The Tragedy of Afghanistan

The Social, Cultural and Political Impact of the Soviet Invasion

Bo Huldt, Erland Jansson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9780367265182
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000397963
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Regional Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 stunned the world and ushered in a new period of superpower confrontation. Research into Afghan society was severely curtailed, and the ability to research the Afghan resistance was non-existent. This book, first published in 1988, was the result of a Swedish seminar that focused on the results of the war on the people and culture of Afghanistan.

PART I

ETHNICITY AND THE NEW NATIONALISM

1

WHEN MUSLIM IDENTITY HAS DIFFERENT MEANINGS: RELIGION AND POLITICS IN CONTEMPORARY AFGHANISTAN

Asger Christensen

‘For Islam, honour, and homeland’ (Islam de para, namus de para, votan de para) are the concepts usually employed when refugees or guerrillas belonging to Afghanistan’s largest ethnic group, the Pakhtun, (1) explain their opposition to the present regime in Kabul and its Soviet allies. Together these three categories define the conceptual realm which provides meaning and raison d’etre for the Afghan resistance struggle: the defence of territory and cultural tradition against interference from an opponent considered to be an infidel (kafir). Yet, although the majority among both the Pakhtun and the other ethnic groups in Afghanistan appear to agree to defend their beliefs and way of life against the Kabul regime and the Soviet forces of occupation, this does not mean that a consensus exists even within the separate ethnic groups, concerning the conceptualisation of the cultural tradition which is defended. The Afghan resistance, and in particular that of the Pakhtun, is split into a large number of political parties and groups, who differ more or less profoundly from each other both with regard to what they view as proper Islam, and with regard to the kind of society they envisage in a liberated Afghanistan. In what follows I shall attempt to outline how the very same categories - Islam, honour, and homeland - which provide the impetus for resistance are also the ones which must be considered, if the political and organisational fragmentation of the resistance is to be explained.

Diversity within Islam

Islam does not contain any distinction between a religious and a secular sphere of life, but strives instead to create a total way of life based on the guidelines, directives and prohibitions which are given by God in the Koran or are contained in legends of the life of Muhammed, the hadith. However, the fact that the overwhelming majority of Afghans consider themselves Muslim and regard the Koran and hadith as the supreme authority concerning all contexts of existence, does not mean that Islam in Afghanistan constitutes an unequivocal or static phenomenon.

The presence of both of the major Muslim sects, the Sunni and the Shi’a, provides the basic diversity within Islam in Afghanistan. Neither Sunni nor Shi’a constitute monolithic systems of belief. Instead both contain internal sectarian differences like that between Imamis and Ismailis among the Shi’a, or those which separate the different Sufi tariqa and also separate the followers of these from the other believers among the Sunni. Moreover, the adherents of both Sunni and Shi’a Islam come from culturally diverse ethnic groups, who consequently in praxis realise mutually distinct versions of a Muslim way of life. All of these versions contain elements which deviate from or even contradict the message of the Koran and hadith, but people experience this condition very differently, and the practical consequences which they draw also vary considerably.

The Pakhtun provide an example of this kind of diversity. They regard themselves as descendants from a common ancestor by the name of Qaiz, who lived at the time of Muhammed, and who was converted to Islam by the Prophet himself. The Pakhtun thus associate and equate their very origin and identity as a people with their Muslim identity, and they contrast this with all the other ethnic groups in Afghanistan, whose Muslimity is not original, but who are later converts. At the same time, however, this notion of common descent also constitutes the basis of a tribal social order, which contains norms and modes of conduct that depart from Islam in several important respects.(2) This schism is part of Pakhtun cultural consciousness and is explicitly formulated as when the tribal notions of honourable behaviour, pakhtunwali, are contrasted with the sayings of the Koran in the proverb ‘Pakhtun half use the Koran, half pakhtunwali’ (Pukhtane nim Quran mani, nim pukhtunwali mani). (3) Most Pakhtun do not consider this conflict specially problematic, and many just appear to accept it as a fact of life, while others experience it as a fundamental existential dilemma and strive to solve it in different ways. Some attempt to do this by practising a personal life-style that places greater emphasis on the precepts of Islam, or attach themselves to a religious figure respected for his piousness and learning from whom they receive spiritual guidance, as for example one of the leaders (Pirs) of a Sufi tariqa. Yet others who wish to eliminate the discrepancy they experience, seek a political solution through a transformation of society which brings it in correspondence with what they view as proper Islam.

Such differences of opinion concerning the relationship between what is understood as proper Islam and the existing social order can be found within all sections of the Afghan population, and it was also present in the attitudes which people held with regard to the increasing ‘modernisation’ and ‘westernisation’ of Afghan society.

So, instead of providing unity of belief and a shared unequivocal conception of how society should be, the role of Islam as the basic conceptual frame of reference and the ultimate source of legitimation means that social and political matters are commonly understood and discussed in religious terms. The concepts of Islam have always been sufficiently ambiguous to allow different interpretations of their meaning and thus to allow mutually divergent political views to be seen as religiously legitimate by their exponents and followers. The result is that attempts to mobilise people for political action through religiously legitimate appeals, or to convince them of the correctness of certain kinds of conduct, invariably take place in a context which contains divergent or even alternative appeals, that are likewise held to be derived from Islam.

Afghan history contains many examples of political confrontations based on different interpretations of Islam. (4) One of the most illustrative of these conflicts took place in the context of the expansion and consolidation of Afghan state authority during the reign of Amir Abdur Rahman (c.1880-1901). In addition to harsh military and administrative measures his attempts to strengthen the authority of the state also involved a religious policy which entailed the propagation of a new interpretation of Islam (cf. Ghani, 1978). The main feature of this interpretation was the attempt to provide state authority with religious legitimacy by defining the good Muslim as identical with the good subject who accepted this authority. Through a combination of repression and rewards the state managed to gain the support of a number of prominent religious personalities who promoted its version of Islam. But at the same time this version was rejected by others who proclaimed the ruler heretic, and who thereby lent religious legitimacy to the extensive popular resistance against the attempts made by the state to expand and strengthen its control.

The situation today exhibits certain parallels to that of the reign of Amir Abdur Rahman. Ever since seizing power through the coup d’etat in April 1978 the new ‘revolutionary’ regime has striven to present itself as Muslim. Its decrees and other official proclamations have all been introduced by an invocation of God, and like its nineteenth-century predecessor, it has repressed and eliminated part of the religious establishment while at the same time attempting to ally itself with other religious figures who were willing to provide the regime and its policies with religious legitimation. However, the extensive popular opposition against the new regime demonstrates that this policy has been far from successful and that most people instead identify themselves with the resistance and consider it the legitimate representative of Islam.

Honour - Autonomy and Rivalry

One of the most important reasons for this state of affairs is the one which prompted the resistance against the centralising policies of Amir Abdur Rahman, and it is expressed in the second of the categories that the Pakhtun use to explain the current resistance struggle - their honour. For them, honour is associated with the maintenance of autonomy and integrity, be that in relation to other members of the local community or to outside powers such as the state. While the notions of honour (nang) appear most elaborated among the Pakhtun, where they constitute the core of the tribal value system pakhtunwali (cf. Janata and Hassas, 1975), the association of honour and autonomy is also shared by the other rural ethnic groups in Afghanistan.

The attempt to strengthen state authority at the expense of local autonomy at the end of the last century, and to introduce such measures as taxation and military conscription, met with open resistance from practically all the ethnic groups in the country (cf. Kakar, 1971). But although the central government succeeded in expanding its influence considerably compared to its predecessors, there nevertheless remained considerable sections of the rural population who managed to retain much of their former autonomy, and who, moreover, have been able to do so right up to the present.

The current resistance struggle began as a number of mutually isolated and unrelated attempts to defend this local autonomy against increasing interference from the new ‘revolutionary’ regime. Clashes between the local population and inexperienced, newly-appointed officials, who often acted in a dogmatic and high-handed fashion, were seen by the government as ‘counter-revolutionary’ resistance and met with military reprisals. The result was that as early as the summer of 1978, a few months after the coup d’etat and before the reforms affecting the rural population had been made public, the actions of the new regime had already fostered a growing popular resistance. At the beginning of October this resistance reached such a level in the province of Kunar in Eastern Afghanistan, that the Afghan army had difficulties handling the situation and had to be supported by Soviet military advisers (Christensen, 1983: 11). The dependency of the new regime on Soviet civil and military aid - a dependency which deepened and became more manifest as the resistance increased - thus made it appear as foreign-dominated and un-Islamic to many Afghans long before the Soviet invasion in December 1979.

However, as mentioned above, the Pakhtun notion of honour has yet another dimension. Just as the maintenance of honour leads to resistance against the imposition of outside control, it is also a source of rivalry on the local level concerning influence, leadership and control over resources. The notion of honour is closely linked to the idea that all (male) Pakhtun are equal (sial) because of their common descent. Honour is preserved by asserting equality vis-a-vis other Pakhtun, be they close or distant kinsmen. The realisation of this involves above all the maintenance of the autonomy and integrity of the household (korunei) through the ability to protect (and control! the women, the house and the land belonging to it, three categories that are united in the same concept of honour - namus. In the eyes of Pakhtun society, then, it is not enough that the individual is a Pakhtun merely through descent, but he also has to do Pakhto (pakhto kavol) by upholding namus in order to preserve his equality and status as a real Pakhtun tribesman.

Equality thus has a dual nature for the Pakhtun: on the one hand it is something which is ascribed and given, yet on the other hand it also has to be confirmed through achievement. This duality is the source of the ambiguity, tension and frequent hostility which pervades the relations between even close collateral agnates, because the effort to secure the premised equality by upholding honour and autonomy may either be pursued through relations to others involving co-operation and conjunction, or competition and attempted dominance (Christensen, 1984: 72).

The ambiguity inherent in the relationship between patrilineal kinsmen is clearly expressed in the concepts used by Pakhtuns. Despite the often stated ideal of solidarity between agnates, the verb siali kavol, which literally means ‘to make equality’, has the meaning of ‘competition’, and the term for patrilateral cousin, tarbur, has the connotation of ‘enemy’, while tarburwali denotes the rivalry often existing between collateral agnates.

So political relations are shaped and conditioned by an organisational context provided by a patrilineal descent system with a strong normative emphasis on solidarity, but where at the same time the actual relations between agnates are crucially influenced by variable interests, which may either bring them together as allies, or separate them as competitors and opponents. The result is that landholdi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of contents
• Introduction
• PART I: Ethnicity and the New Nationalism
• PART II: Afghan Learning and Education
• PART III: The War
• PART IV: Ecology
• PART V: The Exile
• Index