As the Weekly's annual round of Ramadan debates comes to a close, Omayma Abdel-Latif questions Bashir Nafi on double standards and doublespeak Bashir M Nafi is a half-Palestinian, half-Egyptian academic who was educated in Cairo, London and Reading. He lives in England, where he is a senior lecturer in modern Islamic history. Professor Nafi has published extensively on the modern history of Islam, the Arab world and the Palestinian question, both in Arabic and English. His book Arabism, Islamism and the Palestine Question, 1908-1941: A Political History, was published by Ithaca Press last year, while his study The Rise and Decline of the Arab-Islamic Reform Movement, is to be published by the SISS Press this year. Despite a vast body of literature on Islam produced by Western scholars, negative images of Islam continue to be far more prevalent than all others, reflecting not what Islam is but, rather, what certain sectors of a particular society take it to be. Does this reflect a serious misunderstanding, given that much of the work on Islam has become sensationalist "academic journalism" instead of serious scholarship? Does this also reflect an ongoing trend placing academic work in the service of political decision-making, and justifying aggression and Western hegemony in the name of protecting national interests? Let me first deal with the easy parts of your question. More serious and scholarly works on Islam have been produced in Europe and the US during the last two to three decades than at any other time in history. Most of these works are the result of profound academic efforts by both Muslim and non-Muslim scholars and students of Islam. The great majority of these scholars are objective and fair-minded. Despite the inevitable correlation between culture, history and knowledge, some Western scholars have indeed made great contributions to our understanding of Islam and the Islamic historical experience. The problem, however, is that what you called the "prevalent view of Islam" in the West is still immune to the influence of serious academic research. This view is largely shaped by the popular media, the media's hasty and not always reflective interpretation of events, and by expressions of anger from certain Islamic quarters. More important is the Western memory of the historical encounter(s) with Islam, and the Western Darwinian, enlightenment-based view of the world. For Europe, whose heritage has also been at the heart of the American culture, Islam was the 'enemy' and a formidable foe for centuries. The rise and spread of Islam led to the destruction of the Byzantine Empire, reached the Iberian Peninsula and southern France, and penetrated deeply into Eastern Europe. And although the Islamic-European encounter had a complex history of trade, diplomacy and a wide exchange of ideas, it seems that the European memory has retained only the belligerent and conflictual phases. Europe, as we have seen in its attitude toward Bosnia, is occupied with a historical fear of Islam. On the other hand, modern Western culture, post-enlightenment culture, is largely imbued with a Darwinian view of the world: the belief in the sheer value of power, domination and the superiority of Western civilisation. Is it not astonishing that the imperialist project, the ultimate evil in the history of mankind, is still not denounced or condemned by the modern Europeans? Why should the Germans be asked to detach themselves, on every possible level, from their Nazi past, while the French, the British, the Dutch, the Americans, have made no effort to purify their souls of their imperialist past? Imperialism inflicted profound damage, not only on the cultural, economic and social life of the colonised peoples but also, more so, on the moral well-being of the colonisers themselves. The West is celebrating the dawn of a new millennium. Renowned anthropologist and Cambridge professor Ernest Gellner has written that the second greatest event of the century is the fall of Marxism, the first being, as he put it, the "success of Islam". What is your comment? Gellner was no doubt correct in his view of the position of Islam in our world. Gellner was a profound observer of the human condition and, though ambivalent toward religion in general, he was a keen student of Islam and Islamic history. At the core of the success of Islam, I believe -- in the spirit of Gellner's methodology -- was the ability of Islam to absorb and transcend the challenge of modernity. By the beginning of the 19th century, it was obvious that Islamic political, social and economic institutions were unable to withstand the questions imposed on the world of Islam by the rise of Western Europe, its military power, its industry and what appeared to be its socio-economic vitality. In terms of its values, modernity has been deeply disruptive to the value systems of traditional societies, not only Islamic societies but also all other societies that were touched by its intrusive nature. Two centuries after the beginning of the Islamic retreat, and the confusion and bewilderment that enveloped Muslims' responses to the challenges of the West and modernity, it is perhaps fair to conclude that Muslim self-confidence has been restored. For more than 150 years, Muslims have been engaged in a difficult dialogue with various manifestations of the project of modernity, which resulted in painful self-examination and renewal. This is by definition a long process. The vitality of Islam that we are witnessing now is only the beginning of its outcome. Many Western scholars argue that Islamism is the product of intrinsic characteristics of Islam that are irrevocably at odds with the values, and consequently the civilisation, of the West. How would you respond? Western civilisation is, of course, a multi-dimensional paradigm of cultural and moral values, of policies, social models, institutions and technologies, that has exercised a powerful influence on the world community. Islam, on the other hand, is a religion that is expressed, defined and redefined by humans. Only a part of this religion is immutable. But this part is fundamental and essential, since it provides the referential framework for shaping the Islamic world view from one age to another. In this sense, Islamism must be seen as a construct that reflects an Islamic response to the demands and conditions of our times. In its relation to Western civilisation, Islamism therefore represents not only an answer to the Western challenge but also the outcome of a subtle and intricate interaction with it. Some have described Islamism as the third phase of the process of decolonisation that was expressed turn by turn in political, then economic, then cultural terms. Do you agree? In only one aspect can Islamism be seen as a continuation of the process of decolonisation and the Muslims' struggle against imperialism. But as a student of Islamic history, and to be more accurate, I believe that we should see Islamism from a wider perspective. It seems to me that Islamism contains an evident and powerful element of self-renewal, of reconstruction and re-consideration of the self/past as well. French scholar François Burgat once stated that political Islam appears to be the leading candidate to replace the post-independence military regimes in the Arab world. How could the West tolerate such a prospect? I am not really sure whether we can make a definite prediction about the future of the Arab regimes. Political Islamic forces are still evolving and have not taken a final, mature form in terms of their priorities or their conception of the Arab political future. Besides, the body of political Islam is not homogenous and one can easily discern wide variations between the agendas and courses of action chosen by the various forces. But if the Arabs finally choose to establish their governance on the basis of Islam, the West will have to accept the legitimate right of the Arab peoples to determine their own future. If not, it will only instigate new waves of violence on a scale much wider than what we are witnessing in Algeria. Contemporary Islamic movements are mainly led by modern social forces, which are the product of the modern world as much as they are the products of Islam as a religion and a historical experience. The West, if it so chooses, can become a partner of Islam. It is obvious, however, that one of the most persistent features of the imperialist legacy is the sharp contrast, the total divorce between what the Western models of politics and society have come to mean within the Western countries and what they mean in the rest of the world. Generally speaking, Western political systems are based on the rule of law, are democratic, representative, and sensitive to public opinion. In the rest of the world, Western practices, with some variations, are largely hegemonic, exploitative, non-democratic and rarely responsive to the wishes of the peoples, especially when these wishes are in contradiction with Western interests. Economic relations, the heavy national debt burdens under which the Third World economies are crumbling, the hypocrisy of Western environmental policies, the selective use of human rights notions to undermine and blackmail a wide range of nations, the continuous attempts to undermine the cultural autonomy and cultural integrity of different peoples, and the double standards of Western international policies -- all these are indications of the hegemonic and unjust nature of the present world system, which is led by a small number of Western states. Whoever has a claim to a leading role on the world stage must have a moral justification to this claim. When power becomes the only justification for leadership, the result will be a continuous state of conflict, of suffering and instability throughout the world. The West has become home to many leaders of Islamist opposition forces in the Middle East. How can this be reconciled with their manifestly anti-Western attitudes? This is an important question, and gives me the opportunity to qualify my use -- our use -- of the term West. Before that, however, let me try to give a direct answer to your question. As far as I can see, there are two different groups of Arab Islamists who have gone to reside in Europe during the past 10 years or so. The first consists of scores of militants who embraced violence as the means to attain certain political objectives and seem to have escaped the legal process at home. Some of these at least can most likely be considered criminals, and it is the responsibility of the host governments to prevent them from committing or participating in further acts of violence. These are not political refugees, and their activities are detrimental not only to the image of Islam, but also to the understanding of Islam. Apart from a nation's right to resist a foreign occupying power, there has never been an Islamic moral justification for the use of political violence. The second group consists of a small number of Islamic political leaders and activists, mainly from Tunisia and Algeria, rather than the Arab East, who have been forced out of their countries because of the oppressive political atmosphere, torture and severe limitations on public expression. Most of these people, I believe, would have preferred to move to an Arab or Muslim country but found that the option was not available to them. Let us remember that, from the mid-19th century, when political life in the Arab world was beginning to flourish, until the 1970s, Egypt was a safe haven for all kinds of Arab and Muslim intellectuals and political activists. Modern Egypt, though not always the political centre of the Umma, emerged as the all-embracing mother of Arabism and Islamism. That is why Egypt became home to Al-Afghani, Rashid Rida, Al-Kawakibi, Farah Antoun, Hajj Amin Al-Husseini, and many others from all over the Arab and Muslim world. For reasons beyond our discussion here, the late President Sadat put an end to this long established tradition. Having said that, let me now turn to the more important point: the concept of the West. It seems to me that many of us still use the term West to indicate a close and tightly defined geographical or demographic entity. East and West are essentially constructs; in this age, more than ever before, these constructs are becoming anachronistic. The white Caucasian race has spread out of Europe into other parts of the world, while on both sides of the Mediterranean basin no anthropologist would risk speaking of purity of race. Moreover, there are now millions of Muslims who have been living for two or three generations in Western Europe, North and South America, while the sizable native Muslim communities in Poland, Russia and the Balkans are reemerging to reclaim their traditions as well as their positions in their countries. Meanwhile, conversion to Islam is adding a highly interesting dimension to this unprecedented phenomenon of mobility and interaction. In other words, the geographical and demographic West is no longer a reality. When I move from Egypt, where I spent the past academic year, to England, where I have lived for the past 15 years, I feel I am moving from home to home. Each means important things to me and to my family. The West I am talking about is made up of policies, certain cultural attitudes, modes of international conduct, sets of economic relations and discourses of hegemony, which are practiced by some governments, media organisations, banks and multi-national corporations in Western Europe and North America. Would you agree with a conclusion that Edward Said and others have reached, that it has become "very difficult, if not impossible", for the West and Islam to come to peace with each other now that the body of knowledge about Islam has become an orthodoxy, canonising certain notions, texts and authorities? For example, Islam is mediaeval, dangerous, hostile etc. Or could a modus vivendi be reached? I am rather an optimist, a strong believer in the destiny and wisdom of humanity. I think that we are living in very interesting times, where massive changes in the structure of knowledge and the shape of the world, as it was known to our fathers and grandfathers, are taking place. Eventually, forces of convergence in the Muslim world and the Western countries will reach a common agenda and platform of partnership. I am, however, no idealist, and understand the heavy burden of history. A modus vivendi will thus be reached only after the defeat of Zionism and the lingering spirit of imperialism, the two evil and immoral forces that are at the heart of the Western-Islamic conflict. On the other hand, Muslims have to realise that Islam is no longer 'in defence'. They must normalise their relations with, and their view of, the world.
