The Arab Spring and the transformations of the Middle East over the past decade are still a fertile topic for social and political studies in the West. Among them are Revolution without Revolutionaries: Making Sense of the Arab Spring, by Stanford University in 2017, and Political Life: How Simple People are Changing the Middle East?
(Life as Politics: How Ordinary People Change the Middle East) on Stanford University in 2013 and other books and valuable studies.
The discussion revolved around his latest book, edited with the participation of Linda Herrera, professor of anthropology at the University of Illinois, entitled Global Middle East into The Twenty First Century, published this year 2021 by the prestigious University of California Press.
The book revolves around global interconnectedness viewed from the angle of the Middle East. The book explains how the economic, political, cultural, intellectual and artistic formations arose in the region. It discusses topics that intersect with religion, food, movies, fashion, as well as music, sports, science, goods, and ideas.
It also discusses social and political movements and their interaction. The book included papers that employed history, anthropology, sociology, political science, philosophy, religious studies, literature and film studies.
This academic work also included important papers, including the paper of the French philosopher Olivier Roi entitled "The Islamization of Extremism", as well as a dialogue with the American-Turkish philosopher, Sela Bin Habib, on the multicultural Middle East.
Also included were an important Edward Said paper entitled "Reflections on Exile," a paper from Timothy Mitchell's book "Carbon Democracy", American anthropologist Ilana Feldman's paper titled "The Global Movement for Palestine" and Assef Bayat's paper entitled "Global Liberation." The dialogue will try to simplify some of its implications.
And to the text of the dialogue ...
The book "The Global Middle East in the Twenty-first Century" published in 2021 by the University of California Press (communication sites)
I mentioned in the book that the Middle East has always been viewed from an "exceptional" perspective, which is the perspective that summarizes the peoples of the Middle East and portrays them as being besieged by history, culture and religion. Did the book that I edited show the existence of this "exceptionalism" in which the West believes, or It offers something else?
By "exception" we mean that the mainstream Western media view the Middle East as a unique region, fundamentally different from other regions of the world, in that its current problems such as dictatorships, poverty, religious extremism, or ethnic conflicts are a product of their unique culture and religion. (Islam) and its history, our book wants to clarify that while culture and religion influence current developments, international and global geopolitical powers (such as the Western interest in the region’s oil, the dependence of regimes on Western governments, the dependence of these countries ’economies on Middle Eastern oil, or the massive sale of weapons In the region) play a greater role in shaping the region's politics and economy.
Does the book aim to reveal the fragility of the stereotypes used in understanding the Middle East region that marginalizes critical developments in geopolitics, markets, technology, and social policies, and is this thought what can be called "the new Orientalism"?
No, not only that, the book’s perspective is much broader than a mere critique of “exceptionalism” or the new Orientalism. The book seeks to clarify the global interconnectedness of the Middle East and North Africa in many areas of social, economic, political, cultural, artistic and environmental life “such as the water crisis”, as well as in The fields of food, fashion, cinema and music.
Indeed, shining light on this global interconnectedness in all of these areas would directly and indirectly call into question the misleading premises of Orientalism and the "exceptionalism" through which the Middle East is often portrayed, and we have tried to show this in particular in the introductory chapter.
In the past decades, the countries of the Middle East have suffered from wars, political repression, growing inequality, and the rise of extremism, but are these matters rooted in the local culture or are they a legacy of globalization within the region?
Many uninformed people may attribute these problems to the local culture and heritage system, but these issues are more complex, and in fact, some chapters of the book, for example, Olivier Roy's chapter gives a different answer to this question, as it overturns the traditional notion associated with "extremism." Islam "to let us think about what it called the" Islamization of extremism. "
You referred to an important research by the French philosopher Olivier Roy on the roots of jihad, in which he believes that most jihadists lack strong Islamic knowledge. Does this mean that "jihadist groups" do not derive their narrative from Islamic heritage?
Rua's idea of "the Islamization of extremism" is very important, as he argues that there is no inherent element in Islam (or any other religion) to make it "extremist". Instead, specific individuals, groups, or movements in the Islamic world can be " Extremist and gives this a religious and identity character, and it is precisely the extremism demonstrated by the extremist terrorists, as it was present in the past and was adopted by various ideological trends, including the "secular" radical groups, especially in the seventies of the last century, which is embodied by groups such as the "Red Brigades" (Brigate) The Italian Rosse or the German "Red Army Group" (Baader-Meinhof), and the "radical jihadists" only appeared in recent years (due to the rise of the religious renaissance in the world).
Rua says that the fact that jihadists lack the "religious knowledge" of Islam, especially what is related to the concept of "jihad," confirms that their efforts towards violence are not linked to Islamic values, so it is necessary to search for these sources and their roots outside the Islamic system.
In one of the research papers in the book, presented by sociologist Amr Ali, in which he worked on the player "Mohamed Salah" as a value symbolizing the Middle East region;
Was the reason for the symbolism of Muhammad Salah because he intensified his moral values through his “philanthropic” morals and practices that transcended culture, religion, and national borders, or that the matter lay in something else?
Indeed, this important chapter related to "Mohamed Salah" was written by the Egyptian sociologist Amr Ali, in which he brilliantly demonstrated the spirit of this sports star.
For Ali, Mohamed Salah is not popular just because he is a skilled soccer player, after all, there were many skilled football stars like the Algerian-French Zidane, but they did not become like Mohamed Salah, the main reason for Mohamed Salah’s exceptional popularity around the world. Especially in Britain, it is due to his moral values, benevolence and humility, which is rare in the professional sports scene .. This type of ethical value transcends culture, religion and geography.
According to Amr Ali's paper, Mohamed Salah represents a global leader for the Arab world, unparalleled, perhaps since the time of Gamal Abdel Nasser.
In your research paper included in the book entitled "Global Liberation", you considered that the Tahrir Square protests have become a model for globalized protest in the Western sphere, how is that?
Does this mean that the West, in turn, needs tools to protest against the globalization policy?
What I'm trying to show in this chapter is how the political ammunition that developed in Egypt in 2011 quickly became a global phenomenon. It was the occupation of Tahrir Square in Cairo for 18 days (where thousands of protesters pitched tents to stay day and night, organizing logistics and security. Food, medical assistance, and connection to the rest of the world), a new form of spatial politics.
It was a form of protest, a form of democratic collective life and self-organization in the public space, and this idea was subsequently transmitted through social media to different countries and became a model for occupation movements, such as the "Occupy Wall Street" movement, which developed shortly after in hundreds Cities around the world, activists from Western countries traveled to Cairo to see the experience and meet their counterparts in Egypt, and some activists from Egypt traveled to the United States and Europe to discuss their common strategy.
In the case of unequal power relations in the world, the flow of ideas is usually from the "center" (industrialized countries) to the "periphery" (developing countries), which is exactly what the "liberation" model worked at its heart.
You mentioned in your research paper that the Arab Spring in Tahrir Square changed, at least for a short period, the Western image of Arab societies as a bastion of religious fanaticism and terrorism, and instead presented it as a symbol of peaceful, democratic and idealistic uprisings for justice and freedom, why did this new perspective on Middle Eastern societies not last long? ?
Yes indeed. Before the Arab revolutions, the Middle East was still seen in the Western media as a region that nurtures extremism and religious fundamentalism, but the revolutions that were mostly peaceful in Tunisia and Egypt and in which people rose up to demand democracy, responsible governments, dignity and justice, are what changed attitudes in the West.
However, this did not last for long, with the intervention of the regional counter-revolution - such as what Saudi Arabia did, which tried to sow sectarian conflicts in places like Egypt - as well as the rise of ISIS and the brutality it endured, and the rise of religious parties in the elections, the Middle East has returned once again to express the region of extremism. Violence, despite the fact that much of the violence has come from established regimes that enjoy the patronage of regional powers.