The Clash of Values

Islamic Fundamentalism Versus Liberal Nationalism

Mansoor Moaddel

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Year: 2020
• eBook ISBN: 9780231550529
• Topic: Théologie et religion
• Subtopic: Politique du Moyen-Orient

Much of the Middle East and North Africa still appears to be in a transitional period set in motion by the 2011 Arab uprisings, and the political trajectory of the region remains difficult to grasp. In The Clash of Values, Mansoor Moaddel provides groundbreaking empirical data to demonstrate how the collision between Islamic fundamentalism and liberal nationalism explains the region's present and will determine its future.

Analyzing data from over 60,000 face-to-face interviews of nationally representative samples of people in seven countries—Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, and Turkey—Moaddel reveals the depth and breadth of the conflict of values. He develops measures of expressive individualism, gender equality, secularism, and religious fundamentalism and shows that the factors that strengthen liberal values also weaken fundamentalism. Moaddel highlights longitudinal data showing changes in orientations toward secular politics, Western-type government, religious tolerance, national identity, and to a limited extent gender equality, as well as a significant decline in support for political Islam, over the past decade. Focusing on these trends, he contends that the Arab Spring represents a new phase of collective action rooted in the spread of the belief in individual liberty. Offering a rigorous and deeply researched perspective on social change, The Clash of Values disentangles the Middle East and North Africa's political complexity and pinpoints a crucial trend toward liberal nationalism.

Chapter 1

Expressive Individualism

Expressive individualism is the first component of liberal values to be considered. It rests on the recognition, exaltation, and celebration of individuals’ private judgment about and ability to decide matters related to their lives, giving precedence to their choices and preferences over parental authority, patrimonial domination, and religious instructions. Although the exigencies of the communal or nationalist liberation struggle against foreign domination may complicate or even limit individual choices, the ultimate objective of the struggle for democratic change is the recognition and institutionalization of individual sovereignty.

The concept of expressive individualism has been the subject of considerable philosophical and political debate, and the varied operational meanings assigned to it have generated enormous controversies in different social contexts, including the contemporary Middle East and North Africa. This chapter, while discussing these debates, is concerned with measuring and analyzing expressive individualism, using a survey of people’s preferences concerning the basis for marriage, a woman’s right to dress as she wishes, and the most favorable qualities for children. A more liberal democratic order is predicated on the extent to which individual choices in these domains of social life are confirmed, promoted, strengthened, and institutionalized. A society may change in an individualistic or a collectivist direction, depending on how social actors resolve these practical issues and how their resolutions are institutionalized and become a part of the permanent features of the social order. In this book, I discuss the predictors of liberal values, of which expressive individualism is a component, on the macro (country) and micro (individual) level. In this chapter, I limit the discussion to analyzing cross-national variation in expressive individualism. I also analyze this variation by age, gender, and education.

The realization of the ideal of individual equality is also a matter of degree and a function of social arrangements. In modern democratic societies, this autonomy is the quintessential component of equality of opportunity and of political voice. It is formally sanctioned by law and practiced most of the time, though violations of individual rights do happen. In the patriarchal cultures of the Middle East and North Africa, on the other hand, priority is often given to the patriarch or the dominant male member of the family, religious authorities, or the ruling regime. The cultures of these countries tend to emphasize obedience to authority in family, politics, and other forms of social hierarchy. They, however, vary in terms of their support for individualistic values. Although one may arrive at the utility of the idea of individual equality through moral and rational reasoning, its wide social acceptance is an outcome of the operation of social forces, some of which are addressed in this book.

This chapter first discusses the concept of expressive individualism. It then suggests three indicators as measures of the construct: basis for marriage, a woman’s freedom to dress as she wishes, and favorable qualities for children. Next, it assesses variation in these measures across the seven countries and by age, gender, and education.

Liberal Democracy

Expressive individualism is one of the key dimensions of liberal democracy, along with gender equality, secular politics, and national identity. From a philosophical viewpoint, however, individualism may be construed as the foundation or the essence of liberal democracy, not just one constitutive element. Liberal democracy is the exaltation of individual freedom and the right of private judgment. A liberal democratic order recognizes and institutionalizes the principle of the individual as an autonomous actor in every domain of social life. This recognition is reflected in the emergence of the institution of free labor—that is, free peasantry—and the recognition of property rights in economic relationships following the breakdown of the precapitalist social order. More directly, liberal democracy rests on the acceptance of the principle of equal voice in politics and on the belief that individual rights are not defined by gender and are equally applicable to men and women in social relations. Finally, it is rooted in the tenet that knowledge about the world resides in the faculties of the individual—that is, rational thought and the experience of the senses and intuition, which are the foundation of modern science. The basis of this knowledge neither emanates from God, nor is it extracted from religious texts. Without the presence of the autonomous individual whose rights are protected in all these domains of social life—the family, economic, political, educational, and scientific—a fully developed liberal democratic order would not be possible.

From a sociological perspective, individualism in one domain of social life may not be readily transferrable to another domain, and the process of the rise and recognition of individual rights in the scientific, educational, political, economic, and gender domains has been subject to different societal and historical dynamics. Concerning the relationship of gender and democracy, for example, until the first half of the twentieth century, the existing democratic orders were male democracies in western Europe and a white male democracy in the United States. Thus, some societies may apply the principle of equality in politics only to men and rigorously defend gender hierarchy and male supremacy. They may also variably accept the authority of scientific knowledge over religious beliefs. A liberal democratic order is thus possible at the point of convergence of the diverse dynamics that promote equality in all the domains of social life. The empirical data from the seven countries presented in this book show that on the micro (individual) and macro (country) levels, three components of liberal values—expressive individualism, gender equality, and secular politics—are all positively correlated (see chapters 3 and 5).

Territorial nationalism or adherence to national identity, on the other hand, cannot always be considered a component of liberal values or liberal democracy. More often than not, nationalism has also been linked to authoritarian or even chauvinistic and xenophobic political movements. To account for such opposing tendencies in people’s perceptions of their collective sovereignty, historians and political scientists have made a distinction between nationalism and patriotism. ...

Table of contents

• Cover 
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents 
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction: People and Their Issues
• 1. Expressive Individualism
• 2. The Social Status of Women and Gender Equality
• 3. Secular Politics, Liberal Values, and National Identity
• 4. Religious Fundamentalism as Disciplinarian Deity, Literalism, Religious Exclusivity, and Religious Intolerance
• 5. Macro-Contextual (Country) Variation in Religious Fundamentalism and Liberal Values
• 6. What Makes a Country More Developed: Liberal Values Versus Religious Beliefs
• 7. The Arab Spring and Trends in Values: Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, and Turkey
• Conclusion: The Viability of Liberal Nationalism
• Appendix: The Questionnaire
• Notes
• References
• Index