Wednesday, April 16, 2008

A Window Into the Muslim Mind


In the view of some experts, the reason the west keeps screwing up in the Muslim world is because the west keeps screwing up the Muslim world. We've meddled there so much for so long that just about everything we now touch there turns sour.

Georgetown University Prof. John Esposito and Dalia Mogahed, executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies, helped organize a survey of 50,000 Muslims from 35-countries and churned their findings into a 200-page report. US News & World Report published a few excerpts from their book, Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think:

We did a survey of Americans in 2002, asking what they knew about the beliefs and opinions of Muslims around the world. Fifty-four percent said they knew nothing or not much. We asked that same question in 2007, after we've had two wars and a great deal more media coverage of Muslims, and this time 57 percent said they knew nothing or not much. We are no closer to truly understanding this part of the world, even as we are more engaged with it.

Asked what they most admired and most resented about the West, they answered first technology and second, democracy. People would mention their support for freedom of speech, the rule of law, and the transparency of government. What they most disliked was the perceived moral laxity and libertinism of the West, which, interestingly, is exactly what Americans said when we polled them on those two questions. There is common ground on that issue.

Even in places like Iran and Saudi Arabia, there were only percentages in the single digits that said they admired nothing about the West. When we asked Americans what they admired about the Muslim world, the most frequent response was "nothing."

Compared with the entire population of Muslims, those who don't condemn the 9/11 attacks are no more likely to say that they are religious. But they are much more likely to say that the United States is not serious about promoting democracy in their part of the world and that the United States will not allow them to fashion their own political future. When we asked their greatest fear, while the general population will talk about personal safety, this radicalized group most fears political domination and occupation. They have a heightened sense of being threatened and dominated by the West. But those same people are also far more likely to say that greater democracy will help Muslims progress. So, they have a greater desire for autonomy and a greater sense that freedom is being denied.

The important thing about this survey is that it confirms that Islamic radicalism is fueled by those who most want democracy in their homelands. They're not motivated by some irrational hatred of us. They pretty much want similar democratic rights to those we enjoy. Yet, by our insistence on propping up undemocratic, repressive regimes (Egypt and Saudi Arabia for example) we actually fuel the radicalism that is so essential to the future of Islamist terrorism.
Surely our own experience teaches us that democratic movements aren't easily crushed and may, if necessary, become revolutionary. This Islamic democracy movement isn't radical of its own choosing but out of necessity. It's also ripe for the picking if we want to drive a wedge between Islamist terrorism and its base of support.

When are we going to learn?

4 comments:

KC said...

What they most disliked was the perceived moral laxity and libertinism of the West, which, interestingly, is exactly what Americans said when we polled them on those two questions.

... which is what concerns me about the devoutly religious--be they Muslim or Christian--given what passes for "moral" in a theological context.

The Mound of Sound said...

I understand what you're saying, KC, but that seems to be their cultural norm and I'm not sure we have a right to criticize.

We have a serious inconsistency in our approach to democracy in the Middle East. Having done our full share to radicalize the population we seem astounded when, in genuinely democratic elections, they elect radical candidates. I think we need to see this as a phase inherent in the establishment of democracy in such places rather than an existential threat to western relations with the Middle East.

KC said...

I understand what you're saying, KC, but that seems to be their cultural norm and I'm not sure we have a right to criticize.

Well that might be so if I were a cultural relativist. Asinine religious morality when implemented as law by the state is a human rights abuse of the first order whether it be done in the Middle East or Canada. I dont really see how a democratic theocracy as being any better than a secular dictatorship.

The Mound of Sound said...

Fair enough but progress has to begin somewhere. Look at our own tortured path to democracy going back to Magna Carta. Even the Soviets never achieved forced secularism although they certainly tried. Social change takes time.