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ByTarek Heggy
The idea for this article took shape while I was watching a panel
discussion between two distinguished Egyptian intellectuals over the
agreement reached in Nairobi last month between the Sudan People’s
Liberation Army (SPLA), led by John Garang, and the Khartoum government.
The debate was a study in contrasts, an exchange between two men belonging
to different stages of historical development. One came across as a
throwback to a bygone era, his cultural terms of reference and political
discourse locked in the mind-set which held sway in the region up to the
nineteen sixties, while the other, despite being an octogenarian, spoke
the language of the age and displayed a sound grasp of the profound
changes which have swept the world over the last thirty years. Going
beyond the static confines of the question put to him by his interlocutor,
who asked him whether the Nairobi agreement was “good or bad” for
Egypt, the latter launched into an elaborate reply which can be summarized
as follows:
“The answer depends on us. If we continue to look upon Sudan as an
Egyptian invention… if we continue to talk of Sudan as though it were a
part of Egypt like it was in the days of Mohamed Ali and his sons… if we
continue to warn that any encroachment on the sources of the Nile waters
will be met with dire consequences…that kind of static, backward-looking
thinking will inevitably lead to a situation in which the agreement will
be harmful for us. On the other hand, if we place matters in their proper
perspective and deal with the issue in accordance with the realities of
the age… if we can establish a healthy and constructive dialogue based
on mutual respect with all the concerned parties… if we work to forge
common interests with those parties in the context of the new realities
and not on the basis of antiquated slogans, then the Nairobi agreement can
be beneficial for Egypt.”
Apparently not realizing that his question had been answered, the first
panelist continued to press his interlocutor for a reply. As I looked on
in consternation, it occurred to me that what we were seeing here was more
than a simple misunderstanding, that it was in fact indicative of a much
deeper problem, a kind of intellectual inertia that has come to
characterize the thought processes of many among us, public figures and
private individuals alike. The problem manifests itself in a tendency to
indulge in what I call static thinking, where the terms of reference are
not present-day realities but cliches and slogans which, though obsolete,
continue to be regarded by many as the ultimate truth, as constants carved
in stone. Actually, the word ‘constants’ is meaningless in the rapidly
changing landscape of today’s world, even when used in reference to what
makes up our cultural specificity. For what is specific to our culture, or
to any culture for that matter, includes not only positive but also
negative features, all of which are amenable to change. In other words,
they are variables, not constants. But instead of placing our faith in the
only real constants in our world, which are science, strategic interests
and humanity, we choose to wallow in nostalgia, clinging to
pan-nationalism and narrow parochialism as though they were immutable
truths.
The greatest proof that our thinking is inward-looking, past-oriented and
out of step with the times lies in the fact that the outside world finds
our slogans totally incomprehensible and is consequently not interested in
reading what our writers and intellectuals have to say. Of course, this
does not apply to the works of our creative writers, who do have an
audience transcending the language barrier. Nor does it apply to a certain
political writer, whose works have an appreciative audience in the outside
world, not because his readers necessarily agree with what he says but
because of the high quality of his writing. By and large, however, we have
dug ourselves into a cave, cut off from the rest of humanity thanks to a
static mind-set that ignores the realities of our time and the new
balances of power. We have managed to isolate ourselves even from such
staunch former allies as India, China the countries of Eastern Europe and
Russia, which have distanced themselves from our position on many issues.
The reason is that these countries have evolved with the times and adapted
themselves to the requirements of the age, while we remain locked in a
fantasy world of our own making, speaking a language that is
incomprehensible to all but the initiated, a world in which anachronistic
slogans are still widely regarded as sacrosanct, immutable constants. This
has resulted not only in our growing isolation from the outside world and
in alienating our former allies, but in a disastrous internal situation
marked by a pattern of lost opportunities and a climate inimical to
democracy and development.
Proceeding as it does from so-called constants while ignoring the givens
of contemporary reality, this closed system feeds our propensity for
dealing with challenges in a static, fatalistic manner. Such a passive
approach is natural in cultures which believe the future is a kind of
mythical being that already exists in its final shape, regardless of
anything they do today. A very different approach is found in societies
whose citizens in general, and whose elites in particular, believe they
can play an effective role in shaping the future. These societies do not
believe in an abstract, absolute being called the Future; rather, they
believe that, as the famous exponent of existentialism, Jean-Paul Sartre,
put it: “There is no such thing called the future; the future is what we
make it today.” The absence of effective participation encourages a
deterministic perception of the future as preordained and inevitable,
which in turn encourages the belief that this mythical being is shaped by
others to serve their own interests. From there, it is one easy step to
subscribe wholeheartedly to the conspiracy theory!
It is true that the history of humanity, of life itself, is one of bloody
conflict and ferocious struggle. But it is also true that the engine of
history is driven by people who believe that their actions can affect the
course of events, people who see themselves as active participants in
shaping the future, not by those who sit on the sidelines and wait
passively for whatever life decides to throw at them. The former strive to
create a future whose features conform as closely as possible to their
ideal vision of what that future should be; the latter wait for a future
that can only be disappointing because it is the creation of others. The
tendency to believe that no human agency can affect the shape of things to
come is natural in societies like ours, where destiny, not human will, is
seen as playing the leading role in determining the present and the
future. This feature is more salient in our culture than it is in any
other. Of course, every culture believes in destiny to one degree or
another. The real issue is the hold that belief has over the lives of the
majority of people within a society. In some societies, people sit and
wait passively for whatever fate has in store for them, on the grounds
that they can do nothing to change what is written in the stars. In
others, people believe they have a say in determining their lot, on the
grounds that the future is still in the making and what they do in the
present can affect its ultimate shape.
I wrote this article after re-reading two books I had first read thirty
years ago, when I was in my early twenties. One, entitled “The
Incoherence of the Philosophers”, is by Abu Hamid Al-Ghazali, known as
Algazel in mediaeval Europe; the other, entitled “The Incoherence of the
Incoherence”, is by Ibn Rushd, or Averroes, as he is known in the West,
the most outstanding Arab philosopher of his time. The books represent a
bitter conflict between the representatives of two schools: Al-Ghazali was
the proponent of tradition and orthodoxy, Ibn Rushd believed in the
primacy of reason. The conflict waged ten centuries ago ended in the
victory of the former over the latter, with disastrous consequences for
our societies today. That is why we have become spectators rather than
participants on the stage of life, looking on as others act in the drama
unfolding before our eyes. Like all audiences, our role is limited to
applauding or booing the actors or, occasionally, to adding new jokes to
our already impressive repertoire.
While we turned our backs on Ibn Rushd, Western Europe adopted his defense
of Aristotelian philosophy at a time Europe was the arena for a similar
conflict between reason and tradition. But while the school of reason
prevailed in Europe, we followed the teachings of Al-Ghazali, elevating
him to the rank of Hujjat al-Islam (proof of Islam). In fact, the man who
deserves that title is Ibn Rushd, whose enlightened approach shines
through in one of his most famous works, Fasl al-maqal, in which he calls
philosophy the companion and foster-sister of the Shari’ah. Readers
interested in Ibn Rushd’s influence on thirteenth century Europe are
referred to the chapter entitled “Ibn Rushd and the Enlightenment” in
Dr. Murad Wahba’s book, “The Holders of Absolute Truth” (1999, pp.
105 to 110).
Our fatalistic approach to the future is even more at odds with the times
if viewed from the perspective of modern management, the newest member of
the group of social sciences and, since its introduction as an independent
discipline in the second half of the twentieth century, arguably the most
important one of all. The word ‘impossible’ does not exist in the
lexicon of modern management science, which assumes that, as long as we
have a vision of our future goal, as long as we lay down the strategies,
plans, programmes and policies that will serve as our bridge towards that
future and, finally, as long as we make optimal use of available
resources, particularly human resources, we are sure to reach our goal.
But such an outlook needs a cultural climate that is not dominated by a
fatalistic acceptance of the vicissitudes of fortune, a climate in which
people recognize that the shape of their future will be determined largely
by their actions in the here and now. It also requires a climate in which
citizens are encouraged to participate actively in all spheres of life, as
well as one in which a healthy process of social mobility allows the best
elements in society, the men and women who are equipped to help it achieve
its desired goals, to rise to the top of the societal pyramid.
How such a climate can be achieved is a subject beyond the limitations of
one article or even an entire book. In writing this article, I hoped only
to draw attention to the magnitude and complexity of the problem we are
facing. The question of society’s ability to shed its fatalistic
attitude in favour of a more affirmative approach as a precondition for
rising to the challenges of the present and the future is related to many
other issues, such as people’s understanding of religion and the
prevailing religious culture, the cultural formation of religious leaders,
educational programmes and curricula, general freedoms and the degree to
which democratic values have taken root in society. It is also related to
the general cultural climate as well as to one of the most important
issues in any society, namely, the status of women. As a general rule,
civic participation in societies which marginalize the role of half their
citizens tends to be poor. In fact, I believe the status of women in any
society is a pivotal issue in its cultural formation and intellectual
development. Until we reach a stage in which the notion of complete
equality between the sexes takes hold in society, and until the necessary
mechanisms to translate that notion into practical measures are put in
place, we are doomed to remain hostage to our fatalistic mind-set,
allowing destiny to rule our lives while we sit on the sidelines waiting
for whatever tomorrow may bring instead of playing an active role in
shaping the future.
The reader is entitled to ask what the common denominator is between the
various issues addressed by this article. The answer to that question lies
in the account I gave at the beginning of the article about the debate
over the Nairobi agreement, which encapsulates two different attitudes
towards the event: one static, which proceeds from the assumption that we
are helpless onlookers with no choice but to wait for the future to unfold
as it will; the other dynamic, which assumes that we can and, indeed,
must, have a say in determining its ultimate shape. In other words, the
common denominator between all the issues raised in the article is our
mind-set and the passive way we deal with external challenges, present and
future. Our thinking has to become more forceful, dynamic and imaginative
if we are to rise to the many challenges facing us. The greater the degree
of our involvement in and awareness of the realities of the age, the more
we liberate ourselves from obsolete slogans, the better our prospects of
confronting these challenges successfully. This applies in all cases, not
only in respect of the Nairobi agreement, which is just an example used to
illustrate the fundamental message of this article. What we need to
realize before it is too late is that our static mind-set can only lead to
greater loss, while a dynamic approach based on active participation can
do just the opposite.
In 1784, the great philosopher Immanuel Kant published a remarkable essay
under the title “An Answer To The Question: ‘What is
Enlightenment’?” What he had to say on the subject is worthy of
contemplation in our current situation: “A revolution may well put an
end to autocratic despotism and to rapacious or power-seeking oppression,
but it will never produce a true reform in ways of thinking. Instead, new
prejudices, like the ones they replaced, will serve as a leash to control
the great unthinking mass.…For enlightenment of this kind, all that is
needed is freedom. And the freedom in question is the most innocuous form
of all freedom to make public use of one’s reason in all matters.”
Kant believed enlightenment came from using the human mind, not human
instincts, not human links with the past and not human emotions, That, I
think, sums up the message this article has tried to convey.
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