Author: Subhash Kak
Publication: Rediff.com
Date: November 16, 2005
URL: http://us.rediff.com/news/2005/nov/16kak.htm
The last time Paris came this close to anarchy
was in the summer of 1968. Then noisy demonstrations by anarchists and Communists
almost brought the government to its knees. Now, it is not just sound, but
also fire.
What began in a ghetto suburb of Paris spread,
by the eleventh night, to 300 towns across France and to Belgium and Germany.
After nearly two weeks of uncontrolled mayhem, and burning of about 6,000
cars, buses, as well as schools and houses, President Chirac revived a 1955
curfew law -- originally meant to fight war in colonial Algeria -- that allowed
local authorities to impose curfews and a state of emergency. But peace has
not yet returned and there are new incidents of rioting and arson every night.
The rioters have no specific demands excepting
to be free of French police and a rage at French society and culture. It is
as if they are impelled by this famous slogan from 1968:
On ne revendiquera rien, on ne demandera rien.
On prendra, on occupera.
We will claim nothing, we will ask for nothing. We will take, we will occupy.
The Left has declared this as a simple consequence
of high unemployment among the ghettoised youths -- the children and grandchildren
of Islamic immigrants from North Africa -- in the doughnut suburbs of Paris,
who face racial discrimination at the hands of employers and police. They
blame the despair of the youth on economic deprivation and urban decay and
the reduction of about 20 per cent in spending on social programmes. They
blame the French State for failing to recognise the special needs of immigrant
groups.
It is true that there is a widening gap between
rich and poor. Whereas globalisation can be an engine that lifts countries
out of poverty, as is happening currently in Asia, it also disrupts life and
society. The globalised market place is leading to the formation of a ruling
international aristocracy that is out of touch with the poor. It becomes easy
to overlook the need to invest in education and cultural resources, especially
in an atmosphere of war.
The Right sees this in terms of the battle
between the civilisations of the secular West and Islam, pointing out that
France's situation is not unique. European nations that have a more assimilative
approach to its Islamic immigrants have had similar problems. Last year, the
filmmaker Theo van Gogh was ritually murdered in multicultural Netherlands.
This year, there were the 7/7 London bombings, and more recently there was
a riot in Birmingham, England and another one in Denmark.
If it is a clash between rival civilisations,
one can almost foresee the future. The post-industrial economies of the West
require increasing number of immigrant workers -- mostly for menial jobs which
native Europeans shun. At the same time, Europe's native populations are shrinking
due to a declining birthrate which has fallen below the replenishment rate.
The immigrant population will not only become a larger proportion over the
next few decades, both through higher relative birth rates and further immigration,
it may even become the majority in certain countries.
The European is mystified that in spite of
its tradition of freedom of religious belief and expression, the immigrant
groups have not assimilated into the secular fabric of its life. The reasons
related to economic deprivation is not the entire story, when it is noticed
that many figures in the jihadist organisations come from privileged families.
Also, the immigrant has agency and the native population cannot always be
blamed for unemployment and poverty, as is seen from the very different experiences
of the Indian and the Pakistani communities in Britain, who started from the
same situation fifty years ago.
The rioters, the bombers, and the terrorists
see themselves as revolutionaries. They have a critique of the West; they
speak of its decadence, the breakdown of the family, and its drug and sex
culture. They are able to tap to the despair that has entered into the modern
life as a consequence of the mechanisation of life, and alienation from society.
They claim that a solution exists in the clarity and zeal of early (Salafi)
Islam.
Irfan Husain, who is one of the most astute
observers of the scene, writing in the Pakistani newspaper Dawn has this to
say of what is driving the Islamic revolution: 'Apart from wishing to restore
the Caliphate, they also want to reverse the expulsion of the Muslims from
Spain, as well as overthrow the rule of non-Muslims from countries where the
faithful once held sway. These include India, Bosnia and Chechnya. And of
course, Jews must be thrown out of Israel. They also want to see the removal
of all kings, generals and sundry rulers currently running Muslim countries.
It goes without saying that all other Muslim sects with the exception of a
Salafi interpretation of the faith have to be destroyed. In the long term,
the whole world must be converted to Islam, and Sharia must be the law governing
everybody.'
But they are not the only people who are speaking
of a religious utopia as a cure for the ills of modern society. Mechanisation
and family breakdown is also causing native Europeans and Americans to join
other utopian religious communities some of which speak of an impending end
of the world.