By Arshad Alam, New Age Islam
28 April 2018
Over half a billion
Muslims, nearly one third of their total population, live in contexts in
which they are minorities. The context of their being minority differs
from place to place. In places like Europe, this is the result of result
migration owing to the wars in Arab world. These communities are new,
and need to adjust to the new political environment which they find
themselves in, which is very different from their home Muslim
majoritarian context.
Then there are Muslim
minority contexts which are in the form of historically established
communities who have been living together with other communities for
centuries. India is an obvious example. Yet, over the years, owing to a
number of factors, there has been a growing alienation of the Muslim
minority communities. Some reasons for this are internal: there is
increasing reliance on particular readings of religious texts which is
weaning Muslims away from their shared cultural contexts. But the
problem is also from the outside: increasing Islamophobia has meant that
Muslims have come to be considered as untrustworthy and their religion
as the epitome of backwardness.
In some places, such
stereotypical construction of Islam and Muslims have resulted is pure
unadulterated hate towards them. Muslim minorities have been the unfair
targets of discriminatory policies including from the highest echelons
of the state.
Rohingyas for
example, have been systematically made stateless through a series of
state level policies designed to obliterate their language, identity and
citizenship rights. While these minorities have negotiated their
trajectory within the political limits of their respective
nation-states, there was always a need for a platform to bring them
together, perhaps to listen to their specific problems and formulate a
strategy so that internationally they can act as a pressure group in
order to influence policy decisions.
It is for this reason
alone that the proposed establishment of World Council of Muslim
Minorities should be welcomed. The stated objectives of the proposed
Council is to “coordinate the efforts of Muslim minority institutions
and enhance their role by encouraging members of Muslim minorities to
contribute to the renaissance of their states, correcting the
stereotypical image of Islam and Muslim minorities and bridging the
intellectual and cultural gap between the components of the human
society”. The council also aims to “promote cultural pluralism and
respect for the cultural and intellectual specificities of the Muslim
minorities in the world and to promote the values of moderation,
dialogue, tolerance and national belonging, and to reject religious
fanaticism and hatred of others and to promote the civil and political
rights of Muslim minorities as an inherent human right in accordance
with international and national convention”.
The stated objectives
of the Council are laudable. However, there are certain important things
which the proposed Council should deliberate when they meet in May at
Abu Dhabi. The first is the very political locus of this initiative. A
platform like this should have been initiated through the efforts of
Muslims who live in minority situations. What we see here is quite the
reverse: the call to establish such a Council has come from a Muslim
majority context. What is perhaps more disturbing is the very tone of
paternalism adopted by the founders of the Council. They state that they
were ‘obliged’ to establish this platform after learning about the
difficulties that Muslims living in minority contexts are facing.
Now, there is no
denying the fact that Muslims in minority contexts do have their share
of the problem, but then this is a problem which should have been
resolved by them. They should have been the initiators of such a
political action. In taking away the agency from Muslim minority
contexts that actually experience discrimination, the Arab world is
trying to re-establish its hegemony over the rest of the Muslim world.
There is therefore a very real danger that the voices of those Muslims
who are experiencing alienation would not be represented in such a
forum.
Therefore, one of the
first measures that the proposed Council should adopt is to have
adequate representation of Muslims from minority contexts in its
executive body. Any failure to do so will certainly send a signal that
the Council is not serious at all in the welfare of Muslim minorities.
Secondly, it is
certainly admirable to talk of promoting pluralism as one of the aims of
the Council. However, fostering pluralism should not just be done at an
inter-community level but also at the intra-community level. What is
being argued here is that without looking at the internal dynamics
within Muslim societies, it will not be possible to promote pluralism
and dialogue between Muslims and other communities. The Council aims to
correct the perception of Islam amongst non-Muslims and for this it
wants to present the true face of Islam to other communities.
However, there is a
huge problem here: there is no correct way of defining Islam and hence
search for the true face of Islam will always remain illusory. What is
more worrisome is that from the moderate to the most radical factions
within Islam, all claim to be the true face of Islam. Recognizing the
plurality of Islamic tradition itself therefore is a more refreshing
idea; something which the proposed Council is silent about.
Coming back to the
question of internal pluralism within Muslim societies, it should be
fostered on priority. The proposed Council must see to it that the
internal diversity within Muslims-culturally and religiously-must be
reflected within all decision making bodies of the Council. We know that
Sunnis have deep mistrust of the Shias and vice versa. We also know
both together look at the Ahmadiyyas as a heretic community within
Muslims and therefore beyond the pale of Islam. The question that needs
to asked of this Council is whether these communities and by extension
these historically valid interpretations of Islam will be part of the
leadership of the Council or not. It is all very good to talk of
dialogue, moderation and pluralism, but such noble intentions will make
more sense when we ask ourselves the more difficult question as to why
we lack these things within our own societies in the first place.
Arshad Alam is a NewAgeIslam.com columnist
6:06 PM
Moderate Islamist here
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