Islamophobia and the Challenge of Pluralism Workshop
Workshop summary by ACMCU Visiting Researcher Sara Amin
On September 20th 2007 the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU) and the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) gathered leading scholars and researchers, heads of national and international organizations, newspaper editors, and government officials to discuss the content, causes and consequences of Islamophobia. Dr. John L. Esposito (Professor and Director of the ACMCU) and Secretary General of the OIC Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu underscored that this meeting was a starting point for a long-term project of understanding and developing practical strategies to challenge Islamophobia. As such, the discussion, produced at its conclusion, a set of pragmatic suggestions on what directions and actions could be taken.
What is Islamophobia? The discussion revealed Islamophobia to be a multilevel phenomenon, manifest in attitudes, discourse, and action. Dalia Mogahed measured Islamophobia through people’s attitudes towards Islam and Muslims as surveyed in the Gallup World Poll. She found that there was a significant difference between how people perceived Islam and Muslims, compared to how they perceived other religious groups: Muslims and Islam repeatedly fared worse. Peter Gottschalk assessed Islamophobia by examining to what extent Arab/Muslim characters in political cartoons were caricatured vs. stereotyped. He argued that in contrast to caricatures, stereotypes erase particularities and reflect deeply held prejudices. Gottschalk showed that in American political cartoons portraying Arabs and Muslims from the 1950s onwards: Arab/Muslim characters are always generalized; over time, Arab and Muslim features have been conflated; and the Arab/Muslim is repeatedly placed in categories of extremes, in opposition to the norm: the effeminate vs. angry Arab man, the titillating vs. oppressed Muslim woman, the hedonistic vs. puritanical Arab/Muslim. Juan Cole argued Islamophobia was manifest in the rhetoric of US foreign policy. He identified the rhetoric of fear directed towards Muslim and Islam by leading political figures as a “very insidious way of spreading hatred.” Amedée Turner found in his study on Muslims in Britain and the United States that Muslims found Islam and democracy to be completely compatible; however, like all other groups in Western societies, Muslims too had a particular vision of what form and content democracy would take. “Islamic exceptionalism” (John L. Esposito, Parvez Ahmed) and double standards in democratic and journalistic practices against Muslims (Haroon Siddiqui) are also indicators of Islamophobia.
What causes Islamophobia? Discussants and presenters identified a range of “root causes” of Islamophobia. Ignorance of Islam was repeatedly identified by participants as a key reason. However, rather than ignorance per se, (i.e., no knowledge of Islam), what is more important is actually the kind of knowledge and information that people are exposed to of Islam (Dalia Mogahed). This implicates the role of public opinion makers, including the media and politicians, and what knowledge (or ignorance) they are spreading (Mark Tessler, Juan Cole). Other participants pointed to the conflation of the structural (socio-economic and demographic) with the religious as an important dimensions of where Islamophobia comes from: for example, in France, Jocelyn Cesari pointed out, the “Muslim problem” is really a “working class problem”; in Great Britain, the “Muslim problem” is a problem of divided cities, where communities have been ghettoized.
Another key factor that leads to Islamophobia are the Eurocentric narratives of nation and citizenship where non-Christian-non-whites are excluded from what it means to be British, German, European—thus the fear of the foreigner (xenophobia) becomes legitimately associated with established Muslim communities (Dilwar Hussain). These exclusionary narratives are part of school curricula, national media, and political/policy discourse. In the American context, Sherman A. Jackson argued, the national narrative holds the anti-black racist morally reprehensible, but not the Islamophobe. This is because the Muslim has been racialized as a “non-descript” other, devoid of race. In the American landscape, where race is of crucial importance, this “unracing of the Muslim” along with the American Muslim community’s “agnostic position vis-à-vis race” leaves them, Jackson says, in a position of weakness in “raising consciousness and responsibility” in those engaging in prejudice against Muslims. Islamophobia is also rationalized by the “invisibility in the US of its imperial self”, which is “intimately related to the cultural hegemony of America” (Peter Gottschalk).
Finally, participants regularly came back to the idea that Islamophobia and Anti-Americanism (or “Westophobia”) were intimately linked in a vicious cycle. Mohamed Nimer identified two main reasons for this: firstly, mutual misconceptions of each other which obscure the diversities in the Western and Muslim societies; secondly, concrete grievances experienced by both groups at the hands of the other permits the extension of blame to situations where responsibility cannot be placed in a rational manner. A series of historical interactions (e.g., Crusades, colonialism) between Islam and the West created these parallel discourses, which legitimize Islamophobia (and Westophobia) as rational and justified.
Why is Islamophobia important? Islamophobia, participants stressed, has important consequences for the relationship between the Western and the Muslim worlds. It reinforces relations of mistrust, enmity and hostility between Muslims and non-Muslims. Nihad Awad and Juan Cole pointed to the war on Iraq as a profound example of what Islamphobia can lead to. Parvez Ahmed, among others, discussed the distortionary effects Islamophobia has on civil rights and civic life. Louay M. Safi articulated that Islamophobia was not a problem of a few bigoted individuals—instead it was a political and social problem, precisely because the attitudes of a few bigots were determining the relationship between Muslim and non-Muslim communities in the West and elsewhere. Jasser Auda, Phillip Lewis, Daniel Madigan, and Louay M. Safi, among others, indicated that Islamophobia not only normalizes prejudice, discrimination and violence towards Muslims, it also, silences legitimate criticism within the Muslim world and conflates legitimate anxiety in the West. Participants agreed that there are urgent moral and pragmatic imperatives to actively engage in curbing and eradicating Islamophobia so that we can build a safe and secure world and a global society “constituted by equals and working towards a common good.”
What can be done to challenge Islamophobia? Of primary importance, the conference concluded, was to put Islamophobia on the map—to make it visible as a problem. This requires extensive practices of monitoring and reporting of all acts of Islamophobia. Discussants saw the upcoming OIC report on Islamophobia, the first of its kind, as a significant stride towards the goal of changing the deficit of systematic and scientific information on Islamophobia, around the world. Phillip Lewis and Nihad Awad underscored the pragmatic importance building on the work of existing organizations and governments already fighting Islamophobia and other forms of racism. Daniel Madigan, among others, pointed to Jewish institutions’ efforts (and success) at fighting anti-Semitism as something anti-Islamophobia organizations could model after.
Cooperation and active efforts to build and mobilize networks of anti-Islamophobia activists, scholars, and policy-makers was of paramount importance (Secretary General Ihsanoglu, Dilwar Hussain). The OIC was seen to potentially have an especially influential role in this aspect. The discussants also emphasized the importance of creating (counter-) spaces for dialogue that would bridge divides between Muslim and non-Muslim communities, with a special emphasis on all interfaith activities (Jocelyn Cesari, Zahid Bukhari). Participants underscored the importance of providing financial and other resources to grassroots efforts: these included creation of programs that built (youth) leadership in Muslim communities as well as non-Muslim communities (Phillip Lewis, Omür Orhun).
Education was consistently marked as an area of where work needed to be done to curb Islamophobia: educational efforts needed to go beyond religious education curricula and instead be integrated into all aspects of the curricula, with a special emphasis on history. Educating the media is also important (Ibrahim Karin): production of media guides for journalists so that responsible journalism could be practiced in reporting on Muslims and Islam. When educating non-Muslims about Islamophobia, the strategy of making comparisons with other forms of discriminations, rather than talk about Islam per se, is more likely to be fruitful (Peter Gottschalk). Participants agreed that discussion on Islamophobia, in all its forms, needs to be taken to policy makers directly if their attitudes and actions are to change. Therefore encouraging responsible (and sanctioning against irresponsible) rhetoric by politicians was of crucial importance. Finally, Muslims themselves need to be educated on what constitutes as Islamophobia and how to practice critical engagement in their societies.
Jasser Auda, with others, encouraged a human rights framework for guiding all efforts against Islamophobia. Omür Orhun advised that we rethink the term Islamophobia since not Islam but the human rights of Muslims were at stake. Daniel Madigan also advised a rethinking of the term because its ambiguity as a concept hinders the development of practical strategies. Fighting Islamophobia requires, Dilwar Hussain, with others, providing an alternative discourse—one that allows space for expressing legitimate concerns and anxieties of both Muslims and non-Muslims. The goal in curbing Islamophobia is neither to assert the superiority of Islam, nor engage in “competitions of victimhood” of religious groups. The goal of challenging Islamophobia is “for the next generation to grow up” in societies built around mutual respect and trust, where all are empowered to live in full human dignity.