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Clash of Civilizations

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, many political scientists wanted to find out what

was next for the international community, and how the world would interact. In Samuel P.

Huntington’s article titled “The Clash of Civilizations?” he talks about how the international

community would eventually split into eight major civilizations such as Western, Confucian,

Japanese, Islamic, Hindu, Slavic-Orthodox, Latin American and an African civilization.

Huntington’s work was influential to world politics. However, after Huntington’s release of his

article, it was met with criticism by other scholars such as Edward W. Said and Fouad Ajami.

Both men criticized his work for being xenophobic, bigoted, and he promotes isolationism in a

world economy that promotes the opposite. After reading Huntington’s article, he is wrong for

identifying the clash of civilizations as the fundamental source of conflict in the post-Cold War

World. The best paradigm for post-Cold War politics is that nations will inevitably interact and

pursue their own self-interests.

Huntington explains his paper on the basis of his hypothesis in which he states that in this

new world conflict will no longer be primarily ideological or primarily economic and that the

fundamental source of conflict will be cultural (Huntington 22). Huntington believes that nation

states will remain actors in world affairs but in times of crisis, nations will flock to other nations

based on cultural traditions. He comes to the conclusion that since civilizations are different, this

creates a problem in world politics. Huntington further continues his argument into why

civilizations will clash. He divides the cause into six categories. The first being the differences

among civilizations are basic meaning language, culture, tradition, and religion; Second, the

world is becoming a smaller place, which demonstrate any commonalities or differences between

civilizations; third, economic modernization and social change is separating people from local

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identities; fourth, growth of civilization-consciousness is enhanced by the West, which makes

non-West countries want to return to their original roots; fifth, cultural differences are less

mutable and less easily resolved than political and economic issues; and sixth, economic

regionalism is increasing (Huntington 25-27). As a result, he believes that these nations will form

alliances not in terms of ideologies, but culturally. He dives further into the notion saying that

there is a fault line between civilizations and that through this fault line there will be violence

because of the recent and past interventions of the West in Middle Eastern affairs during the

twentieth century, which draws more Middle Eastern civilizations or groups of people to hate the

West (Huntington 34). As a result of this fault line, international politics would lead to kin-

country syndrome where countries with identical cultures would come together at the aid of each

other through proxy wars such as the Azerbaijan crisis and the Bosnian crisis. According to

Huntington, this creates a West versus the rest mentality because of the West’s capabilities to

write the rules of world politics militarily and economically (Huntington 39). He believes this

will cause conflict because it’s almost seen as modern colonialism for these countries. After this

section, Huntington goes on to talk about “torn countries” and their role in joining certain

civilizations. He then comes up with this alliance of Islam-Confucian pact that will inevitably

arise because no one can challenge the west. After that he goes into what the West could do to

deter the conflict of civilizations.

Ultimately, Huntington’s argument is wrong. His argument was vague in his approach to

civilization identity. According Edward Said’s article, “The Clash of Ignorance” he states,

“Certainly neither Huntington nor Lewis has much time to spare for the internal dynamics and

plurality of every civilization, or for the fact that the major contest in most modern cultures

concerns the definition…of each culture…or downright ignorance is involved in presuming to

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speak for a whole religion or civilization” (Said 207). Huntington is generalizing and combining

separate identities without taking into consideration the smaller identities within all of the

supposed conglomerate of civilizations that are supposed to arise after the Cold War. In his belief

about the West versus the rest it seems discriminatory to all other cultures, specifically Islam. He

attacks and ridicules small ethnic groups according to his fault line issue. What he doesn’t do is

criticize Western ethnic fanatical groups such as the followers of Jim Jones or Branch Davidson

(Said 208). This creates mass confusion for the public within other countries. It further

generalizes a culture just because of the actions of a small fanatical group, so it separates cultures

and promotes a xenophobic attitude. Huntington assumes that these civilizations are homogenous

and he forgets the fact that countries are constantly interacting especially in cases such as

immigration. Through Huntington’s paradigm, nations discriminate against immigrants. For

example, Said talks about how certain countries have hate speech actions and law enforcement

efforts against Arabs, Muslims, and Indians (Said 209). Huntington’s paradigm would create an

international community based on ignorance, isolationism, and a form of discrimination.

Isolationism cannot be an option in a modern, world economy that is interdependent. The only

logical paradigm is that nations will inevitably interact and pursue their own self-interests.

The paradigm that nations will inevitably interact and pursue their own self-interests is

located in Fouad Ajami’s article “The Summoning”. Ajami criticizes Huntington, but comes to

the conclusion that states are the fundamental actors and will always remain the most important

actors in world politics and local politics (Ajami 2). Ajami argues that Huntington is wrong in

believing that ethnic groups, because of their cultural ties to government, will dictate what states

do. States will suppress fanatical groups before they allow small groups to take over. This is the

power of modernity and the secular state according to Ajami. States have become secular and as

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a result tradition have dwindled and this idea of tradition does not prove that these civilizations

outside of the West are intact or present a military threat. Although some states do use some

cultural traditions, Ajami believes that “Nations ‘cheat’: they juggle identities and interests.

Their ways meander…the traffic of arms from North Korea and China to Libya and Iran and

Syria show this-that states will consort with any civilization, however alien, as long as the price

is right and the goods are ready” (Ajami 6). World economics are in command of the way

nations interact. Culture is only used as a way to cheat in order to receive necessary goods or

make necessary alliances in order to fulfill the self-interest. This paradigm is realistic because

Ajami uses examples from Huntington’s work to prove him wrong. For example, he analyzed the

Gulf War in which Huntington believed Islamic states were secretly cheering on Sadam Hussein

when in actuality, those Muslim states wanted a balance of power to return to the Middle East.

Overall, Huntington’s argument is wrong. It promotes xenophobia and bigotry while

neglecting the states as the actors in world politics and glorifying culture. Since this paradigm is

wrong. The paradigm in Fouad Ajami’s article is correct because it demonstrates the true motive

of states in an interdependent economy. It acknowledges the fact that states have the capability to

suppress small fanatical ethnic groups and the important role that secularization places within

international and local politics. This paradigm even points to weaknesses within traditionalism,

but Huntington neglects these factors within his argument, which ultimately makes him wrong.