Posted on 04/17/2008 2:08:14 PM PDT by kiriath_jearim
There's an impression that Muslims suffer disproportionately from the rule of dictators, tyrants, unelected presidents, kings, emirs, and various other strongmen - and it's accurate. A careful analysis by Frederic L. Pryor of Swarthmore College in the Middle East Quarterly ("Are Muslim Countries Less Democratic?") concludes that "In all but the poorest countries, Islam is associated with fewer political rights."
The fact that majority-Muslim countries are less democratic makes it tempting to conclude that the religion of Islam, their common factor, is itself incompatible with democracy.
I disagree with that conclusion. Today's Muslim predicament, rather, reflects historical circumstances more than innate features of Islam. Put differently, Islam, like all pre-modern religions is undemocratic in spirit. No less than the others, however, it has the potential to evolve in a democratic direction.
Such evolution is not easy for any religion. In the Christian case, the battle to limit the Catholic Church's political role lasted painfully long. If the transition began when Marsiglio of Padua published Defensor pacis in the year 1324, it took another six centuries for the Church fully to reconcile itself to democracy. Why should Islam's transition be smoother or easier?
To render Islam consistent with democratic ways will require profound changes in its interpretation. For example, the anti-democratic law of Islam, the Shari'a, lies at the core of the problem. Developed over a millennium ago, it presumes autocratic rulers and submissive subjects, emphasizes God's will over popular sovereignty, and encourages violent jihad to expand Islam's borders. Further, it anti-democratically privileges Muslims over non-Muslims, males over females, and free persons over slaves.
For Muslims to build fully functioning democracies, they basically must reject the Shari'a's public aspects. Atatürk frontally did just that in Turkey, but others have offered more subtle approaches. Mahmud Muhammad Taha, a Sudanese thinker, dispatched the public Islamic laws by fundamentally reinterpreting the Koran.
ATATÜRK'S EFFORTS and Taha's ideas imply that Islam is ever-evolving, and that to see it as unchanging is a grave mistake. Or, in the lively metaphor of Hassan Hanafi, professor of philosophy at the University of Cairo, the Koran "is a supermarket, where one takes what one wants and leaves what one doesn't want."
Islam's problem is less its being anti-modern than that its process of modernization has hardly begun. Muslims can modernize their religion, but that requires major changes: Out go waging jihad to impose Muslim rule, second-class citizenship for non-Muslims, and death sentences for blasphemy or apostasy. In come individual freedoms, civil rights, political participation, popular sovereignty, equality before the law, and representative elections.
Two obstacles stand in the way of these changes, however. In the Middle East especially, tribal affiliations remain of paramount importance. As explained by Philip Carl Salzman in his recent book, Culture and Conflict in the Middle East, these ties create a complex pattern of tribal autonomy and tyrannical centralism that obstructs the development of constitutionalism, the rule of law, citizenship, gender equality, and the other prerequisites of a democratic state. Not until this archaic social system based on the family is dispatched can democracy make real headway in the Middle East.
Globally, the compelling and powerful Islamist movement obstructs democracy. It seeks the opposite of reform and modernization - namely, the reassertion of the Shari'a in its entirety. A jihadist like Osama bin Laden may spell out this goal more explicitly than an establishment politician like Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, but both seek to create a thoroughly anti-democratic, if not totalitarian, order.
Islamists respond two ways to democracy. First, they denounce it as un-Islamic. Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna considered democracy a betrayal of Islamic values. Brotherhood theoretician Sayyid Qutb rejected popular sovereignty, as did Abu al-A'la al-Mawdudi, founder of Pakistan's Jamaat-e-Islami political party. Yusuf al-Qaradawi, Al-Jazeera television's imam, argues that elections are heretical.
Despite this scorn, Islamists are eager to use elections to attain power, and have proven themselves to be agile vote-getters; even a terrorist organization (Hamas) has won an election. This record does not render the Islamists democratic but indicates their tactical flexibility and their determination to gain power. As Erdogan has revealingly explained, "Democracy is like a streetcar. When you come to your stop, you get off."
Hard work can one day make Islam democratic. In the meanwhile, Islamism represents the world's leading anti-democratic force.
[The writer is director of the Middle East Forum and the Taube/Diller Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution of Stanford University.]
I can see the two as completely compatable.
Democracy is ‘Mob rule’.....
Democracy bows to popular opinion.
Islamic law never changes. It is implemenation of Mohammed’s law. One man.
Well, from the Jihadist Islamic perspective (which perspective is much closer to what their Koran actually teaches them), they would say,
"Sure, we can be democratic if you all agree to convert or die or submissively follow our law."
...and we have quislings amongst us who believe that may not be too bad a thing.
I don't see Islam being around in six centuries. It's too empty and so lacking in God that it'll implode upon itself. I predict that I'll see it on the ash heap of history in my lifetime and the grandchildren of its most violent practictioners bowing down and proclaiming that Jesus Christ is Lord. Before you say I'm too "pie in the sky", consider:
-Ronald Reagan predicted that the Soviet Union would be on the ash heap of history, at a time when it looked the strongest.
-According to a Muslim imam, there's 6 million Arab Muslims converting to Christianity annually.
I wonder if Islamicists see democracy as good when it replaces a secular government with a Islamic one (Gaza, recently, Algeria, I think, in the 1980s). And only when it gives them power. But if people decide they don’t like Islamic fundamentalism anymore, they don’t get a vote anymore (Iran).
Pipes analysis is close, but it misses on the religious side.
Christianity, as epitomized by the Roman Catholic Church during the Middle Ages, did NOT change. The Roman Catholic Church changed when confronted with the Protestant Reformation.
One needs to go no further than the documents which founded this country to see that individual freedoms were seen to be given from God, not from government. This inspiration came from Christian dogma and a firm belief in divine providence. This belief in divine providence is not evident in the religion of Islam.
In any case, unlike the Koran, slavery, divine right of kings, is NOT codified into Christian doctrine. Therefore, the Church; i.e., ALL Christian denominations, can coexist with various governmental organizations.
Anyone who says that that death cult is compatible with democracy is an idiot.
“In any case, unlike the Koran, slavery, divine right of kings, is NOT codified into Christian doctrine. Therefore, the Church; i.e., ALL Christian denominations, can coexist with various governmental organizations.”
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Good points. You must be a John Locke fan...
Two other thoughts:
1) Christianity grew up and flourished with a heritage of Graeco-Roman thought, much of wich was democratic or republican. And depite ancient and medieval religious and political hierarchies, there were frequently votes taken amongst peers (e.g., ecumenical councils, or lords petitioning a king). Islam does not have such a heritage.
2) Christianity grew up and flourished with a heritage of Graeco-Roman self-criticism. In every age there were outlets for critiques of leaders' policies as well as examination of consciences by individuals. Self-doubt and self-criticism is a Western mainstay which has no counterpart in Islam.
examinations of conscience by individuals
Ataturk only partially succeeded because Islam simply is not compatible with democracy. Islam means submission. Everything about the Koran points to submission and extreme fatalism. Neither is at all conducive to democracy. Turkey is slowly sliding backwards even now and it will not reverse again until/unless the Army once again fills its Constitutional role as Guardian of the Republic.
^million annual converts does not come near to offsetting the Moslem birthrate.
In fact, that is one things Liberals either do not understand about Christianity or hate vehemently if they do. Christianity does not support or oppose any form of government or social institution like even slavery. Christianity is a religion for individuals who are to be themselves holy regardless of the milieu. There is no social gospel. If you are a slave you must be righteous. If you are a king you must be righteous. There is no requirement to force anything on anyone but there is a call to educate mankind- to “spread the Good News.”
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