the rest of the world are stated war agains islam, mainly USA stated war
agains islam, that stated on:
source Address:
http://www.brothersjudd.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/reviews.detail/book_id/342
Book Author: Samuel P. Huntington
The Clash of Civilization and Remaking of World Order (1996)
World politics is entering a new phase, and intellectuals have not
hesitated
to proliferate visions of what it will be-the end of history, the return
of
traditional rivalries between nation states, and the decline of the nation
state from the conflicting pulls of tribalism and globalism, among others.
Each of these visions catches aspects of the emerging reality. Yet they
all
miss a crucial, indeed a central, aspect of what global politics is likely
to be in the coming years.
It is my hypothesis that the fundamental source of conflict in this new
world will not be primarily ideological or primarily economic. The great
divisions among humankind and the dominating source of conflict will be
cultural. Nation states will remain the most powerful actors in world
affairs, but the principal conflicts of global politics will occur between
nations and groups of different civilizations. The clash of civilizations
will dominate global politics. The fault linesbetween civilizations will
be
the battle lines of the future.
The Clash of Civilizations? (Samuel P. Huntington, Foreign Affairs, Summer
1993)
So wrote Samuel Huntington nearly ten years ago now, in one of the most
debated, commented upon, and controversial foreign policy essays this side
of Francis Fukuyama's End of History. In the simplistic terms in which
such
things tend to be discussed, Fukuyama was understood to be saying that
mankind's ages long global conflict was over because everyone would seek
to
become liberal democratic capitalists as opposed to Huntington, who was
understood to be saying that certain societies (or civilizations) would
never evolve into such modern Western states. For the duration of the
90s,
with the Western economy humming and peace mostly reigning, Fukuyama
appeared to have the better of the argument. Then came September 11th,
and
suddenly Huntington was hailed as a prophet, Fukuyama dismissed to the ash
heap of history. Suddenly, you couldn't find Huntington's book anywhere
(I
had to special order it). But it is well worth tracking down and, upon
reading it, I believe that, though Fukuyama gets the better of the overall
argument, Huntington offers an im****tant corrective.
Huntington states his basic contention pretty concisely :
The central theme of this book is that culture and cultural identities,
which at the broadest level are civilization identities, are shaping the
patterns of cohesion, disintegration, and conflict in the post-Cold War
world.
He breaks the world up into seven separate competing civilizations :
Western; Sinic (roughly the Chinese); Japanese; Hindu; Islamic; Orthodox;
Latin American; and offers the possibility that African civilization may
be
an eighth; and then goes on to elaborate his theory: The five parts of
this
book elaborate corollaries to this main proposition.
Part I: For the first time in history global politics is both multipolar
and multicivilizational; modernization is distinct from Westernization and
is producing neither a universal civilization in any meaningful sense nor
the Westernization of non-Western societies.
Part II: The balance of power among civilizations is ****fting: the West is
declining in relative influence; Asian civilizations are expanding their
economic, military, and political strength; Islam is exploding
demographically with destabilizing consequences for Muslim countries and
their neighbors; and non-Western civilizations generally are reaffirming
the
value of their own cultures.
Part III: A civilization-based world order is emerging: societies sharing
cultural affinities cooperate with each other; efforts to ****ft societies
from one civilization to another are unsuccessful; and countries group
themselves around the lead or core states of their civilization.
Part IV: The West's universalist pretensions increasingly bring it into
conflict with other civilizations, most seriously with Islam and China; at
the local level fault line wars, largely between Muslims and non-Muslims,
generate "kin-country rallying," the threat of broader escalation, and
hence
efforts by core states to halt these wars.
Part V: The survival of the West depends on Americans reaffirming their
Western identity and Westerners accepting their civilization as unique not
universal and uniting to renew and preserve it against challenges from
non-Western societies. Avoidance of a global war of civilizations depends
on
world leaders accepting and cooperating to maintain the
multicivilizational
character of global politics.
It seems to me that parts three, four and five are correct and are
actually
compatible with Fukuyama, but that parts one and two are quite wrong. As a
threshold issue, I would argue that modernization and Westernization are
identical. By modernization we mean adoption of the kind of liberal
secular
democracy, free market economy, and protestant (small "p") religious
structures that characterize the West in general, but the United States in
particular. We do not mean the attempt to have one of these without the
others, or two without the third. The best example of a "modern" state
which did not Westernize sufficiently is Japan. In fact, one doubts that
were hew writing today Huntington would even include them in his list, for
they are in such decline that it's hard to see where they can clash with
anyone in any significant manner. Japan made a horrendous mistake when it
tried to retain a command economy and to rely on huge cor****ate
structures.
The inherent inflexibility of this centrally planned and oligarchic system
has debilitated their economy. Added to this is the demographic crisis
they
face--declining birthrates, more abortions than live births, low
immigration--and the resulting problems which include reduced economic
growth and an eventual collapse of the social welfare net as there are
fewer
and fewer workers left to pay for the retirement of the aged. Japan is a
civilization in decline, perhaps irreversible decline. The only
imaginable
way for them to reverse their slide is to become more Western.
On the other hand, it is undeniable that there is a very real conflict
between the West and at least the Red Chinese and the Islamic world. But
even this is deceptive. Islam is a special case which we'll address later,
but China is merely the last remaining Communist power and even it is now
really only a fascist regime (in that it combines capitalism with
authoritarian government, rather than relying on the totalitarianism of a
Communist system). There does not appear to be any reason that China will
not evolve into a relatively Western style state over the next several
decades. Many, like Huntington, seem to be nearly hypnotized by the sheer
size of China and by the human, natural and resulting financial resources
it
has at its disposal. But if you look at China with a cold eye, it has
just
as uncreative an economy as Japan did twenty years ago, and we all know
what
has happened to Japan. A China which is permanently sentenced to cheaply
assemble machines and clothing that we design is not any kind of threat to
our economic hegemony. They will have to loosen further or remain a
Western
sweatshop.
A similar caution should attend worries over China's military potential.
Sure they have a huge army, but they are equipped by an essentially
backwards armaments industry. Does anyone realistically think that they
could withstand an assault by American weaponry ? The USSR pretty
conclusively demonstrated that no matter how much money such an
inefficient,
unproductive, and uncreative society invests in its military, it can not
compete with the West.
Finally, as regards China, it seems improbable that a single state of over
a
billion people can remain stable and be administered efficiently. There
have to be tremendous internal pressures pent up within China's borders
(consider merely the examples of the Uighurs, Tibet and Hong Kong) and any
of the loosening of central control which modernization will require will
inevitably allow these pressures to be released, with likely divisive
results.
As to several of the other "civilizations" that Huntington depicts as
being
in conflict, the choice of the Orthodox world and Latin America do not
withstand much scrutiny. These regions have had a difficult time
transitioning from Communism and Colonialism, respectively, to the modern
Western model, but there is little evidence that they have permanently
forsaken it or will do so for any significant period of time in the near
future. In fact, nations like Chile and the Czech Republic, which have
embraced Westernization most completely, have actually made significant
progress. Moreover, as we whittle away some of these "civilizations" and
it
becomes clearer that the main clash is between Islam and the West, we must
expect that the Orthodox and Latin America, both overwhelmingly Christian,
will be driven even further towards the West and Westernization.
Inclusion
of Eastern European states in NATO and the expansion of NAFTA are but two
obvious signs of this process. We must not be too alarmed if a nation or
two in these regions backslides into a brief flirtation with fascism or
communism, a modi*** of pressure from the West should suffice to push them
back toward democratic capitalism fairly quickly.
The inclusion of Hindu civilization is also problematic. There has been a
definite rise in Hindu nationalism in India, but, despite some growing
pains, India is still a democracy and generally still seeks to emulate the
West both economically and politically. Moreover, the nationalists do not
appear to hold any special brief against the West; instead they are
largely
anti-Muslim. Considering the large Muslim minority within the country and
the continuing tensions between India and Pakistan, this is hardly
surprising. In the future though, there is good reason to believe that
India's sense of being at war with both Islam and potentially with China,
will serve to make Hinduism an ally of the West. rather than a competitor.
More im****tantly, there is no way that any system other than capitalism
can
feed the one billion citizens of India any more than communism could feed
the Chinese.
Before finally getting to Islam, we might note that while most of the
major
historical religions are considered by Huntington to be distinct
civilizations, one of the longest lived and most militarily powerful
religions is not : Judaism. Considering the prowess of the Israeli armed
forces and the fact that they have nuclear weapons, it is not unlikely
that
in purely geostrategic terms Israel is one of the two or three most
powerful
nations in the world. And the state of Israel is quite explicitly the
Jewish homeland. So why do they not get their own civilization? Because
they are Western. And it is because they are Western that they have
succeeded against such formidable odds. Thus, the absence of Judaism
speaks
volumes.
Which brings us, at last, to Islam. Unique among the racial, religious,
and
cultural civilizations that Huntington delineates and which we have added
to, it is Islam alone which demands that church, economy, and state be
governed by one eternal, unchanging, and inseparable entity, and/or
philosophy, based on the word of God as revealed to Mohammed. Without
examining the actual content of the religion, we can state that trying to
run a modern society on inflexible doctrines that are fourteen hundred
years
old and were intended for a primitive people is destined to be
extraordinarily difficult, if not impossible. Considering just one
central
tenet of the religion, the extreme egalitarianism that it demands, it is
evident that the modern politico-economic system that most closely
approximates Islam is Communism, and the century long experiment with
Communism proved to be a complete disaster. There is no reason to
believe
that Islam will succeed where a like system failed, nor is there any
reason
to believe that there is something unique about the Islamic form of
theocracy that will enable it to succeed where all other forms have
failed.
There are really only two alternatives : either Islam will reform itself
and
become more like the West on its own--including, most im****tantly,
separating church and state and accepting greater economic inequalities as
the price to be paid for greater growth in general--or Islam will be
devastated in war and will be rebuilt, even if against its will, along
Western lines, as happened in Japan after WWII. It just is not possible
to
envision a scenario in which Islam succeeds in defeating the West. If,
God
forbid, the West ever really had its back to the wall it would undoubtedly
unleash a thermonuclear, biological and/or chemical holocaust in the
Middle
East (and probably Indonesia) which would essentially annihilate Islam.
As
Victor Davis Hanson has written in his terrific book Carnage and Culture,
the single factor that has been most significant in the repeated victory
of
the West in global conflicts has been the ruthlessness and finality with
which it prosecutes war. The West has been more willing than other
civilizations to utterly destroy enemies. There is no reason to believe
that it would not do so again.
Despite these weaknesses in his thesis in its broadest form, Huntington's
book is invaluable in its narrower form. First, by warning that the clash
of civilizations that genuinely differ from one another will continue to
be
a central feature of world politics, he provides a much needed warning
that
the West must deal with Islam and Communist China as rivals, not merely as
alternative types of societies. As regards China, we can somewhat assume
that the forces of capitalism that have been unleashed will eventually
subvert the authoritarian political system. History has proven again and
again that you can not provide your citizens a little bit of freedom
without
them eventually demanding more. China today much resembles Gorbachev's
USSR, a society on the verge of crumbling which needs only strong and
consistent pressure from the United States to fall apart completely. The
most effective ways of applying this pressure have the great benefit of
also
being good policy for the U.S. We should invite Taiwan, Russia, Japan,
India, Australia, New Zealand, and the moderate nations of Southeast Asia
to
join NAFTA. To the greatest extent possible we should also seek to make
such an organization a strategic and military alliance, with its might
directed specifically against China and, to a lesser extent, Indonesia.
The
U.S. should also step up its Missile Defense program and should
simultaneously pursue the development of offensive space-based weapons.
The
goal of the latter should be to develop the capacity to eliminate any
nation's nuclear arsenal and its communications satellites in a first
strike. At that point we would be in a position to impose nuclear
nonproliferation and disarmament on the rest of the world.
Second, as regards Islam, while Turkey and Iran offer fascinating case
studies in the eventual possibility of Islam and democracy co-existing,
both
have struggled so mightily and are such unique situations, both having
been
run by pro-Western dictators for an extended period of time, that it seems
only realistic to assume that Islam and the West may eventually engage in
a
widespread conflict. It would obviously be preferable to have Islam
reform
itself, but one searches in vain for leaders, religious or secular, with
the
stature, ideology and steadfastness of purpose to lead such a fundamental
restructuring of the entire Islamic Civilization. In the absence of such
a
leader, leaders, or a coherent reformist movement, and in the absence of
any
evidence of willingness on the part of the current leaders of Islamic
nations to countenance such reform, conflict becomes increasingly likely.
It is therefore necessary for the West to plan and prepare for this
eventuality, even as we seek ways to avoid it.
Unfortunately, we have come to the point, not infrequent in such clashes,
where the course of future events by and large depends on the doomed
civilization. In the 1930s and 40s, German and Japanese fascists wrote
their own death warrants by declaring war on the United States. There
followed a total war, with the demand for unconditional surrender, that
left
those two nations virtually unrecognizable in its aftermath. The Soviet
Union well realized that it would meet the same fate if ever it forced a
final showdown, so it festered along for several more decades before
reforming itself out of existence. It is now up to Islam which course it
pursues. They can confront us now and get it over with quickly or die a
lingering death, but, make no mistake, these are the alternatives. Those
in
the Islamic world who view globalization an
(Reviewed:23-Oct-01)
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