Eclectic Grounds

In the Guardian, Tariq Ramadan gives his perspective on the question I posed here yesterday:

There are only four minarets in Switzerland, so why is it that it is there that this initiative has been launched? My country, like many in Europe, is facing a national reaction to the new visibility of European Muslims. The minarets are but a pretext – the UDC wanted first to launch a campaign against the traditional Islamic methods of slaughtering animals but were afraid of testing the sensitivity of Swiss Jews, and instead turned their sights on the minaret as a suitable symbol.

Every European country has its specific symbols or topics through which European Muslims are targeted. In France it is the headscarf or burka; in Germany, mosques; in Britain, violence; cartoons in Denmark; homosexuality in the Netherlands – and so on. It is important to look beyond these symbols and understand what is really happening in Europe in general and in Switzerland in particular: while European countries and citizens are going through a real and deep identity crisis, the new visibility of Muslims is problematic – and it is scary.

At the very moment Europeans find themselves asking, in a globalising, migratory world, “What are our roots?”, “Who are we?”, “What will our future look like?”, they see around them new citizens, new skin colours, new symbols to which they are unaccustomed.

Over the last two decades Islam has become connected to so many controversial debates – violence, extremism, freedom of speech, gender discrimination, forced marriage, to name a few – it is difficult for ordinary citizens to embrace this new Muslim presence as a positive factor. There is a great deal of fear and a palpable mistrust. Who are they? What do they want? And the questions are charged with further suspicion as the idea of Islam being an expansionist religion is intoned. Do these people want to Islamise our country?

Some reactions by the victorious camp in favour of the ban on minarets after the referendum on Sunday, 29 October:

“Forced marriages and other things like cemeteries separating the pure and impure – we don’t have that in Switzerland and we don’t want to introduce it.”
Ulrich Schlüer, co-president of the Initiative Committee to ban minarets.

“Society wants to put a safeguard on the political-legal wing of Islam, for which there is no separation between state and religion.”
Oskar Freysinger, member of the Swiss People’s Party and a driving force in the campaign

“People who settle here have to realise that they can’t turn up to work in a head scarf or get special dispensation from swimming lessons.”
Toni Brunner, president of the People’s Party

(all quotes from SwissInfo)

If one listens to its initiators, yesterday’s referendum was not about the construction of new minarets in Switzerland at all. The organizers of the campaign admit quite frankly what was really rejected: their image of a Muslim religion and culture and what they perceive as an assault on Swiss values.

With only four minarets existing in the country is hard to argue that the referendum is justified. Yet, the campaign poster speaks a clear language where minarets are used symbolically for a hostile attack: missile-sharp minarets riddle a Swiss flag. The rationale behind the campaign is “a” culturally pure Switzerland and “a” hostile culture of Islam.

So as of Sunday, the Swiss have joined the exclusive club of Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan as the world’s only countries that have laws which to prohibit the construction of towers on religious buildings (In S.A. and Afghanistan, it’s Christian churches though). With the outcome and implementation of the ban, Switzerland breaches the European Convention on Human Rights and is likely to face expulsion from the Council of Europe.

Just to be clear: a debate concentrated on issues (dispensation from swimming lessons, head scarfs, etc) is necessary for communities as a negotiation of shared communal values. However, in such debates the majority often drifts of to racial and cultural stereotyping of minorities. It looks as if the anti-minaret campaign is the most extreme example of this in a European country to date.

The question that the organisers of the winning side will have to ask themselves is whether their success will really help their goal of driving back “traditional Islam” and the construction of “parallel societies”.

The campaign has highlighted a massive stigma of Muslims in Switzerland as culturally inferior and ultimately unwanted. On top of that, Muslims will now be more marginalised than ever before. Discrimination will no longer be limited to the social level but also reflected in the legal structure as soon as the words ‘the construction of minarets is prohibited’ will enter article 72 of the Swiss constitution.

With this decision, the liberal and integrated majority of Muslims in Switzerland is under attack and extremist groups will gain momentum. If the initiators of the referendum were genuinely interested in the integration of religious and ethnic minorities they would see the outcome of their campaign as a catastrophe.

From Gideon Levy, columnist for Haaretz:

Why is it permissible to talk to Hamas about the fate of one captive soldier and another several hundred prisoners, but forbidden to talk to them about the fate of two nations? Never has Israeli logic been so distorted. Now, when our hearts look forward to the deal’s implementation, when every human heart should look forward to Gilad Shalit’s release – and yes, to the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, some of them political prisoners for all intents and purposes, not just “terrorists with blood on their hands” – now is the time to finally rid ourselves of some of the foolish prohibitions we have imposed on ourselves and the entire international community. [...]

Yes, we are conducting what we are denying to ourselves: negotiations with Hamas – and the sky hasn’t fallen. Whether direct or indirect, there are talks; whether or not we recognize Hamas, there are negotiations. For us, as usual, the method that should come first waits for last. Only after we try all the rest – killing and destruction, war and starvation – do we turn to the direct route: negotiations. [...]

A free Gaza undergoing rehabilitation will be much less explosive. A Hamas busy rebuilding will behave differently, especially if it is also offered a political horizon. It will have much more to lose, something that is hard to say about Gaza today. So after we finish crossing our fingers for Shalit’s release, we have to open the same hand and reach out to Hamas in peace.

The notion of a “global war on terror” has always been nonsense. It has manufactured a threatening picture of an alleged global ideology of hatred for the western world. But the “global war” image obscures the fact that every crisis zone has its unique context and that most people who join or support insurgent groups do so for their very personal reasons which are far from ideological.

This still seems to be a perspective shared by but few officials in the US military:

Matthew Hoh, a senior US state department official and former marine who was based until recently in Zabul province [of Afghanistan], explained his resignation on 10 September 2009 by referring to his experiences in the Korengal valley and elsewhere. These, he is reported as saying:

“taught him ‘how localised the insurgency was. I didn’t realize that a group in this valley here has no connection with an insurgent group two kilometres away.’ Hundreds, maybe thousands, of groups across Afghanistan, he decided, had few ideological ties to the Taliban but took its money to fight the foreign intruders and maintain their own local power bases. ‘That’s really what shook me,’ he said. ‘I thought it was more nationalistic. But it’s localism. I would call it valley-ism’” (see Karen De Young, “U.S. official resigns over Afghan war“,Washington Post, 27 October 2009).

Found here.

- two often-debated questions in Germany after the recent federal elections. Following the victory of the conservative-liberal coalition, it is customary for the head of the smaller coalition party (the liberals) to become vice chancellor and foreign minister.

The head of the liberals is Guido Westerwelle. Now, in my opionion, there is a lot that is wrong with Westerwelle becoming FM: Be it his inexperience and previous indifference to international affairs, his political stance and style, as well as his apparent gaucheness on the international stage.

The more central question for many commentators, however, seems to be whether Westerwelle as an openly homosexual political can represent Germany as a Foreign Minister in Muslim countries.

Why wouldn’t he?

Diplomacy is probably the most pragmatic policy field. Quite regularly, countries or groups who are in the midst of the fiercest political conflicts, still maintain diplomatic relations. Just think of the close political contact of the US and the USSR throughout the Cold War, despite their existential ideological battle. You see the point: diplomacy is rational, not symbolical, an therefore mostly blind to ideology.

Why would that be any different with two countries that maintain friendly relations like, say, Germany and Saudi Arabia? Simply because of the sexual orientation of one country’s representative? Should the Saudi foreign minister be criticised at home for shaking the hand of a homosexual, his answer would simply be: do you want to jeopardize trade relations with one of our most important partners?

A statement from an official of the Turkish foreign ministry seems to confirm this. He told the Turkish paper Milliyet that, while there is no rule of protocol in case Westerwelle as German FM would bring his partner, “a middle way will be found”.

So far, Westerwelle’s sexual identity has been a non-issue in Germany, and I think Germany can be a little proud of that fact. Why should this situation of normality be questioned, now that it is reflected internationally?

As much as I disagree with Westerwelle representing my country from a political point of view, I would love to see his appointment create some cracks the foundation of the alleged Gay/Muslim faultline.

On ResetDOC, Michael Dillon comments on violence by the Chinese government against the Uyghur population and points to the underlying structural racism:

If [Uyghurs] don’t speak and read Chinese correctly, then they do not get a job. But they are also excluded for ethnic reasons: Han Chinese prefer to work with Han. Simply, there is a strong anti-Uyghur racism there.

Dillon also comments on the hesitant role of European countries and the US:

The difference is certainly that the Uyghurs are Muslims and Muslims are not very popular in the West right now. Though the main difference is that with Tibet there is an alternative government in exile under the Dalai Lama, so the Chinese have always been able to point at the Dalai Lama and say that he is undermining their control over Tibet. And a lot of Tibetans as we know support the Dalai Lama. That is not the case for Xinjiang. The Uyghurs do look to Central Asian states, such as Kirghizstan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, as a sort of a mother, but there is not an alternative government.

ResetDOC also features two more articles that portray the economic backgrounds of the conflict as well as the role of Turkish language spoken by the Uyghurs.

I recently saw a panel discussion involving Dutch sociologist and politician Paul Scheffer. In 2000, Scheffer published an influential article called “The Multicultural Drama“, in which he criticised the system of migration in the Netherlands and Europe in general. Indifferent ‘pillarisation’ of societies, he argued back then, leads to segregation and conflicts between migrants and settled society.

Now, Scheffer has published a book called “The Unsettled Land” which offers a comparison of the process of migration and its consequences in several countries of Europe and North America. He argues that, besides different systems and different responses in all these countries, the process of migration is quite similar. According to him, there are three steps that can be identified:

Step 1: Avoidance. Initially, the arrival of new immigrants causes “white flight” and segregation, until open conflict breaks out.

Step 2: Conflict. At this stage, the receiving society starts to question its own values and cultural identity to be able to cope with a reality that has outlived the society’s self-conception.

Step 3: Accomodation. Societies develop mechanism to cope with the new demographics. Examples of accomodation include symbolic politics and recognition (monuments, arts, etc) as well as more egalitarian social politics (such as role of religion in policy-making, etc).

What’s remarkable in my view is that Scheffer develops a very sober, almost mechanic, analysis that he deems to be generalizable. First, this perspective removes fear and hysteria from the debate. Migration is seen as a social change;  and while change naturally causes conflict which can be painful, it will eventually lead to a new social formation that is workable. On the other hand, it emphasises strongly our ability to manage this process by finding our ways to come to an accommodation, which, according to Scheffer, will necessarily happen.

In the process that he describes, conflict that migration causes will always lead to the receiving society questioning itself. If we want to integrate newcomers, we have to become clear into what they will be integrated. Migration can therefore also be seen as a reflection for a society

Scheffer’s book was criticised as banal in the discussion I witnessed, but I think it is useful as it sets a ‘frame’ to view the debates in that are fought daily in newspapers and discussions. Surely there are weaknesses, like overgeneralisation and a strong emphasis on the nation-state. Yet, it points to the importance of ‘management’ to be able to accommodate and emancipate newcomers within societies, and it gives a hint as to how societies benefit from it simply be reflecting upon its core values and by redefining what makes up the community that people live in.

 You can find Scheffer’s presentation of his thesis and the following panel discussion online. While the debate was in German, the presentation was in English. It starts at around 2:15. Since I still haven’t figured why I can’t embed external videos here within the blog, please click here for the video.

I like philosophical perspectives on cultural and social phenomena, because they go beyond explaining them but try to give ethical and universal instructions on how to act. One of my favourite authors in this sense is K.A. Appiah and his writing on cosmopolitanism and identity politics.

In a 2003 article in Loyola of Los Angesles Law Review, T. P. Seto explores terrorism from an ethics perspective. Can we condemn terrorism, based on consequentialism, deontology and virtue ethics? Each of them, he concludes, is unsatisfactory because they fail in being culturally neutral and provide little practical guidance. It’s a recommendable read for anyone who wants to explore the meaning of terrorism could be and the moral dilemmas of accepting or opposing it lie.

I want to quote the final section of the article here: Based on the previous argumentation, Seto gives guidelines of how societies may ethically deal with terrorism. Any solution, he argues, must be long-term to be successful and tackle the foundations of terrorist movements:

Punishment is moral. We therefore must punish, as we have. In the absence of a common ethos of reciprocity, however, punishment is likely to feed a cycle of mutual defection. In the short run, we can seek to disrupt the organizational structures that make terrorism possible. Unfortunately, terrorism requires very little organization; the Israelis have attempted this solution for decades, and have utterly failed. The only real long-term solutions are (1) expansion of our We to include the terrorists, or (2) the genocidal elimination of populations that feed the terrorists. The second is inconsistent with our internalized moral codes, for good reason; it is also impractical in most circumstances. Were we to try to eliminate all Muslims in the world, we would probably pay a price too high to contemplate; if we did, most would conclude that we got exactly what we deserved. Our only real choice is to work to expand our We—to develop an ethos of reciprocity that includes the terrorists, even as we punish them.

These shirts apparently are popular amongst Israeli soldiers these days:

According to Sociological Images, “the shirt on the left shows a pregnant woman, clearly meant to be Arab/Palestinian, in crosshairs and says ‘1 Shot 2 Kills.’ The one on the right has a kid carrying a gun in crosshairs and says “The smaller, the harder,” or maybe ‘the smaller it is, the harder it is.’”

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has led the two groups become strangers to each other. Through policy, but also though social processes over the decades of violence, both groups have become indifferent to each other’s suffering. Haaretz (via Jörg Lau) recently ran an article about Israeli soldiers’ behaviour during the latest Gaza offensive. One soldier is quoted saying “The lives of Palestinians, let’s say, is something very, very less important than the lives of our soldiers. So as far as they are concerned they can justify [human rights abuses] that way”

Lucy Nusseibeh at opendemocracy.org analyses the emotive effects of the conflict:

The result of the massive and indiscriminate use of force is to diminish Israelis’ as well as Palestinians’ human security. Both are locked in a (very asymmetrical) system that is dominated by fear, victimhood, violence, and (for most) a striking lack of empathy.

What’s happening in Israel and Palestine just as in most conflicts is that the devaluation of the other creates the ideological justification which makes it possible for a group to commit collective crimes. Human rights violations are facilitated by group distinctions made absolute and by the consequent application of separate moral standards for in‐group and out‐group.

There are a few sociological and psychological insights that can explain this pattern: 

Personal identity and group identity: When personal identity fades behind an absolutist definition in terms of one’s group, and when this group is excluded from the human family, it is no longer morally unacceptable to harm and kill these individuals.

Victims are never innocent: We can see the role of dehumanisation of victims as central feature of atrocities on all levels. On the psychological perspective, a central theme in the dehumanisation of victims by torturers is the concept of just‐world thinking. It refers to the blaming of victims as ultimately responsible for their sufferings in an act of self‐persuasion. The innocence of the individual cannot be established as the individual cannot not be cleared of the “misdeeds, evil intention, or faults” of her communal groups. A devaluation of the other and diminishing concerns with their suffering is the consequence.

Moral double standards: The dehumanisation and application of negative stereotypes against a communal group may lead to a justification of atrocities by reshaping moral standards and turning evil deeds in good ones: the perpetrator is doing a good thing by eliminating evil people. Out-groups who become victims of atrocities often have a history of victimisation and marginalisation, thereby socially guiding the thought processes of perpetrators. 

The role of the state: In modern society, the state is the most important instance of authority, which individuals derive their rights from. To be excluded from the state means being regarded a non‐person, vulnerable to arbitrary treatment.

Sociology of the army: Ideological elements are inherent to any modern army. Armies create systems of ideas and symbols that revolve around discipline and giving up on an individual moral system. Symbols, in‐group fetishism and the channelling of aggressiveness toward the enemy become central elements in this ideology. In this way, separate morals and manners different from the population are established. 

For excellent research on how dehumanization is used by soldiers and societies in conflict to rationalize violence, look up  H.C. Kelman’s book “The social context of torture”, Mika Haritos‐Fatouras’ work, Anette Smeulers’ interviews with Greek torturers, entitled “What transforms ordinary people into gross human rights violators?”, and Alex Alvarez’ “Destructive Beliefs: Genocide and the Role of Ideology”.

All but Alvarez can be downloaded as PDF for free.

In an essay published at Conflicts Forum, AU Beirut Professor A. Moussalli deconstructs different discourses on modern Islamic thought often identified as “Islamism”. His focus is on Wahabism, salafism and Islamism.

In the introduction, Moussalli writes:

Understanding these trends and their discourses will allow world powers, policymakers, academicians, intellectuals, terrorism experts, journalists, and many others to distinguish between and understand the logic of the radical and the moderate, the active and the inactive, the jihadi and the peaceful, the takfiri and the tolerant, the modern and the traditional, and the rational and irrational. This essay will also clarify the terminology used chaotically by different policy-makers, analysts, journalists, academicians, and intellectuals. 

Find the full article here.