The Clash of Civilizations, Term Paper Example

The Clash of Civilizations by Samuel Huntington (1997) is an extremely ambitious work attempting to identify the basis of future conflicts in the world.  It is sometimes viewed as both prescient and self-fulfilling.  It is prescient because it does predict many of the sources of conflicts today, and self-fulfilling because it may strengthen the beliefs of those who hate the West and desire to see its downfall.  Writing on such a topic can be very challenging as it is a very complex issue.

I believe this book falls short in some areas.  There were however, some things in the book with which I agreed.  One of the things which I agreed with was the data presented in table 3.3. (p. 65) In this table, Huntington shows increases in the proportions of the world’s population adhering to the two major religions, Islam and Christianity.  Islam is growing faster because Christianity spreads primarily by conversion whereas Islam spreads by both conversion and reproduction.  This contention is true even to a greater degree today.  Many predominantly Christian civilizations have birth rates which are too low to support a future civilization.  Where the birth rates in many European and North American cultures have dropped to below 2 per family, Muslim families are having 5-10 children per family (Koenraad, 2010).

There are many other ideas in this book which I see happening today. The author asserts that world politics is entering a new phase.  He states his hypothesis as follows:  “It is my hypothesis that the fundamental source of conflict in this new world will not be primarily ideological or primarily economic.  The great divisions among humankind and the dominating source of conflict will be cultural.  Nation states will remain the most powerful actors in world affairs, but the principal conflicts of global politics will occur between nations and groups of different civilizations.  The clash of civilizations will be the battle lines of the future.” (p. XX)

Throughout the history of the world, conflicts have been based on a number of different things.  The old groupings of the Cold War era are no longer relevant (First, Second and Third Worlds.)  The author proposes a new way of categorizing countries in terms of their culture and civilization rather than in terms of their political or economic systems.  He defines civilization as a “cultural entity”.  Villages, regions, ethnic groups, nationalities, and religious groups each have different levels of cultural diversity making each a unique cultural entity.  A civilization is therefore the highest cultural grouping of people.  The author contends that a civilization is identified by “common objective elements, such as language, history, religion, customs, institutions, and by the subjective self-identification of people”. (p. XX)  Of all these elements of a civilization, religion is the most important.

The longstanding power of the West is shifting to non-Western civilizations.  As the west attempts to assert its values and protect its interests, non-Western societies have to make a choice.  Huntington writes: “Some attempt to emulate the West and join with the West; while other Confucian and Islamic societies attempt to expand their own economic and military power to resist and to balance the West.  The central axis of post-Cold War world politics is thus the interaction of Western power and culture with the power and culture of non-Western civilizations”.(p.XX)

Huntington seems to rely mostly on anecdotal evidence for the support of his thesis  with such comments as “the continued fighting in central Asia between Russian troops and mujahedeen guerrillas,” and “the voting, apparently almost entirely along civilizational lines, that gave the 2000 Olympics to Sydney rather than Beijing” (p.XX).  While these arguments seem convincing, more rigorous empirical studies have not shown any particular increase in the frequency of intercivilizational conflicts (Tusicisny, 2004).

Huntington’s thesis falls short in a few areas.  He argues that future conflicts will be based upon culture.  He identifies these major cultures as including North Americans and Europeans, Latin Americans, Africans, Sinic, and Japanese as well as groups within the Islamic, Hindu, Orthodox Christian, and Buddhist religions.  Although true to a sense, many of these civilizations have internal conflicts among themselves.

For instance, the Muslim world is disjointed along many different ethnic lines.  The Arabs, Persians, Turks, Pakistanis, and Indonesians all have different world views.  It could also be argued that Vietnam has more differences with China than does Japan, and yet China and Vietnam are both identified under the Sinic civilization.  I also take some issue with his proposed cultural boundary lines.  These boundary lines are not convincing when one looks at the relationship between the United States and Saudi Arabia, and the fact that many Islamic extremists spend significant time studying in the West.

Huntington’s section “Islam has bloody borders” gives reasons why Islam is involved in the majority of the world’s fault-line wars.  This is in some degree due to demographics he explains.  In many countries, Muslim’s are having 5 children per family, and are becoming the dominant race in that region.  They are therefore seen as a threat in those regions.

Another issue is that people had to find new identities after the Cold war as they were no longer on the side of the communists.  This led many back to their religion to find identity.  Another issue is probably that their prophet Muhammad was viewed as a fighter and general, which is quite contrary to the Christian view of Jesus who rarely committed acts of violence.  Muslim’s therefore do not view fighting and violence as such a bad thing.  In fact, the Quran encourages it to a point.

The Islamic religion has mingled with many cultures over the years, and this history has not been forgotten among different ethnic groups.  Islam is an absolutist faith which predicts the entire world will convert to Islam one day.  This automatically tends to put Muslims at odds with those of many other faiths.

In light of what is happening in the Middle East today, Huntington’s thesis is especially poignant.  Many of these nations feel that the West must be punished.  Most of these sentiments are coming from fundamentalist Islamic groups, but they exist among other groups as well.  The president of Iran has expressed a very strong dislike for the West, as did the late Saddam Hussein of Iraq.  These sentiments may not exist among all Middle Easterners.  Recently, when the president of Iran was seeking re-election, his opponent campaigned on the idea of improving relations with the West.  Unfortunately, he lost and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was re-instated as president with no intention of warming up to the West.  Conversely, other nations of the Middle East maintain friendly relations with the West therefore Huntington’s thesis has not entirely come to pass.

The ongoing war over Israel is another thing the author writes about.  His theory is that religion plays a more important role in this conflict than anything else.  With Christians, Jews, and Muslims all fighting over the same area, this assertion is certainly true

Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations is at times prophetic.  Many of the ideas he discusses are unfolding before our very eyes today.  But since it is a book predicting the impetus of future conflicts, it is in retrospect, easy to say where he was wrong and where he was right.  My understanding of current world affairs has increased somewhat.  Some of his ideas seem obvious, and some are little more subtle.

Perhaps the most poignant concept in the book was the author’s perspective on the general attitude of many Eastern cultures regarding the West.  He succinctly refers to this issue as “The West verses the Rest.”  Huntington contends that the United States tends to equate modernization and forward social growth with democratization and alignment with overall Western values.  Whether or not this is universally true, it is, he asserts, the way non-Westerners see it.

One plank in Barack Obama’s campaign strategy dealt with this issue.  He articulated a desire to repair America’s image that had been tarnished by President Bush’s heavy-handed approach to international politics.  Most would agree that he has made some progress in this area.  About a year ago, MSNBA reported a Pew report that concluded “The image of the United States has improved markedly in most parts of the world” (AP, 2009).

While the perception of the US may have improved, there are still extremely negative attitudes and resentment remaining in the Middle East.  Despite large amounts of foreign aid distributed by the US, many Eastern countries continue to remain disconnected from the West.  In his article, Thomas (2010) reports on the billions of dollars the US has sent to Egypt, Jordan and Pakistan while these countries continually vote against the US in the United Nations.

Perhaps Huntington was right in contending that cultural differences will continue to fuel conflicts more than economic issues.  This theory may hold true from a psycho-social perspective.  In his article published in the Evolutionary Psychology Journal, Macdonald (2009) discusses the psychological impetus fur culture development and the role of explicit processing in cultural identification.

The bottom line in MacDonald’s article is that individuals develop personal self-views that are based on culture but not necessarily controlled by it.  This is the reason why conflict can become so intense.  A Muslim man for example, might perceive some affront on Iraq by the US as an affront on him personally in that his self-view is enmeshed with his cultural identification.  While Huntington’s views were mostly observational and anecdotal, some of his theories regarding conflict appear to have some basis in psychological fact.

From my perspective, I see a lot of these attitudes every day.  I have observed people looking with a cautious eye at men wearing turbans or women with head scarves.  Huntington writes about the fact that non-Western people will increasingly populate Western countries while retaining their unique native culture with fervor.  He concludes that there will be no universal civilization any time soon.  Cultures are not melding.  They are simply coexisting – sometimes peacefully and sometimes not.

References

(AP 2009623 Poll: U.S. image abroad surges under Obama)AP. (2009, June 23). Poll: U.S. image abroad surges under Obama. Retrieved from http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32108351/ns/politics/

(Huntington S 1997 clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order.)Huntington, S. (1997). The clash of civilizations and the remaking of world order. (1 ed.). New York: Touchstone.

(Koenraad 2010 Muslim birth rate)Koenraad. (2010). Muslim birth rate. Retrieved from http://koenraadelst.bharatvani.org/books/demogislam/part3.html

(Macdonald K 2009 Evolution, psychology, and a conflict theory of culture)Macdonald, K. (2009). Evolution, psychology, and a conflict theory of culture. Evolutional Psuchology, 7(2), 208-233. Retrieved from http://www.epjournal.net/filestore/ep07208233.pdf

(Thomas C 201057 U.S. aid to Muslim nations not paying any dividends)Thomas, C. (2010, May 7). U.S. aid to Muslim nations not paying any dividends. Retrieved from http://www.theoaklandpress.com/articles/2010/05/07/opinion/doc4be2329534164293196775.txt

(Tusicisny A 2004 Civilizational conflicts: More frequent, longer and bloodier?)Tusicisny, A. (2004). Civilizational conflicts: More frequent, longer and bloodier? Journal of Peace Research, 41(4), 485-498. doi:10.1177/0022343304044478