Author: Martin Kramer

Good news and bad news

On By Martin Kramer

I’m back from London and the conference at Chatham House devoted to the question: “Is Islam a Threat to the West?” The good news, in case you’re worried about losing the clash of civilizations, is that the assembled experts answered the question with a resounding “no!” The bad news that there still exists a dire threat to the West. It’s posed by America. I simplify, but that was the general tenor of the deliberations: in the blame game, the United States incurred the most fouls. I did what I could to balance the score (and got thanked by someone from the U.S. embassy for my troubles). But it was a lopsided contest.

Fred Halliday and I had a civil exchange; when the summary of remarks is released by the organizers, I’ll post it. Avid readers of this site may know that Halliday is the author of a scathing review essay of my book Ivory Towers on Sand (an essay that appeared in Chatham House’s journal, International Affairs). He’s obviously misguided, and I’ve promised him that I’ll set him straight when it suits me. But I’ve no problem appearing with Fred or debating him. Why not?

So I was amused to hear him tell the audience that Edward Said once attended a conference at Chatham House and demonstratively left the hall when it came Halliday’s turn to speak. Why? Halliday had made a (rather mild) critique of Said in an essay on the orientalism debate. Christopher Hitchens once wrote of Said that he was “famously thin-skinned” and “had a vivid tendency to take any demurral as a personal affront.” This character trait had the neat effect of keeping acolytes in line. Hitchens adds that “it can be admirable in a way to go through life with one skin too few, to be easily agonized and upset and offended.” I fail to see anything admirable in it at all, and it’s too bad the same tendency has infected so many of Said’s disciples. To whom I say: give me your best shot, and I’ll give you mine. No hard feelings.

The star of the show was Tariq Ramadan. He’s the Geneva-based thinker, named to a chair by the University of Notre Dame, whose visa got yanked by Homeland Security only days before his departure for South Bend. Ramadan is persuasive, subtle, and disarming, and it’s easy to see how some might see him as a great threat, and others as a great promise. I’ve nothing to add to the debate about him, and I’ll just repeat the allusion I made to his case in my own remarks:

Don’t be misled by the affair of Tariq Ramadan. His exclusion from the United States has led some observers to think that the administration has set the bar for Islamic moderation impossibly high. But the Ramadan affair was governed by a very peculiar set of U.S. domestic and French circumstances. In fact, in the Middle East, the administration keeps setting the bar for Islamic moderation lower and lower. Today the Da’wa party in Iraq gets a pass, tomorrow it might be the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, and the day after, it could be Hamas and Hizbullah.

And that was my key point. Not only does Washington not see Islam as a threat. It doesn’t see Islamism as a threat either, and some of my friends, backed into the democracy cul de sac, are talking about it as a solution. Some ideas never die.

Update: Here is a rapporteur’s detailed summary (pdf) of our debate and the discussion that followed.

Is Islam a threat to the West?

On By Martin Kramer

That’s the title of a conference I’ll be attending this week, organized by the Royal Institute of International Affairs (Chatham House) in London, in partnership with the Khayami Foundation. Among the notable speakers: Euro-Islamist Tariq Ramadan and Iranian reformer Abdolkarim Soroush. I’m paired with Fred Halliday, who teaches international relations at the London School of Economics. Halliday and I last “debated” back in the 1990s, in a plenary session of Britain’s Middle East studies society. Since then we’ve traded a few blows, so I’m looking forward to the event. Here’s the program.

Is Islam a threat to the West? When I get the answer, I’ll report back to readers of Sandbox. In the meantime, ponder this simulation of how the Houses of Parliament could appear in future (click on image to enlarge). It’s the work of a group of provocative Russian artists. I suppose it’s one possible answer to the conference question.

Sorry, no blogging or links this week. The site will return to life sometime over the weekend, after I get back.

Arabic scandal at Berkeley

On By Martin Kramer

In the immediate aftermath of 9/11, Congress increased funding for the Title VI subsidy program to area studies in universities by 26 percent. The lawmakers stated their intent to boost language study, particularly where “Islamic and/or Muslim culture, politics, religion, and economy are a significant factor.” We all know what that means: more Arabic. Thanks to the windfall, federal funding for Middle East centers is at an all-time high. Berkeley has just such a center, continuously subsidized under Title VI for the last forty years.

So you have to shake your head at reports that Berkeley has actually been cutting its introductory Arabic offerings for four years running, regularly leaving more than a hundred undergrads stuck on a waiting list. Why? Budget reductions. “It’s a disaster, it’s a tragedy,” the head of the Near Eastern studies department says. “Instead of growing, we’re pulling back at a time when Arabic is vitally important.”

Well, maybe scandal is a more apt description than disaster. Why hasn’t Berkeley poured its increased Title VI subsidy into the gap left by university budget cuts? What does Berkeley do with our Title VI tax dollars that’s more important than meeting undergrad demand for Arabic? That a university can bag a windfall Title VI increase, cut its Arabic instruction year after year, and face no consequences, is more proof if more were needed that Title VI just isn’t working. Academe’s lobbyists sell Title VI to Congress as a language program. As I’ve shown before, that’s a false bill of goods.

The federal Department of Education should send a sharp warning to Berkeley, and publicly lay down this rule: at universities hosting Title VI centers for the Middle East, no potential Arabic student should be left behind. And Congress should get moving on an advisory board for Title VI. It’s a provision of HR509.