The end of the end of history
Feb. 13th, 2006 01:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
imomus
I haven't commented yet on the main news story of last week; the deaths, embassy arson and angry protests sparked by the Danish cartoons. My comment is: Huntington was right.In the 1990s, after the collapse of communism, right wing philosophers like Francis Fukuyama and Bernard-Henry Lévy started talking about "the end of ideology". The West had won, Western concepts of property, the family, rights and the individual would prevail, there was a "New World Order" in which we would all simply trade happily and globally with each other, sharing an interest in prosperity.
Long before 9/11, in fact back in 1993, Samuel P. Huntington contradicted this "end of history" idea in the Foreign Affairs magazine essay which launched the phrase "the clash of civilizations". Ideology in the form of the struggle between the competing rationalities of communism and capitalism may have ended, he said, but conflict would continue along cultural and religious lines.
Huntington identified the following cultures:
1. The Christian West, centered on Europe and North America but also including Australia and New Zealand.
2. Eastern Europe and Russia (Orthodox, Slavic).
3. Latin America.
4. The Muslim world of the Middle East, North Africa, Central Asia, the northwest of South Asia (Pakistan, Bangladesh, and parts of India), Malaysia, Indonesia.
5. Hindu civilization, located chiefly in India, Nepal, and the Hindu diaspora.
6. The Sinic civilization of China, Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, Taiwan.
7. Africa south of the Sahara desert.
8. The Buddhist areas of Northern India, Nepal, Bhutan, Mongolia, Buryatia, Kalmykia, Siberia, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, Laos and Tibet.
9. Japan, considered an independent civilization.
What I call "pompous universalism" (the tendency of dominant cultures to think of their own ideas as neutral and universal; only other cultures' ideas, apparently, are vested and situated) is covered by Huntington, who says that "the Western belief that the West's values and political systems are universal is naïve and that continued insistence towards democratization and universal norms will only further antagonize other civilizations." This bullheaded "pompous universalism" is exactly why the West is losing in Iraq, and it gives Bin Laden his continued leverage, helping him (and Islamic fundamentalist parties) create power for themselves all over the Islamic world. Applied to "the universal right to freedom of expression", pompous universalism also explains the tragic misunderstandings behind the Danish cartoons affair.
I like Huntington's concern to separate modernization from Westernization (he stresses that Western individualism pre-dates and has different sources from the West's own economic modernization). His speculations are interesting too. According to Wikipedia, "Huntington identifies the Sinic civilization, with its rapid economic growth and distinct cultural values, to be the most powerful long-term threat to the West. He sees Islamic civilization as a potential ally to China, both having more revisionist goals and sharing common conflicts with other civilizations. Huntington also believes that the demographic and economic growth of other civilizations will result in a much more multipolar civilizational system. The demographic decline of the West, combined with its inability to unify and even a decadent society, risked significant dangers.
"Huntington labels the Orthodox, Hindu, and Japanese civilizations as "swing" civilizations, with the potential to move in different directions vis-a-vis the West, perhaps mostly tied to the progress in their relations with the Sinic and Islamic groupings. Huntington argues that an "Islamic-Confucian connection" is emerging in which China will cooperate more closely with Iran, Pakistan, and other states to augment its international position."
I talked with Hisae about this at the weekend as we bathed in the snowy landscape of Kinosaki, on the Sea of Japan. We both agree that Japan warrants being called a separate civilization. Hisae (who's half Korean, by the way) thinks Japan will "swing" with the West, but I'm not so sure; I think the high point of Japanese identification with the West was reached in the 1980s, and that Japanese in the future will be less rather than more Western than they are today. American influence is on the wane, Chinese influence on the rise. I'm not sure how close Japan will want to get to China, though. There seem to be huge culture gaps (as well as historical grievances) stopping that. Then again, Hisae's mother commutes between Seoul, Shanghai and Osaka buying and selling clothes, and in terms of Japan's trading patterns (rather than cultural patterns or diplomatic patterns) that's not so very unusual.
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(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 04:23 am (UTC)These critiques come from the margins, yes, but interesting things happen there.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 04:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 04:48 am (UTC)"The greatest question perhaps may be whether modernization must inevitably cause a culture to place greater emphasis on individualism and individual rights. A popular interpretation of Western history is that industrialization created the conditions that led the rise of individualism. This may be a false reading of history. The concept of individual human rights predates industrialization and modernization in Western Civilization by many centuries. Today while Muslim societies possess far more technology than Americans of two centuries ago those Muslim societies of today place less emphasis on human rights than American culture then."
There's also an interesting point at the end about an internal threat to Western culture from multiculturalists, diversity fans and pluralists who want to detach the West from Eurocentrism. But what is the West if it's just the sum of all the people living (diversely and differently) within it? For instance, if it's as much extended families as nuclear families, and as much intolerance of offence against the prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him, even in Denmark) as tolerance of freedom of expression?
A (perhaps) related aside...
Date: 2006-02-13 05:09 am (UTC)Also, is the scientific method a Western idea?
Also, an interesting speech yesterday in Berlin (plz see my blog)...
Re: A (perhaps) related aside...
Date: 2006-02-13 05:36 am (UTC)The scientific method is not just Western. For instance, left to its own devices the West would still be using the Roman numeral system (I, II, III, IV, oh, forget it!) rather than the Arabic system we have today. However, that doesn't mean that scientific method transcends cultural systems. It just merges several.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 05:37 am (UTC)Re: A (perhaps) related aside...
Date: 2006-02-13 05:45 am (UTC)- the right to offend preserves society
- societies without critical voices fail
- all forms of nonviolent political expression, especially satire, are things that we should be willing to defend with our lives
I also think the things Ayaan Hirsi Ali says need to have the "I think" bit stressed. You can't say that someone (especially not the figurehead of a major world religion) was objectively wrong to say this and that. You can simply say that you disagree with certain positions, and that you hold other ones.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 05:48 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:09 am (UTC)Here in the U.S. the swing toward religious fundamentalism led by radical clerics like Pat Robertson seems to get stronger every day.
Here is an excerpt fro Gore Vidal's "President Jonah": (http://www.truthdig.com/dig/item/20060207_president_jonah_redux/)
The British historian Charles Freeman published an extended discussion of the transition that took place during the late Roman empire, the title of which could serve as a capsule summary of our current president: "The Closing of the Western Mind."
Mr. Bush, God knows, is no Augustine; but Freeman points to the latter as the epitome of a more general process that was underway in the fourth century: namely, ‘the gradual subjection of reason to faith and authority.’ This is what we are seeing today, and it is a process that no society can undergo and still remain free. Yet it is a process of which administration officials, along with much of the American population, are aggressively proud.” In fact, close observers of this odd presidency note that Bush, like his evangelical base, believes he is on a mission from God and that faith trumps empirical evidence. Berman quotes a senior White House adviser who disdains what he calls the “reality-based” community, to which Berman sensibly responds: “If a nation is unable to perceive reality correctly, and persists in operating on the basis of faith-based delusions, its ability to hold its own in the world is pretty much foreclosed.”
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:09 am (UTC)No, not at all. What does a Danish newspaper have to do with Iran? Nothing. This is more about Islam's own pompous universalism, expecting that everyone else play by their rules. Of course, you'd rather frame it the other way around because for you, what is exotic is correct.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:16 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:20 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:32 am (UTC)Re: A (perhaps) related aside...
Date: 2006-02-13 06:45 am (UTC)http://www.welt.de/z/plog/blog.php/the_free_west/the_free_wests_weblog/2006/02/10/the_right_to_offend
It should also be noted that the threatening fatwa stabbed to filmmaker Theo Van Gogh's corpse with a knife last year was directed towards Ali, so I'm inclined to think that act has influenced her decision not to tread so politely on the subject.
I see what you mean. But, to be honest, the only part of my opinion that you've forced me to reconsider is that "the right to offend preserves society." I do believe that free speech only works inside an atmosphere of nonviolence and genuine listening. Granted, that is quite an idealistic situation, especially these days. So, is the solution to quell inciteful speech directed at notoriously violent groups? To me, this reasoning seems a variant of that which led to the rise of Nazism during the 1930's. A fear-based stifling of government criticality that led to murderous totalitarianism.
I only abandon my use of the phrase "in my humble opinion" when theocracies purposefully step on my toes.
Also, as you may know, the American animated series "South Park" has Jesus as one its regular characters. In a recent episode, its creators portrayed a statue of the Virgin Mary with blood exploding out of her ass onto the face of the Pope. Of course, there was a smattering of protest here, but most American Catholics and Jews understood (or seemed to understand.. I am neither Catholic nor a Jew) that this kind of stuff is the price paid for free speech. I'd argue that most fundamentalist Muslims in Denmark do not.
At the risk of sounding republican, I do believe that it's time for them to get over it. And it's time for many sections of the worldwide media to drop their double-standards.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:50 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:52 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:54 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:54 am (UTC)You couldn't possible mean to imply that the Crusaders back in their day weren't on their own "mission from god", despite the ridiculous cruelty and death they rained down on christians and muslims alike.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:56 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 06:59 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 07:02 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 07:08 am (UTC)seperately, taking capitalism as the new binding force, it seems like even the most entrenched of enemies are slowly creeping toward each other in their fundamental beliefs (china most dramatically). Before long, the broadest remaining chasms will be those of historical circumstance... like the china/japan, islam/christian, basque/spanish gaps.
The sinic region (for example) can never substantial territory by war, unless they carry out a full scale extermination of the former inhabitiants of conquered lands. Left in place, the populations of ideologically conquered countries will, at most, mix some sinic blue in with their purple or brown or orange or whatever. History has been wiping out the smaller hold outs for ages, but as we get down to the last few players, uniformity can't be acheived by conquest... to omou.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 07:11 am (UTC)Has Japan ever had some sort of equivalent of America's civil rights movement or an analogous time of cultural upheaval on par with the late 60's? It's time for me to do some historical googling. I suppose the time immediately after WWII was no cultural cakewalk.
I'm really enjoying this discussion, btw!
(no subject)
Date: 2006-02-13 07:12 am (UTC)