African geopolitics - One often thinks that there is a substantial incompatibility between Islam and democracy. Why wasn’t democracy capable of putting its roots in certain Moslem countries, in North Africa for example?

Ghaleb Bencheikh - This so-called relentless incompatibility between democracy and Islam is one of the most recurring, the most entrenched commonplaces of our time. I am against it for one simple reason: it is not because democracy did not flourish that one has to hold the religion intrinsically responsible for this phenomenon. It is caused by the behavior of megalomaniacs’ people, uncultivated, full of themselves, people who have a very pronounced interest for power. It just happens to be that they are of Moslem confession, but only God knows if they really are.

In fact, at the same moment, this situation has endogenous and exogenous causes. Among the first, it is necessary to say that after a peak of civilization, there was in the Moslem world congestion, decline, deterioration, “colonizability” - if I can employ this neologism. The populations that experienced colonization - and the one that underwent the Moslem peoples was very difficult - plunged them into a profound lethargy. When, at the very same time, somewhere else, universities were plethoric, where Marie Curie discovered radium, marabouts used an electric torch beneath their burnous to call upon divine light in front of the prostrations of gullible people. Religion became a hotchpotch of superstitions, preventing the awakening of a real political consciousness. The Moslem world has had no equivalent of Montesquieu. Ibn Khaldoun[1], the great historian and sociologist had no successors.

In fact, as for the Christianity or for the Judaism, there is nothing in the theological order that considers democracy as an incompatible concept with the Islam. The fact that this term is not Koranic has nothing to do with it. After all, the Koran affirms that the pilgrim should go to the Mecca “on foot or on a camel’s back, with whatever means (..) from the most remote parts of the country”. Today, pilgrims arrive in jumbo jets or air-conditioned cars, but it is not because the air-conditioned car is not quoted in the Koran that one cannot use it! The other, more serious, argument: in the beginning of the khalifat era, the first four caliphs were designated more or less democratically, something that, considering the conceptions of the time, was an extraordinary political exploit.

Even more important, Islam, due to the internal coherence, due to its proper logic and theology, considers itself as the natural successor of the rules and moral commands of Judaism and Christianity. It is not a new religion, it is a restoration of the cult of Abraham. Mahomet did not claim to do nothing else than prolong the mosaic and Christian message. Furthermore, during the first ten years of the Mecca period, Islam was not called Islam. It was called the “wise memory”, “the religion of the reminder «,” the religion of Abraham" etc.... There is divergence on several points of the doctrine, it is unmistakable. But debates have been taking place between the members of the same abrahamic family. So, there is nothing intrinsic in the Islam, that could imply a particular incompatibility with democracy.

A. G. - Samuel Huntington spoke nevertheless about the clash of civilizations, a relentless opposition between the Islam and the Western society.

G. B. - Under every issue - geographical, conceptual and historical - there is no opposition between the Islam and the Western society. Conceptually, what exactly do we call the “West” when visualizing this continent that has borders more or less well defined? Is Japan a part of it? Is it Europe and North America, or all of the democracies?

On the historic plan, Islam was an absolute Western world from 711 to 1492: from Tariq, the Moorish conqueror, crossed the strait of Hercules’s Pillars - today Gibraltar - until the discovery of the New World. At that time, Islam rules in largest Western world known at the time: the word Maghreb means West and one considered Cordoba as a khalifat of the West.
On the geographic plan finally, forgive me for this joke, but Austria is not West for Morocco!

Now, if one defines the West because of the human rights, and democracy, I have the weakness to believe that the age of Enlightenment was not completely unaware of Aver roes’[2] theses. In the Faculty of Arts of Paris - which will afterwards become the Sorbonne-, one discussed the doctrines, and also the rationalism inherited from the Koran, of the way of governing the town etc.

A. G. – Could the problem be the total decentralization of the Islam? Each one interprets it in his own way, because there is no supreme authority capable of saying how it is necessary to interpret the dogma. Isn’t it, paradoxically, a handicap? Catholics have the Pope …

G. B. - Indeed, this decentralization is at the same moment a source of happiness, a fundamental freedom, and a source of problems causing us a deep sufferance. The absence of a clerical structure is so that the expression of the faith can be situated in a transcendent relation, a vertical line between the creature and the creator, a personal relation in the intimate consciousness of each man. It does not require the intervention of a spiritual guide. The Moslem is his own bishop, a bit like the Protestants.

But this, as I already mentioned, is also cause of problems. Some individuals self-proclaim themselves bearers of authority and they succeed in their intent, taking advantage of despondency, galvanizing the crowds by speculating on the misery and the frustrations. A typical example of this is the mollah Omar. He has never gone out of Afghanistan, is not convinced of the roundness of the earth, and sees in the United States the country of the unfaithful and the perversion.

Now, regrettably, those that do know how to avoid these constraints, the erudite, the authorities, the intellectuals, are cautious because they say, in front of kamikazes who sacrifice their life to take that of innocents away, “We are targets”. I do not call up for martyr, but I do say: " Give evidence of your values if you have to give your life in ransom». It is a situation that necessarily, one has to be avoided, but this does not mean that one does not have to testify.

A. G. - The Koran contains several very aggressive verse, appeals “to fight the non-believer” …

G. B. - It is necessary to locate “fight the non-believer” in a determined context, limiting it in a given space time; the Mecca of the 7^th century. May I remind you that the Bible also, calls out for the extermination of such or such population “up to the seventh generation”. And nevertheless, nobody has ever said that there is no breath of love in the Bible. We are now in the 21^st century, and, in the era of globalization, it is fundamental to clarify the past as it really was.

It is important not to forget the seer’s aphorism “The ink of the erudite is superior in front of God’s eyes than the blood of the martyr”. About an eighth of the Koranic corpus is an order to the acquisition of knowledge, not of the conflicts. The primacy of the feather on the sword is a constant in the Islamic area, since always.

The fundamentalists are the ones that cause the most damage, but compared to the rest of the Moslems, they are simply an offshoot, a tumor.

A. G. - There are also the fatwas, like the one that Khomeiny had pronounced against Salman Rushdie …

G. B. - The term fatwa does not mean death sentence, in any case. And anyway, theologically speaking, Khomeiny was not authorized to decree it. The only authority that could, is the mufti, on issues that go from the most harmless to the least known. It is a decree, a religious opinion that engages only the one that approves it, without touching the penal or civil responsibility that remains absolutely unreduced. I have always said that Khomeiny’s fatwa caused us much more disadvantage, to us Moslems, than the so blasphemous “Satanic Verses” have ever done. And anyway, this is not the question, since I respect literary fictions and shall never accept censorship.

A. G. - Does world misery have something to do with the upspring of Islam?

G. B. - Yes. The scandal of the famine, with thousands, even the million people, women and scrawny children, with their bloated womb, begging for something to eat right next to those that have feasts, that sell weapons so that the warlords can continue to kill either by shooting or by letting them starve. This scandal nourishes Islam.

A. G. - Bin Laden, please excuse us, in no way, defended these causes. Originally, he wanted to chase away the unfaithful from the Holy Land of Arabia … You seem to ascribe qualities to him that he does not have.

G. B. - I could never find the slightest justification for what says or for what does Bin Laden. I was simply replying to your question on the upspring of Islam. One of causes, not the only, that prevails among the Islamic, is the scandal of the famine in the world. Now Islamic movements are numerous. At this regard, someone once said that “ism” kills the root: Marxism destroyed Marx and environmentalism is going to destroy ecology. And Islamism is suffocating Islam, as we can see nowadays.

A. G. – In your opinion, will Bin Laden become a sort of Che Guevara, an historic figure for the Islamic? Will he make things even worse when dead?

G. B. - Bin Laden is not a religious or moral authority, he is not a theologian. He is a huckster who used to live in the lust, in the Scandinavian countries, until the changeover that converted him to the mystico-revolutionary terrorism. Million of Moslems have listened to him because, regrettably, he defends right causes. And in these cases, those that are embittered, bruised, ill, desperate, simply follow the godfather.

A. G. - In your opinion, which propositions could be addressed to the Moslem world so that Islam adopts this century, adopts globalization?

G. B. - In front of a theology that is necrosis, neurotic, narrow-minded, it seems clear to me that some substantial reforms are really necessary. At first, it would be important to promote what I shall call the “theology of the minority”. In all times, philosophers and Moslem theologians have preached when their lands were under hegemony, universalizing these thoughts. It is not true! We are only one fifth of the humanity and it is not up to us to Islamize the world. We have to live in harmony in the human mosaic. As is said in the Koran itself: “If God had wanted to, he would have created one single community. Instead through this gift, he wanted to make you feel that he created you. Try to surpass one another for your good actions; one day you will return to God, then he will enlighten you on your differences”.
A “theology of the minority”, following the example of what was the theology of the liberation. It allows to feel at ease when one is a minority, in order to break the umbilical cord between the temporal and the spiritual. The Church has done so, and it can only be delighted at it has found freedom. Islam will be delighted later, when its freedom will find a shelter from the germs of intolerance scattered by the extremists.

Another reform will consist in setting up schools of exegesis that will make a clear distinction between the Koranic verses, those that go beyond time, anti-historic or metahistoric and of universal reach - that I shall define paradigmatic - and the Koranic verses, that are instead cyclical, temporal, contingent and that are, by far, the least numerous. If the quantitative approach is a good railing of approach, it is important to know that these last ones constitute about only one thirtieth of the Koranic corpus. I do not see why one should focus on the one thirtieth leaving aside the other twenty-nine.

A. G. - Do you mean the verses that concern the woman’s condition?

G. B. - Of course. Because an essential reform will consist in dusting, if not to throw to consign a jurisprudence or a Moslem right that enslaves the woman to oblivion. Three or four severe Koranic verses are against women, but this is not something new since there are other religions that are even more severe, and that are based on writings with the same type of statements.

There have been women at the head of dynasties in Egypt, others, in Andalusia, anticipated Madam de Staël. It is therefore advisable to return to the respect of human dignity in his feminine constituent. This by being inspired by what the Koran teaches us above other things: “Adore your Lord who has created you from a unique soul, who has put among you love and mercy”. On the ontological perspective, there is no difference between men and women. And I do not understand why resentful, rigorous jurists, phalocrates and misogynous continue to enslave, in an anachronistic visions, a human being who is, as the man, God’s icon on earth. We, the male race, represent simply half of the humanity, and not necessarily the best.

Naturally, I am not one who accepts to veil the woman. It is in my opinion a form of subjecting them, a way to make women look ugly, and there is no conceivable reason why the expression of the faith should be materialized with a shawl. It is moreover a simple recommendation that does not contain the least pressure, and it is not completely new in the Koran: Saint Paul used to say that an unveiled woman was the equivalent of a shorn woman.
On the whole, and paraphrasing Malraux, I would say that 21^st century will or will not be feminine. Honestly, and without flattering women. We have paid a high price for a establishing a strictly male civilization. The woman, once taken out of the gynoecium’s, has been represented only in terms of bacchanalia, odalisque, geisha or “girlfriend” … It is necessary to move towards a line that exalts the femininity and is more equal. It will engender a more free spirit spirituality.

A. G. - Since September 11, projectors are pointed towards Saudi Arabia. Which is, according to you, the responsibility of this country?

G. B. - It is enormous. Saudi Arabia is doubtless a unique example in the current world. A single family gives its name to a monarchy and to a country member of the United Nations. Now the Saudi monarchy has no legitimacy, neither historic, nor legal, nor democratic. Therefore, in order to set up their power and their legitimacy, the government leans on, by deforming them, Koranic verses or other exegesis of the type: “It is better to obey the authority rather than cause a rupture”

It is a scandal, simply because nobody in the world asked them to hold this role. The king Fahd defines himself as “the servant of the holy lands”. But when the monarchy was shaken by a rebellion in 1979, he called out for major Barril’s help, a French who is not a Moslem, as far as I know. It is his most absolute right. But then, why extend the perimeter of the holy lands to all of the realm? Generally speaking, holiness is parsimonious in the Islamic theology: very few things are considered as holy. In the Islam, one does not talk about saints, one talks about the friends of God, about virtuous people. One does not talk about the Holy Land, but about a consecrated perimeter that is considered the shelter of God’s temple, during pilgrimages.

Besides Saudi Arabia has exported radical Islam, it financed it and propagated its doctrines with an incredible schizophrenia. The Saudi princes, for example, while enjoying themselves in George V, in the hotel Crillon, in Saint-Tropez or somewhere else, clearly neglect the holy places! This hypocrisy is unbearable, especially since we, the Moslems, are the victims of it.

A. G. - The Americans dread the replacement of the Saudi monarchy by a laic regime similar to that of Saddam Hussein, an extremely anti-American and anti-Israeli …

G. B. - The Iraqi regime is not democratic, but it is secular – of course it is also important to say that secularism does not inevitably keep pace with democracy. Saddam Hussein appeared as the rampart of the secularism against the overwhelming wave of Khomeinism, but when he began to receive bombs, he prayed in front of the cameras and wrote “God is great” on the country’s flag. Regrettably, this late reunification had its effect on the population, in the street. He deceived the young people in search of an ideal and fighting against injustice, young people that dreamt of fighting by Saddam Hussein’s side, the unfortunate who defends Islam. Therefore, now, if one is afraid that the Saudi monarchy is replaced by another regime, it will be necessary to choose between the least of two evils: radical Islam or a secularism not favorable to the United States.

It is necessary to condemn the “flirtation” of Western democracies with regimes that are not democratic. By cynicism, hypocrisy or laxness, one has closed its eyes, ignore the recognition, by Saudi Arabia and Emirates of the Gulf, of one of the most barbaric regimes and the most medieval of the planet: Saudi Arabia gave up supporting the talibans only after September 11. And it is not the fruit of an ethical concern, nor a will to help the unfortunate Afghan women, but a consequence of a diktat from junior George Bush. In fact the Americans, as well as the British, began, but only, after September 11 to realize the position of the fundamentalist Islam and began to “do the cleaning”.

A. G. - In your opinion, could the current regime in Saudi Arabia, after September 11, if I can say, undertake some reforms? Would it be capable of this?

G. B. - I believe that the young take charge. Those that went to Western universities and therefore have noticed the existing gap between the reality and what their parents and their theorists wanted them to see as legitimate model of regime. These ones say that it is better to reform rather than being annihilated. In democracy, when one drifts away from the people, one loses the elections. In Saudi Arabia, one can lose his head. It will be necessary for them to negotiate this type of change of situation, after September 11.

A. G. - In Algeria, ten years ago, the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) won the elections democratically. They were stopped by general Nezzar, at the time Minister of the defense. Was it something necessary to do?

G. B. - Forgive me for the cliché’: Hitler came to power by democratic means. In 1991, we were dealing with individuals who would say: “Ok, let us play the game of democracy”, before cynically adding that once in power “we will distort it”. At the time, I agreed with the will to stop the electoral process. With the risk of contradicting myself, I have to say that the Algerian people were still not ready for a true democracy. They were susceptible to statements such as: “Vote for FIS, you will go to paradise, vote for the FLN (Front de Libération Nationale) or for FFS (Front des Forces Socialistes), you will go to hell”. And regrettably the people, massively gullible, went and voted for FFFIS. Hell began, and afterward, the GIA (Groupes Islamiques Armés) was even more barbaric. A posteriori, I begin to think and say to myself that if we had had a rather strong Constitutional Council, this electoral process would have been able to be stopped: if there had been unconstitutional decisions, the council would have been there to proclaim the unconstitutionality of these laws that consequently reduce fundamental liberties. And the army would have intervened against this violation of the fundamental law. In brief, ten years ago, I was for the blocking of the electoral process, and now I am simply wondering several things. But one cannot remake History.

A. G. - For you, which country from the Arabian - Moslem world, has the most chances to reach this type of tolerance and democracy? Who could be a sort of lighthouse, a model for the others?

G. B. - Paradoxically and curiously, this country could be Algeria. Why? Because nothing is made sacred there, even the Koranic verses, since in their name women are disemboweled. The only problem, I was about to say that Algeria’s only drama, is that it lacks theologians. There, physicists are formed, even nuclear scientists, but few theologians. Naturally, with the intellectual excitement, the revolt of the kabyles, the desire for the president Bouteflika to muzzle the lawyers, the press and the civil society, we are facing, today, a total regression. But I think that Algeria will be able to give the example one day.

Another example is the future Palestinian State. Naturally, if Hamas or the Islamic Djihad snapped up the population, there could be a shift. But the political consciousness of the Palestinians, their profoundly laic charter, the fact that there are Moslem Palestinians, Christian Palestinians, atheists, all this can turn out to be a sort of lighthouse.
In Egypt also, the day that Moubarak will not appoint about fifty of the opposition’s representatives himself, when the vice-chancellor of El Azaar’s university will free himself from the tutelary shadow of the presidential palace, yes, there are good chances. The long tradition of Egypt can give place, after September 11, to a real reflection.

A. G. - Nevertheless, in North Africa, democracy simply does not stay in place, even if it is what populations desire. In Senegal, a Moslem country, we witnessed a political alternation. Democracy worked, therefore it is conceivable.

G. B. - Indeed, we are delighted to see that president Wade, the opposition for twenty-five years, won the elections in the second ballot, was congratulated by his opponent, Moslem like him, and confirms a peaceful transition by confiding to his predecessor a mandate of itinerant ambassador. It is simply wonderful. But at the same moment, one or two weeks near, Ben Ali is elected, in Tunisia, with 99,8 % of the votes. But I do not understand why Islam would be implied in there. Especially since one has the bad habit to confuse Arabic and Moslem. Arabs are only a minority in the Islamic world, and all of the Arabs are not Moslem. Furthermore, the demographic center of gravity, for the Moslems, is in Insulinde: the Moslem minority of the Indian peninsula or of China is infinitely more important than the entire Arabic world reunited. It is a plethora of paradoxical regimes all referring to Islam. So, of the two things one has to be chosen: either Islam is so moldable and so supple that it has no monolithic doctrine of power, from this point of view - forgive me for this cynicism, it is a quality-, or it was simply used as a mean of action. It was an instrument of the monarchy of the divine law for Morocco, as it was in Yemen, by the Marxism-Leninism - freed of the materialist and atheist dialectic in order for it to remain compatible with the religion. There are still regimes “like Kadhafi”, based on popular committees that replace parliamentary representation. In Syria, we were all witnesses of when the age limit for being elected went down from 40 to 34. This, for just one simple intention - clear to everybody: allow the former dead president’s son to succeed him. Changing de facto a republic in a monarchy.

Another example is Algeria, which can be distinguishes for its bicameral system, a modern structured parliament. But the third party of the Upper House is appointed and not elected. Is there a Koranic verse that indicates the way the third party of the Upper House should be elected? Absolutely not. I condemned the crimes of the GIA, and I shall continue to do so, and I do not assimilate the generals and the criminal barbarians. But I also do criticize the generals, because they used their legitimacy drawing on the religion. For example, I do not understand the role of a Minister of religious business. Is it a question of sending an authority for Friday’s sermon, similar to the circular sent from the Interior ministry to his prefects? It is not necessary to be amazed to see mosques, which should be a haven of peace and a place of meditation, future terrorist marks, when the opposition, having no democratic space to express itself, finds in the pulpit a mean to fustigate power and to reject those that it defines non-believers.

A. G. - Is there a difference between Islam of the North of the Sahara (the Maghreb, Egypt etc.) and the Islam of Black Africa? In Senegal, brotherhoods play an importing role, but they represent an Islam very different from that of the Algerian GIA. If there is a difference, on which basis?

G. B. - Allow me to push aside right away the comparison between the Islam of brotherhoods and that of the GIA, a completely unique group, ostracized from humanity - and not only of the Islam. It is more relevant to compare it with the Islam of China, Indonesia, and Afghanistan - different of course from that of the talibans. Then, yes, there is what I call the tempered and peaceful Islam of the Africans. It contains wisdom, good-nature, serenity, substantial philanthropy, and this is not limited to sub-Saharan Africa. One finds it also by the Touaregs or the Bedouins of Jordan.

Considering Africa, it is also necessary to remember that the expansion of the Islam in this region of the world was not a consequence of a conquest, but by caravans, exchanges and studies. One does not know enough about this, but there are African letters in Arabic language that surpass by far the oriental ones.

A. G. - Could the progression of the radical Islam in Black Africa be expected? Saudi Arabia and other countries have not they tried to penetrate there, to build their Koranic schools in order to give an extremist education? Is’nt it a risk for this African Islam, that you qualify as peaceful?

G. B. - The risk existed before September 11: Saudi Arabia kept competing, with impunity, with the evangelists. Now, everyone has realized that the evil is upstream, not as much as in Bin Laden as in the wahabbism, which remains in the background. It will be necessary to be watchful and to begin to stop this, notably in Nigeria. I think that it will not put roots in Senegal, in the Ivory Coast, nor even in Togo or in Tanzania. Certainly, it recruited several individuals to commit attacks against the American embassies in Africa in 1998. But in Kenya, more generally in Eastern Africa, in the Comoro Islands, in the Mauritius, in the Reunion, it is peaceful and I think that this is the way it will stay.

A. G. - Nigeria, cant it be considered an exception, with the institution of the sharia in a part of the country?

G. B. - It is indeed an exception. It is necessary at first to clarify something. The word sharia means “law”. If the word has to be gallicized, then one should be able to talk about the sharia of the jungle, the sharia of Napoleon, or the sharia of Moses. There is no reason why one should use Arabic words in their most restricted meaning, such as a barbaric application of punishment, mutilation, etc. If one wants to talk about the sharia as an inspiration of the Koranic religion, it is necessary to clarify it.

Now, the problem with Nigeria, is that Saudi Arabia exports there its rigorous and archaic vision of the religion. The law, considered deriving from a divine inspiration, that is applied in twelve States of the Nigerian union is a scandal. Besides, it is unconstitutional. It is imitating what is happening in Saudi Arabia, where the crowds assist to public summary executions, where the young people are whipped, where the women’s freedom is very reduced.

A. G. - If tomorrow, a Palestinian State were to be created- something everybody wishes, starting from a majority of Israelites-, do you think that there will be peace in the Arabic countries, democracy, etc.?

G. B. - It may not be sufficient, but, with the end of bombardments on Iraq, it is a necessary condition, for two reasons. At first in order to unmask these anti democratic regimes that will no longer be able to justify their existence with the excuse that it is necessary in order to face the “American - Israeli coalition”. Secondly, there should not be a connection between law and justice and other considerations. The law must be announced and the justice applied.

In the Israeli-Palistinian issue, I am with the Palestinian people. If it had been the Israeli people that underwent the torments of the occupation, the disproportionate retorts, the pulverized houses, the extracted olive trees, I would have been with the Israeli people - it does not matter. But why do a series of resolutions of the UN get dusty in drawers? There is here an absolute cynicism. What I say does not justify at all the terrorist acts of September 11: any cause, even noble as it may be, cannot justify such a massacre. But maybe now the moment has come to try to understand the incoherence, the cynicism and the systematic partiality of the different American administrations in their unconditional support to the successive Israeli governments.

A. G. - In France, it seems that the police keeps a more vigilant eye than anywhere else on the extremist sermons susceptible to engender terrorists’ vocations …

G. B. - That is what is said. I say to myself that in all times - it is a phenomenon inherited from the colonial period - there has always been a police management of the Islam in France. But for the “Renseignements Généraux” (Home Intelligence Service), when needed, it would be easier to deal with mosques, visible places of cult, rather than to poke their noses in cellars, warehouses and in other unhealthy places … There is a proverb that says: “the most subversive movements come out of catacombs.”

Unfortunately, because of the nervousness of the authorities in front of the French Islam, one has imported, and does not stop importing, a homo economicus who is revealed to be a homo islamicus. When one suggests a certified regime, the answer is: “Islam is post-concordat, so one is not going to create a faculty of Islamic theology financed by the authorities, in Strasbourg or somewhere else.” We have also imams trained in autarky, in Château-Chinon, where a piece of land could be acquired thanks to François Mitterrand, who was the mayor of the city at the time. They are over there in total immersion and, after three years of studies, they take their functions without ever being in touch with the French society. It is as if they had directly come from Saudi Arabia or Egypt!

Notes

[1]. Ibn Khaldoun ( 1331-1406 ), historian from the Maghreb, was one of the first theorists of the history of civilization.

[2]. Ibn-Rushd, called Averroès, born in Cordoba in 1126 and died in Marrakech in 1198, jurist and doctor, he was one of the big Moslem thinkers, and commentator of Aristote. He gave his name to a current of the European philosophy, the averroïsme.