I cannot agree with the author's title, but the article is very interesting nonetheless.
Rome wasn't built in a day, Mr. Pressfield.
A Representative Republic will do.
Tribalism?
No problem. Simple answer: Reservations.
Followed by Casinos and cheap smokes.
Who cares about Arab democracy? I just want them pacified and removed from the equation. When they are ready to join the 19th Century, let alone the 21st, they can let us know.
There is a Darwinism to ideas. The good idea will invariably push out the bad one, no matter how much the believers in the bad idea fervently pray that it dominate.
Socialism is an excellent example of a Darwinistic loser.
Fortunately, successful systems of organization are pretty rare, and for the time being, we can see most of them coexisting on Earth at the same time.
To begin with is familial organization, never complete chaos. But families soon expand and have to interbreed. From that point on, they must exist in a tribal organization, the lowest order of real organization.
This is because tribes perform the essential role of government, by the definition of Adam Smith, providing for external security and internal order.
However, tribes have structural limitations as to how many members they may have, so you are faced with the need for a multi-tribal authority.
Enter codified legal systems like Sharia law. When they are needed to act as a government of different tribes, they are very useful and very popular. This is because they are so much more efficient than tribal custom.
But this is overcome with urbanization, and the loss of tribal affiliation. Sharia works when your organization is based on tribal leaders meeting in jurga. But when tribes wither away, it is overcome by the best system of government ever devised.
Democracy.
I will note that many of the wiser tribal leaders in Iraq see the superiority of democracy over tribal custom, and even Sharia law. It is so obvious to them, as leaders, that they have expressed a willingness to cede their tribal authority to the democratically elected government.
In doing so, they are doing the best they can for their tribe, because in democracy, they see their tribe benefitting far more in all ways than they as tribal leaders could bring about.
I distictly omitted another phase of organization that happened in the western world, feudalism, because it parallels Sharia law as another system by which diverse tribes can cooperate to mutual advantage. But both feudalism and Sharia law are outmoded; neither have a place in a modern country anymore.
In those few nations that try to have both a secular law and Sharia, it is a disaster, and cannot survive. Because a nation, like a man, cannot have two masters. So either elements of Sharia will become part of that nations secular law, as interpreted by secular judges, or Sharia will fade away.
Another arrogant Liberal "intellectual" who thinks "little brown people" are too stupid to understand the benefits of democracy and freedom.
This Scottish clansman is here to tell you that this article is a bunch of B.S.!
There has been democracy in the Middle East in spite of this
history. In the 1950's Lebanon was a democracy and could be now. When the Middle Eastern "man in the street" sees this
freedom existing in a neighboring country it certainly affects him.
The "tribalism" of Iraq can disappear in a single generation. Liberals will be forced to accept this truth as it unfolds before their eyes.
And then liberals will pretend they were never opposed to it in the first place.
Thank you, President Bush.
Instead of trying to play 'nice' let's just kill the SOBs.
The problem if MidEast tribalism is no secret, but the significance of Islam in this myopic writer's view is misnderstood. Far more than a "mere overlay," it is the glue which keeps the tribes in place as the intermediate source of social control. Without the pre- and pro-scriptions of Islam, the tribes would be easy prey to westernizing influences, and would soon have only nominal, vestigial control. It's one thing to hold out against Alexander's army. To resist the blandishments of materialistic Western affluence is a horse of a different color entirely. Only a super-ordinate set of sanctions such as provided by islam make it possible.
The problem of MidEast tribalism is no secret, but the significance of Islam in this myopic writer's view is misnderstood. Far more than a "mere overlay," it is the glue which keeps the tribes in place as the intermediate source of social control. Without the pre- and pro-scriptions of Islam, the tribes would be easy prey to westernizing influences, and would soon have only nominal, vestigial control. It's one thing to hold out against Alexander's army. To resist the blandishments of materialistic Western affluence is a horse of a different color entirely. Only a super-ordinate set of sanctions such as provided by islam make it possible.
Values vs blood, ping.
Looks like ABC is trying to kiss-up to the libs after showing "The Path to 9/11".
Yes, much of the middle east is dominated by tribal societies, but this is because until 100 years ago, these lands were literally wilderness. There is no economy, middle class or independent intellectual class. These things had been on the rise but reactionary Islam has gone back to work crushing them.
When Western Europe was completely dominated by religious rule and serfdom, we called this the dark ages. It took Europe hundreds of years and wars and horror to come up with the Magna Carta, the common law and the concept of individual freedom and freedom of conscience.
These concepts evolved and form the foundation of Western Civilization which has been under assault by all who wish to justify oppression and human suffering as a means to "order."
Nevertheless, people from the middle east come to the west and breath freedom and love it. Their kids, well sometimes they don't appreciate freedom the same.
This person essentially casts folks from the Middle East as lesser human beings who cannot find their way to loving freedom and justice. LAME.
Never say "never." But the problem is that you can't reliably produce democracy in countries that don't want it.