Why They Hate Us: The Long Answer

Husain Haqqani explores the roots of Muslim instability
By Tricia Brick
January 4, 2008 :: Alumni Web :: Boston University


Husain Haqqani argues that a lack of economic, intellectual, cultural, and technological productivity in the Muslim world has left a vacuum that has been filled by paranoia and inflammatory rhetoric.
Photo by Kalman Zabarsky


Husain Haqqani recalls a Newsweek cover from October 2001: a Pakistani child brandishing a gun and the headline “Why They Hate Us.” The photo is emblematic of a question that has haunted Haqqani, director of BU’s Center for International Relations and a College of Arts and Sciences associate professor of international relations. “I have always wondered why the Muslim world is in the eye of virtually every storm, in my lifetime at least,” he says. “The Middle East is a cauldron. The India-Pakistan conflict has a Muslim dimension. In Russia, there’s Chechnya, another Muslim dimension.” Why is the Muslim world plagued by instability, undemocratic governments, and sectarian violence?

Haqqani has set out to find answers. He calls his project State of the Muslim World, and he draws broadly from such fields as anthropology, sociology, history, economics, and demography. He has written a series of articles exploring some of his questions, and he plans to begin writing a book this year.

Despite the diversity of the Islam-influenced world, he says, Muslims everywhere share membership in the Ummah, or community of believers. “There are many differences among Muslims, but there are also common streaks running from Egypt to Indonesia, and there is a sense of belonging together,” he says. “And yet, in the last few centuries, it has been a belonging together in decline. The Kuwaitis may be rich, but they know it is coming from oil in the ground, not from something they’ve accomplished. There is a lack of a general sense of accomplishment in modern times.”

He reels off a succession of surprising statistics in support of this argument: the GDP of the world’s fifty-seven Muslim-majority countries combined is less than that of France. Those fifty-seven countries are home to about 500 universities, compared to more than 5,000 in the United States and 8,000 in India. Fewer new book titles are published each year in Arabic, the language of 300 million people, than in Greek, spoken by only 15 million. More books are translated into Spanish each year than have been translated into Arabic in the last century.

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August 15, 2006 by the Los Angeles Times

No, it's not our freedoms. Anti-Americanism isn't going away until the U.S. puts some fairness in its foreign policy.


AMERICA'S MORAL standing in the world has precipitously declined since 2001. For starters, blame the Bush administration's go-it-alone tough talk after 9/11, contempt for the Kyoto accord, war and then chaos in Iraq, secret prisons in Europe and alleged use of torture at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Democrats would have you believe that a new team — theirs — in Washington would change all this. Not so fast.

Around the world, anti-Americanism is not simply the result of anger about President Bush's foreign policies. Rather, it is deeply entrenched antipathy accumulated over decades. It may take generations to undo.

Consider the causes:

• Cold War legacy: U.S. intervention in Vietnam, and covert attempts to overthrow governments in Iran, Guatemala and Cuba, among others, created profound distrust of U.S. motives throughout the developing world. Europeans also disdain these policies and bemoan the cultural coarseness of Americanization sweeping their continent.

Americans, by contrast, tend to dismiss this side of the Cold War. Gore Vidal famously referred to this country as the United States of Amnesia. We're all about moving forward, getting over it, a nation of immigrants for whom leaving the past behind was a geographic, psychological and often political act. As the last guy standing when the Cold War ended, in 1989, we expected the world to embrace free markets and liberal democracy.

• Power and powerlessness: Power generates resentment. But the United States has lost the ability to see its power from the perspective of those with less of it. In Latin America, for example, U.S. policies — whether on trade, aid, democracy, drugs or immigration — presumed that Latin Americans would automatically see U.S. interests as their own. And when denied deference, we sometimes lash out, as did Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld when he lumped Germany, a close U.S. ally, with Cuba and Libya because Berlin opposed the Iraq war.

He describes the problems well enough, but then he acts as though they caused themselves, no mention of political or economic colonialism, no mention of European wars and meddling, no mention of coups and invasions, or the cold war. But he is doing well, I am sure, he gets well-paid for writing this simple-minded drivel.

. . that people are all the same inside and that cultures only provide a framework for multi-varied expressions of all those wonderful yet basically similar qualities that we possess as members of the human race.

But I think there are differences in cultures that determine to some extent how people relate to each other, how they relate to other cultures, how they try to solve problems and differences between themselves and other cultures, what roles they accept for governmental authority, for religious authority, etc.

I think it is a mistake to deny that these differences exist because then we will never fully understand why people from different cultures do what they do. I think its just as wrong to say there are no significant differences between people from different cultures (progressive post-modernist views) as it is to say that only one's own culture is virtuous and all the rest are backward (xenophobic RW views).

People are who they are both because of their human nature and because of their culture's nature. It is not racist to explore such questions nor are those who objectively discuss those differences, bigots.

The genetic differences don't amount to a hill of beans, the environmental differences are the 800 pound gorilla in the issue of why people are the way they are. Take ten little israeli babies and raise them as Arabs in an Arab family in Baghdad, and you will get ten citizens of Baghdad. Do the reverse with ten little Iraqi babies, and you will get ten Israelis.

Except a small part which I'll explain later. But,

"Culture is adaptive, it is an effect, not a cause."

Culture is definitely adaptive to the environment. That's why the Inuit have a distinct culture that was shaped by their almost totally protein diet, where they venerate the sea creatures who sustain them. That's why Arabs developed a culture around nomadic tribes that traveled long distances across open deserts where their survival against other bands was totally in their own hands. Those are just a small microcosm of the environmental influences on those cultures but those are the kinds of things that influence culture.

"The genetic differences don't amount to a hill of beans". I almost completely agree with that. There are scientific differences of opinion in some areas that have not been resolved. So I keep open the possibility that genetics could have some influence on culture. But, I have seen no conclusive evidence of this.

"Take ten little Israeli babies and raise them as Arabs in an Arab family in Baghdad, and you will get ten citizens of Baghdad. Do the reverse with ten little Iraqi babies, and you will get ten Israelis." I absolutely agree with you on that one. I hope that I never said anything here that would lead you to believe otherwise.

My only disagreement is with your first statement. When you say, "culture is adaptive, it is an effect" - I assume you mean an effect of environment. I agree. But then when you say it is not a cause - I'm not sure what it is you are saying it is not a cause of - but I assume you mean behavior.

To be clear, I think culture is caused by environment but culture is also a cause of behavior. And behavior can change the environment. That's the key issue that I am discussing regarding the op.

For example, the west developed a technology-based culture that was an outgrowth of our environment (the enlightenment) but has also greatly shaped our environment - and also now affects our behavior in millions of ways. So, I see a lot of feed-forward and feedback going on between environment, culture and behavior, over time. I don't know if you agree with that or not.

I am simply saying that the disfunctional aspects of muslim culture that the OP focusses on are the result of a failure to modernize, and that that "failure" has been largely influenced by several hundred years of ham-handed and self-serving meddling by European powers. You can start with Napoleon, but it just goes on and on.

It is no easy thing to make the transformation from agrarian autocracy to modern social and economic models, it took Europe around 500 years and wealth stolen from all over the World to do it. When you have constant meddling from outsiders that want to keep you weak and disorganized while they exploit you, it becomes impossible.

The Japanese are the best example I can think of success in that department. Perhaps the Russians and Chinese too. But they all managed in one way or another to minimize or eliminate the outside meddling, much to our annoyance at the time.

That said, it is true that we are slaves to our cultures, most of us, most of the time, and in that sense culture is certainly causative.

The author *is* Muslim. He is Pakistani by origin, and worked for Benazir Bhutto. No doubt the current situation in Pakistan is a big worry to him.

The way I interpret the article is that not that 'Muslim culture' is harming Arab countries; but that Muslim countries are suffering decline in a number of ways, and that the problem is aggravated by a 'culture of anger', which leads to violence, xenophobia, and distractions from real problems within their societies. 'Angry rhetoric...keeps Muslims in a constant state of fear that Islam and Islamic culture are in danger of being snuffed out, resulting in a persistent cycle of violence as Muslims respond to the perceived threat posed by both external and sectarian enemies.....At the same time, this culture of anger prevents Muslims from examining the internal problems that plague the Islamic world, such as repressive governments, sectarian conflict, and a lack of democratic representation.'

I don't think this these remarks any more bigoted or unreasonable than, or indeed very different from, what many of us DU say of Bush and the American Right and their allies. Most would agree here that Bush et al whip up anger and fear against real, potential and imagined terrorists and other outsiders to gain support, and to escape responsibility for the effects of their own bad policies (including decline in several important areas); and that many voters at least in the past have fallen into their trap. I think that the author is implying that RW leaders in the Muslim world are doing the same, and that following such leaders in their xenophobia interferes with addressing real social and political problems in their societies. The 'culture' being referred to is IMO the current *political* culture in some Muslim countries of fear and anger and blaming outsiders, not Muslim culture as such.

I am not saying these things are not disfunctional, as he points out, I am saying those symptoms did not arise in some sort of vacuum. You can see the same symptoms in the non-muslim world, as you point out, in various places, and that means that any attempt to explain them as caused by muslim culture, as opposed to some other culture, must fail. They are a result and a tool of political repression, not something dictated by special characteristics of muslims or muslim culture as such.

But I also feel that you're arguing against a point the OP wasn't making. He began with the premise that the Muslim world is in decline and collectively lacks a sense of accomplishment. He attributes the subsequent strife to this widespread problem, but he never mentions the origin of the problem itself. Whether it is caused by colonialism or a cultural "flaw" is not discussed.

Haqqani argues that a lack of economic, intellectual, cultural, and technological productivity in the Muslim world has left a vacuum that has been filled by paranoia and inflammatory rhetoric, fueling “a culture of political anger, rather than political solutions.”

He is saying that the vacuum is the cause of this "culture of political strife", not that political strife is an innate part of Muslim culture itself. He simply never says that Muslim culture is the cause of its decline. In the OP he isn't even examining the decline itself at all.

Here's my question though. He is asking why so much of the world's violence and instability seems centered around Muslim countries, and you answer that it is due to political and economic meddling by the west, not because of anything from within their cultures or religion, right? Why is it then that the strife in question seems to center around Muslim countries so much more than non-Muslim ones? For example, why is Pakistan so much more fucked up than India? Why didn't even a relatively violent conflict like the Maoist insurgency in Nepal render the entire country an unsafe warzone, like it does in so many Muslim nations. (Despite America supplying the government with arms, tourists could safely travel in Maoist-held territory.) Why was Salman Rushdie sentenced to death, why did Palestinians attack their European protectors in Hebron over Danish cartoons, and why was the real anger and violence over these incidents SO extreme and widespread in the Muslim world while I can't think of similar examples in non-Muslim countries? Basically, why doesn't Lhasa look like Gaza?

or indeed anything much about the original history behind the problems. I would be surprised if a Pakistani *didn't* think that colonialism was a bad thing and a historical cause of many problems - though since I haven't read any of his other writings, I don't know. But I think what he's saying here is that concentrating on fearing and hating foreigners is interfering with the Muslim countries actually doing more about their own social and political problems in the present. I don't think that this is 'something dicated by special characteristics of Muslims or Muslim culture as such', or that the author thinks so; except that many of the countries that identify politically as Muslim currently have theocratic, RW, xenophobic governments. The author does not think that Muslim culture is inherently a bad thing; he thinks that Muslim culture, which was once very successful, is now suffering a decline, and that the leaders and citizens of such countries need to devote more effort to internal reform, and less to whipping up fear and hatred of Others. Exactly the same sort of thing could be, and is, said about other countries and groups that succumb to RW xenophobia; and indeed are frequently and rightly said here on DU about America under Bush.

The difference between 'aggravated by' and 'caused by' is that the latter refers to the original causes of the problems - which may not be treatable or reversible at this stage (e.g. we can't make it so that colonialism never happened, much as one might wish to); while the former refers to ongoing factors which it might be possible to do something about.

Now, I *may* be misinterpreting the article, especially as I have not read any of the author's other articles. The author may be rejecting RW xenophobic Islamism only to jump into RW xenophobic American cultural imperialism - but that isn't how the article came across to me. But I think that one has to be a bit careful about assuming that reformists who want to modernize their cultures/ countries from within, and are concerned about xenophobia becoming an excuse for leaders not doing so, are necessarily against their own cultures, or unaware of real external threats. That is a little like the common RW assumption that American liberals who want social and political reforms in their own country, and are concerned about Bush and his supporters using the War on Terror as an excuse for suppressing civil liberties, must be anti-American and soft on terrorism.

It's called "xenophobia" and it is not an Arab invention.

I am not saying Arabs are intrinsically better than other peoples.
I'm saying they are not any worse.

When you prop up bad, disfunctional, hate-mongering governments, which the Western powers commonly do, you aquire some responsibility for the results; and it is dishonest and evil to attribute the bad results to the native deficiencies of the people you have harmed by your interference.

The OP is just a fellow that is getting on with his life by internalizing the opinions of the people that pay him, he doesn't matter at all, but the opinions he expresses are dishonest drivel.

I would guess that he is, or at least feels, exiled from his country because of the RW politics there; and that this is affecting his views. (He is not Arab but Pakistani.)

Perhaps we are interpreting the phrase 'culture of hate' differently. You think that he is saying that 'hate' is an intrinsic part of *Muslim* culture. I think he's saying that a political culture of hate, which is part of current politics, not part of Islam, is preventing Muslim countries from advancing as much as they could, or maintaining their former advances. He is not saying IMO that Muslims or Arabs are worse than others; but Muslim culture is what principally concerns him, as a Muslim reformer. Exactly the same sort of thing can be, and is, said about the malign influences of RW xenophobia within American, and other Western, culture. Some people do interpret American reformers, who argue that Bush's 'culture of hate' is damaging America, as implying anti-Americanism; I don't. The same here.

I don't think he's talking about 'native deficiencies' of Arabs/Muslims, but about what he perceives as deficiencies in their current leadership and political systems. Again, this may reflect a difference in our interpretation of how the word 'culture' is being used. You are interpreting it in the ethnic sense of 'culture'; I think it is being used more in the sense that British writers and policymakers on all sides frequently say things like: "British industry does not reward excellence, resulting in a culture of mediocrity"; "The culture of managerialism in British schools is harming education"; etc. I could be wrong - and there could even be a sort of cultural difference in the ways that British and American people use the word 'culture'(!) - which may affect our perceptions.

I am not defending xenophobia, whether muslim, israeli, or american. It is definitely a bad thing.

I don't see any reason to think that Arabs or Muslims are any more xenophobic than the English or Dutch or Americans or Jews, or that the effects are any more pernicious in muslim countries than in Western countries. So what I object to is the singling out of Arabs and/or Muslims for examination in this regard, not the discussion of the perils of xenophobia.

. . the main effect of Western "meddling" has been to force modernization in those areas of Arab society that required relationships with Western powers - such as banking, etc.

The Mandate was not colonialist. It was a temporary administration set up by France and England expressly to help Arabs modernize. The West provided military protection, education, training, etc. for the indigenous people - and in most cases a framework for a working democracy. The purpose was actually to help them better resist colonization from other totalitarian regimes in the ME and SE Asia.

The purpose was to make them more modern so they could defend themselves and become allies of the west at the same time. It was not to dominate them. Obviously, that upset those who already had positions of power under the Ottomans and who could lose that power in a more democratic society. The Arab political and religious elites have been kicking and screaming against modernization ever since - calling it a western plot to destroy their religion and their culture.

If you want to go back a few centuries, Muslims dominated the whole Mediterranean, all of N Africa, much of India and SE Asia and ruled half of Spain as well. Their decline was due IMO to the militaristic and supremacist nature of Islam with respect to other religions and cultures. Not to Western "meddling". The art and science they acquired was mostly by absorbing other cultures that they conquered with the sword of Islam. Once those scholars who lived through the conquest because they submitted to Islam, died out - there was little further creativity in the arts and sciences in Islamic society. Islam started its decline well before the Ottomans came to power and it's been downhill ever since - despite western efforts over the last century to halt that decline by offering them a path to modernization and many billions in aid.

Yes, they were only trying to help, just like Bush in Iraq.

So you think that being "militaristic and supremacist" causes cultural decline? I might agree with that, but I might not apply it in a way that you like.

You need to read up on the muslim period in the Iberian peninsula.

In fact they had very selfish reasons to want the people of Egypt and the Arabian Peninsula, who sat on trillions of barrels of oil and sat astride the Suez canal, as allies. They mostly engaged in geopolitics to do it - which meant providing aid with strings attached and humanitarian projects to marginalize our cold war enemies - like the Aswan Dam.

But, they didn't colonize them and had no intention to do so. And, the meddling had nothing to do with preventing modernization which was your premise. Modernization was our main goal. Today, just as then, the West and average Arabs (not the elite) would have been the main beneficiaries of Arab modernization.

I claimed that successful industrialization and modernization require sovereignty, autonomy, and I pointed out several examples. The European powers have continued to intervene to overthrow governments that are not to their liking up to the present day. Iran had a democratic modernizing government in the fifties, which the CIA overthrew and replaced with the Shah. A few decades later the Shah was replaced with the present islamic government, which having again achieved autonomy is proceeding in the direction of political, social, and economic modernization. This annoys various parties no end and is seen as a "threat". Maybe it even is a threat. But it does not support the idea that we only are trying to help the poor benighted souls to find the light. Turkey is a good example of progress towards modernization after achieving national independence too. There are, of course, a number of Arab powers that have not done so well. Independence is necessary but not sufficient.

The British rule in Egypt hamstrung progress by interfering in economic and political development. You cannot do economic modernization while imposing a mercatile economic dependency. The Middle East has always been seen by the Western powers as a source of labor and raw materials and a sink for European processed goods. There is no freedom without economic freedom.

The US has claimed hegemony over Latin America for two hundreds years. The primary effect has been to thwart any semblance of social, economic, or political modernization; and the US government is now about to have a cow because the Latin Americans are finally breaking free and making their own decisions.

" . . trying to help the poor benighted souls to find the light?"

These are known as straw-men in the BS trade. I never said such things or anything like it. But, have fun attacking them. :thumbsup:

:hi:

I doubt MsMghee was saying that anything was done in the best interests of any country under discussion. But that doesn't mean that the west is to blame for the whole of their current state of affairs either. Yes, the west intervened in many areas when it seemed in their best interests to do so. But that is also true of the mid eastern states themselves, look at Syria and Lebanon for instance. The fact is that geo-political power plays were/are a fact of life, and part of why many post-colonial success stories ARE successes hinges on their leaders' acuity in this area. Places like the Czech Republic were under the USSR's colonial thumb for decades, yet emerged with certain skills still intact that enabled them to take advantage of the post-soviet situation and become productive, solvent countries.

Nations like saudi arabia and kuwait have plenty of natural resources and money that could have been invested in their countries' education and technology industries, or whatever. There's no reason that someplace with zero resources like Japan can be a success and Kuwait can't. It's never as simple as "Oh, western colonialism left all these places unable to build or be successful on their own." Colonialism played a role, I understand, it's not for nothing that Thailand is nearly the most successful SE Asian country while also being the only one never colonized. But its next door neighbor Cambodia's problems can't be hitched exclusively to the west either. It can sometimes appear so, but I would also suggest that there is a difference between "the west causing a problem" and "a problem arising in part because of bad diplomatic choices made with the west." Cambodia might look very different today had King Sihanouk not been deposed by Lon Nol.

The problem with blaming all of Arabia's problems on the west is that not everyone's doing so terribly. Namely, Israel. What is the difference between Israel's beginning and that of the surrounding states? If anything, Israel started out with a few more strikes against her than they did. Having to immediately fight an expensive war despite facing arms sanctions, followed by extremely expensive military needs that sapped crucial dollars and manpower; facing diplomatic, economic and material sanctions from most of the world which eventually limited her trading partners to basically America and south africa, etc. Remember that Israel wasn't getting any aid from the US or France or anyone during its initial years. By the time she started getting real amounts of aid from the US, Israel was already doing far better than the surrounding states in terms of the kinds of accomplishments being discussed. And all that aid from the US was being matched by the USSR to Israel's rivals anyway, so we know it isn't about that. (Egypt gets almost as much $$ from the US as Israel does right now.)

So, why is that? What was the difference between Israel and Jordan, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon that made Israel a success and these states *not*?

within Israel who does better as a group, the Ashkenazim or the Sephardim?

Your statement- So, why is that? What was the difference between Israel and Jordan, Egypt, Syria and Lebanon that made Israel a success and these states *not*?

Seems very close to the same could be said for different groups within Israel why do European Jews generally do better then Arab Jews?

Could it be that Israels original founders were were well educated European Jews? How else could it be that even prior to partition the Daniel Sieff Institute, now known as the Weizmann Institute was founded? Israel did well because it's original leaders came from the colonial culture, the original Zionists were not the ultra right wingers of today, they were in fact leftists, closely related to Marxists and as such part "intellectual elite" of their time. Now it is true that in in places like Poland and Russia Jews were persecuted, in places like Paris and Berlin they were not, keep in mind I am talking about the time period from about 1880-1930.

Arab Jews came from the same colonized culture that Arabs did and as such tended to be less educated and modernized.

As to the Arab countries of today while most came out of colonial rule at about the same time as Israel and as you point out have vast natural resources those resources stayed under western control until the seventies.

Mostly because the mizrahim dealt with institutionalized racism within Israel as well. In terms of the Jordanians vs. the Israelis however, the founders essentially grew up under the Mandate in both cases. I am arguing that it was a cultural difference that allowed Israel success while denying it to others. I just don't think it sprung solely from colonialisms effects though.

It would be difficult to pick out a more disenfranchised group of people than Jewish refugees following WWII. If the colonial mentality was a burden for those from Arab lands, the holocaust and subsequent pogroms and expulsions severely yoked the capabilities of the state of Israel's first Jewish immigrants.

Plus, Israel is successful despite having to overcome the fact that it is an immigrant culture. Jews from wildly disparate cultures had to learn to work together and make the state a success. There's no question that Israel faced greater hardship in nearly every category than her neighbors did.

As to the Arab countries of today while most came out of colonial rule at about the same time as Israel and as you point out have vast natural resources those resources stayed under western control until the seventies.

And what have they done with it since then? Or the wealth it generated beforehand? Regardless, Israel had none of this at all to help as an economic engine or safety net. Oil was an incredible headstart, even if they got ripped off somewhat.

that emigrated to Israel may have been disenfranchised, however they did not for the most part barring magor brain damage or injury lose their pre-Holocaust skills, the European survivors were by and large educated skilled people, if one was a Doctor, or scientist, carpenter or a plumber you still had those skills and they were put to good use.

As for this part And what have they done with it since then? Or the wealth it generated beforehand? Regardless, Israel had none of this at all to help as an economic engine or safety net. Oil was an incredible headstart, even if they got ripped off somewhat.

I find this argument a bit like the Reaganites of the late '70's and early '80's reasoning for ending the "war on poverty", well it's been 16 years and look there's still poverty so obviously those______are too lazy shiftless, just plain do not want change.
It takes more then 16 or 35 years to undo what was created over centuries, there are changes in most of the Arab world. there is even somewhat of a womens movement Saudi Arabia but it will take time although it will happen.

Where the hell do you get your information?

Israel is a success because of the will and determination of the people who live there, who have fought annhilation for their entire lives. Many Israelis have made a prosperous life, not because of any help from anyone in the world (and don't trot out the US and their "aid", which is mostly funneled back into the US economy anyway, in the form of arms purchases) but because of their dedication to education and hard work. The end.

I said most European Holocaust survivors were skilled and educated are you denying this? What they were goat herders? I don't think so

Any aid from the US received in Israels early days was mostly from private donations, I never deyed that Israel worked hard, what I am saying is that there was an advantage in that a greater percentage of the population was educated.

As far as arms purchases from the US most of the US aid is military and in the form of arms/ As it stands Israel is now the worlds 4th largest arms exporter.

If you find what I have had to say so far unconvincing, then you will just have to stay unconvinced.

thanks so much for sharing.