The Great Debate UK

from FaithWorld:

Will the Arab Spring bring U.S.-style “culture wars” to the Middle East?

(From left: Olivier Roy, Cardinal Angelo Scola and Martino Diez of the Oasis Foundation at the conference on San Servolo island, Venice, June 20, 2011/Giorgia Dalle Ore/Oasis)

Where is the Arab Spring leading the Middle East? What will be the longer-term outcome of the popular protests that have shaken the region since the beginning of this year? Of course, it’s still too early to say with any certainty, even in countries such as Tunisia and Egypt that succeeded in toppling their authoritarian regimes. Some trends have emerged, however, and they’re on the agenda at a conference in Venice I’m attending entitled “Medio Oriente verso dove?” (Where is the Middle East heading?). The host is the Oasis Foundation, a group chaired by Cardinal Angelo Scola, the Roman Catholic patriarch of this historic city, and guests include Christian and Muslim religious leaders and academics from the Middle East and Europe.

In one of the most interesting -- and hotly debated -- presentations, the French Islam specialist Olivier Roy described the Arab Spring as “a break with the culture and ideologies that dominated the Arab world from the 1950s until recently.” It marks a clear change in the demographic, political and religious paradigms operating there, he said. The old dichotomy of the authoritarian regime or the Islamist state has broken down, he argued, and Islam is taking on a new role in the political process. In the end, the region -- or at least the states where the Arab Spring brings real change -- could see democratic politics marked not by major efforts to establish an Islamic state but by Muslim “culture war” controversies not unlike the way hot-button issues such as abortion and gay marriage emerge in U.S. political debates.

(Newly wed Egyptian anti-government protesters in Tahrir Square in Cairo February 10, 2011/Dylan Martinez)

The first trend Roy cited to back up this thesis is the sharp drop in fertility levels in the Arab world since the late 1980s and the 1990s. Several Arab countries, especially those in North Africa, now have birthrates of around two children per woman, close but still above the European average. Tunisia’s birthrate is actually lower than France's.  “The generation that is now on the job market is the last generation of big families,” said Roy, who is now director of the Mediterranean Programme at the European University Institute in Florence. “It’s a generation that has many fewer children and marries much later.”

from FaithWorld:

Pakistan’s booming female madrassas feed rising intolerance

(Covered Pakistani female madrassa students take part in an anti-government demonstration in Islamabad August 27, 2004 after a government raid in their mosque and Islamic seminary/Mian Khursheed)

Varda is an accountancy student who dreams of working abroad. Dainty and soft-spoken, the 22-year-old aspires to broaden her horizons, but when it comes to Islam, she refuses to question the fundamentalist interpretations offered by clerics and lecturers nationwide.

Varda is among more than a quarter of a million Pakistani students attending an all-female madrassa, or Islamic seminary, where legions of well-to-do women are experiencing an awakening of faith, at the cost of rising intolerance. In a nation where Muslim extremists are slowly strengthening their grip on society, the number of all-female madrassas has boomed over the past decade, fueled by the failures of the state education system and a deepening conservativism among the middle to upper classes.

Parents often encourage girls to enroll in madrassas after finishing high school or university, as an alternative to a shrinking, largely male-orientated job market, and to ensure a girl waiting to get married isn't drawn into romantic relationships, says Masooda Bano, a research fellow at the British-based Economic and Social Research Council.

But, like Varda, many students at the 2,000 or so registered madrassas are university students or graduates looking for greater understanding of Islam, as well as housewives who, like others in Pakistani society, feel pressured to deepen their faith.

Asked about the killing of a governor earlier this year because he opposed the country's controversial blasphemy law, Varda, without hesitation, said Salman Taseer's murder by his own bodyguard was the right thing to do. "If people ... call themselves Muslims and they are members of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, then they should not be criticizing this law," she said. "I am sorry to say this, but this is what he deserved."

from FaithWorld:

Libyan clerics in rebel-held east see big role for Islam after Gaddafi

(A Libyan woman wearing a niqab with the colours of the Kingdom of Libya attends Friday prayers in rebel-held Benghazi April 22, 2011/Amr Abdallah Dalsh)

An Islamic revival is taking hold in rebel-held eastern Libya after decades of tough curbs on worship by Muammar Gaddafi, but clerics say this will not be a new source of religious extremism as the West may fear. Restrictions on Islamic piety have become history in the east of the Arab North African state since its takeover by anti-Gaddafi insurgents, and clerics see a much bigger role for Islam in the country if Gaddafi is ultimately driven from power.

Under the autocratic Gaddafi's idiosyncratic brand of communal socialism overlaying Islam, worship was carefully regulated and any apparent manifestation of political, or militant, Islam drew harsh security crackdowns. Yet Libyan society remained religiously conservative in character and that is now flowering anew in the rebel-held east.

In signs of greater Muslim piety, some rebels have grown longer beards, public prayer has become ostentatious, religious books are selling well and plans are afoot for more centres for the study of sharia, or Islamic law -- all of which, under Gaddafi, could have led to arrest and imprisonment.

"The situation in free Libya will revert to its natural state -- the natural state of the practice of religion in life, in the morals of the people, their ways, their return to the mosques," said Osama al-Salaaby, a well-known cleric and professor of sharia in Benghazi, the rebels' de facto capital.

The rebels' slow battlefield progress has benefited the cause of Islam in Libya, said Salem Jaber, the most senior cleric in the east and head of its mosque oversight body. "We've been mixing, and the Islamists and the secularists are coming together to create a middle road," said Jaber.

from FaithWorld:

Concern about Islamists masks wide differences among them

(Hamas supporters hold up copies of the Koran at a protest in Gaza City December 26, 2010/Mohammed Salem)

Part of the problem trying to figure out what Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood or Tunisia's Ennahda party would do if they got into any future power structure in their countries is knowing what kind of Islamists they are. The label "Islamist" pops up frequently these days, in comments and warnings and (yes) news reports, but the term is so broad that it even covers groups that oppose each other. Just as the Muslim world is not a bloc, the Islamist world is not a bloc.

I sketched out a rough spectrum of Islamists in an analysis today entitled  Concern about Islamists masks wide differences. This topic is vast and our story length limits keep the analysis down to the bare bones. But the overall point should be clear that any analysis of what these specific parties might do that ignores their diversity starts off on the wrong foot and risks ending up with the wrong conclusions.

(Electoral posters of candidates of the banned Muslim Brotherhood in Alexandria on November 27, 2010 for the 2010 parliamentary electionS/ Goran Tomasevic)

While reading and talking to experts about Islamism these days, I either had the television on (zapping between BBC, CNN and Al Jazeera English) or listened to radio stations like BBC and NPR. When the Muslim Brotherhood came up, there were often suggestions -- explicit or implicit -- that it would seize power in a Leninist-style coup or whip up the masses to install a theocracy  in a replay of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini's 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. Experienced generals sometimes  end up fighting the last war. Clever analysts can reach for the wrong historical parallel to the situation they're tying to explain. Could it be that reflexes like these are clouding our view of what the Brotherhood and Ennahda actually are?

from FaithWorld:

Can Arabs learn from Turkish model of Islam and democracy?

(Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara, December 2, 2008/Umit Bektas)

If President Hosni Mubarak bows to the clamor of the street and goes, Egyptians and other Arabs seeking to turn a page on autocratic government may look at Turkey for some clues on marrying Islam and democracy.

Relatively stable, with a vibrant economy and ruled by a conservative and pragmatic government led by former Islamists, Turkey has often been cited as a model Muslim democracy and a linchpin of Western influence in the region.

With a wave of unrest spreading from Tunisia to Jordan to Yemen and as calls intensify for Mubarak to start a transition soon, Middle East analysts are turning their attention to Turkey, a rising diplomatic force in the region.

"The only effective, working model in the Middle East is the Turkish model. There is nothing else," said Fatwa Gerges, professor of Middle Eastern politics and international relations at the London School of Economics. "Turkey's model serves as a foundation for similar societies so I think then in the wake of the protests Arabs will be taking a second look at the Turkish model that marries Islamic values and democracy as a universal form of government," Gerges said.

But analysts cautioned that deep differences between Turkey, a NATO partner and European Union candidate with a moderate brand of Islam, and an Arab Middle East lacking a culture of political freedom, means the model cannot be readily copied. "There is no question Turkey's example can be an inspiration in Tunisia or in Egypt, but if any Arab country would take Turkey as a model it would take it decades to emulate Turkey's political and economic development," said Fadi Hakura, associate professor at London's Chatham House think tank.

from FaithWorld:

Saudi king, religious police, Islam and donkeys – via WikiLeaks

WikiLeaks has come up with an interesting insight into the way King Abdullah views his own kingdom's religious police, the mutaween who enforce Islamic behaviour in public. A cable from the Riyadh embassy entitled IDEOLOGICAL AND OWNERSHIP TRENDS IN THE SAUDI MEDIA and dated 11 May 2009 mentions what appears to be a U.S. diplomat's visit to a Saudi newspaper editor whose name is XXXed out. The Saudi says the king had visited the office and complained about how ignorant the religious police were about Islam and how they  treated people like donkeys:

//Okaz// ¶18. (S) In a meeting with Jeddah CG and XXXXXXXXXXXX, XXXXXXXXXXXX was blunt when asked about SAG efforts in countering extremist thinking. “King Abdallah was here,” he said, pointing around his well-appointed office XXXXXXXXXXXX in Jeddah. “He told us that conservative elements in Saudi society do not understand true Islam, and that people needed to be educated” on the subject. King Abdallah, he said, used a metaphor of a donkey to explain how the religious police use the wrong approach. “They take a stick and hit you with it, saying ‘Come donkey, it’s time to pray.’ How does that help people behave like good Muslims?” XXXXXXXXXXXX quoted the king as saying.

The same cable also comments on a new and more moderate tone in religious programming on some television channels:

¶15. (C) Saudi-produced religious programming on ART and Rotana also departs from past models. Rotana’s popular religious channel “Al Risala” features a hip, clean-shaven Saudi in western clothes offering practical religious advice in a calm and friendly manner. Jeddah-based Arab Radio and Television company (ART) (owned by Saleh al-Kamel and according to our contacts being edged aside by MBC and Rotana) recently featured an MTV-style music video clip on its “Iqraa” religious channel depicting a group of dissolute young Saudi men who give up their carousing and return to observance. They are then shown succeeding in sales presentations and other interactions at work, gaining the admiration of their colleagues and supervisors. The young men continue to dress in standard attire, remain clean-shaven and are fully integrated into normal, workaday Saudi society. The message of moderation in the religious realm could not be clearer.

The religious police don't treat all Saudis like donkeys, however. In a cable on 18 November 2009 entitled UNDERGROUND PARTY SCENE IN JEDDAH: SAUDI YOUTH FROLIC UNDER “PRINCELY PROTECTION”, the Jeddah Consulate  reported on an underground Halloween party where the "full range of worldly temptations and vices are available -- alcohol, drugs, sex -- but strictly behind closed doors." It then noted:

from FaithWorld:

“Burqa bans”: First France, then the Netherlands – who’s next?

First the French banned Muslim face veils, now the Dutch have decided to follow suit. With debates about outlawing burqas and niqabs spreading across Europe, a third ban -- perhaps even more -- may not be far behind.

Only a small minority of Muslim women in Europe cover their faces, but their veils have become ominous symbols for Europeans troubled by problems such as the economic crisis, immigration and Muslim integration.

With Europe's political mood moving to the right, low-cost, high-symbolism measures such as veil bans have become a rallying cry for far-right parties knocking at the door of power. Their appeal also resonates with those worried by possible security threats from masked people or offended by the blow to gender equality they see when a covered woman walks by.

Raffaele Simone, whose book "The Meek Monster: why the West is not going left" has aroused debate in Italy and France, said the rightward drift fits an individualistic and globalized consumer society that Europe's left-wing failed to understand. "In aging European populations, modernity has generated a worrying and chaotic jumble of threats and fears only the right and the far right seem able to respond to now," Simone, a Rome university linguistics professor, told the Paris newspaper Le Monde.

Calls for a "burqa ban" are now heard across Europe, with local politics influencing how close it gets to becoming law.  Read the full story here.

Follow FaithWorld on Twitter at RTRFaithWorld

from FaithWorld:

Fears rise over growing anti-Muslim feeling in U.S.

Amid threats of Koran burning and a heated dispute over a planned Muslim cultural center in New York, Muslim leaders and rights activists warn of growing anti-Muslim feeling in America partly provoked for political reasons.  "Many people now treat Muslims as 'the other' -- as something to vilify and to discriminate against," said Daniel Mach of the American Civil Liberties Union. And, he said, some people have exploited that fear in the media, "for political gain or cheap notoriety."

The imam leading the project to build the cultural center, including a prayer room, near the site of the September 11, 2001 attacks said there was a rise of what he called "Islamophobia" and the debate had been radicalized by extremists. "The radicals in the United States and the radicals in the Muslim world feed off each other. And to a certain extent, the attention that they've been able to get by the media has even aggravated the problem," Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf in an interview with ABC news aired on Sunday.

Mistrust of Muslims has grown in recent years. A Pew poll released in August found the number of Americans with a favorable view of Islam was 30 percent, down from 41 percent in 2005. American feelings about Islam are partisan -- 54 percent of Republicans have an unfavorable view of Islam compared to 27 percent of Democrats. In November 2001 there was not the same partisan divide of opinions on Islam.

Some believe Obama could convert minds were he to mount the type of public relations campaign which saw Bush attend mosques and talk with Muslim leaders back in 2001. Alan Cooperman of the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life said, "Americans' opinions of Muslims became more positive after 9/11 than they were before 9/11."

Pew polls from 2001 found 59 percent of Americans had a favorable opinion of Muslim Americans two months after the attacks compared to 45 percent in March of that year, and that the biggest improvement was among conservative Republicans. Cooperman credited the increase to Bush's outreach to show the Muslim community as a religion of peace.

Read the full story here. Click for a slideshow of photos of the 9/11 commemorations here.

from The Great Debate:

Torching U.S. power

The following is guest post by Andrew Hammond, a director at ReputationInc, an international strategic communications firm, was formerly a special adviser to the Home Secretary in the government of Prime Minister Tony Blair and a geopolitics consultant at Oxford Analytica. The opinions expressed are his own.

The ninth anniversary of September 11 is being overshadowed by the news of Pastor Terry Jones and his now-suspended plan to burn copies of the Koran at the Dove World Outreach Center in Gainesville, Florida. Even if the bonfire does not take place, the news of it is tragic for a number of reasons.

First and foremost, although President Barack Obama and other US officials have rightly condemned the pastor’s previously intended actions, the episode has exacerbated anti-American sentiment, especially in the Muslim world. This comes at a sensitive period at the end of Ramadan, when debate is also still raging about an Islamic group’s plan to build a community center, which includes a mosque, near Ground Zero in New York City.

It is this latter issue that has apparently enraged Pastor Jones whose backpedaling on the Koran burning only came after he announced an alleged agreement with the community project’s leaders whereby the building would be located further from the World Trade Center site. Although the pastor’s claims of a deal reportedly have been denied by some of those involved in the project the risk remains that he could resume prior plans to hold his “International Burn a Koran Day.”

The re-invigoration of anti-Americanism caused by this episode presents a major political headache for the Obama administration whose public diplomacy has -- over the last two years -- helped restore US standing across much of the world. But there is still much work that remains. The 2010 Pew Global Attitudes Survey released in June shows that in nine of 15 countries public favorability toward America lags behind that recorded at the end of the Clinton administration a decade ago.

The Pastor Jones episode is so serious because it further erodes America’s “soft power” -- the ability to influence preferences of others derived from the attractiveness of a state’s values, ideals and government policies, especially foreign ones.

History underlines the key role soft power has played as a means of obtaining desirable outcomes. For example, Washington used soft power resources very skillfully after the Second World War to encourage other countries into a system of alliances and institutions, such as NATO, IMF, World Bank, and the United Nations.

from FaithWorld:

Criticism mounts of “anti-Muslim frenzy” in U.S., Koran burning plan under fire

U.S. religious leaders  have condemned an "anti-Muslim frenzy" in the United States, including plans by a Florida church to burn a Koran on September 11, an act a top general said could endanger American troops abroad. Christian, Muslim and Jewish religious leaders denounced the "misinformation and outright bigotry" against U.S. Muslims resulting from plans to build a Muslim community center and mosque not far from the site of the September 11, 2001, hijacked plane attacks in New York by Islamist militants. The Vatican has also condemned the Koran burning plan.

Tensions have risen with the approach of both the September 11 anniversary on Saturday and the Muslim Eid al-Fitr festival that marks the close of the fasting month of Ramadan, which is expected to end around Friday. Passions have been further inflamed by Terry Jones, the pastor of a 30-person church in Gainesville, Florida, who has announced plans to burn a Koran on Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the September 11 attacks. Jones says he wants to "expose Islam (as a) violent and oppressive religion."

Religious leaders, including Washington Roman Catholic Archbishop emeritus Cardinal Theodore McCarrick and Dr. Michael Kinnamon of the National Council of Churches, released a statement on Tuesday saying they were "alarmed by the anti-Muslim frenzy" and "appalled by such disrespect for a sacred text." Read the full story here.

General David Petraeus, the head of U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan, said in a statement the Koran burning could "endanger troops and it could endanger the overall effort" to stabilize the Afghan situation. "It is precisely the kind of action the Taliban uses and could cause significant problems, not just here, but everywhere in the world we are engaged with the Islamic community." Read the full story here.

U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley called the plan “un-American.”

“We are conscious that a number of voices have come out and rejected what this pastor and this community have proposed,” Crowley told a news briefing on Tuesday. “We would like to see more Americans stand up and say ‘this is inconsistent with our American values.’ In fact these actions themselves are un-American.”

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen has also condemned the proposed Koran-burning, calling it disrespectful and saying it could put Western troops in Afghanistan at risk.