Arabs doin' it for themselves

Photo source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/zarwan/4486130923/



At the present time the whole world is closely following the events in the Arab world, especially Egypt at the moment, that have transpired as a revolt of the Tunisian uprising. Browsing through English-language blogs and comments left on online news sites, one may detect a popular pattern of thought. It is quite common to find comments in support of the Mubarak government, which range from expressions of strong backing to grudging tolerance. However, what these opinions have in common is a view that ultimately, the fate of Egypt and other Arab countries caught in the political storm must either be harsh but stable rule by the existing pro-Western strongmen, or a slide into backwards/hostile/violent (insert your adjective of choice here) Islamic theocracy.

The vehemence with which such persons uphold this blindingly misleading false dichotomy is astounding. It is asserted that incumbent governments are essentially the lesser of two evils. According to this viewpoint, the choice is between the West or Islam. West good, Islam bad. According to them, governments which have already demonstrated their corruption and cruelty, but are allied to the West, may be bad but are better than prospective Islamist governments which don't even exist yet.

Well, I can tell you one thing. People can wet their pants over how we're all in danger from folks like the Muslim Brotherhood, but believe it or not there's a huge gulf between political parties which seek to increase the prominence of their traditional religion in society (and follow policies of non-violence like the MB), and gun-toting fanatics hell-bent on killing the 'infidels'. The attempt to paint each and every political and social movement with the slightest thing to do with Islam as parts of a single monolithic anti-all-things-good juggernaut is a horribly trite slander which we don't even need to bother debunking here.

As well as this egregious reductionism, such attitudes also betray a deep historical amnesia, and a misuse of the term 'theocratic'. Sunni Islam - 90% of the Muslim demographic, and dominant in the Arab world - doesn't even have a religious hierachy. These people are in effect transplanting the European historical experience onto a completely different context, where the religous scholars were not rulers themselves, but frequently acted as a buffer against government oppression. The current social and political situation in the Middle East, as any academic worth his salt would tell you, is inextricably linked to the experience of colonialism by the Western powers. The environments which violent nationalist and religious groups grow out of are a direct consequence of the destruction of traditional institutions and civil society, the haphazard manipulation of borders and creation of artificial states and the imposition of secular dictatorships completely at odds with the interests of the common people - just like Mubarak's mob. 

It is precisely the status quo which feeds the resentment which leads to political violence. It provides extremist groups of both secular and religious persuasion with the demagogic ammunition for promoting a sense of hostility against foreign entities.  To unconditionally continue to support Arab dictatorships is to essentially prove that you are an imperialist power!

When we express alarm at the prospect of more 'Islamic' governments, we are merely demonstrating our intellectual hypocrisy and adherence to the classic 'Fukuyama fallacy' that 'liberal democracy' is the natural and normative end-point of human government. But by taking a world-view that developed in a very specific historical context and attributing universal relevance to it, we only express our own ideological totaliatarianism and intolerance for alternative points of view. 'Democracy' is a loaded term anyway - nobody (apart from the dictators themselves) seriously denies the desirablity of public consultation in matters of governance. However, if we use the term 'democracy' to describe the specific systems and institutions which developed in the West, we can imagine how people may very legitimately come to be opposed to it.

Western societies are extremely priviliged in that, in the modern age, they were more or less free to develop their political systems according to their own internal dynamics. The Arab world has not benefited from that luxury. So we should shut up and stop spouting the usual cliched, paternalistic tripe. The Egyptians, Tunisians and other Arab peoples are perfectly capable of deciding their own destinies, and we should let them get on with it, no matter what the end result may be.