The Middle East has become a focal point in the last 50 old ages because of concerns sing the parts function in economic science. international security and political relations. There is urgency in developing peace and development for the part: its place in the world’s oil markets and its function as gateway between Europe and Asia are critical grounds for the involvement. There has been an thorough sum of literature taking to analyse and develop solutions for the part developing a consensus to what has to be done has proven to be hard and even if accomplished. execution has been debatable.
One point of suggests that the trouble in the part stems from cultural grounds. Orientalists contend that the civilization of the people in the Middle East which is preponderantly Islamic is one of the grounds for the development struggles. The intent of this paper is to study bing positions on this position and to measure the cogency of the statements presented. In making so. the paper will be able to specify how civilization affects the peace. order and development in the Middle East based on historical and current surveies of the part.
Positions of Orientalism The term Orientalism was coined to define the geographical divide between the Europe and the Americas with Asia. This reflects the more recent usage of the “west” to mention to the West and “east” to mention to the orient peculiarly during the colonial enlargement in the twentieth century. Though the term was originally developed as a geographical term. the more important application is in its usage to connote a cultural divide that in bend is the nucleus of struggles held against the “west” .
In Cole’s reappraisal of Bernard Lewis’ What Went Incorrect: Western Impact and Middle Eastern Response. he cites that Lewis uses Orientalism to qualify and develop his penetrations sing the Middle East’s state of affairs. Lewis uses the West as a criterion to specify what is incorrect with the policies in the part. The attack is non merely used to measure the current province of personal businesss in the part but reaches back historically with the survey of the Ottoman Empire versus Central and Western Europe.
Harmonizing to Ismael Hossein-Zadeh. orientalist positions have had revival after the September 11th onslaughts. He considers that development an attempt to understand the grounds behind the calamity and at the same clip an attempt to develop the supporters and adversaries of what was to be the war against terrorist act. In this visible radiation. the Middle East and Afghanistan were modeled harmonizing to their difference with the Allies and the most distinguishable difference being the civilization of the part.
Stefan Lovgren reflects that this position of the Middle East is steeped and history every bit evidenced as far back by the Crusades. Ideologically. there are important similarities: in the in-between ages. the focal point was to present the part from the domination of Arabs of Christendom’s place of birth and today. the nonsubjective to emancipate the part from the protagonists of terrorist act. Measuring Oriental studies In Edward W. Said’s reappraisal of Samuel Huntington’s article The Clash of Civilizations he criticizes the War of the Worlds scenario presentation of the cultural and spiritual struggles.
Huntington’s attack is distinctively orientalist because of his usage of cultural or civilisations to exemplify his theories. Said’s position is that Huntington is merely “reinforcing defensive self-esteem than for critical apprehension of the perplexing mutuality of our time” . One of the cardinal troubles in Orientalism is that there seems to be excessively much focal point on superficial differences. This is non to connote that cultural differences have to be considered but instead. there is small historical position given to the economic. political and strategic factors.
For illustration. Nanda Shrestha and Kenneth Gray reflect that the current struggles between the West and the Middle East and all other struggle in recent history belie a two hundred old ages of good dealingss in footings. Using an orientalist attack. one civilization or group is evaluated based on what is considered a more superior civilization. In such a scenario. one group finally is considered to be superior to another therefore its usage as a criterion.
This so leads to conflict because either of the perceptual experience that a civilization is being judged as inferior or because of the action on implementing judgement or the will of the “superior” state to the other in what is seen as in consideration of the involvement of the other. It should be noted that this is non the motivation of Orientalism but is frequently used as the justification of exterritorial action non merely in the Middle East but the remainder of the universe every bit good. Conflict and Orientalism
Cole points out that one of the troubles in Orientalism is that it tends to chunk together issues and so gives it a cultural or cultural label that seldom represents all the persons involved in the issue. Harmonizing to him. when the footings Middle East is used the intension is of Islamic insurgence which does non stand for the bulk of the states in the part in either faith or sentiment. Bernard Lewis considers the current points out that this has lead for Moslems to fell that they are being persecuted and has led to resentment and misgiving of the West. peculiarly the United States.
The rhythm so continues on with Middle Eastern tilting towards orientalist positions in covering with other states. Which. to be expected merely farther encourages struggle and misinterpretation among the parties involved. In Shrestha and Gray’s rating of Huntington’s article clang of civilisation theory is that it should be considered as an “ideological work underpinning a neoconservative docket for a planetary American Empire than a work of scholarship or accurate representation of historical reality” .
Measuring the Conflicts Lewis suggests that the rating of the struggles should non concentrate so much on the disparities suggested by orientalist but instead on the competition because of common involvements in footings of economic system. political relations and security. His position is supported by Lovgren whose survey of the metropolis of Jerusalem. one of the most contested metropoliss in history and a goof microcosm of the part. reflect that history has shown that assorted civilizations and civilisation have co-existed good plenty.
He cites that most struggle has developed from territorial. economic and political differences instead than from cultural differences. Furthermore. Kunihiko Imai that there has been greater tenseness non merely in the Middle East but in the universe as a whole because of greater exposure and mutuality among states. Common bets and conflicting involvements are considered as one of the chief causes of struggle. The disagreements between the developed and lesser developed states is making tenseness and brings to the surface inquiries sing the equity of today’s planetary economic sciences and political relations.
At the same clip. J. J. Nance points out that there is besides realisation that issues like terrorist act are planetary issues that have gained the attending of the international community that may non needfully be in the involvement of some country’s sovereignty. Fagot uses as an illustration the air power industry which has been among the hardest hit after the September 11th onslaughts: the air power industry is typically one the highest grossing industries of any state. bring forthing one million millions of dollars in revenue enhancement gross.
Educator Henry A. Giroux besides points out that the struggles that develop can besides be attributed to the deficiency of cultural literacy which is the development of context and apprehension of other civilizations which has created “politics of difference” that gives small border for existent communicating. Hossein-Zadeh supports this position: he believes that there has been small attempt in turn toing the root of the struggles and faith and civilization are used as a convenient whipping boy for the struggles. There is no denying the impact of civilization and civilisation. It affects all facets of society. making the dimensions and forces that shape persons.
Orientalists’ positions have merit in that societies have their ain motives and capacities that either allows them to go more developed than another. However. sing communicating and engineering today which has created unprecedented channels for planetary interaction the differentiation of what the West and Middle East encompasses is going blurred. Equally much as one would desire to see the Middle East as a far off and foreign part to the West. the sarcasm is that most recent leaders of the part have been educated in the West.
Decision It is easy. if non convenient. to utilize cultural or regional word pictures to explicate struggles but this provides small option for the creative activity of satisfactory solutions. The existent albeit more hard issues to cover is whether there is equity in economic policies ; whether there is footing of foreign military presence ; whether there is spiritual. racial and societal favoritism ; whether there tolerance for differences ; and whether issues are non being misconstrued because of differences in position or aims.
There is small consideration of the underlying issues that was created the bing position quo and leaves excessively much to guess and premise. Therefore. any effort to undertake with the issues in the Middle East must non be limited to this position and if used. should non see it as declarative for the part. In decision. issues can non be to the full assessed and solution can non be to the full developed from orientalist positions entirely. These positions consider merely a snapshot of the issues that have to be dealt with.
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