Clash of civilizations?
So I'm finally reading The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order, the extended version of Samuel P. Huntington's 1993 Foreign Affairs article.
Why was I not assigned this book at any point during my undergraduate experience? Why had I not heard of it until a professor from a college other than my own -- at a bar, no less -- suggested it to me?
It's mostly my fault. I should have subscribed to Foreign Affairs years ago, and then I surely would have noticed it being referenced a lot. Or perhaps I wasn't reading my assigned reading thoroughly enough during classes.
Either way, I should have read this book during my undergraduate career.
If you're not familiar with the book, it argues that the post-Cold War era is best explained as the interactions of the seven or eight major civilizations: Western, Islamic, Orthodox (i.e. Russian), Chinese, Hindu, Japanese, Latin American, and African. Ideology doesn't matter as much, states don't matter as much, but the civilizations do.
(An funny note in the forward is that Huntington points out most people didn't realize his original article, "Clash of Civilizations?", had a question mark at the end.)
My only real question at this point is how Huntington would classify people such as John Walker Lindh, who was raised as Western as can be, but converted to Islam and moved to Afghanistan. Can you change civilizations?
Lindh is certainly not the only exception. There are many people in the Western world who essentially live as part of another civilization -- residents of Chinatowns, for example. And what about the highly Westernized residents of other civilizations, such as some business leaders in India or some teenagers in Japan?
Huntington attempts to address this (and I haven't finished the book yet, so maybe he does in more detail later), but somewhat dismisses the notion of peoples' ability to shift or share civilizations by saying that a half-dozen teens in the Middle East might be wearing jeans, drinking Coke, and listening to rap, but they might at the same time be building a bomb destined for a Western airliner. The teens in Huntington's example have not, of course, been fully Westernized.
Sure, but:
1.) We've seen that anti-Western Muslims drink Mecca cola, not Coke. (Note the use of the phrase "Zionist fascism" on the home page of that beverage company.) So there's a flaw in his example.
2.) Qatar or the United Arab Emirates could show an example of hybrid cultures, or perhaps Westernized locales that were once strictly Islamic.
3.) His example was not meant to refute the possibility of "civilization-hopping" (my term, not his, and meaning when a person leaves his civilization for another), but rather the Western civilization's takeover of others as its business products spread. But I think his example cannot disprove either civilization-hopping or the possibility of Westernization -- or the spread of any civilization.
I concede, of course, that the spread of business products or pop-culture trends does not mean one civilization has disappeared for another. But it does happen.
So I suppose in this jumbled mess above, I have two points:
1.) Individuals sometimes choose to change their civilization, which Huntington does not explain. Perhaps it isn't relevant to whether such civilizations exist or clash, but it does complicate "civilization" as a form of identity.
2.) Islands of one civilization can thrive in the sea of another, which he does not seem to address.
Why was I not assigned this book at any point during my undergraduate experience? Why had I not heard of it until a professor from a college other than my own -- at a bar, no less -- suggested it to me?
It's mostly my fault. I should have subscribed to Foreign Affairs years ago, and then I surely would have noticed it being referenced a lot. Or perhaps I wasn't reading my assigned reading thoroughly enough during classes.
Either way, I should have read this book during my undergraduate career.
If you're not familiar with the book, it argues that the post-Cold War era is best explained as the interactions of the seven or eight major civilizations: Western, Islamic, Orthodox (i.e. Russian), Chinese, Hindu, Japanese, Latin American, and African. Ideology doesn't matter as much, states don't matter as much, but the civilizations do.
(An funny note in the forward is that Huntington points out most people didn't realize his original article, "Clash of Civilizations?", had a question mark at the end.)
My only real question at this point is how Huntington would classify people such as John Walker Lindh, who was raised as Western as can be, but converted to Islam and moved to Afghanistan. Can you change civilizations?
Lindh is certainly not the only exception. There are many people in the Western world who essentially live as part of another civilization -- residents of Chinatowns, for example. And what about the highly Westernized residents of other civilizations, such as some business leaders in India or some teenagers in Japan?
Huntington attempts to address this (and I haven't finished the book yet, so maybe he does in more detail later), but somewhat dismisses the notion of peoples' ability to shift or share civilizations by saying that a half-dozen teens in the Middle East might be wearing jeans, drinking Coke, and listening to rap, but they might at the same time be building a bomb destined for a Western airliner. The teens in Huntington's example have not, of course, been fully Westernized.
Sure, but:
1.) We've seen that anti-Western Muslims drink Mecca cola, not Coke. (Note the use of the phrase "Zionist fascism" on the home page of that beverage company.) So there's a flaw in his example.
2.) Qatar or the United Arab Emirates could show an example of hybrid cultures, or perhaps Westernized locales that were once strictly Islamic.
3.) His example was not meant to refute the possibility of "civilization-hopping" (my term, not his, and meaning when a person leaves his civilization for another), but rather the Western civilization's takeover of others as its business products spread. But I think his example cannot disprove either civilization-hopping or the possibility of Westernization -- or the spread of any civilization.
I concede, of course, that the spread of business products or pop-culture trends does not mean one civilization has disappeared for another. But it does happen.
So I suppose in this jumbled mess above, I have two points:
1.) Individuals sometimes choose to change their civilization, which Huntington does not explain. Perhaps it isn't relevant to whether such civilizations exist or clash, but it does complicate "civilization" as a form of identity.
2.) Islands of one civilization can thrive in the sea of another, which he does not seem to address.
posted by bp at
3:58 PM
4 Comments:
Be cautious approaching Huntington. It's good to read him, but typically only because he's referenced (or refuted) so often in the literature. Two primary problems with the basics of the text that I've found: 1) Huntington does not define civilizations well, and when he does he defines them differently each time. Methodologically this makes no sense. 2) Where civilizations do make sense, it's in the form of collective identity. Identity is a finely nuanced and individual subject though (the instance of Chinatowns is helpful in exploring it). Lumping the diversity of a 'civilization' such as the West or Latin America into a collective identity is problematic since so often identities are weak or diverse even at the state level.
An excellent piece that addresses Huntington and then goes on to address better identity in the global arena is Mark Salter's Barbarians and Civilization in International Relations (2004). Give the introduction a read after you've finished Huntington, it should provide some balance.
By
Anonymous, at 12:59 PM
Interesting thoughts on Huntington. It's been years since I've read his FA article, and despite its regular references I haven't seriously considered it much since.
By
t'su, at 1:55 PM
Huntington is one of those prophetic writers who is often wrong, despite wing right. And vice versa.
I share the criticisms of his methodology, and he clearly overstated his case. But the current war cleavages do seem to be cultural, more than anything else. But the lines are NOT well drawn (as you pointed out, Brian).
I would also suggest Benjamin Barber's "McWorld v. Jihad" as a follow up. Also written about a decade ago.
By
Miguel Centellas, at 4:34 PM
Thanks for the comments and recommendations, gents. The way(s) he defines civilizations does seem problematic. His argument is tempting as an explanation for the struggle between jihadists and the West, but because those jihadists represent so few Muslims, it can hardly be called a clash between the civilizations.
And so many other conflicts can't be explained through his template. But I'll keep reading and report back if any other segments jump out at me.
Thanks again.
By
bp, at 1:53 PM
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