Love your children, those little
terrors By Chan Akya
Selected lyrics of the song "Russians" by
Sting: [1]
... We share the same
biology Regardless of ideology Believe me
when I say to you I hope the Russians love
their children too ...
Max Weber
designated sovereignty to be a monopoly on the
legitimate use of force. In Muslim societies
across Asia, [2] this maxim has been perverted
with the use of force being legitimized
by the establishment of
sovereignty. Rather than far-fetched notions of
holy wars and the ultimate battle between good and
evil, this trend merely marks the transition of
power between the youth of Islam and the older
generation - put simply, being unable to
participate in economic growth forces Arab and
other Islamic youth to focus on regime change,
with unfortunate consequences for the rest of the
world.
The singer Sting wrote the lyrics I
quote above many years ago, at a time when the
Cold War was still peaking. In the current
environment, it's perhaps appropriate to replace
"Russian" with "Muslims" - and equally for Muslims
to replace the term with any phrase of their
liking such as "Indians" or "Americans".
That unforgiving environment for mistakes,
China, has its act together in terms of ushering
in prosperity for millions of people using
aggressive industrialization. The Indian private
sector has a long way to go before it overcomes
the limitations posed by the country's government
and a competitive China, but it does have the
luxury of a strong workforce to fall back on.
Assuming that India does continue its recent
strong economic-growth trajectory, the competitive
landscape away from natural resources for Islamic
societies is dire.
Confronted with the
competitive dynamos of China and an emerging
India, Islamic societies have to run many times as
fast just to catch up with these juggernauts.
Failure to do so will only produce more
disaffected youth, which is a prime ingredient in
the recipe for global terrorism.
That many
of these societies have not even peaked
demographically yet adds a layer of both
opportunity and urgency to this issue. Countries
such as Afghanistan and Pakistan are not expected
to reach their demographic peaks in the
foreseeable future, which means the production of
young people with precious little to do will be a
structural rather than transitional problem for
these societies. This is very different from the
experience of China, which has already peaked, and
India, which will peak in the next 10 years.
WDR, and its implications The
World Development Report for 2007 [3] makes for
gripping reading. Okay, so I lied; it's actually
one of the usual statistics-heavy-but-ideas-light
publications that multilateral agencies so often
produce. Away from the insomnia-curing potential
of the WDR, its most important implication may lie
in understanding the risks posed to world society
by the underdevelopment of Muslim youth across
Asia.
Fortunately for the uninterested
reader, in which category I include every single
head of state from New Delhi to Riyadh, the basic
premise is formed quite early - to wit, the
interplay of three "lenses", viz Opportunities,
Capabilities and Second Chances, to the sustenance
of youth-friendly policies.
Where
Islamic societies falter The unemployment
rate for younger people is always higher than that
for older people, but we can also note that many
Islamic societies provide very few opportunities
for this situation to change. First, the quality
of opportunities provided to youth is more limited
in many Islamic societies as compared with those
of South and East Asia, simply because of the
differences in the quality of education.
Thus while India may well have a lower
literacy rate than a typical Islamic society in
the Middle East, its educated are more likely to
have employable skills, where the products of
Islamic education systems are often overly reliant
on religious studies. This makes them useful for
employment in religious schools, but not IT
(information technology) companies. The subject of
education is an important one for Islamic
societies to ponder, particularly given their
opposition to the teaching of many modern
scientific theories such as Darwin's theory of
evolution/natural selection.
Second, too
often Islamic societies do not provide the right
means for people in general, and youth in
particular, to communicate with their governments.
The absence of democracy in Islamic societies is
well documented; existing autocracies run by
military-religious leaders all too often do not
have the foresight or the moral courage to
implement educational reforms, nor provide the
scope for social reforms that could provide the
basis for improving education.
Capabilities The above two
issues transcend immediately into the world of
Capabilities, which is WDR-speak for
decision-making and civic participation. Within
feudal societies, both Islamic and Confucian, the
power of the patriarch encompasses all important
decisions from education and work to marriage.
This reduces the participation of youth in their
own families, and being unable to express
rebellion within the confines of four walls of
their homes usually pushes youth toward extremism.
Osama bin Laden was the product of one such
family, as were many of his key lieutenants.
The subject of Capabilities also covers
many other topics, including access to information
and quality control of education. Its key point,
though, is access to resources, which is where
Arab societies fail grandly. I wrote briefly on
this subject in a previous post, [4] wherein I
argued that the venality of the ruling Saudi
family and the absence of a financial
infrastructure prevented the development of any
innovative enterprises in Saudi Arabia. The same
observation holds true for the rest of the Middle
East, as well as other Islamic societies such as
Pakistan. The key exceptions to this trend, such
as Iran and Bangladesh, have specific
infrastructure in place to obviate the ills of
feudal systems, although the system of
micro-credit [5] provides a growth edge compared
with the social-revolution approach of the
Iranians.
Second Chance Saloon By far the most important framework discussed
in the WDR that I find lacking in Islamic
societies is the question of providing second
chances. Given that not enough youth are educated
in the useful subjects, and too few have access to
financial and human capital, the question of
second chances becomes all too important. Without
optimal economic growth (by which I mean increases
in per capita income without the Gini coefficient
widening) to serve as a tide that lifts all boats,
disaffected youth are left with few options but to
consider leaving society altogether.
Heart-rending stories from such countries as
Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq talk of families
discovering the transition of individuals from
unemployed youths to terrorists all too late.
Given the absence of democratic institutions, and
feudal cultures where the scope for dissent within
families is too limited, it comes as little
surprise that many middle-class Muslims opt to
join global terrorist networks. [5]
What can be done Kamal Ataturk
earned near-universal opprobrium from his
countrymen when he banned the fez
(then-traditional headgear) on ascending to power
in Turkey in 1925. As a master of social
symbolism, Ataturk's motive was not accidental,
but rather to emphasize the need for modernity in
Turkey. Confronted with the economic demons of
China and India, Islamic societies have no option
but to adopt radical changes to their development
economics.
Any change will have to start
with the dismantling of religious schools that
provide incomplete education in the modern
economic context. The second big change will have
to be social, in allowing a greater flow of
information from the apparently decadent West as
well as East and South Asia. The last change will
be in the area of government, with greater direct
participation seen as the key cure for engaging
new generations.
Many Muslim scholars cite
the backwardness of the West during the Dark Ages,
when Islamic culture flourished and Europe was
reduced to a series of vassal states. They
proclaim themselves as the carriers of Asian
civilization to Europe, as the people from whom
the Europeans learned everything they now hold
dear about the sciences and the arts. The biggest
point for such scholars to remember now is that
the Europeans did.
Notes 1. Sometimes even
the most hard-boiled among us have to use mushy
pop lyrics to get a point across. 2. And a few
non-Muslim ones, such as Nepal and Sri Lanka.
3. World Development Report 2007, "Development
and the Next Generation", published September
2006. 4. In-Sen!, Asia Times
Online, September 16. 5. A capital alternative to
terror, Asia Times Online, October 21;
the WDR makes a positive reference to the
micro-credit movement.
(Copyright 2006
Asia Times Online Ltd. All rights reserved. Please
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