Recently, Fareed Zakaria published a piece in Newsweek entitled Learning to Live with Radical Islam." In it, he argues two broad points, both of which I think are important questions that we are not properly addressing.
• At what point do internal politics in a Muslim-majority country become a foreign policy concern for the US?
• Are all Islamist movements our concern?
• Is there a natural turn against extremist ideology?
The basic problem, as he describes it, is that there is no nuance in our understanding of Islamist movements. As a result, I believe, we fear that which does not need to be feared and miss the organic debates and evolution going on in the Muslim-majority world. In the 1980s, the US had a more pragmatic foreign policy, funding the Afghan mujahidin, the soldiers that would go on to become part of the Taliban. President Ronal Reagan called them the greatest freedom fighters since the Revolutionary War. We encouraged Saudi Arabia to establish schools that taught violent warfare against enemies in our client state of Pakistan. The goal was to create a highly localized, reactionary force that would be a counter-force to the invading Soviets. Although that eventually metastasized, I do not believe that is the reason we have become reluctant to engage with new Islamist groups.
The primary learning we should have is that Islamist groups are not inherently evil, and their existence indicates a theoretical support in some quarters of the society in which they reside. Most are highly local and are interested in how their nation/society functions, not in global violent extremism. The issue is that many of these groups, such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, exist as an alternative power structure in states with poor governmental and civic institutions. If Islamists movements are conceived of as Muslim Religious Right movements, then a society can turn to them and give them a chance to create a better society. In countries with robust institutions, a failure by the Islamists means they can be replaced; even if they try to hold on to power, institutional inertia will prevent it. However, the threat is when these institutions are not in place. In Afghanistan in the 1980s, the mujahidin became the Taliban because there was no state power that developed. They were trained in two things: armchair theology and warfare. The reason that we are still dealing with Taliban in the Afghan government is because they were the default power center and there is still no structural alternative to them. We cannot build the government without them. In Iraq, we are able to reach out to the Sunni Islamists because there is a semi-functioning government. They are parties that can be brought to the table without overwhelming it.
The situation in Iraq and Afghanistan highlights the fact that we can work with Islamist movements to put an end to violent extremism. Most of these groups, as do the vast majority of Muslims, find the acts of violence committed in the name of Islam abhorrent. For some of these groups, the objection may be one of degree, but they also recognize that extremist groups are at their core nihilists. There is no positive vision that these groups offer; it is simply killing to prove superiority, including killing other Muslims. The idea of takfir, to call someone a disbeliever, is one that traditionally could only be used with strict rigor, oversight, and sparingly. The extremists use the term more often than they call upon God.
However, where I think Zakaria misses the mark is when he says the Islamists are more important than the moderates. First, what is a moderate? Is he arguing that by adopting Western conceptions of liberal democracy, people are moderate? He knows better; there are non-Western conceptions of liberal democracy, as well as liberal oligarchy. Rather than delve into the term, I simply wish to acknowledge that it is problematic. The important point here is that Islamists are more important than moderates in dealing with extremists. However, it is the moderates who are the most important in constructing the state. If you imagine a spectrum of religious thought, the Islamists are closest to the extremists; they speak the same "language." Once the current extremists are neutered, the Islamists are the new extremists. It is the moderates who can help determine what a "moderate" debate can look like. If the state is only open to extremes, then we do have a concern about all Islamist groups.
Zakaria's most important point he saves for the end. He says: “We can better pursue our values if we recognize the local and cultural context, and appreciate that people want to find their own balance between freedom and order, liberty and license. In the end, time is on our side. Bin Ladenism has already lost ground in almost every Muslim country. Radical Islam will follow the same path. Wherever it is tried—in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in parts of Nigeria and Pakistan—people weary of its charms very quickly. The truth is that all Islamists, violent or not, lack answers to the problems of the modern world. They do not have a world view that can satisfy the aspirations of modern men and women.”
A Response to Zakaria's, "Learning to Live with Radical Islam"
Recently, Fareed Zakaria published a piece in Newsweek entitled Learning to Live with Radical Islam." In it, he argues two broad points, both of which I think are important questions that we are not properly addressing.
• At what point do internal politics in a Muslim-majority country become a foreign policy concern for the US?
• Are all Islamist movements our concern?
• Is there a natural turn against extremist ideology?
The basic problem, as he describes it, is that there is no nuance in our understanding of Islamist movements. As a result, I believe, we fear that which does not need to be feared and miss the organic debates and evolution going on in the Muslim-majority world. In the 1980s, the US had a more pragmatic foreign policy, funding the Afghan mujahidin, the soldiers that would go on to become part of the Taliban. President Ronal Reagan called them the greatest freedom fighters since the Revolutionary War. We encouraged Saudi Arabia to establish schools that taught violent warfare against enemies in our client state of Pakistan. The goal was to create a highly localized, reactionary force that would be a counter-force to the invading Soviets. Although that eventually metastasized, I do not believe that is the reason we have become reluctant to engage with new Islamist groups.
The primary learning we should have is that Islamist groups are not inherently evil, and their existence indicates a theoretical support in some quarters of the society in which they reside. Most are highly local and are interested in how their nation/society functions, not in global violent extremism. The issue is that many of these groups, such as the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, exist as an alternative power structure in states with poor governmental and civic institutions. If Islamists movements are conceived of as Muslim Religious Right movements, then a society can turn to them and give them a chance to create a better society. In countries with robust institutions, a failure by the Islamists means they can be replaced; even if they try to hold on to power, institutional inertia will prevent it. However, the threat is when these institutions are not in place. In Afghanistan in the 1980s, the mujahidin became the Taliban because there was no state power that developed. They were trained in two things: armchair theology and warfare. The reason that we are still dealing with Taliban in the Afghan government is because they were the default power center and there is still no structural alternative to them. We cannot build the government without them. In Iraq, we are able to reach out to the Sunni Islamists because there is a semi-functioning government. They are parties that can be brought to the table without overwhelming it.
The situation in Iraq and Afghanistan highlights the fact that we can work with Islamist movements to put an end to violent extremism. Most of these groups, as do the vast majority of Muslims, find the acts of violence committed in the name of Islam abhorrent. For some of these groups, the objection may be one of degree, but they also recognize that extremist groups are at their core nihilists. There is no positive vision that these groups offer; it is simply killing to prove superiority, including killing other Muslims. The idea of takfir, to call someone a disbeliever, is one that traditionally could only be used with strict rigor, oversight, and sparingly. The extremists use the term more often than they call upon God.
However, where I think Zakaria misses the mark is when he says the Islamists are more important than the moderates. First, what is a moderate? Is he arguing that by adopting Western conceptions of liberal democracy, people are moderate? He knows better; there are non-Western conceptions of liberal democracy, as well as liberal oligarchy. Rather than delve into the term, I simply wish to acknowledge that it is problematic. The important point here is that Islamists are more important than moderates in dealing with extremists. However, it is the moderates who are the most important in constructing the state. If you imagine a spectrum of religious thought, the Islamists are closest to the extremists; they speak the same "language." Once the current extremists are neutered, the Islamists are the new extremists. It is the moderates who can help determine what a "moderate" debate can look like. If the state is only open to extremes, then we do have a concern about all Islamist groups.
Zakaria's most important point he saves for the end. He says: “We can better pursue our values if we recognize the local and cultural context, and appreciate that people want to find their own balance between freedom and order, liberty and license. In the end, time is on our side. Bin Ladenism has already lost ground in almost every Muslim country. Radical Islam will follow the same path. Wherever it is tried—in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in parts of Nigeria and Pakistan—people weary of its charms very quickly. The truth is that all Islamists, violent or not, lack answers to the problems of the modern world. They do not have a world view that can satisfy the aspirations of modern men and women.”
Hussein Rashid
http://www.husseinrashid.com