What I would like to say in this paper is from a glocal perspective even though the case study I will offer at the end is local. That does not mean that I believe that Ireland is the centre of the universe, though for three decades at the end of the twentieth century we had that tragic privilege. An introverted narrative is negative, be it Irish, British, American, Canadian or wherever. My Irish case study is informed and underpinned by global perspective and is therefore, I hope, a glocal story. I would also like to explore two key components of peacebuilding which education can address, indeed I believe, must address, if humanity is to live at peace on the planet as well as with the planet.

PEACEBUILDING THROUGH EDUCATION

In June of this year Aung San Sui Kyi visited Europe. She is a woman who has suffered greatly, remains committed to non-violence, and is a champion for democracy in her own Burma. She reminds us that peacebuilding is about building democracy, which is essential to sustainable peace.

Just over two decades ago many of us sat glued to the television screen. The image is indelible, that of Nelson Mandela finally emerging from his Robben Island prison compound. He walked to freedom to lead, with others, the transformation of apartheid South Africa into a Rainbow Nation. It’s still a work in progress. Mandela has reminded us that peace building is the creation of a pluralist, participative democracy. Peace building is pro-democracy and it is about actively creating rainbow nations and societies, pluralist, participative democracies – at least! Education has a crucial role to play in all of this.

Education for pluralist democracy

Democracy is developing. There is no finished product and there is no one model to be imposed universally irrespective of contexts and cultures. It is not a flawless system either. Winston Churchill once said, “Democracy is the worst of political systems, except for all the others.” Democracy is about freedom. What the promise of freedom and potential for democracy does induce is an almost universal abhorrence of tyranny. Dictatorships, totalitarian regimes and fascist states do not last and do not satisfy the deepest longings and needs for freedom and participative belonging. Whatever past history, newly liberated nations usually move towards democracy. In 1918 when Czechoslovakia was born, its President said, “Our whole history inclines us towards the democratic Powers.” That was repeated in 1989-91 by leaders of all the countries of the ex-Soviet bloc (Norman 1997, 131).

Education for pluralist democracy as part of peace building needs to engage history. Democracy has a lineage, a family tree and young people and adults should be aware of it.

The Greeks invented politics and it began with our city states. The polis needed governance and there was a recognition of a public good, a shared public interest and common concerns, and over these issues there could be argument, debate, discussion, decision and policy making. The assembly of citizens was known as the ecclesia, though it was far from being fully participative. It was only for wealthy males, people of power, excluded women and certainly had no place for slaves and lower classes. Athenian democracy lasted for 185 years. It had limited participation and Plato even thought that democracy meant the rule of the incompetent. Democracy was forgotten for a millennium.

European democracy owes more perhaps to the democratic practices of the Viking world. Popular assemblies enter European history in the 9th century in Sweden and Denmark. Iceland’s national assembly came into being in 930 CE. Long before England had such a democratic assembly, it existed in the Manx assembly, the Isle of Man, a small island between Britain and Ireland with a Viking history. The Manx Tynwald or assembly is also 9th century. Wherever the Vikings went, Nordic democracy went with them.

In the modern era the two great shapers of democracy were the French Revolution and the American Revolution. Any education in pluralist democracy needs to be aware of these seismic events. The history of the 18th-19th century Europe was a history of wars and conflict, and absolutist monarchies and imperial powers. The first political revolution of a new time in European history happened outside of Europe and it led to the dissolution of the first British Empire. It began in 1773 with the Boston Tea Party and a decade later at the Paris Peace Conference American Independence was recognised. Now the people of North America “could work out their problems virtually untroubled by foreign intervention, a blessing to much that was to follow” (Roberts 1997, 347). Popular sovereignty was embodied in the opening words of the Constitution, “We the People.” All governments derive their just powers from the assent of the governed. The American Revolution was a landmark in world history.

Then followed the French Revolution and by 1789, notwithstanding the Terror, great reforms were achieved.

The formal abolition of feudalism, legal privilege and theocratic absolutism, and the organisation of society on individualist and secular foundations were the heart of the principles of ’89 distilled in a Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen… legal equality and legal protection of individual rights, the separation of Church and State and religious toleration were their institutional expression. The derivation of authority from popular sovereignty acting through a unified National Assembly, before whose legislation no privilege of locality or group could stand… (Roberts 1997, 353-354).

Modern democracy is born and by 1900 the principle of democracy was an idea, albeit still resented in some parts of Europe, whose time had come. An education process needs to engage with the historical development of democracy. We may have little consensus about its essence and it remains flawed in practice. “We the People” may even be impossible, strictly speaking, in practice. But democracy as a theory of governance and the ordering of the public good has promoted “all the virtues, from freedom, justice and equality to the rule of law, the respect for human rights, and the promotion of political pluralism and of civil society” (Davies 1997, 131).

Democracy is not amoral. It implies a need to be underpinned by a value system. Values and ethics are the foundation of democracy at work. Peace building is an ethical task, it needs democracy and the values and ethics that underpin democracy. Democracy involves pluralism and freedom, it also requires tolerance or respect. The education process needs to draw the distinction between passive tolerance and active tolerance. The former is the tolerance of indifference. The latter is “The attitude of one who positively co-lives with the other because one respects the other and accepts the multi-faceted richness of reality” (Boff 2011, 8-9). At the heart of any education for democracy is justice, especially justice as distributive and restorative. Democracy is for human, social flourishing. And distributive and restorative justice are core to peace building.

Education for global citizenship

Yale historian, Jay Winter, believes that a new kind of vision emerged at the end of the dark 20th century after the momentous events of the late 1980s and early ’90s. It is a vision set in the framework of globalisation which aims to create a new kind of politics called the “politics of global citizenship.” It has also been described as “globalisation – from – below.”

Global citizens are emerging out of an array of transnational social forces animated by environmental concerns, human rights, hostility to patriarchy, and the vision of humane community based on the unity of diverse cultures seeking an end to poverty, oppression, humiliation, and collective violence. (Winter 2006, 169-170)

A new kind of political consciousness is developing which is transnational and is flowing across national borders. It is a glocal movement holding together the local and global. “Global citizenship is a political project helping people to imagine a different kind of world.” Citizenship is not tied to the state, it is “participation in a transnational set of struggles for dignity and justice” (Winter 2006, 170). The nation state is no longer primary. We are no longer just Irish, American, Turkish or Indian citizens but global citizens, in a different and larger solidarity on environmental rights, women’s rights and human rights. Transnational citizenship is about all of these glocal justice issues none of which is limited by national boundaries. Community now is in the local and the global.

Perhaps this began for many of us as children when we put our name and address on the inside page of a school text book. Name, street, town/city, Ireland, Europe, The World, The Universe! It is now the reality in a globalised world. Transnationalism and global citizenship may still have an unmapped future, but like modern democracy at the beginning of the 20th century this new local – global reality is and will shape who we are in the 21st century. It will be a peace building project stretching us well beyond any introverted narrative. Citizenship education now needs to be global for all ages, and it is not only an alternative to introverted narratives, but also to economic globalisation as the sole determinative factor for human and environmental life on the planet.

A GLOCAL CASE STUDY

I currently work on an initiative called Ethical and Shared Remembering. It is an initiative which will respond to the centenaries of events that occurred in Ireland between 1912-1922 and shaped the rest of the 20th century for the people in Ireland. It was a decade of enormous political change ending with the partition of Ireland, and it was also a decade of brutal violence.

How the centenaries will be handled between 1912-1922 will shape the decades ahead for better or worse. Ethical remembering is an approach that is critical in relation to the militarisation of politics and the violence that was so deeply embedded in culture and practice. Shared remembering is an approach that encourages the protagonists in all their complexity to engage with each other as human beings and to understand better each other’s perspectives on this crucial Irish decade and its legacy. The legacy has left many issues unresolved which have been re-played in the more recen phase of violence and conflict in Ireland. Some of these issues are; nationalism, nation-state, faith and politics, faith and violence, class and labour relations, feminism and equality issues, trauma and peace building. These constitute for any educational programme a generational peace building agenda which needs to be set in a global or glocal context.

There are multiple Irish narratives from this decade. Not only will this initiative try to recover them, especially the alternative, repressed or forgotten narratives, but the events of 100 years ago will be carefully set in the larger global, at least European context of that time. The memory of the Irish narrative(s) has often been introverted, but this community education initiative will seek to provide a larger and more critical perspective on a century ago by placing the events in a more global context. Early 20th century imperialism and the catastrophe of the Great War, provide a larger and rather different perspective.

The framework for an educational exploration will not only include global contextualisation but also narrative hospitality. This is about generosity of spirit and openness to engage with multiple narratives, especially those of one’s sectarian tradition or narrative perspective. Narrative hospitality will also include narrative pluralism and narrative flexibility. These latter two approaches will encourage an openness to recognise that there are multiple histories and diversities of interpretation of historical events and never a fixed or final norm. It is openness to realise that history is a plethora of interpretations, little of which may be about what actually happened even if ever that can be fully known.

Another educational framework will be integrative complexity. This is also getting beyond mono-narrative or mono-truth, simplism or fundamentalist politics or religion. Integrative complexity (IC) is a way of seeing history, culture, politics, faith, the world in all their diversity and complexity and integrating or weaving together the complexities of personal, communal and historical existence, and to see this complexity in the other.

Key to this project will be the development of critical thinking skills in a community where there has been, through the dynamics of violence and conflict, a culture which is unquestioning. The latter has often been understood as being disloyal or unpatriotic. Few people have thought for themselves and this educational methodology will engage with critical reflection on matters of history, politics, religion and cultural identity without reducing their complexity.

Essential to the educational exploration of the past will be future visioning. This is not just about a 2030 vision for Ireland. It is about transcending local nationalist politics of whatever shade and visioning a common good. It will also be about global citizenship, a transnational vision that will require the imaginative creation of a larger identity myth, beyond introversion, and glocal in perspective and complexity. Not only will the initiative encourage the development of an ethical vision for future society but will also unpack the need for ethical leadership in a society where the moral authority of the major institutions has collapsed. The initiative is being delivered through community education programmes, dialogue events, training resources and materials and a series of in-depth publications, and also the use of the arts. The community of ethical and shared remembering will include people from the community development and community relations sector, education, youth, the faith sector, politicians, ex-prisoners, commemorative groups and institutions. This is an initiative which we hope will make a positive contribution through education to peace building as a glocal task.

References

1. Davies, Norman. 1997. Europe: A History, London: Pimlico.
2. Roberts, J.M. 1997. The Penguin History of Europe, London: Penguin Books.
3. Boff, Leonardo. 2011. Virtues: For Another Possible World, Oregon: Cascade Books.
4. Winter, Jay 2006. Dreams of Peace and Freedom: Utopian Moments in the 20th Century, New Haven and London: Yale University Press. The extended quotation is from Richard Falk.

This particular kind of freedom is presented as one of the causes of war in the book Muhammad: The Messenger of God by Fethullah Gülen. If one approaches the problem from a partial analysis, rather than a holistic one, then one can easily come to the conclusion that “war can be waged to ensure spiritual guidance and communication.” In the aforementioned book, Gülen basically says that force is allowed if there is a resistance against the preaching of Islam and others are prevented from listening to its message.

Viewing the issue from this aspect, it is not correct to reach a conclusion that Gülen, thus Islam, does not recognize freedom of religion and conscience. Those who reach such a conclusion means, they are disregarding Islamic verses and the literature on the traditions of the Prophet that pertain to the freedom of religion and conscience, as well as the important interpretations made by Gülen in this issue. There are also some circles who never tire of spouting their biased discourse, manifested by slogans such as, “Islam is the religion of the sword,” “Islam is an oppressive and coercive religion,” or “either Islam or death.”

In contrast, it is very clear in Gülen’s message that no war can be fought in order to communicate one’s faith. A war can be fought when faith, Islam in this case, is prevented from teaching its message “in peaceful ways.”

In my opinion, restriction of the communication of any religion is a violation of a birthright and rights agreed upon in international human rights declarations. In other words, the prohibition in question, if one indeed exists, is a sheer atrocity that has been imposed on people living in a particular social system. Living in the West, where such debates have occurred, I have two alternatives: either to investigate the written and oral literature of Fethullah Gülen in order to examine the accuracy of this approach, or to ask him directly. I preferred to take the easier way and directly asked him my question: Here I give you his reply:

“It is possible to categorize all the battles the Prophet fought, when analyzed thoroughly with their basic characteristics, within the concept of defense. If there is an attack by an enemy, or if there is evidence acquired by a very reliable intelligence that there is going to be an attack, then war will be necessary. The Qur’anic evidence that supports this is Baqara 2:191: “fight against them, if they fight you.'”

Another remark by Gülen, made at another time, confirms this:

“Take a close look at his battles at Badr, Uhud, and the Trench. All of them took place in the vicinity of Medina, while the enemy, the polytheists of Mecca, were living 500 kilometers away. What could the Muslims do? Should they welcome the enemy forces, who had come to the front line and inside the town, trying to kill them? The Battle of Haybar, on the other hand, was fought because previously signed treaties were violated, and these treaties stipulated violation as a cause for war. While emphasizing the fact that the Prophet only fought defensive battles, there is no need to claim “there is no war in Islam by any means,” evoking some kind of an inferiority complex. On the other hand, Islam does not give the right to any nation to clamp on another nation for no reason, or just for the sake of her national sovereignty. This critical balance was maintained in the eras of the Prophet and the Four Rightly-Guided Caliphs. But it is not possible to state that the same sensitivity has been preserved by some Islamic states after the Abbasids until today-the Ottomans included. Several wars were waged for the sake of gains, or to extend territory. They treated their enemies with justice during and after the war; but this is a different issue.”

The issue is crystal clear: war is the very last thing to do, when other solutions are exhausted, in order to eliminate an injustice that restricts the freedom of communication and guidance for teaching one’s religion. Thus, from where does this confusion stem? There are two reasons for this. The first is the inability to delineate the Prophet’s actions as the Messenger of God-which bind all Muslims until the Day of Judgment-from some of his actions as a statesman, which were basically formed in keeping with the policies of the day according to the prevalent context.

The second reason is that some concepts that pertain to war are predicated in their religious rather than political connotations, arising from the fact that war is a sphere where religion and politics intermingle; in other words, the “literalist” approach is adopted.

These two reasons, in the final analysis, give rise to misinterpretation of some of the concepts in a far distant meaning than what they were originally constructed for. Take the concept of “fi sabilillah,” as an example. This concept, which is repeated many times in the Holy Qur’an and the sayings of the Prophet, literally means “in the way of God.” However, the role that this concept plays in the field of religion differs from that which it plays in politics in the Arabic language. “Fi sabilillah” in the field of religion covers all the good deeds aiming to acquire merit, whereas it signifies to ensure the rule of law in the field of politics.

In conclusion, fundamental rights and freedoms are not issues that are open to question. All people are free to choose their religion. No state should be able to revoke this right from her citizens. The ordinances of the Qur’an and the Sunnah which pertain to this issue are clear enough. Regulations and applications that inhibit these freedoms should not be allowed. Restrictions may be exercised by the authority of a legitimate state only if an encroachment of the rights of other people is in question, particularly in the fields of public security, common order, public decency, and health. As regards the case of war, a war can only be declared in keeping with the will of the legitimate political authority. The fact that people prefer to believe in a religion other than Islam is not considered to be a cause of war. On the other hand, if a state does not allow its citizens the freedom to choose their religion, whichever religion that may be, this is oppression. To prevent this kind of atrocity is a legitimate cause of war if all possible means of peaceful settlement have been tried and failed.

Fortunately, the contributors to Schooling Islam (2007), eleven internationally renowned scholars brought together by Robert Hefner and Muhammad Qasim Zaman to examine the different modes of modern Muslim education and their implications for national and global politics, provide new insights into Muslim culture and politics in countries as different as Morocco, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan, India, Indonesia, Mali, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Great Britain. The authors demonstrate that Islamic education is neither timelessly traditional nor “medieval,” but rather that it is complex, evolving, and diverse in its institutions and practices. Citing historical instances of pedagogical reform and attesting to a flexible list of texts and subjects used in religious instruction – (most notably, Arabic grammar and lexicography, rhetoric, logic, Islamic jurisprudence, the prophetic traditions (ahadith), Qur’anic interpretation (tafsir), theology (kalam), pre-Islamic and early Islamic poetry, mathematics, astronomy, philosophy and Islamic history, economics, politics and sociology, and modern adaptations of “customs and common usages” – ‘urf and ‘adat – including world religions, European history and languages) – they convincingly challenge the hyperbolic assertion that Islamic education deadens all sense of inquiry. Moreover, they reveal the extent to which the struggle to capture hearts and minds occurred in Muslim lands before the Western media discovered the madrasas, as well as the degree to which Islamic schools remain on the frontline of regional and national debates surrounding culture and politics. Finally, they unanimously conclude that the present struggle, which is concerned with both the political functionalization and the internal dynamics of Islamic education, will shape a generation of young Muslims and their relations with the West.

In his introduction to the volume, Robert Hefner remarks that the reform of Islamic education was given momentum by the decline of Muslim political power: “In colonial settings, Islamic schools were functionalized to sustain Muslim values and ‘ulama social standing, even in the absence of a Muslim-led state. After the Second World War, national independence seemed at first to offer Muslim educators an opportunity to relax their guard. But postcolonial nation-building only ushered in new struggles to control the commanding heights of public ethics and culture. This was no more forcefully the case than [in debates] on the question of where Islam should figure in new programs of mass education” (p.32). Recalling the resurgence of personal piety and public observance which swept through many Muslim societies in the 1970’s and 1980’s, and citing contemporary examples, like the increased involvement of the Egyptian ‘ulama in politics in response to the regime’s efforts to co-opt al-Azhar scholars, as well as the politicization of Pakistani madrasas, particularly during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, Hefner states that the primary question today as regards Islamic education “is not whether it should be drawn up into broader political projects (functionalized), but whose projects they should be and how they should engage the plurality of peoples, powers, and ideas that marks our age” (p.33).

According to Hefner, a second line of reflection that emerges in the chapters of Schooling Islam concerns the internal dynamics of Islamic education rather than its functionalization. Indeed, a number of authors discuss how the rise of modern Islamic education has brought about a shift in the distribution and style of Islamic knowledge. The earlier pattern of informality and, in Louis Brenner’s phrase, “initiatic transmission” gave way to classrooms, fixed curricula, examinations, and professional teachers. In these relatively depersonalized settings, many believers came to view their faith as “a subject which must be ‘explained’ and ‘understood”’ (Eickelman 1992, 650) on the basis of formal doctrinal canons. The transmission of Islamic knowledge was abstracted from intimate teacher-student relationships, with their habits of dress, bearing, and deference, and repositioned in classrooms and quick-read textbooks (see Berkey, chpt.2). More recently, as debates over Islamic knowledge have moved from elite circles into restless, mobile and ever-more technologically savvy mass societies, the authority base of teachers in live classrooms and that of print textbooks have begun to be challenged by participants in virtual chat rooms and producers of YouTube video clips, who argue an increasingly diverse set of views. Many of the latest shifts in the internal dynamics of Islamic education – such as Muslims’ increasing reliance on electronic Qur’anic devices, online sermons, and instructional hajj videos, the integration of nasheed, “Islamic rap,” religious cartoons and children’s books in Islamic weekend school curricula, the emergence of international dawah conferences and online fatwa resources, and the recent (2004) establishment of the International Alliance of the ‘Ulama – have not yet been sufficiently examined by scholars of Islamic and social sciences.

The lack of evidence suggesting that the agonistic pluralism of Muslim politics and learning will diminish in the near future leads Hefner to make a third and final conclusion as regards the cultures and politics of contemporary Islamic education. Rather than viewing the ferment surrounding religious schooling as proof that the modern Muslim world dances to the beat of a different drummer than that of the West, East Asia, and Latin America, he reminds us that mass education of a moralistic temper has been the hallmark of nation-making and societal reform since the late nineteenth century’s “Age of Education” (Zeldin 1977); ie. that a moral agenda of one sort or another lay at the heart of state educational projects that unfolded in disparate parts of the late nineteenth-century globe (Fortna 2000, 35). Hence, Hefner argues, “[We] in the West would be truer to our own moral history were we to recognize that our schools and politics, too, bear the imprint of struggles over how children and citizens should ethicalize and behave. Current debates over Islamic education, then, do not represent Muslim civilization’s regression to some pre-modern past. They are a civilizationally specific response to the challenges of pluralism, knowledge, and ethics faced by all citizens in the late-modern world” (p.35).

Schooling Islam has been described as the most comprehensive work available in any language on madrasas and Islamic education. Because it gives a broad, comparative overview of educational developments in the Muslim world, and because each chapter’s bibliography directs the reader to more detailed sources of information, it can, indeed, be called “essential reading” for scholars and policymakers who are interested in the multifaceted cultures and politics of Islam and the future of the Muslim world.

Dr. Jeannette Okur is the translator of Tales from Rumi, a selection of Mathnawi stories adapted for young readers. She is currently conducting research on the portrayal of Muslim-American teens’ lives in a new literary genre called Islamic youth fiction.

On September 11th, in the first year of the new millennium, all humanity appeared vulnerable against attacks launched by fanatics. Invisible terrorism can show itself anytime and anywhere’in five-star hotels, fantastic malls equipped with modern high tech monitoring devices, airports, or even beneath an isolated table.

What kind of strategies can solve this messy problem? In the opinion of some commentators whose hasty and careless comments create sensational speculations, the time of the ‘clash of civilization’ prophecy, which has been forgotten for 15 years, has arrived. Although sensational, these comments are far from depicting reality, because terrorism cannot be linked with any civilization, especially with Islamic civilization. To which civilization did Attila, who threatened Rome, belong?

Since the days of the Roman Empire, war has been a part of politics. Now, terrorism has become a part of politics. Terrorist actions, from the frequent hijacking of planes to the bloody actions of representatives of the ETA (the Basque separatist movement in Spain) and of the IRA in Northern Ireland, are committed for political reasons. In terms of the global community’s reaction, other terrorist actions do not reach the level of the events of September 11th.

It is too early to comment on the results of this global campaign against terrorism. Furthermore, it is questionable whether the United Nations can develop judicial or other types of sanctions to end terrorism.

As always, the only hope is the military and political alliance of powerful states. The only thing can be said now is that nothing will be the same after the events of September 11th.

Women in politics

I attended a lecture by Iceland’s Olof Olafsdottir, who is the head of the division for Equality between Women and Men at the Council of Europe a very long title to carry along with the heavy responsibilities that follow

The topic was women in politics in the 43 Council of Europe member states. First of all, it is worth noting that voting rights for most European women were achieved only after World War I (1919 for the US). Statistics on the percentage of women in the government are extremely astonishing,1 although the trend is rather expected. As we move toward southern and eastern Europe, the female percentage decreases. Sweden, Finland, and Norway, are at the top of the list. Half of all Swedish government officials are women. On the other hand, Italy has only 8%, the lowest among European Union member countries.

Certain countries have undertaken serious reforms to increase female participation. For instance, Spain moved up to 21% when, in the post-Franco era, women took advantage of the rebirth of democracy. France, the symbol of equality, fraternity, and liberty, recently reformed its constitution to grant equal opportunities for women to participate in politics. Even though women had the right to vote and be elected since 1949, the French government was only 27% female as of 2001.

Political systems are a major factor. If political parties and politicians have too much power, the competition is tougher. As a consequence, it is believed that women find it too difficult to deal with process as well as with the power of the positions. Turkey and France are perfect examples of this phenomenon, and so women are likely to be discouraged by the ensuing harsh power struggle.

Paternal leave for fathers

Why does the decision-maker’s gender make a difference? Many people might pose this question. The most current and concrete answer is the case of Sweden, where 50% of the decision-makers are women. A paternal leave law exists in many democratic countries. However there is a major flaw almost all cases only the mother uses her paternal leave while the father does not interrupt his career. The Swedish Parliament passed a law offering a month-long paternal leave to the father that cannot be passed on to the mother. As a result, many fathers who had used the excuse that their jobs were more important and any interruption would be considered a major reversal suddenly decided to use this opportunity to be with their new-born children!

Another major result of the high female presence in the Swedish Parliament is the seen in legislation related to prostitution: both the prostitute and the customer are punished!

Cultural reasons for lower political participation in Muslim countries

Two related factors can account for the major gap between countries having high and low rates of women in their governments: democratic identity and culture. Efficient and older democracies have established a real democratic culture in which individuals are valued and politics is close to the people. Also, culture tends to affect the role of men and women immensely. For instance, Turkish women are very powerful in the household. The division of duties has developed according to Islamic teachings, which assigns specific social roles to men and women according to their nature. Women are more emotional, intuitive, and affectionate, and so are more fit to run the family and the household and to educate the children. Men, on the other hand, are responsible for struggling outside the house to maintain the family. Thus, in most Muslim-majority countries the percentage of women in politics is rather low. However, as the family structure is very strong, fewer social problems are observed.

Gender Equity in Qur’an

It was hard for me to accept this view until I realized that, according to the Qur’an:

– Men and women have the same spiritual human nature.

– Both genders received the divine breath, for they were created with the same human and spiritual nature.

– Both genders are dignified and are trustees of Allah on Earth.

– Woman is not blamed for humanity’s fall. Pregnancy and childbirth are not seen as punishments for eating from the forbidden tree. On the contrary, the Qur’an considers them to be grounds for love and respect due to mothers.

– Men and women have the same religious and moral duties and responsibilities, and both face the consequences of their deeds.

– The Qur’an does not state that one gender is superior to the other. Some mistakenly translate qiwamah (responsibility for the family) as superiority. The Qur’an makes it clear that the sole basis of superiority is piety and righteousness instead of gender, color, or nationality.

– The absence of women as Prophets or Messengers of Allah is due to the demands and physical suffering associated with such figures’ roles, not because of any spiritual inferiority.2

Conclusion

There is no evidence from the Qur’an to preclude women from leading a state. Islam does not forbid or discourage the education of women. On the contrary, Islam authorizes women to have careers in fields such as teaching and medicine. However, a woman’s most essential responsibility is to educate her children and raise a sound family. Raising children is a key social function, for a society’s future and efficient functioning depends on educated generations. Thus, from this perspective, a woman’s responsibility is rather significant and challenging.

I hope that those who are having a hard time with gender equality in Islam take the time to do a little research, because the most logical and convincing answers are there to be discovered.

Footnote

1. All statistics are from the 2001 Report of the Directorate General of Human Rights of the Council of Europe, Women in Politics in the Council of Europe Member States.

2. Jamal A. Badawi, Gender Equity in Islam. Online at: www.iad.org/books/GEI.html.

Plato’s (427-347 B.C.E.) political ideas remain influential. His idealist philosophy emphasizes ideas and ideals (independent of material and historical contexts), virtue vs. vice, and essential human values, and thus challenges modem philosophy’s general dependence on materialism, excess “objectivism,” and relativism. His search for the ideal person and the ideal city based on justice and harmony still motivates us. Although Plato is criticized for the totalitarian nature of his ideal city, his ideas are helpful when it comes to understanding the limits of democracy, especially direct democracy.

Plato was born into an aristocratic Athenian family. In The Republic, he analyzes the main psychological and sociopolitical pillars of the ideal person and the ideal city. His analyses are affected by such contemporaneous sociopolitical crises as the Peloponnesian War and Socrates’ execution by popular decision.(1) Believing that these problems have individual and systemic causes, he considers both the just person and the just city as an indispensable whole. In other words, a good individual life can be lived in a good city and good people can create a good city.

According to Plato, absolute truths are objective facts beyond relativistic opinion. Things have ideal Forms, whether they differ from the real ones or not. He emphasizes that things are good or bad by nature, and thereby accepts psychosocial phenomena as primordial instead of socially constructed.

Justice, the pillar of the ideal individual and social life, is a crucial good value. Plato rejects the idea that “justice is nothing other than the advantage of the stronger.”(2) On the contrary, justice, regardless of power, is based on virtue and is the main source of happiness. Justice is awarded in this life and the Hereafter, and injus tice is punished.

Ideal People, Ideal Society

The soul, according to Plato, is affected by three groups of motives: reason, spirit, and appetite. Human justice means maintaining harmony among these motives. Similarly, social justice depends on the harmony among the three social classes symbolizing these motives. Each motive might result in virtue or vice. The virtue of reason, courage, and appetite are, respectively, wisdom, courage, and moderation. But these motives can result in ignorance, cowardice, and licentiousness.

Since reason is the most significant factor for harmony among people and within the city, it symbolizes the guardians (the golden class). Spirit is symbolized by soldiers (the silver class), and appetite by farmers and artisans (the bronze class).

Plato considers knowledge, the source of wisdom, as coming from education instead of experience. Therefore public schools are crucial, as is the guardians’ task to censor other educational sources, such as poetry, to protect students from vice. Children begin to study music and poetry, the sources of a balanced and harmonious education, at an early age and are socialized independently of any family influence.

The guardians are the “soulcrafts” and holders of wisdom having absolute power.(3) Thus politics is a technical issue-there is no political race or opposition, and public opinion is irrelevant. The guardians answer only to wisdom and live a pure communist life, one without private property and family.(4) Military power is not used for imperialistic and other common militaristic purposes, but only for self-defense. Production is based on satisfying the citizens’ necessities and avoiding any accumulation of capital or market competition.

Plato explains four deviant types of political regimes as following: honor-oriented timocracy, wealth-oriented oligarchy, freedom-oriented democracy, and personal-exploitation-oriented tyranny. These regimes differ from the ideal reason-based regime (aristocracy), because timocracy is based on spirit, oligarchy on appetite, and democracy on a mixture of these two. Plato explains cyclical transformations of these regimes in light of the changes in the value structure, thereby stressing the significance of values and ideas on political transformation.

Plato and Modern Thought

Plato and modern social theory analyze several common issues, such as the importance of the division of labor. He considers people social creatures who must live within a complex and interdependent social life. Although he accepts social class as a consequence of division of labor, he rejects class warfare and class-based economic disparity. His understanding of this division, with its vertical and disciplinary structure, also differs from liberal social relations in terms of agreement or social contract.(5) In addition, he insists upon gender equality, for one’s class membership depends only on merit, which, in turn, is based on one’s quality of soul and education. For example, as “a male and a female doctor have souls of the same nature,” they are equal.(6)

Plato made great contributions to political theory by describing, generalizing, and systematizing psychological and sociopolitical issues. The Republic’s main contribution to political science is its sui generis emphasis on the role of ideas, values, and ethics in politics. He attaches importance to ideas and an intelligence not restricted by custom, instead of material/historical structural factors.(7) He questions “what ought to be” in politics, and stresses such moral and ethical values as justice and virtue as being the main criteria of normative social theory. As Wolin points out: “No one has ever surpassed Plato in insisting upon the moral urgency and centrality of political vision.”(8)

These contributions are very relevant now, for “the primary problem today is the reconciliation of the classical aim of politics-to enable human beings to live good and just lives in a political community-with the modern demand of social thought, which is to achieve scientific knowledge of the workings of society.”(9)

Some Critical Remarks

Plato’s ideas become problematic when analyzing the relationship between theory and practice, as follows:

•Sociopolitical issues exist in a dynamic structure and always face change and transformation. Therefore, even if the guardians grasp the knowledge, the impact of change on time and space might render their knowledge obsolete.

•Sociopolitical problems cannot be solved by transcending them because ignoring certain facts does not change the outer reality. Plato, however, seeks continued peace and stability by ending competition in politics, economics, and other spheres of activity. Moreover, he seeks to create harmony through social homogenization. As political theory’s essential aim is to solve real-life problems, it must “create a common rule in a context of differences,” instead of destroying social diversity.(10)

• Power is necessary to translate knowledge into practice, and only a stronger source of power can emancipate people from the pressure of another source of power.(11) Plato offers no specific methods to solve this vicious circle and make power subservient to knowledge.

Another, problematic aspect of The Republic is its totalitarian political ideology, which is neither necessary nor convenient for realizing Plato’s ideal people and ideal city (based on justice and wisdom). In his book, Plato supports indoctrination and social engineering instead of social contract and consensus. Such a totalitarian system has many potential problems, among them the following:

• It destroys the private sphere (i.e., the family), uses censorship to prevent any space for individual freedom, and violates basic human rights. Moreover, as the Soviet Union proved, it destroys the citizens’ motivation, creativity, and efficiency.

• A system that classifies people in a three fixed groups (gold, silver, and bronze) denies multiple identities and also results in discrimination.

• Politics is too important to be left to guardians. As it affects human life, ordinary citizens must be able to intervene to politics and determine their own interests and goals.

• A guardianship regime makes it impossible for people to recover their rights from manipulative dictators. The only way out is revolution, which is made all the harder by the systemic brainwashing received in the public schools.

• It is hard to find rulers who accept authority not out of personal desire but out of fear that they could be “ruled by someone worse than oneself.”(12) In this regard, Plato’s philosopher-kings might be very dangerous, for “power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely.”(13) While disciplinary education may be somewhat suitable in semi-voluntary stitutions (monastic orders) or in the parent-child relations for a short time, it may be disastrous if applied to a whole society for a long time.

On the other hand, Plato’s non-democratic arguments include some good points that are used in modern political systems. For example, modern democracies are generally representative, instead of Athens’ direct variety, which Plato believes leans toward the tyranny of majority. The modern judiciary system, including a constitutional court and judges, symbolizes the dominance of knowledge’s quality over the majority’s quantity. Moreover, the main basis of a democratic state’s bureaucracy-meritocracy-refers to officials selected on merit, which is similar to Plato’s ideas.

Conclusion

Plato could not find the medium system and so tended toward totalitarianism as a reaction to Athenian direct democracy. Such a reaction derives from his bipolar mental world-everything is either good or bad. In this regard, his ideas resemble Zoroastrianism or the Confucian concept of yin-yang.(14)

However, as Aristotle stresses, psycho-social phenomena may be categorized into three groups, two of which are bad (excess and deficiency) and one which is good (means). For example, reason’s excess is demagogy, its negligence is ignorance, and its means is wisdom. The spirit’s excess is rage, its negligence is cowardice, and its means is courage. The appetite’s excess is licentiousness, its negligence is frigidity, and its means is moderation.(15) In this regard, the excess and negligence of political systems are Plato’s totalitarianism and Athenian direct democracy, while the ideal system is located in the middle way.

Footnotes

1. Arlene W. Saxonhouse, Athenian Democracy: Modern Mythmakers and Ancient Theorists (Notre Dame: 1996), 87.
2. Plato, “The Republic,” in Classics of Moral and Political Theory, ed. Michael L. Morgan (Indianapolis: 1996), 41.
3. Sheldon S. Wolin, Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Western Political Thought (Boston: 1960), 36.
4. In his ideal society, family ties are provisional and trivial.
5. George Sabine, A History of Political Theory (New York:1965),49.
6. Plato, The Republic, 125.
7. Sabine, A History of Political Theory, 63.
8. Wolin, Politics and Vision, 35.
9. Richard J. Bernstein, The Restructuring of Social and Political Theory (Pennsylvania: 1976), xxii.
10. Wolin, Politics and Vision, 61.
11. Ibid., 67.
12. Plato, The Republic, 48.
13. Robert Dahl, Democracy and Its Critics (New Haven:1987), 76.
14. Mulford Q. Sibley, Political Ideas and Ideologies: A History of Political Thought (New York: 1970), 69.
15. Aristotle, “Nicomachean Ethics,” in Classics of Moral and Political Theory, ed. Michael L. Morgan (Indianapolis: 1996), 268-71.