International Relations Paradigms, Religion and Islam

Since the occurrence of the events of September 11th, it seems that our daily lives are saturated with reports of religious violence. We are constantly reminded by the media and government that we are in a continuous state of war against an evil enemy consisted of extremist religious groups. This threat to peace has transformed our lives in a very significant way. Most importantly, it has brought to our attention the importance of the role of religion outside of our secular system of living and the essential need of understanding religious worldviews if we desire to achieve of global solidarity.
International Relations (IR) is a field that has a secular foundation and is theorized in the United States with state-centric paradigms; therefore, it does not give enough importance to the social relations among people. In IR mainstream, religion is considered a private matter of the individual, and therefore religion is not included in its theories. However with the late widespread of the global resurgence of religion, IR scholars are been confronted and challenged to re-examine its theories. In my view, it is inevitable that the studies in IR will have sooner than later to encompass and contribute to the study of religions. With this framework, Kubalkova, in her text “Religion in International Relations The Return from Exile”, suggests the creation of a subfield in IR called “International Political Theology” (IPT). She argues that in today’s world, there is a greater need by individuals for the search of meaning of life. There is a special general attention paid to the inner voice, to the feeling rather than the thought, and all that is based on religious antecedents. We are living in a time where individuals feel a loss of identity. This identity crisis is believed to be exacerbated by Globalization, which with its secular agenda dictates that humans will find self fulfillment by acquiring material means. To understanding “meaning”, IR scholars have to re-direct the line of thought that took social science to the wrong destination, secularism. The best approach to religion in IR is from the context of Rule Oriented Constructivism (ROC), which we can begin to surpass ontological and epistemological restrains and take social science studies to embody the fullness of human experiences. Secular humanism, secular nationalism, modernism, empiricism, structuralism does leave room for the appreciation of religious experiences. On the contrary, ROC affirms that humans in general have the ability to reason. Religion itself is a rational choice. Therefore, institutions in different religions have been socially constructed with revelation of the divine. Believers make a rational choice in adhering to assertive rules. Religious believes come before reason in the mind of the faithful and thus they control reason. This is usually misunderstood by secular scholars as nonmodern, primitive and irrational. In addition, it is believed by many that religious figures historically have successfully assisted the resolution of international conflicts due to their trusted reputation among believers. Constructivism consequently is a realistic way of accepting people’s culture in the pursuing of religious preferences, a vital component of the individual reasoning. IR needs to move away from labeling religion as bad or good and dedicate special attention to its role in world affairs and its significance in how we construct the world around us.
Mark Juergensmeyer’s Holy Orders Religious Opposition to Modern States exemplified the importance of re-evaluating religion in the contemporary world. He states that since the attacks on the World Trade Center, religious activists have shifted their target from other religions to our secular government. This is true not only in Islamic extremists groups but also in American Right Christian extremist Timothy McVeigh who bombed Oaklahoma City Federal Building, Buddhist terrorism nerve gas attack in the Tokyo subway by Shoko Asahar, to name few. All these assaults redefined the enemy, which is not only the secular government but an increase in acceptance and adoption of secular lifestyle and value systems among nations. With the occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq, there is an increase in popularity for the aversion of secular ideology throughout the Muslim world. Thus, such extremist groups gain acceptance within this context and an increasing anti-modern/ western support gain grounds, justifying the use of violence to combat this war of truth and evil. Extremists by default reject the separation of church and state and the secularization of politics. Therefore they become political activists with a religious framework. It is difficult to overcome this “cosmic war”, because the rewards for martyrdom are beyond our worldly existence, so there is no need for compromise. In the same way, United State leadership has used the same linguistic terms to address this conflict. We often are reminded of the war against evil. Thus, it is unrealistic to disregard the political power of religious ideology and the desire of obtaining supremacy in the global arena by the extremist terrorist organizations. Additionally, globalization is responsible for changes in the political and social life. Fundamentalists see secular globalization and modernization a sort of new American or western imperialism. With Globalization, the European Enlightenment idea of national social contract lost its authority because people are connected economically and socially to other nations and ethnic groups causing a sense of lost of identity as described before. Therefore, the goal should be a realization of a sense of belonging in the global civilization.
Richard Falk’s Worldwide Religious Resurgence in an Era of Globalization and Apocalyptic Terrorism start by explaining that after the Cold War, Islam as a religion is the leading challenge to the west world order based on constitutionalism and advocating a strong private sector economy in the achievement of progress and prosperity. This antagonism against secular politics projected the image of the America as the Great Satan trying to enforce its liberal views and abolish traditionalism in the Muslim World. In the G8 meeting in 2001, a movement against Globalization arose and it protested against the policies based on American values, claiming that they are discriminatory, antidemocratic and with socially unfair claims. After 9/11, the declaration of war against the West by Usama Bin Laden’s extremists group projected what Falk calls “experience of apocalyptic terrorism religious overtones”. In Falk’s view, we are in danger of a civilization war and the significance of religion to this issue cannot be overlooked. It is important then to extend religious integration in the debates regarding global governance. However, secularism has a long path in accepting the introduction of religion in forming patterns of such governance. Secular and religious scholars have to abandon the predisposition against each other to mutually and respectfully contribute to construct humane forms of global governance. Today, there is a frustration among the south hemisphere with the existing world organizations. For the traditionalist world, global order is a concept taken with a great sense of skepticism due to the agenda of exclusion of religion in its political imagination. Globalization has proven to further separate people, marginalize the poor, increase a nonsustainability of environment and the contractions of self-realization with consumerism. Falk calls the current global governance as “Global Inhumane Governance”. The resurgence of religion is attributed to the lack of creativity of the secular world to solve problem in the global political domain. Inclusion of religion bring to the table of humane global governance debates a realistic social and political basis, mobilizing movements that challenge injustices, bringing sense of legitimacy to popular culture, increasing a sense inclusiveness and solidarity, and pursuing the achievement of fundamental needs of humanity as peace.
Ole Waever’s World Conflict over Religion: Secularism as Flawed Solution discusses “political solutions to cultural conflicts”. It is noticed the importance that religion is given in global security affairs. It is crucial to secular scholars to come to realization that they are part of this conflict, not above it as some perceive. Secularism cannot continue to present themselves as part of solution or conflict resolution with the pluralistic idea of a place for everyone. Secularism is not a single principle, because it needs religion to define who they are. This is exactly what the religious part is fighting against. It is very undemocratic to me this notion of imposition of a secular culture as the self-righteous way for a peaceful global society. The Muslim world has a vision of America as morally decadent and that is precisely the biggest threat. As Europe embarked in the same ideological fashion, where secularism is established, the Islamic world is frightened of the anti-religions agenda of the “dominant” world.
Piscatori’s Islam in a World of Nation States, The theory and practice of territorial pluralism describes the majority of Muslims as being conformists (accommodating themselves to the prevailing political reality, accepting the West nation-state). In Classical and Medieval Theory there is a basic push for all Muslim to recall the unity they feel has been lost. Islam support pluralism and calls for a peaceful coexistence between the Islamic community and the Non Islamic one. Muslims accept the idea of territorial sovereignty and the modern state system because of its history. Some scholars argue that Muslim rulers showed little interest in diplomatic relations with the Westerns because they were centred on themselves for centuries but is historicallt known that these same rulers had no problems with having formal diplomatic relations with non Muslims when it was necessary. There are treaties dated back to the Prophet himself, following with Byzantine, and even with European Christians during the Crusades. The Ottoman Empire history is marked by innumerous accounts of conformist’s adaptations, territorial pluralism and peace with the infidels. From treating non Muslims as equal as Muslims and the institution of the first constitution in a Muslim nation shows that Ottomans demonstrated flexibility in formulating agreements to promote peace and allowed European influence in internal Muslim affairs. Persian also demonstrated regular diplomatic contacts with Europeans, Russians and Americans. In India, Muslims Hindu and Christians practices inter-community harmony was encouraged. Therefore, throughout history many treaties were made between Muslims and western nations and diplomatic agreements between Muslim nations among each other contradicts what many Muslim and Western scholars position of what Islam would allow. Another implication to be considered in the Muslim pluralism is the acceptance of the separate power centres within the Islamic umma and the territorial ambition by neighbors Muslims. In the late 20th century, there was a movement towards the emergence of local nationalism and Arabia regions was divided into a system of nation-states and the new state needed to secure international recognition. The local elite sought great power recognition; validated peace and friendship with infidel powers; and the relationship with the neighbors territories was based on European norms of interstate conduct putting in second the concept of umma. Muslims understood that their acceptance of the interstate model was due to their inferior position to the Western imperialist. Commitment to national pluralism was demonstrated by the importance of the League of Nations. The League sanctified the territorial and political independency of every member. With this commitment of the participation in the international arena, national divisions among Muslim were consequence on the independence and integrity of one’s own territory. The Inter-Muslim relations are to acknowledge the spiritual and cultural unity of the faith preserving the reality of territory divisions.
Muslims today accept the grounds of the international systems because there is an agreement among the Islamic scholars and the educated elite which perceive the concept of nation-state as a natural occurrence in human history or even essentially Islamic. The approval of the territorial pluralism conveyed the acceptance of national pluralism when the nationalism was brought to the Muslim world in the 19th century. With the European imperialist gone, Muslim scholars still support the “old” idea of territorial state of affairs to maintain the religious circumstances. With the influence the ulama and the elite in society, the general population has adhered the positive nationalistic agenda supporting of the nation-state. Muslims today defend the concept of international relations and pursue of international peace.
In order to accomplish realistic discussion regarding the achievement of a global society committed to human rights, we the students and future advocates of IR have to give the importance deserved to the discipline of religious studies in order better understand this important aspect of human relations.