Part Eighteen
(This is a translation from the original Arabic, offered so that my grandchildren, and others of their generation, may understand something of their history— a history they were denied when they were uprooted without choice.)
The Crisis of the Arab Educated Class – III
In the previous instalment I had promised to write about the path I believe the Arab nation ought to take. Yet, upon reading the responses to my earlier writing, I found it more fitting to linger a little longer on this issue before turning to what I envision for the future.
The discussion of linguistic weakness among educated Arabs, and their inability to convey ideas in clear and sound Arabic, is a matter of genuine concern—as one of my friends aptly described it. For the educated individual who cannot articulate himself ultimately becomes incapable of educating the next generation. More critically still, he becomes incapable of formulating a vision for an educational policy for his people—indeed, perhaps even incapable of conceiving such a policy or recognizing the need for it. Thus, both the Arab intellectual and those he is meant to educate are led into a complete loss of principled orientation and any genuine sense of belonging to a homeland. A generation of this kind serves neither its nation nor even itself.
There are numerous indicators of this loss and erosion of belonging. I will present only a few, though I am certain that much more could be cited in support of what I seek to demonstrate.
The alienated intellectual either forgets—or fails to realize—that what he has learned is not necessarily known among his own people. He writes and speaks as though his ideas were self-evident and universally understood. What escapes him is that these ideas may not even be clear to specialists in his own field, let alone to those outside it. More than once, I have read Arab architects speaking of “postmodernism” in architecture. Each time my instinctive response has been to ask: what, first of all, is modernism in Arab architecture, before we ask what comes after it? One cannot meaningfully grasp what follows modernism without first understanding modernism itself.
Modernism and postmodernism are movements that express particular methodologies and philosophies in architecture that prevailed in the West during the twentieth century. I do not intend to discuss them here, as that is not our concern. What concerns us is recognizing that the Arab architect who speaks of modernism does so as if every architect in the Arab world already understands what the term “modernism” signifies within Arab architecture. There is no justification for such an assumption. And even if it were accurate, he would still be addressing only architects, not the broader Arab public, which is expected to comprehend why we supposedly need Western modernism. I do not claim that we should not learn from the West or benefit from what is new. Rather, I argue that transferring—or even speaking of transferring—ideas without pausing to interrogate their meaning and implications constitutes a deadly form of alienation that destroys both heritage and future.
The transplantation of Western architectural modernism into our lands has transformed Arab societies—who for thousands of years learned to build homes in harmony with their environment—into societies desperately seeking ways to mitigate the effects of concrete and wall-sized windows. Such features may suit Western homes, but they are unquestionably ill-suited to ours, regardless of whether they are labelled “modern” or not.
As though the importation of unsuitable architectural methods were not enough to damage Arab society, the alienated Arab architect compounds the harm by writing about modernist and postmodernist concepts as if he were advancing progress, while in reality deepening the injury. The Arab architect largely failed throughout the twentieth century to produce an architectural thought or philosophy suitable for the region. He was unable to reconcile what he learned with the genuine needs of his environment, settling instead for blind imitation and uncritical transfer from the West—an approach that is not necessarily appropriate for every region.
This state of alienation in architecture is not unique; it permeates all fields of knowledge. I have cited it merely because it is easy to illustrate. It exposes the schism between the Arab architect’s authentic identity and his illusory allegiance to Western thought.
My second example concerns the political concept of the desired Arab state. Rarely does an Arab speaker—particularly one who has lived or studied in the West—discuss his ideal Arab state without calling for the transplantation of Western “democracy” into Arab lands. I do not wish here to write about democracy itself, a system in which I have never believed, despite having lived most of my life within it. It suffices to note that the number of Westerners who mock their own democracy exceeds the number of Arabs who wish to adopt it as a political system for their societies. What concerns me instead is the Arab’s confusion and alienation when he calls for the transfer of democracy to Arab lands.
The democratic system prevailing in the West did not emerge overnight. It is the product of centuries of accumulation, born of political, economic, military, and social struggles. It began with the Enlightenment, which wrested politics from the grip of the Church, passed through the Industrial Revolution, and was accompanied by the largest process of colonial expansion and settlement across four continents. This complex and layered history produced the democratic system dominant in the West today. It is not a system that can simply be transplanted elsewhere merely because it succeeded in its original context. There is no social law that dictates its suitability for every other society beyond that framework.
Freedom of opinion and expression would not have been granted by the capitalist system prevailing in the West had it not been confident that institutions forged through centuries of struggle were capable of maintaining stability and protecting the state in the face of dissent. The Arab who believes that importing Western democracy into Arab lands will succeed and lead to a just political order need only look at Europe three centuries ago to grasp the fallacy of his claim. The Arab who fails to understand that democracy in Britain was achieved at the cost of—and through the blood of—millions of people across four continents has no grasp of history or politics. And if the fact that British democracy was built upon the ruin of others does not concern him, then he has no connection to humanity itself. And one who has no connection to humanity does not much concern me, whatever he may think.
The Arab who calls for the transplantation of Western democracy may also fail to realize that the apparent justice of the system conceals much beneath the surface. Once exposed, it reveals that Western democracy possesses tools of oppression and authoritarianism no less severe than those of any despotic regime in what is termed the “Third World.” I say this not in defense of authoritarian regimes in that world, but as a reminder that a democracy designed to protect capital can become fully tyrannical when capital is threatened. To illustrate this, I note that there is scarcely a law deemed despotic or tyrannical enacted in Iraq or Syria during Ba‘athist rule that does not have an equivalent in British law. I do not mean that Britain enacted all such laws in the twentieth century, but many were legislated earlier and remain in force. This reality was underscored by recent British legislation that criminalized mere belief in the principles of any movement placed by the Home Secretary on the list of terrorist organizations. This is no different from Iraq’s Ba‘athist regime criminalizing support for the Da‘wa Party, or Syria’s Ba‘athist regime criminalizing ISIS. In fact, British law in this regard is broader than its Iraqi or Syrian counterparts, for British jurisdiction over “support for terrorism” is global: anyone who supports, for example, Hamas may be prosecuted in British courts regardless of nationality, residence, or location of the alleged act.
I will not dwell further here on the concept of democracy, as I intend to return to it when I write about the political system I hope for in the anticipated Arab state. But I must ask: how can Western democracy be transplanted today into an Arab society where many still differ, affiliate, and vote along the very lines drawn at the Saqifah of Banu Sa‘idah fourteen centuries ago?
Those who call for importing Western political systems into Arab lands are alienated individuals ignorant of history, sociology, and politics—and ignorant of human nature itself. The laws of natural science are fixed and may be generalized across place and time, but laws governing human thought, psychology, and behaviour are neither universally constant nor universally applicable.
These are but fragments of the crisis of the Arab educated class—a crisis whose negative effects reverberate throughout the entire nation.
So, what is the path I believe Arabs must take?
This is what I shall attempt to examine next.
To be continued…