Home >> United States & Canada >> Culture  Email  Print Clash of Civilizations Revisited Safdar Jafri - 4/19/2008 As the religious violence rages across the world, Huntington's Clash of Civilizations has become one of the most talked about theories of the day. The theory argues that West and Islam are two radically different civilizations that are bound to clash in view of their extremely conflicting values. It stereotypes Islam as inherently non-progressive and anti-liberal; the two most core values of the western civilization. Recent surge of radical Islam that culminated in the ghastly events of 9/11, has catapulted this once obscure theory into political and intellectual limelight.
Today, thanks to the rise in religious radicalism, as the security risk across the world rises, this important theory must be closely scrutinized for if it is true and backed by facts, then it has the power of steering the entire course of future global geopolitics and international relations.
The theory argues that the clash will take place between Islam and the West. The two are presumed to be civilizations. But while West may in a general sense be regarded as a civilization (a questionable but acceptable approach for the purpose this article), it is technically impossible to confine Islam to a civilization. Islam is a religion, just like Christianity or Judaism. Civilizations exist in specific time, space and geographic location. Religions are beyond such confinements as they invariably transcend time, space and geography. Persians and Egyptians were a civilization; but sun-worshippers and fire-worshippers were not. Similarly, there is a Chinese civilization but there is not Buddhist civilization. Just as there cannot be a Jewish, Christian or Buddhist civilization, there cannot be an Islamic civilization. Unless, this theory is renamed as 'Clash of Western Civilization and Islam', the semantics alone can be its downfall.
This point also concludes the fact that Islamic fanatics and those inflicting terrorism in the name of religion are not the representative of a civilization, i.e. Islam but of a violent interpretation of a religion.
The second and equally significant aspect of the theory is the 'Clash' itself. Now, even if we momentarily assume that Islam is a civilization, a point clearly disproved above, and that it is in clash with the Western civilization, we must check some very obvious facts to test the validity of this aspect. What place can represent Islam more than its birthplace Saudi Arabia? One of the most repressive and undemocratic Muslim country, Saudi Arabia does not seem be having any clash with the West at all. Despite all its vices such as human rights abuse, suppression of political dissent and extreme interpretation of Islam, it has one of the friendliest relations with the country that appears to lead the Western civilization, i.e. the USA. One wonders how the theory would explain this relationship or show the clash. As a matter of fact, Saudi Arabia is only an extreme example that exposes the fundamental flaw in this theory. There are also suppressive and undemocratic regimes in Jordan, Egypt, UAE and until lately, Pakistan but we do not see any clash there. The theory therefore fails to satisfy even such fundamental queries.
It is highly regrettable that some political analysts continue to assert that the present global political crisis, particularly in the Middle East, is a manifestation of the Clash of Civilizations theory. Instead of intellectually challenging and exposing the theory's most fundamental flaws, some of which have been touched upon in this article, there is an advertent or inadvertent attempt to convert this theory into a self-fulfilling prophecy to the disadvantage of political science and humanity in general. What we are experiencing today in the world of politics is a far more complex scenario than what can be satisfactorily explained away by one theory. There are different players with different motives that are interacting as well as clashing in their own way and a far more comprehensive approach is required to understand these developments.
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