is no need to differentiate
between the church and the state, between what is God’s and what is Caesar’s”.
But there are cleavages between the Sunnis and the Shiias(the current situation
in Iraq provides the most glaring example); between the Arab and non-Arab
Muslims; between those who believe in hereditary and hierarchical system as
Bernard Lewis put it “The Imam is central to the Ismaila system of doctrine…the
Imams were divinely inspired and infallible” and those who believe that no
intermediary is necessary between God and His devotees. These differences have
arisen with the passage of time and have caused both social and political
conflicts. The merchants of death today are exploiting these differences not
only to promote sectarian violence within the Islamic world but also to deny
the fruits of technological advancement to the Muslim subalterns of the
yesteryears. Our misfortune is that these ideologues of hatred, semi-literate
themselves, are convincing the illiterate( of secular education) madrasha
students of their inerrant moral and intellectual “superiority” over others to the extent that these “others”
being moral degenerates need to be physically eliminated to purify the earth of
apostates. This kind of Hitlerian menace( who believe in superiority of faith
in place of racial superiority) has now assaulted our shores. As it is according to Human Development Index, Growth
Competitive Index, Failed States Index and Transparency International’s
Corruption Perception Index Bangladesh has fared miserably. Unless our
authorities can free themselves from the vortex of being a politician who can
see only up to the next elections and graduate themselves to the statust of a
statesman who thinks of the next generation Bangladeshis may have to account
for their failure to the elders of the global village.
HOW REAL ARE EURO-US DIFFERENCES? 15th May 2003
By Kazi Anwarul Masud
(Retired Secretary to the Bangladesh
government and former ambassador)
Timothy Garten Ash of the Oxford University
echoing Robert Kagan (who provides the intellectual benchmark—reflecting the
views of the current administration and not inconsiderable part of the foreign
policy establishment and scholarship) said that in matters of strategy the
Americans were from the Mars and the Europeans are from the Venus. He saw no
“clash of civilizations” between Europe and America
As both belonged to the same historical roots and shared most of the values. The Kantian, internationalist, law based European approach to foreign policy, argued Timothy Ash, had been repeatedly advocated and embraced by the US since the end of the Second World War and therefore to call on the US to shun neo-conservatism and return to multilateralism based on international law was not a call for conversion to Europeanism but for a return of the US to its best traditions. A strong and united Europe compromising between neo-Atlanticism spearheaded by Britain and neo-Gaullism of France is in the best interest of the United States. It has been argued that Europeans must not abandon those diplomatic tools dismissed by neo-conservative Americans as ineffective e.g. Negotiations, multilateral institutions and engagements through economic development because the US despite its overwhelming military power vis-a vis the rest of the world does not have the capacity to follow through as demonstrated in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghanistan and almost inevitably in Iraq. The superiority of the European values have already been demonstrated in Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain who rose up from fascist or clerical rule; overwhelmingly rural based economies; and mired in incorrigibly corrupt administrations into what they are today because of the will of the European people to make them a part of the Union. In his most recent commencement address at the University of South Carolina President Bush informed his audience that the combined GDP of all Arab states was smaller than that of Spain. Many have rejected alleged attempts by the present US administration to undermine European coherence by proclaiming Europe’s division into two irreconcilable and hostile blocs—old Europe and new Europe—in order to forcefully project unrivalled American economic, political and military power to serve the narrow American national interests as depicted in the Bush Security Strategy to the detriment of the rest of the world. Such rejection was further fortified by former Irish Prime Minister John Burton when he pointed out the economic relationship was by far the most important in the entire world and that European investment in Texas alone was greater than all US investment in Japan. He recognized that the Bush doctrine of preemption/prevention war “ is a big and potentially dangerous departure from the existing norms of inter-state behavior”. So, he suggested that EU should establish a comprehensive and formalized dialogue with the US on linked questions of preemptive wars, WMD, and terrorism in order to develop a new, predictable, well understood and intellectually sustainable doctrine of managing the post- nine eleven world. Indeed if one were to listen to Colin Powell’s address to the American Foreign Policy Association (on May 7, 2003) one would come away with the impression that Euro-US differences were not only transient but also cosmetic. Powell reminded his audience that for more than half a century ties between the US and her European allies have been “ the sinews of security, democracy and prosperity in the transatlantic region” and praised the EU and NATO’s willingness to accept the concept of “out of the area” by accepting engagements from Kosovo to Kabul to Kirkuk (in Iraq). He conceded that sometimes the US and EU/NATO disagreed but mostly over means and not ends. Powell was at one with European prerogative to disagree with the US because the consensus sought by them should be forged in “honest, open, rigorous debate (as) all is free and sovereign nations” entitled to their own opinion. At this consultative stage US has another decisive advantage over Europe that it can project its views through a single agency, the Presidency bolstered by the Congress, a process in which America’s fifty odd states have no say at all whereas the diverse interest of the EU members are always reflected in foreign policy (e.g. British neo-atlanticism and French particularism).
While Colin Powell’s reassurances are
encouraging it would be imprudent to paper over EU-US differences. It is time
to stop pretending, wrote Robert Kagan, that Europeans and Americans share a
common view of the world or even occupy the same world. According to him
Europe” is entering a post-historical paradise of peace and relative
prosperity, the realization of Kant’s ‘perpetual paradise’. The United States,
meanwhile, exercising power in the anarchic Hobbesian world where international
laws and rules are unreliable and where true security and defense and promotion
of liberal order still depend on the possession of military might. That is why
on major strategic and international questions today, Americans are from Mars
and Europeans are from Venus”. It is not difficult to find out the differences
in this prismatic variant. They differ as to when diplomacy should end and
bombs should start to fall. Europe largely remains unconvinced of the efficacy
of the doctrine of preemption/prevention; marginalization of the UN by the US
(Powell would ask the UN to play a vital role in Iraq while the major powers on
the UNSC, NATO and EU would have a special role to play in facing the
challenges of the new century); and assigning international law to a secondary
role to military power (which the Europeans find alien and appalling).
Do the Americans have a case in their favor?
Perhaps. Tomas Vaslek (Director, CDI, Brussels) argues that in the changed
world of post-nine the UN system set up to regulate inter-state relations is
now faced with the advent of globally organized terrorist groups or non-state
actors. These non-state actors taking advantage of failing and failed states
necessitated the adoption of UNSC resolution 748(1992) making states
responsible for the actions of the terrorists. So when the Talibans were driven
out of Afghanistan, in a way Law of War was revised, and the world concurred. Definition
of self-defense as given in the UN Charter, some feel, needs revision due to
change in technological nature of the threat. If the reaction time is too short
then should the “intended victim” wait till it is attacked so that self-defense
measures can be taken?Elihu Root, US Secretary of War(1899-1904) defined
self-defense as “the right of every sovereign state to protect itself by
preventing a condition of affairs in which it will be too late to protect
itself”. Defense of the doctrine of preemption/prevention war was germane to
Elihu Root’s definition as in the notes of Antonio Cassese; former President of
ICC for Yugoslavia that current justification of self-defense against has
become fuzzy because of the advent of non-state actors. Another factor was
added by the dissolution of Yugoslavia and consequent Bosnia, Croatia and
Kosovo crisis. The question arose whether state sovereignty should remain
inviolable if large-scale human rights violations/genocide occur. Despite
article 2(7) of the UN Charter relating to territorial integrity regardless of
what is happening within the territory; 1999 NATO bombings of Serbia into
submission established the principle that sovereignty does not allow waging war
against one’s own people. So Slovodan Milasovich is now being tried as a war
criminal by the Hague Tribunal This is breaking of new ground of the
“humanitarian war” doctrine.
Given European (Britain excluded) reservation
on Bush doctrine of preemption/preventive war coupled with their inability to
stop the Americans to do as they please; Europe is left with the option of
revising the Law of War in concert with those Americans who believe in the
multilateral system. As Harvard professor Joseph Nye concluded that while the
US was too powerful to be challenged by any nation state, it was not strong
enough to solve new transnational problems by itself. US would therefore have
to define its interests in congruence with those of other states particularly
of Europe. It would therefore be fallacious to assume that US-Europe
differences would be allowed to run deep to fracture the institutional and
structural bonds already existing between these countries. Economic ties are
too strong. Cultural ties are historical. Racially majority of the Europeans
and Americans are Caucasians and by religion Christians. Kalypso Nicolaides of
Oxford University advises both to learn to live together as they had been doing
for so long despite their current differences; define a constructive and
conscious division of labor; EU should not approach the US power in structural
terms—unipolar or multipolar, friends or rivals; Europe must recognize that the
world beyond Europe is closer to a pre-Kantian world with a great number if
Hobbesian islands in the form of rogue states, failed or failing states, and
local zones of conflict. Nicolaides feels that time has come to revisit the UN
Charter regarding the link of enforcement of its fundamental norms (human
rights, non-proliferation) and the use of force or coercive diplomacy which in
any case has been used repeatedly from Kosovo to Sierra Leone.
While the West without great efforts may find
consummation of their seemingly differing strands of behavior; the problem of
any forcible revision of the UN Charter and norms of international law so long
regarded as sacramental would be disastrous for the Third World. In a fluid and
inconstant world where the behavior of the rich and the powerful may not be
predictable and constrained by universal moral code of conduct, let alone
international law, the small and the weak may face enslavement of sorts by the
comparatively more powerful nations. In such situations North Korean aberrant
nuclear policy may appear to some as a sound logic for providing ultimate
defense against predator states. It is therefore necessary that people from
Mars be aware of their limitations and act in concert with the people from
Venus who have found over centuries the usefulness of compromise over
conviction.
DANISH CARTOONS AND FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION(
FOR PUBLICATION ON SUNDAY THE 12TH FEBRUARY 2006)
By Kazi Anwarul Masud( former Secretary and
ambassador)
Unsavory characterization of Prophet
Mohammed(SM) in the cartoons published by a Danish newspaper and reproduced by
several European newspapers have brought to the fore the modern debate on
limits of freedom of expression and speech. It is generally accepted that
freedom of expression is circumscribed by its adverse fall out on the dignity
of the individual(libel) or the majesty of the divinity(blasphemy). Society by
definition being a conglomeration of diverse individuals societal
responsibility demands that rights of the members of the society not be
intruded upon. Libel laws exist in a variety of forms to safeguard the
individual honor. Similarly, blasphemy laws enacted in many countries, though
increasingly falling into disuse, are aimed at protecting the majesty of God.
Black’s Law Dictionary defines blasphemy as “ any oral or written reproach
maliciously cast upon God, His name, attributes or religion”. Catholic
Encyclopedia considers blasphemy as heretical when insult to God involves a
declaration that is against the faith; imprecatory when it would cry a
malediction upon Divinity; and contumacious when it is wholly made up of
contempt or indignation towards God. Interestingly British Criminal law
contains in its statute book law relating to blasphemy even today though it was
developed mainly during the 18th century to protect the Anglican
version of Christianity. As late as 1979 the House of Lords upheld a
prosecution on charge of blasphemy centering on the publication of an erotic
homosexual poem about Jesus Christ in a British weekly. When the decision was
challenged the European Court of Human Rights ruled that protection for
religious freedom was superior in this case to protection of freedom of
expression.
The arguments proffered in this essay are not
for enacting blasphemy laws. On the contrary the First Amendment to the US
Constitution insisting that “Congress shall make no laws respecting an
establishment of religion”, a declaration powerfully pursued by the US Supreme
Court to ensure separation of the Church from the State and generally emulated
by developed economies, should act as beacon light to ships sailing against the
tumultuous waves of the 21st century seas.
With the virtual disappearance of communism
from its European strongholds Karl Marx’s description of religion as opiate of
man has lost favor with majority of the
people of the world. Dethronement of atheism has, perhaps, resulted in peoples’
greater devotion to established religions than what would have otherwise been
expected to happen. Though an inverse relationship between wealth and
religiosity is believed to be axiomatic yet the description of the US, the
largest economy in the world, as “a poster child of super natural belief” is
profoundly telling. Supernatural belief, according to anthropologist Edward
Taylor, is the “minimum definition of religion”. Just about any American,
blessed with the material advantages of technological age, believe in God in
the biblical sense along with miracles, angels, devils and after life. This
belief in the super natural is not confined to Christian Conservatives, once
described by the Washington Post as “largely poor, the uneducated”, but for
example, embraces about half of the scientific community of the US .
There is nothing inherently wrong in being
wealthy and religious. Indeed some psychologists have concluded that belief in
God is “bred in the bone”, it is instinctive and natural and not necessarily
learnt. The problem is not in the contradiction between religiosity and
atheism/agnosticism but in the continuing war between religions. Historian
Webster’s description of the Thirty Years’ War as “the last great war of
religion” could not have been more misplaced if one were to chronicle the
persecution of the Jews at the hands of the Christians for centuries and the
current tension between the Islamic and the Judeo-Christian civilizations. The
terrorist attacks of 9/11 though carried out by a handful of renegades in the
name of Islam and condemned by the whole Islamic world (along with the rest of
the international community) have nonetheless reduced the Muslims, particularly
the Muslim Diaspora living in the West, to negotiating the parameters of
minority citizenship.
In Denmark the publication of the cartoons
and the consequent Muslim outrage in Europe and in some parts of the world has
increased the popularity of the populist anti-immigration Danish Peoples Party
which openly says that Islam is not a religion but a terrorist organization.
European antipathy towards Islam is grounded in history. The Crusades and the
domination by the Ottoman Turks over a large part of European lands had fuelled
anti-Islamic sentiments among the Europeans which had remained dormant as
Christians of different denominations fought among themselves( not religious
wars though) and in their struggle to colonize then pristine world unsullied by
European lust and greed, and engineered the death and destruction of millions
of people in the two Great Wars in the Twentieth century. Like infected blood
anti-Muslim feelings flowing in the sub-terranean veins has now found renewed
expressions. For example, when finally the issue of Turkey’s admission as a
member of the European Union could not be delayed any longer some European
nations have voiced opposition to Turkish membership. Austria which
historically served as bulwark against Ottoman expansionism in Europe has
suggested for a pan-European referendum on the question of Turkish membership. Former
French President Valerie Giscard d’Estaing expressed the fear that Turkey’s
membership would spell the end of Europe. Other opponents include Slovakia,
Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Malta and Cyprus. Prominent German politician
Wolfgang Schauble was skeptical about an EU with Turkey as a member would
continue to be able to build “an ever closer political union or speak with one
voice”, and suggested limiting the size of the European Union. Late last year
France witnessed religious-race riots between Muslim
youths and the French authorities and their escalation to other European
countries. Though apparently caused by the accidental death by electrocution of
two Arab Muslim youths fleeing from the pursuit of the French police , the
riots were basically caused by decades long socio-economic exclusion of Muslim
immigrants brought into France from North Africa to shore up the post-War
sagging French economy. Generally immigration is determined by the demands of
the advanced metropolitan capitalism weighed against the disadvantages of
socio-cultural asymmetry caused by the refusal/inability of the immigrants to
fully assimilate with the values of the host country. This gives rise to “us”
versus “them” feeling resulting in sharp division in society and consequent
violence in which the authorities tend to take the side of the host country
population against the immigrants
forgetting that the second or third generation immigrants are no less citizens
of the country as those belonging to the majority community. Additionally the
“failure” of the immigrants to fully integrate themselves with the mainstream
life results in gaining political territory by anti-immigration political
parties who play on the unfounded fear of the host country voters about the
immigrants.
In response to the Organization of Islamic
Countries’ condemnation of the “printing of blasphemous and insulting
caricatures of Prophet Mohammed(SM)” which the Organization thought to be a
“trap set up by fundamentalists and foster acts of revenge”; Danish Prime
Minister Rasmussen felt that “freedom of speech is absolute (and) not
negotiable” while a prominent Danish academic expressed the view that “people
are inclined to see Islam and political extremism as two sides of the same
coin”. His subsequent apology for the publication of the cartoons and his
description of Denmark as a country tolerant of different religions and having
an open society is too little too late.
One wonders whether the repeated onslaught on
Muslim sensibilities through cleverly disguised provocations are not aimed at
perpetuating Western minds along the views expressed by Bernard Lewis, among
others, of Islam being an intolerant religion. “Islam was never prepared”
writes Lewis “either in theory or in practice, to accord full equality to those
who held other beliefs and practiced other forms of worship”. Besides, adds
Bernard Lewis, there exists millennial rivalry between Islam and Christianity—a
competing world religion, a distinctive civilization inspired by that
religion.... the struggle between these rival systems has now lasted for some
fourteen centuries.. and has continued virtually to the present day”. The other
school of thought less severe on Islam for example, Samuel Huntington of Clash
of Civilization fame observes: “The West won the world not by supremacy of
ideas or values or religion but rather by superiority in applying organized
violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do”.
The whole episode about the cartoons’
portrayal of Prophet Mohammed_(SM) in unflattering terms appears to be more by
design than by accident. Had the Danish Prime Minister Rasmussen not refused to
see the Arab ambassadors when they sought a meeting with him to discuss about
the cartoons’ publication last September the current explosion in the Islamic
world could have been avoided. The situation deteriorated with the repeat
publication of the cartoons in January in a small evangelical Christian
newspaper in Norway and in other European countries and with the EU backing of
the Danish position on inviolability of freedom of expression at the cost of
hurting the religious sentiment of more than one billion Muslims all over the
world. This arrogant display of an “inerrant” interpretation of right to
expression leads one to look for other views.
“For a society to claim universal desirability” wrote Irish
anthropologist Vincent Tucker “while turning its back on others from whom it is
convinced it has nothing to learn, is not only cultural elitism, but cultural
racism”.
It
becomes difficult to comprehend the inherent contradictions in making Woodrow
Wilsonian promises to democratize the world( made once again in Bush 2006 State
of the Union address) and lack of Western comprehension of Islamic
fundamentalism’s repeated attempt to transcend the boundary of quietism. The
West, unless it opts to retreat into some fortified areas of affluence to
escape the contagion of religious extremism( a doubtful venture in this age of
globalism and fraught with risk to its own security), would be better advised
to cooperate with the moderate elements in the Muslim world engaged in their
struggle with those imbibed with absolutist, “ inerrant” and arrogant
confidence in the supremacy of their belief, for the soul of Islam.
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