The Truth and Illusion of Islamic Fundamentalism

THE TRUTH AND ILLUSION OF ISLAMIC FUNDAMENTALISM Jahangir Amuzegar Islamic fundamentalism has now replaced the old Yellow Peril and the Red Menace as the perceivedthreat to the West. The recent surge ofIslamic militancy in the Middle East, North Africa, Central and Southeast Asia, and elsewhere has attracted a good deal of attention and concern in the West.1 Bittermemoriesofrevolutionaryexcesses, reports ofstate-sponsored terrorism, and the evidence of human rights violations associated with Iran's Islamic Republic have led many to view political Islam with alarm. This is largely because the Islamic resurgence has often been equated with a rejection ofsecular democracy, a repudiation ofwhat George Bush called the "new world order," and hostility to free enterprise. Militant Islam has been depicted as a new foe of the United States, replacing international communism. Fanciful tales that characterized the Bank ofCredit and Commerce International as a Moslem-owned bank aiming to dominate and control Western financial institutions, or which depicted Bosnian Moslems as wishing to create a radical Islamic state in the heart of Europe, have 1.See Judith Miller, "The Islamic Wave," TheNew York Times Magazine, May 31, 1992, and "The Challenge of Radical Islam," Foreign Affairs (Spring 1993). 2.See "The Real BCCI Agenda: Islam," TAe New York Times, August 8, 1992; and "Bosnian Serbs Say They're Fighting Against Islamic Fundamentalism," Washington Post, August 11, 1992. Jahangir Amuzegar is an international economic consultant, a former executive director of the International Monetary Fund, and a former member of the SAIS faculty. His most recent work, Iran's Economy Under the Islamic Republic, will be published shortly by LB. Tauris & Co, London and New York. 127 128 SAIS REVIEW intensified nascent suspicions.2 Underlying these concerns have come dark hints at the prospects of a billion Moslems, uniting worldwide one day to challenge Western secular institutions and the Western way oflife.3 Some commentators argue that America, as the sole superpower, should confront the Islamic challenge "resolutely and perhaps brutally,""while others ask the world "to curb and fight this menacing phenomenon."4 The opposite view holds that resurgent Islamic activism should by no means be regarded as a threat but as a competitive challenge. The wilUngness ofIslamic activists in Algeria, Indonesia,Jordan, Kuwait, andLebanon to use generally accepted political processes to gain power has been cited as an indication that the Islamic renaissance is a legitimate democratic alternative to the status quo. Consequently, the argument runs, Islam and democracy are assuredly compatible.5 Besides appearing as a powerful symbol of legitimacy in many Moslem countries, democracy is depicted as an integral part of modern Islamic thought and practice.6 The West is therefore advised to seek peaceful coexistence with Islam. The chasm between these opposing views is significant not merely as a matter of intellectual curiosity, but as an ultimate basis for policy and action. Failure by the West, particularly the United States, to understand the true nature and aspirations of Islamic fundamentalists is likely to result in a protracted and fruitless confrontation with the Moslem world. It may also lead to a risky and imprudent complacency in the face of a threat to vital Western interests in the Persian Gulf, and a menace to moderate Arab governments in the Middle East. An objective assessment of political Islam may help find proper responses to the rising challenge.7 Islamic Diversity The prospects of a unified Pan-Islamic threat to the non-Moslem world can easily be dismissed as political myth or elitist paranoia. Islamic funda3 ."New Dawn Beckons for Islam Unlimited," Middle East Economic Digest, July 3, 1992. 4.See, for example, B.R. McGuinn, "Why the Fundamentalists Are Winning," The New York Times, March 22, 1993; and Gad Yaacobi, "We Must Act Now," The New York Times, March 23, 1993. 5.Robin Wright, "Islam, Democracy, and the West," Foreign Affairs (Summer 1992), and L.T. Hadar, "What Green Peril?," Foreign Affairs (Spring 1993). 6.See John Esposito, TheIslamic Threat, Myth orReality, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992). 7.The term Islamic fundamentalism is evidently borrowed from Christianity and has no specific connotation in classical Islam. As used in the Western press, it commonly refers to a militant, revolutionary, tendency involving...