DEMOCRACYin

D E F I N I N G THE CHALLENGE

Contributors:

Joshua MuravchikLaurie MylroieGraham FullerMartin Kramer

Mohammed Abdelbeki Hermassi

Edited by Yehudah Mirsky and Matt Ahrens

A WASHINGTON INSTITUTE MONOGRAPH

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Democracy in the Middle East: defining thechal lenge/ edited by Yehudah Mirsky and MattAhrens ; contributors, Josh Muravchik ... [et al.].

p. cm."A Washington Institute Monograph/ 'ISBN 0-944029-53-11. Democracy—Middle East. 2. Middle East—

Politics and government—1979- 3. United States—Foreign Relations—Middle East. 4. Middle East—Foreign Relations—United States. I. Mirsky,Yehudah. II. Ahrens, Matt. III. Muravchik, Joshua.IV. Washington Institute for Near East Policy.JQ1758.A91D46 1993321.8/0956--dc20 93-28820

C1P

Copyright © 1993 byThe Washington Institute for Near East Policy1828 L Street, N.W., Suite 1050Washington, D.C. 20036Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 93-28820ISBN 0-944029-53-1

Cover Design by Jill IndykCover photograph © Gregoire/EEA/SABAOctober 1992 Borj-Mlain, AlgeriaA FIS RALLY

WHERE ISLAM AND DEMOCRACYPART WAYS

Martin Kramer

My purpose is to consider and critique theargument which has emerged as conventionalwisdom about Islamic fundamentalism, and whichhas been echoed here in the presentation by GrahamFuller, that is that Islamic fundamentalistmovements are, in reality, democracy movementsand reform movements in disguise.

Graham did make the case, most eloquently, andperhaps a bit extravagantly, in the piece he wrote onIslamic fundamentalism for the Washington Postlast year, when he called it "a movement that ishistorically inevitable and politically 'tamable.' Overthe long run, it even represents ultimate politicalprogress toward greater democracy and populargovernment."1

Robin Wright has made a parallel argument, inwhich she declared Islam to be "at a junctureincreasingly equated with the ProtestantReformation," thanks to the growing number offundamentalists who "are now trying to reconcilemoral and religious tenets with modern life, politicalcompetition and free markets."2

This representation of Islamic fundamentalism,which has gained widespread currency in academicand journalistic circles, is being drivensimultaneously by two different rationales. The firstis a variation of democracy theory, largely the

1 Graham Fuller, "Islamic Fundamentalism: No Long-TermThreat/' Washington Post, January 13, 1992.2 Robin Wright, "Islam, Democracy, and the West," ForeignAffairs, Vol. 71, No. 3, Summer 1992.

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province of political scientists; the second is atendency towards Islamic apologetics, which isevident among some Western students of Islam. Isubmit that their shared conclusion, that Islamicfundamentalism is really not fundamentalism at allbut an earnest yearning for democracy and reform inIslamic guise, is driven more by disciplinarycommitments and biases than by the evidence.

This variation of democracy theory, first of all, iscommitted to a thesis that the world is movingsteadily and inexorably towards democratization in auniversal and inevitable process. The Islamic Arabworld is no exception. But there is a difficulty in thecase of the Arab world because there are no obviousdemocracy movements, movements with whichWestern opinion would immediately sympathize, asthere are in Eastern Europe.

Nonetheless, these are immensely popular andpopulist movements, Islamic in nature, and theydemand free elections and the "rule of law/' Sincetheory posits that democracy movements must beemerging here as elsewhere, and since the onlymovements that seem to be thriving are Islamic,logic strongly suggests that Islamic movements maywell be democracy movements in disguise.

To be sure, much that they actually say and do istroubling. They talk about Islamic governmentrather than democracy; Bernard Lewis is right whenhe writes that fundamentalists do not use or evenmisuse the term "democracy" in their discourse.1And their notion of the "rule of law" refers to theunalterable law of Islam.

Nevertheless, the argument goes, this is adifferent cultural setting. If we cannot see the

1 Bernard Lewis, "Islam and Liberal Democracy/' The AtlanticMonthly, February 1993.

Martin Kramer /33

democratic yearning beneath the surface, thenperhaps it is a narrowness of our own vision and theresult of our Western biases.

Some Western students of Islam are equallycommitted. They have invested immense energiesin trying to bring about a Western understanding ofIslam, an understanding that has always been sorelylacking. They are quite right that Islam, as a system ofbeliefs that comforts and inspires hundreds ofmillions of people, has not always gotten its due inthe West, certainly not in the media. And one doesfind in the West, a lamentable tendency to associatethe religion of Islam with terror and despotism.

These students of Islam find themselves in theawkward position of being asked about Islam onlywhen someone is assassinated or something isblown up. They have been more than justified inreminding the world on these occasions that Islam isnot Islamic fundamentalism.

But, recently, they have begun to realize that inmany places, Islamic fundamentalism is becomingnormative Islam. This is not the Islam that they hadbeen defending. They had assumed that Islam wasmoving in another direction, towards Islamicmodernism, the attempt to reconcile Islam withmodern values.

In point of fact, Islamic modernism has been ineclipse for some time, yet the basic assumption ofmany scholars remains that the mainstream ofIslamic thought must move, inevitably, again,towards some sort of enlightened reform. And if thisis so, then the burgeoning fundamentalistmovements cannot be what they seem to be, that is,an atavistic regression. Beneath their rough exterior,then, the work of reform must be underway. And ifwe cannot see this clearly, it is because of Westernprejudice against Islam.

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As you will have noted, a similar determinismhas led both the democracy theorists and thestudents of Islam to their conclusions about Islamicfundamentalism. And these conclusions, I submit,are basically ideological. Not surprisingly, they flystraight in the face of an overwhelming amount ofevidence, both of fundamentalist thought andpractice.1

Several salient issues need to be addressed. First,are the fundamentalists attempting to reconcileIslam with democracy? Are they indeed formulatingtheir thought within the confines of the democraticdiscourse, as defined in the preceding presentations?

I see no evidence for this. Indeed, it seems that theprincipled position of every major fundamentalistthinker, the authors of the source texts thatfundamentalists read, from Casablanca to Kabul, isthat democracy is irrelevant to Islam and that Islamis superior to democracy. In this view, the fatal flawof democracy is that it rests upon the sovereignty ofthe people. In Islam, God is sovereign, and his will isexpressed in the sharia, the divinely revealed law ofIslam. Democracy, which places the prerogative oflegislation in the hands of the people, is the veryessence of arbitrary government, because it turns onthe whim of a shifting electorate, and electoratesalways shift, by their nature. No fundamentalist isprepared to submit to the will of that electorate, if itdefies Islamic law. As Algeria's most outspokenfundamentalist put it, "One does not vote for God.One obeys him/'

There are those in these movements today whoallow that believers may participate in elections,envisioned as a kind of referendum of allegiance to a

* See Martin Kramer, "Islam vs. Democracy/' Commentary,January 1993.

Martin Kramer /35

regime of divine justice, which would eventuallybring Islam to power. But once established in power,the fundamentalists would be remiss in their Islamicobligation were they to let it slip from their hands. Anomocracy of Islamic law cannot envision its owndisestablishment.

This does not mean that there can be no debateabout the implementation of Islamic law where thelaw is vague, but there can be no debate over theprimacy of the law itself, especially on points whereit is not vague: the duties and punishments itimposes, and its principled inequalities betweenMuslims and non-Muslims, and men and women.

Nor can the debate take the freewheeling formoften associated with democracy, with the formationof parties or individual campaigning. Thefundamentalist revulsion against party conflict andpersonalities in democratic politics was bestexpressed by Dr. Hassan al-Turabi, himself armedwith law degrees from the University of London andthe Sorbonne, whose tract on the Islamic state arguesthat such a state has no need of party politics orpolitical campaigns.

While Islamic law does not expressly forbid amulti-party system, he has written that "This is aform of factionalism that can be very oppressive ofindividual freedom and divisive of the community,and it is therefore antithetical to a Muslim's ultimateresponsibility to God."

As for campaigning, he goes on to say that "InIslam, no one is entitled to conduct a campaign forthemselves, directly or indirectly, in the manner of aWestern electoral campaign. The presentation ofcandidates would be entrusted to a neutralinstitution that would explain to the people theoptions offered in policies and personalities."

I think we all recognize this formula of elections

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without parties or candidates for what it is. It is a tacitjustification of one-party rule, such as that overwhich Dr. Turabi currently presides in the Sudan.

But surely there must be significant differencesamong Islamic fundamentalists on these points?After all, note the doubters, the Arab Muslim worldcovers a vast expanse. There are many differentmovements which go by many different names.Perhaps it is possible to sort the moderates from theradicals and encourage the process of moderation inthese movements.

Now it is, of course, quite obvious thatcircumstances do differ across the expanse of Islam.No two situations are identical. No twofundamentalist movements are identical. In the past,such movements often functioned in isolation. Butthe world is a changing place, and so is the Islamicworld.

Just as modern technology has wiredfundamentalism in this country (the televangelistscome readily to mind), so it is now wiring Islamicfundamentalism. The jet, the fax, and the cassettehave created global villages of Islamicfundamentalism. I say "villages" and not "village"because there are several of them. Perhaps the mostimportant are that of the Muslim Brotherhood andthat of the Islamic Republic of Iran. But each of thesevillages stretches from one end of the Muslim worldto the other, and, at some crucial points, they evenoverlap.

In these villages, ideas and people move rapidly.Movements learn from, imitate, and often assist oneanother. The international Islamic jihad against theSoviet occupation of Afghanistan was one of theirgreat achievements, a moral equivalent of theSpanish Civil War, which drew men and materielfrom throughout Islam in a way that would have

Martin Kramer /37

been unthinkable only a decade before. And thephenomenon of Hezbollah in Lebanon cannot beunderstood without reference to its place in theclosely-linked network that revolves around Iran.

Today these global villages are indeed global,extending even into the great cities of the West, asrecent events have demonstrated quite vividly. Inshort, no Islamic fundamentalist movement can beregarded sui generis. No fundamentalistorganization exists in a vacuum. In thisinterconnected world, there is no sealed laboratory inwhich a fundamentalist experiment can beconducted. Fundamentalism's fortunes in Algeria,for example, will affect the entirety of North Africaand much of the Middle East in ways that will bedifficult to predict, but affect they will.

Maybe so, one might ask, but why should all thisaffect Western interests adversely? After all, stateswhich have sold oil will continue to sell it. Stateswhich have needed aid, will continue to need it,even if they come under fundamentalist rule. Oncein power, argues John Esposito, fundamentalists will"generally operate on the basis of national interestsand demonstrate a flexibility that reflects acceptanceof the realities of a globally interdependent world."1

Once enmeshed in the world of real politics, thefundamentalists will have to accommodate it.

The argument has also been made, in the specificAmerican context, that the Sunni fundamentalistmovements did work with Pakistan, Saudi Arabiaand even the U.S. in promoting the jihad against theSoviet occupation of Afghanistan. This is sometimesintroduced as evidence that they are not anti-Western or are even prepared to work with the

1 John Esposito, The Islamic Threat: Myth or Reality (NewYork: Oxford University Press, 1992).

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West.The argument, here again, seems to me very thin.

Even in the promotion of the Afghan jihad, thefundamentalists never saw themselves as partners ofthe West in the Cold War. They realized that theWest, for its own reasons, was prepared to arm themfor their jihad, but, in their view, they were actingsolely for the purpose of creating an IslamicAfghanistan. No doubt, were the U.S. prepared tosell them even more guns to create even moreIslamic states, they would deal happily with it. But,ultimately, the idea would be to turn all these gunsand states into the basis for Islam's emergence intogreat power status.

The fundamentalists do not speak in terms of aglobally interdependent world. They now fantasizeabout a new world order very different from the oneimagined in the West. In their vision, Islam willindeed sell its oil, provided Muslims would beallowed to invest the proceeds in instruments of warto enable them to reverse the course of modernhistory. This proliferation will eventually create anew world order based not on American hegemonybut on a new balance of power between areawakened Islam and the West.

As Hezbollah's mentor, Sayyid Fadlallah, has putit, "We may not have the actual power the U.S. has,but we had the power previously and we now havethe foundations to develop that power in thefuture."

From the fundamentalist point of view, therestored balance between Islam and the Westexcludes the intrusive existence of Israel in the landsof Islam. Fundamentalists are uncompromisinglytheological in their understanding of the Arab-Israeliconflict. You no have doubt heard the Hamascovenant recited to you chapter and verse now, ad

Martin Kramer /39

nauseam. I would only suggest, though, that it bekept in mind that this happens to be a livingcovenant, unlike those of some other organizations.

In the fundamentalist view, Palestine is a landsacred to Islam; it is a land stolen by the Jews. Israel isa cancer in the Islamic world, planted by Westernimperialism and nurtured by the United States. Thisis the general view held by all these movements,from the Shi'ite movements that receive guidanceand support from Iran to the Sunni movements inthe Muslim Brotherhood tradition.

Fundamentalist opposition to the American-sponsored Arab-Israeli peace process has beenunequivocal and often violent, and I defy anyone tofind a silver lining in the fundamentalist position.

In sum, the hopes placed on these fundamentalistmovements by Western intellectuals have beenmisplaced in the way that so many Westernintellectuals have misplaced their hopes before.Whether the rationale is democracy theory,apologetics for Islam or garden variety ThirdWorldism, the basic argument is the same: Ignorewhat the fundamentalists say to one another, ignorewhat they do to others. They must inevitably becomewhat we need them to be. And the quicker we givein to them, the sooner that will happen.

Frankly, I confess I have moments when I wishthis were true. However, the fundamentaliststhemselves have countered each of the argumentsmade on their behalf. I find them persuasive andthey have raised more than reasonable doubt aboutthe wisdom which has become so conventional thispast year.

My purpose here has not been to prescribe specificpolicies for particular governments but to note somesimple truths about Islamism. But the debate overwhat should be done has to be prefaced by a hard

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look at what is and a return to the careful reading ofthe sources. If you wish, call this fundamentalism.