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Ali Eteraz, a Muslim-American lawyer and blogger, has been writing a series of provocative articles on his vision for reform in the Islamic world. The latest is posted at the Guardian of London site today, and focuses on the creation of branch of the Islamic world centered on Western political liberalism:I recommend creating a viable and well organised Muslim left. It would be an intra-religious movement as opposed to a universalist one (though obviously it doesn’t shun allies). It would be a cousin of the international left, but in a Muslim garb. Just as the Muslim right found Islamic means to justify the destructive ideas from the enlightenment (Fascism, Marxism, totalitarianism, evangelical religion), the Muslim left should find Islamic means to justify the positive ones (anti-foundationalism, pragmatism, autonomy, tolerance) …
Muslim leftism is the only thing that will assure that Islam’s individualist revolution doesn’t take an even darker turn than it already has. Some in the Muslim right like to insist that they are moderate and ready for pluralism. That might be a bit of wishful thinking. Without a potent Muslim left, the right will not have an adequate check, nor any incentive to make accommodations. This is because political systems that rest on religious supremacism rarely make compromises. We know this from America. We know it from the third world as well. After more than two decades the Iranian right has failed to move significantly towards the centre. If unchallenged, better should not be expected from the Egyptian, Pakistani, or Gulf nations equivalents.
Food for thought — or, as some of the commenters on the Guardian site seem to think, ripe for the picking. “Instead of propping up Mubarak, the bin Sauds, the king of Jordan etc etc we actually support democracy in the Middle East,” writes one going by the handle of Hotbed. “So Muslims actually get to vote for governments to create the kinds of societies they wish to inhabit.“It’s entirely possible that this exercise will create a bearded transnational menace. But at least this will give us an idea of what Muslims actually think, rather than their constantly being ventriloquised by right-wing Islamists and lefty journalists like your good self.”
As in the days of Noah....
