Strategy of Islamic Cultural Action in the West

Adopted at the Ninth Islamic Summit Conference held in Doha – State of Qatar, 2000

Chapter One  : Motivations

The rationale behind adopting the Strategy of the Islamic Cultural Action in the West lies in the need to put forward the methodology and style of Islamic practice in the cultural arena. The Strategy is also motivated by the peculiar reality in which the Muslim communities in Western countries live, and the challenges this reality involves. A look at this reality would reveal that international immigration, one of the most important phenomena related to population dynamism in this century, has provided a new status to the host countries which have become multicultural communities. This has driven these countries to put forward certain plans relating to social, cultural and educational fields, all of which target the "integration" of immigrant communities and minorities in the existing system with its secular options and morals. However, these plans have always been resisted, especially when they involve Muslim communities. This resistance is motivated primarily by the insistence of these Muslim communities on standing by their identity and the authentic Islamic peculiarity. This insistence, by the Muslims in the West, however does not mean self-isolation. Rather, the Muslim immigrant community in the West turned out to be capable of economic integration, and effectively contributed in the realm of production. They have shown that they can co-exist with the host population in an atmosphere of cooperation and harmony. They have also demonstrated that they are able to be open vis-à-vis universal human civilization and to interact with it, preserving their spiritual and moral superiority and distinguishability(1).

Taking into consideration the changes the world has witnessed in recent decades, especially the aspiration of economic globalization to become cultural globalization, imposing a single cultural model worldwide; and given that the cultural problematic constitutes a kernel issue in international relations, “cultural contact and the conflict of cultures may raise in the future issues exceeding in size and number those resulting from unfair economic and social exchange”(2).

Taking all this into consideration, it seems that international relations and conflicts would revolve around “the cultural problematic” in the next decades. This is because the determination to impose a single cultural model would bump into other peoples’ cultures, one of which is the Islamic culture.

The danger of “culture unification” is now threatening Islamic people in their own countries due to the globalization of communication, let alone the Muslim immigrant communities and minorities living in a non-Islamic environment, where the new generations of Muslims are raised in institutions not meant for them in the first place.

This has resulted in the emergence of a wide set of individuals from the second and third generations who do not master their native language. Nor do they know the principles of the Islamic Sharia’. This indicates that the Muslim in the West suffers from a serious shortage in the field of educational socialization and Islamic education. While these immigrant communities accept positive integration in Western societies, they strongly refuse the idea of giving up their identity. However, preserving identity requires a valid Islamic education. It also calls for carefully prepared programmes relating to education, guidance and social welfare from an Islamic perspective. Due to cultural, civilizational and ideological pressures and challenges of the West, the educational requirements for the Muslim communities in the West have become a tangible fact. And the Islamic parties concerned should work towards satisfying these needs. In what immediately follows, we will list the motivations behind putting forward a strategy for the Islamic cultural action in western countries :

1- Settlement of Islamic communities in Western countries :

The population factor has an important impact on evaluating the type of activities of a given population. The long settlement of the Muslim communities in the West, together with their concentration in areas close to each other, has resulted in population centres with peculiar characteristics. For instance, the birth rate in the Islamic communities exceeds in certain areas that of western families. In some countries, it is even noticed that the birth histogramme shows regressions. The table below(3) shows the birth rate of immigrants in Brussels, compared to that of native citizens :

Many immigration researchers have raised the need for the notion of “immigrant” or "alien", taking into consideration the increase of birth rate in Muslim communities and their settlement in western countries; the fact that these communities have given up the idea of returning home, especially after immigration was regulated in 1984; and the emergence of generations born in host countries, “second and third generations(4)". This is because this notion no longer reflects the objective reality. These settlers are no longer sets of individuals who migrated from their native countries to Europe looking for work. Rather, they have settled in Europe for good, and they have given birth to successive generations that have never migrated.

These communities have become minorities with their own population, social, cultural and economic characteristics. In summary, Islam has become one of the well established religions in Europe, and it is almost the second religion in some of these countries. The Final Report of the Meeting of Experts putting forward the Strategy of the Cultural Action in the West(5) points out to this new status of the settlement of Islam and Muslims in the West, as the quotations below show :

- The existence of Islam in Europe has become a constant, tangible fact, deep-rooted in many parts of Europe, which were once under the rule of Islam, and contributed through its enlightening teachings and prosperous civilization to human civilization at large.

- The existence of Islam and the issues it involves now constitute a human and civilizational dimension that interests planning and strategy experts at the level of the Islamic world as well as the leadership of European communities.

- Due to their effectiveness, Muslims constitute part and parcel of their greater European community. They are competent enough to manage their own issues and plan for their present and future in the most positive way.

- Based on all this, we cannot leave the immigrant generations today in a state of isolation, nor can we leave them in a state of disintegration and division into sects and trends. The requirements of the Islamic action dictate that we should put forward a strategy to change the cultural reality of the immigrant communities, so as to combat the intellectual danger that threatens their Islamic beliefs by using the authentic, Islamic, cultural referentiality.

2- Weakness of coordination among Islamic Cultural Centres :

The Islamic cultural centres in the West strive to accomplish certain goals relating to Islamic Education and establishing links among Muslims so as to immunize their cultural identity and consolidate their sense of belonging, and to motivate them to proceed according to what pleases God and benefits Muslims in their host communities. However, the geographical distance between the Islamic centres due to the vastness of Europe has been a preventive factor against any coordination between the plans of cultural action adopted in those centres. This has led to discrepancies in the work methodologies of those centres, which precluded an accord on specifying priorities in the cultural field. The absence of a unified concept about the Islamic cultural problematic in host countries was one of the motivations behind laying down a strategy for Islamic cultural action in the West. This Strategy would facilitate preparing a plan to unify the work methodologies among Islamic centres and Muslim leaders in Europe. It would also help centres develop their mission in the fields of education, information and communication, in conformity with modern discourse and the requirements of consolidating the sense of belonging in young Muslims in particular.

3- Increase of racism :

The economic crisis from which the Muslim communities in the West suffer has had many effects influencing the relations between the native residents and the Muslim communities. Consequently, Muslims were victims to racism and hatred of foreigners. In spite of the efforts made at the level of the European community(6) no effective and decisive measures have been taken to stop the increase of racism in practice. Racist harassment continued against Muslims especially when they practice some religious festivities. Besides, new laws were enacted regulating immigration, residence and integration regardless of the principles of equality and human rights. Also, there are widespread misconceptions and biases about Islam because of a misunderstanding of the Islamic creed and Sharia’, in addition to judging Islam based on practices completely unrelated to this religion. All this requires putting forward an Islamic cultural strategy for the benefit of Muslim communities, safeguarding the authentic origin of their identity.

4- The secular trend of European societies :

The constitution of European societies was inspired by certain principles emanating from the individual development of those societies, such as their secular and materialistic tendency. Although the positivist philosophy and the heretic trend have now weakened in the West, there is still a strong tendency whose goal is to eliminate holiness from everything, reducing religion to a simple “personal issue”. The Muslims growing in those secular societies are likely to be subject to the effect of secular and positivist tendencies, either through schooling, information technology, or through their interaction with their environment. Therefore, the Strategy of the Islamic Cultural Action  in the West should satisfy the needs of the young Muslim as to safeguarding his identity against disintegration, and preserving his cultural specificity, implementing thereby the right to be different, which has become an important constituent in human rights, and consolidating cultural diversity “which  has now become a basic principle of international law, based on the United Nations Charter, the conventions and agreements which regulate cultural cooperation relations among the international community”(7). As a result it is necessary to lay down a strategy of Islamic cultural action to provide the relevant intellectual, spiritual and moral supply for our Muslim community, complying with Islamic moderation, and avoiding the pitfalls of taking extremes.

5- Organized Alienation for the Children of the Muslim Communities through school and information education

The children of the Muslim communities are subject to an organized scheme targeted at consolidating western values and deeprooting the related types of thinking, behaviour, and habits. This scheme starts at the kindergarten level and continues through school education levels, consolidated by the pressures of the street culture and means of communication, in addition to other external influential factors in the social and professional contexts.

By way of example, the school curricula adopted in western countries are not based on the approach calling for interculturalism, though this approach is adopted in some of these countries. Many studies, in this connection(8), indicate that most of what has been written on Islam in school curricula is a misinterpretation of Islam. This results in a distortion of the image of Islam in the minds of learners, emigrants and natives alike. This is because there is a determination to present Islam as a religion incapable of satisfying the requirements of modernism.

In addition, the European curricula do not devote any space for teaching the native language to the children of the Muslim communities. The attempts to do so in this connection have been very limited; though some experiences resulted in a positive feedback, they were not generalized. The recommendations of educators and psychologists stress the importance of the mother tongue and its in role in the psychological and sentimental balance and stability of the child, building his personality as well as preventing school failure. In spite of all this, European schools continue to refuse the introduction of native languages in their curricula. This drove the Muslim community children to go to the schools annexed to mosques and Islamic cultural centres to learn their mother tongue. However, this takes place after the child finishes school, mostly during weekends, which usually leads to stress and exhaustion.

Various mass media build on the work done by school curricula, since they attack Islam and associate it with the practice of some extremists, aiming at creating in the mind of the audience a close relation between Islam and violence. To the extent that mass media ignore the objective facts about Islam, they contain a strong hatred against religion. And since mass media address audio visual perception more than the mind and the critical sense, the danger of these campaigns against Islam can influence the children of the Muslim communities themselves. Therefore, these campaigns should be combatted by putting forward an appropriate policy of religious education, and rectifying the image of Islam by presenting it in its authentic nature, in addition to developing the teaching methodologies of Arabic in a non-Arab context(9). The teaching of Arabic should be extended to all children of the Muslim communities in Europe, since it is the language of the holy Quran and the pillar of civilizational identity.

6. The surge of globalization and cultural penetration

After the Cold War, a new world order developed and was later commonly referred to as "globalization". This order requires submitting international relations in the fields of trade, economy, science and technology to the dominance of multinational companies and cross-ethnic organizations. This was followed by significant changes at the level of the international political map, as some powers disintegrated and  made room for the emergence of a single pole of power  leading the whole world, which managed to manipulate the system of globalization to accomplish its economic and political interests.

Now that globalization dominated economy and trade, it was tempted to dominate "the world cultural order". Hence, there appeared some attempts to impose a world cultural order, ignoring the cultural specificities of peoples, minorities and immigrant communities. In this regard, many questions are in order. For example, "how can civilizational and cultural identity be preserved  while globalization dominates the international community ? How can the requirements of national sovereignty be reconciled with those of globalization ? Globalization tendencies seem to have a negative impact on both identity and sovereignty(10). Cultural diversity, guaranteed by the relevant international organizations, charts and conventions, may also be overridden by globalization.

Globalization itself is undoubtedly a system still being developed, and it has not taken its final permanent shape. Many researchers working on the prospects of globalization predict radical changes likely to influence the present course of globalization. Others believe that dominating the world cultural order will not be as easily accomplished as was the case with dominating the economic and trade order. On the contrary, there are some signs indicating that globalization has raised civilizational and cultural peculiarity to the consciousness of peoples and minorities.

While it is unlikely to escape the pressures of globalization currently, it is possible "to set up a cultural counter-trend standing up to the spirit of dominance characterizing globalization, by providing a theory, a system, and a practice to deal with its repercussions. This trend would operate while waiting for the emergence of a new world power standing against the power now dominating the components of the world order, or at least a new power standing on equal footing with it(11)”.

There is no doubt that the issues of immigration and its problematic facets, relating to preserving cultural identity against inclusion and dissolution, will be remarkably influenced by the phenomenon of globalization. In this connection, it is predicted that Muslim communities in the West will have to face two cultures concurrently : the first is the culture of the host country, and the second is the culture of globalization. These cultures are not equivalent, because if they were so, some European countries would not have called for what is referred as "cultural exclusion".

Communication revolution, which has accompanied globalization, has shortened the distance and removed the boundaries between  countries. Islamic countries and organizations may put forward a new information strategy to guarantee regular communication with the Muslim communities, supporting the communication strategy set up by the Islamic Conference of Communication Ministers, through satellite channels, and a good exploitation of the new information technological means. In an era of globalization, insightful communication can only operate through the new means of information technology. Therefore, an appropriate plan should be set up to deploy all modern technological gadgets, so as to develop an Islamic cultural action. In this regard, Islamic cultural data should circulate on the "Internet", and mass media should be used to publish on a wide scale the studies and symposia on the errors made against Islam.

7. Towards uniform European policies to tackle Islamic immigration

Europe has long been aware that the problems of immigration can not be tackled individually. European countries, therefore, started coordinating and unifying their policies and strategies towards immigration. Muslims in Europe, then, should set up a uniform plan for the prospects of the Islamic presence there. This strategy should  be targeted at providing the necessary conditions for individuals from the Muslim communities to occupy the key positions within host societies, in the economic, cultural, political or information fields.

These have been the main reasons which require setting up a strategy for cultural(12) Islamic action especially designed for the Muslim communities in the West. These reasons, as we have seen, emanate from the fact that Muslims are in a non-Muslim environment. And they constitute the front line at the boundaries of this nation with the West. They are, thus, more prone to cultural and civilizational shocks, and the resulting disappointment, lack of spiritual values, identity crisis and self-blaming. Given this situation and through the active Islamic presence in the West, there emerged a pressing need to provide appropriate Islamic cultural guidance together with the necessary means to implement it. This guidance is meant to serve the following functions :

a/ To help the Muslim communities get over the feeling of being caught between two cultures, and save them from marginalization, extremism and deviance.

b/ To help clarify the requirements for a global Islamic cultural development in the West.

This is because the essence of the cultural development process involves a feeling of individuality and authenticity; and acquiring the ability to maintain and innovate cultural peculiarity (14).

This would enable the Muslim communities to settle down and maintain their religion; to adapt to, co-exist with, and be open to their environment; and to improve their positions together with their social and cultural roles, respecting the laws of the host country, safeguarding their identity and consolidating their sense of belonging.

Notes

1- Dr. Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri, Foreword to the Cultural Strategy of the Islamic World,  ISESCO publications, 1997, p. 8.

2- Cultural Strategy of the Islamic World, ISESCO publications, 1997, p. 24.

3- Dr. Mohamed Houari, Muslims in the West and their Cultural Future, Typed Doc., p. 10, 1997.

4- ibid.

5- Experts Meeting at Brussels, 11-13 Jumada I, 1418H, 12-14 September 1997.

6- For instance, Proclamation of 1997 as the European Year for Combatting Racism.

7- Dr. Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri, Identity and Globalization from the Perspective of the Right to Cultural Diversity, ISESCO publications, 1997, pp. 13-14.

8- See Dr. Roshdi Ahmed Ta’ima, Teaching the Arabic language to non-Arabic speakers : Methodologies and Means, ISESCO’s publications, 1989.

9- Dr. Abdulaziz Othman Altwaijri, ibid., p.16.

10- ibid., p. 17.

11- Abdessamad Benkiran, Observations on the Reality of  Muslim Women in Europe, Proceedings of the Federation of the Islamic Revival on Islam and Muslims in Europe,Casablanca, Morocco,1997.

12- Abdelkebir Alaoui Mdaghri, Closing Address of the Federation of the Islamic Revival on Islam and Muslims in Europe, Casablanca, Morocco.

13- Cultural Development and its Problems in the Islamic World, Proceedings of the Round Table held at the International University of Africa in Khartoum, ISESCO Publications, 1998, p. 49.