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January 15, 2002
REVIEW: Islam’s political culture
THE political turmoil in the name of jihad in neighbouring Afghanistan, its direct impact on Pakistan and the ensuing rise of Islamic extremism in the country are matters of concern for all and the subject of research by Muslim scholars here and abroad.
In the days of the Pakistan movement (1940-1947) the relationship between religion and politics was always shrouded in ambiguity. Except for a general reference to the Quran and the Sunnah being the guiding principles of the new state, the founder of Pakistan, Mohammad Ali Jinnah, never clarified the issue. He was resolute in not going beyond this in all his pronouncements before and after the establishment of Pakistan. He rejected theocracy in any form and shape. Therefore the popular impression was that Pakistan would emerge as a liberal Muslim state, guaranteeing the rights of the Muslims and the non-Muslim minorities.
A serious failing, which made the subcontinental Muslims wary of new, scientific ideas and values, has been their strong attachment to the nostalgia about pre-modern institutions of the post-Rashida) caliphate, sultanate, dynastic monarchy, communal law, mediaeval Muslim sciences and Madressahs, even though these have gone into disuse over the last 200 years. This left a socio-political vacuum in the Muslim world, Pakistan included.
Islamic values and political culture nevertheless received a strong impetus by the epoch-making political events across the Muslim world during the last quarter century. The unprecedented success of the Islamic revolution in Iran, the successful resistance called jihad by the Afghans against Russia (Soviet Union), the armed confrontation between the secular Algerian government and the Islamic popular movement in Algeria, the emergence of the Taliban, and the revival of Islamic laws like Zakat and the Islamic code of punishments in Pakistan, Egypt, Malaysia, etc encouraged the Islamic political culture to reassert itself in many Muslim countries.
In Pakistan liberal Islam took a back seat, weakened by the successive governments’ policies of appeasement of religious extremists. Religious parties and Madressahs tried to take control of the political order by creating an atmosphere of harassment, intimidation and fear. As a result free debates on ideological, political and economic values of the early period of Pakistan have become rare now, suppressing the fact that theological, cultural as well as political ideas and values are full of diversity in Islam.
The powerful national debates during the early years of Pakistan in the fifties and sixties to define and identify a true Islamic (or otherwise) political and economic order as such could not continue and the nation was left confused and deprived of potential development.
Dr Nasim Ahmad Jawed in his work, Islam’s political culture: religion and politics in predivided Pakistan offers an empirical and analytical study of contemporary Islamic political culture with Pakistan (1947-1971) as a case study. This is a pioneering work in the sense that departing from the standard practice of examining mainly the published works, it includes findings of a year-long field survey conducted by the author in Pakistan in 1969, as well as research from both traditional and contemporary Islamic writings including those of the Western writers.
The field survey was conducted among the Ulema and modern professionals who constituted the most influential social groups in both wings of the country. On the basis of the findings of the survey and the published research works, the author has been able to crystallise Islamic positions on modern nationalism and Islamic national identity, purpose of the state, the form of government, free, socialist and mixed economies and other topics in scrupulous detail.
In the last chapter titled, ‘Conclusion’, the author has contributed a masterly discourse on Islam’s ideological, political and economic issues worldwide.
Discussing the vexing issue of Islam and national identity, the author provides an analysis of the relationship between Islam and nationalism. Most of the Ulema maintain that Islam in itself is a sort of nationalism, in which Ummah Muhammadiyya (the Muslim community) occupied the place of the nation, demanding from its followers political loyalty to this Muslim state. Two major differences between Islam and modern nationalism exist. First Ummah Muhammadiyya is considered to be a community of faith, i.e. of rational choice, modern nationalism considers a nation to be a natural community to which one belongs merely by virtue of being born in it.
The second important difference is that traditional Islam demands that a state fulfils the needs of the Ummah. Both Islam and modern nationalism fiercely demand political loyalty of their followers, and these demands make them rivals. At some point these rival claims have the theoretical possibility of mutual conflict between them, according to the author.
The relationship between Ummah Muhammadiyya and nationalism is complicated because in the contemporary world a majority of Muslim governments accept the basic principle of nationalism. Pakistan also accepts the principle of nationalism although it has taken a number of Islamization measures and calls itself an Islamic Republic. But in the Islamic world there are Muslim individuals who subscribe to the idea of Ummah Muhammadiyya, Ulema of the traditional school wholeheartedly embrace the concept and principles of Ummah Muhammadiyya according to which they say it is the duty of the Muslim individuals to join or wage jihad in any part of the world if fellow Muslims are subjected to persecution and tyranny, or their territory is attacked by non-Muslims.
This issue was at the back of the recent upheaval in Pakistan after the American attack on the Taliban and Al-Qaeda militias in Afghanistan. These sordid events revive the unresolved controversy between the Islamic revivalists and extremists and the civil society of Pakistan that prefers a democratic nation state along with a liberal Islam. The book has detailed discussion of such issues, with reference to Pakistan and erstwhile East Pakistan. The author’s field survey, conducted 32 years ago, still has relevance vis-a-vis some of the topics. The book helps the readers reach their own conclusions. The author remains singularly neutral.
Islam’s political culture: religion and politics in predivided Pakistan
By Nasim Ahmad Jawed
Oxford University Press, 5 Bangalore Town, Sharae Faisal, Karachi-75350. Tel: 021-4529025.
Email: ouppak@theoffice.net
ISBN 0-19-579716-7 294pp. Rs495
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