consequences of 'cultural complexity

China Media Research, 3(2), 2007, Chokr, Consequences of ‘Cultural Complexity’

http://www.chinamediaresearch.net [email protected] 62

Consequences of ‘Cultural Complexity’ *

Nader N. Chokr

Shandong University Abstract: Culture has emerged in recent decades as the subject of intense and divisive controversies in a number of areas --e.g., identity politics, the politics of difference and recognition, multiculturalism, cross-cultural communication or incommensurability, and more specifically, regarding the issue of cultural relativism vs. moral universalism as it is brought to bear on the theoretical debates and political struggles about human rights, democracy, human development and social justice. If we are to get a better handle on all these problems and issues in contemporary cultural politics, it is imperative that we articulate an adequate conception of culture and cultural analysis—from both an empirical and normative point of view. In the present essay, I contend that, as a first step, we are well-advised to draw the consequences of “cultural complexity” in a world that is both globalizing and ‘glocalising.’ We would then be a better position to understand not only the complex mechanisms of (individual and group) identity-formation, but to assess and evaluate the complex internal dynamics of cultures as well as the diverse relationships that obtain or not between them at this juncture of our history. [China Media Research. 2007; 3(2):62-82].

Keywords: Cultural Complexity, Globalization, ‘Glocalisation,’ Relativism, Ethnocentrism, Moral Universalism, Identity-Formation, Parochialism, Fundamentalism, Cosmopolitanism.

1. Introduction: Misconceptions and Controversies ‘Culture’ has emerged in recent decades as the subject of intense and divisive political controversies at both the national and international (or should I say, global) level. The intensity and divisiveness of these controversies can be felt in a number of areas. These include: identity politics or the politics of cultural differences and recognition, multiculturalism, cross-cultural communication or incommensurability, or more specifically, with the issue of cultural relativism vs. moral universalism, particularly as it is brought to bear on the theoretical debates and political struggles about human rights, democracy, human development and social justice –to mention only a few of the most hotly debated ones. In the aftermath of the Cold War and the “end of ideologies”, some authors have argued that the single most important conflict confronting the world today and for the foreseeable future will be a “clash of civilizations” (Huntington, 1996) – also characterized as a “clash of cultures” (in the broadest sense of the term), which are irremediably incommensurable and condemned to misunderstand one another. Paradoxically enough, this view is further supported and given credence by so-called “postmodernists” who are typically situated on the other side of the political spectrum. These thinkers (e.g., Lyotard, 1984) take a strong anti-metanarrative stance and recommend that we content ourselves and learn to live with diverging tales and narratives in irreconcilable idioms and languages. They urge that we forego once and for all any attempt to make comparative evaluations

on the basis of a presumably neutral (external, trans-historical, trans-cultural, and universal) set of standards, or to enfold them into synoptic or synthetic visions of any kind. Besides, the phenomenon of “globalization” – apprehended in at least one of its main dimensions – is commonly viewed as something fundamentally new1 and interpreted as one threatening cultural uniformity or homogenization around the world. It is in one sense taken to represent the new face of “cultural imperialism”. In effect, it is viewed mainly as “a threat to cultural diversity”. It is widely believed that the predominance and global expansion of uniformizing and homogenizing modes of production, consumption and information risks alienating non-Western and Western people alike from the intellectual and moral resources embedded in their own ‘distinctive’ cultural traditions. In reaction to what is viewed as the erosion of traditional cultures and civilizations, we seem to be witnessing the re-emergence of a tendency to “re-ethnicize the minds” through renewed and more or less systematic “cultural revivals” worldwide (viz., “hinduization,” “ivoirization,” “sinofication,” “nipponification,” “islamicization,” “indigenization,” “russification,” “gallicization,” etc). Scholars of various stripes and persuasions are clamoring to understand and assess the significance of this phenomenon, as attested by the proliferation of publications on this subject (see Botz-Bornstein & Hengelbrock, 2006). In the past few years (2001), the UNESCO had convened a forum in order to hammer out a convention



on the “protection and promotion” of cultural diversity. Such a convention was finally approved, I believe, in October 2005. The drafters worried that “the processes of globalization …represent a challenge for cultural diversity, namely in view of risks of imbalances between rich and poor countries.” The fear was that the values and images of Western mass culture, like some invasive weed, are threatening to choke out the world’s native flora. Subsequently, alarms are sounded and concerns raised about the imminent disappearance of “distinctive cultures”, and calls made to “preserve” all existing cultures – as if they each and all deserve to be saved, in each and all their respective components and elements.2 “Political correctness” aside, perhaps we should keep in mind that: “Cultures are not museum pieces, to be preserved intact at all costs” (Nussbaum, 1999: 37). Perhaps we also need to come to grips with the unavoidability and even desirability of “cross-cultural contamination, intermingling and fertilization” (Appiah, 2006a). More often than not, a problematic conception of ‘culture’ is at work implicitly or explicitly in the views of various protagonists involved in these debates. They write or talk as if “culture” were a homogenous, coherent, bounded, tightly woven, un-contested, unified or unitary entity with a distinct nature, whose identity-constituting and deterministic role on individuals and groups of people is uniform, continuous and stable. I contend that such a conception of “culture” underlying or underwriting many of the controversies raging today constitutes in fact a fundamental misconception, with profound and at times disturbing philosophical as well as political implications (Chokr, 2006). Admittedly, the concept of “culture” is “essentially a contested concept – like democracy, religion, simplicity, or social justice”, which is multiply defined, multiply employed, ineradicably imprecise (Geertz, 2000: 11). And a history of its evolution over the past couple of hundred years or so – to take a relatively limited yet arguably sufficient historical perspective – would attest to the vicissitudes it has undergone, the battles over its meaning, its use, and its explanatory worth.3 Rather than undertaking a full-blown history of the concept, which would undoubtedly be a worthwhile enterprise (see Kroeber and Kluckhohn, 1963),4 I propose instead to draw together some of the main insights and lessons that we have learned from various such efforts in an attempt to make a case for the notion of “cultural complexity”5 and defend an alternative, more appropriate conception, according to which “culture” is always already ineradicably plural, compound, inconstant, and always already multiply

contested both from within and without. Such a conception constitutes, I believe, a direct challenge to the “cookie-cutter conception of culture” with its focus on consensus, type and commonality. In the face of the kind and degree of fragmentation, dispersion, intermingling, cross-fertilization and contamination characteristic of the (globalizing and ‘glocalizing’) world today, I submit that the view of culture, a culture, this culture, as a consensus on fundamentals –shared beliefs, feelings, values and practices—is hardly tenable except for the so-called “guardians of cultural integrity and ethnic purity” who would like us to believe otherwise. Against such guardians, we must be prepared to countenance instead the compositeness and heterogeneity of cultures. In the present essay, I argue essentially that we are well-advised to draw the consequences of ‘cultural complexity” in a world that is undergoing both ‘globalization’ and ‘glocalisation’ at the same time in an effort to articulate an adequate conception of culture and cultural analysis –from both an empirical and normative point of view. I contend that, if and when we do, we would for example be able to come up with an account of the complex mechanisms of identity-formation for individuals and communities that is far more compelling empirically and normatively. We would also be able to better understand the complex internal dynamics of cultures as well as the diverse relationships that obtain (or not) between them at this juncture of our history. 2. Preliminaries: Terminological Clarifications and Historical Considerations Obviously, there is a broad and narrow sense of the term 'culture.' According to the former, 'culture' denotes virtually every aspect of the social, political, economical, intellectual, religious and artistic life of a people. In this sense, 'culture' refers to the customs, civilization, and achievements of a given people. This was the view taken for example in the classic work of Tylor (1871/1924), who regarded culture as including "knowledge, belief, art, morals, law, custom, and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of a society." In contrast to such an all-embracing notion of culture, there is also another, equally widely used, notion of culture that narrowly focuses only on the intellectual and aesthetic achievements of a people. In the latter sense, culture is then defined as "the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively." In the present context, it is obviously the former sense of culture that is of interest to us. It is also the sense in which the UNESCO commission addresses the problem of cultural diversity (2001).



In the aftermath of WWII roughly speaking, “culture” came to be viewed by anthropologists as the sum total of social systems and practices operating at both the material and symbolic levels of production and reproduction that can be associated with a given group of people situated in a given environment (see Benhabib, 2002). The material level of production/reproduction has to do with those activities, practices and processes which sustain the life of members of a culture or society. These include of course the economic provision of means of subsistence and the maintenance of the goods and various products that such a community deems necessary or useful, i.e., tools, technologies, infrastructures, modes and systems of communication, cultural and artistic artifacts, etc. As for the symbolic level of production/reproduction, it has to do with the following complex processes: (a) The socialization to which a given community subjects its individual members so as to enable them to function within a certain language-game which is itself part of a form of life, under a certain set of reciprocal expectations and moral obligations. (b) The production, maintenance and reproduction of clusters of ideas, meanings, values and beliefs through which members of a given community interpret and view the world as well as their own situatedness in the world. (c) The coordination by members of a given community of their cooperative activities, practices, interactions and exchanges in accordance with certain rules, sanctions, and norms as a result of both (a) and (b). The practices of meaning-making, signification, representation, and symbolism have each with their own autonomous logic, separate from, yet not reducible to the intentions of individuals or groups6 through whose actions and behaviors it emerges and is reproduced. It should be noted that, though cultural and artistic artifacts are listed at the material level, they clearly have something to do with the symbolic level as well. Conversely, one might add, the processes involved at the symbolic level also require institutional and material realizations. The point worth stressing here is that there may well be occasionally tensions and conflicts between the material and symbolic levels in that the processes adopted at the symbolic level may or may not prove to be the most appropriate or helpful for members of a given community in terms of material production or reproduction, and vice-versa. This, as can be expected, may require that changes or adjustments be made (at one or both levels) in order to insure continuity over time of the ‘culture’ in question. Finally, and to cut a longer story short, it should be noted that in the post-colonial, anti-Eurocentric, and “egalitarian” understanding that emerged subsequently,

all such social systems and practices developed by different groups of human beings in their respective environments and in response to their particular conditions constitute as many different “cultures”, i.e., as many different, equally viable ways of setting themselves apart from “animal existence” and away from “nature” and distinctively expressing their humanity in a given environment. And more often than not, the ubiquitous notion of an autonomous and distinct culture came to be associated with the notion of identity. The still lingering Herderian identification of the “spirit” or “genius” of a people with expressions of its cultural identity served to underwrite such a view. 3. Contemporary Cultural Studies and Politics 3.1. Dubious Assumptions, Premises or Theses It is fair to say that cultural politics today is for the most part still characterized by a strange mix of two elements: (1) “the anthropological received view of the democratic equality of all cultures” and (2) “the Romantic, Herderian emphasis on each culture’s irreducible uniqueness and distinctness” (see Joppke and Lukes, 1999: 5; see also Benhabib, 2002: 3). As a result, it is widely assumed that the boundaries separating peoples as well as cultures are easy to draw and delineate, and that each distinct people has a distinct “culture”. Thus, still too many contemporary discussions, including the most well-intentioned ones, seem to be committed to some versions or others of the following assumptions, premises, or theses: (1) Cultural Egalitarianism. (2) Cultural Essentialism/ Monism/ Holism/ Hermeticism. (3) Cultural Idealism/ Determinism/ Reductionism.7 By (1) “cultural egalitarianism”, I don’t mean to suggest that all cultures were viewed necessarily as equally deserving of merit in terms of their ‘material’ and ‘symbolic’ systems of production and reproduction – although this view may also have been taken by some of the protagonists. I only wish to capture the anthropological received view that all cultures came to be given equal consideration as distinct and unique cultures –providing a distinctive set of answers and solutions to the problems encountered by a given people in their environment.8 By (2) “cultural essentialism/ monisn/ holism/ hermeticism”, I mean to capture in an adumbrated manner the most problematic and widespread view according to which each culture has presumably a distinct, essential nature – that is one, whole and somehow hermetically closed off to other cultural influences. Each such culture is furthermore considered to be congruent with a distinct group or people. It is typically apprehended along only one of its dimensions in terms of a powerfully and strictly determining homogenous and uniform symbolic system



of meanings, values and beliefs (often without much regard for the material constraints at work) acting or operating in similar ways on all of its members or carriers (often without much regard for the powerfully individuating historical and psychological forces or factors at play). This view is underwritten by what I call the thesis of (3) ‘cultural idealism/ determinism/ reductionism” –whereby individuals are viewed as being strictly or blindly determined by their respective culture and their lives as reducible to the culture they belong to in that they are shaped “as a cake-mold shapes a cake, or gravity our movements” (Geertz, 2000: 13). It is worth noting that given (1)-(3), it is only a very short step to the thesis of either (4) Ethnocentrism, or (5) Cultural Relativism. Contrary to some authors (e.g., Rorty) who may wish to distinguish between these two notions for self-serving and dubious purposes, I assume that cultural relativism is merely the anthropological or sociological form of ethnocentrism or ethnocentricity, construed in psychological terms. In such a context, it is perhaps perfectly understandable why the thesis of ‘cultural diversity’ meets with overwhelmingly broad and wide support – at times though almost uncritically and without much needed nuances and qualifications.9 We are told at both ends of the political spectrum – albeit for differently expressed reasons – that the preservation and continuation of all different cultures is a good and desirable goal. On the Left, we are told by a diverse group of authors [e.g., Taylor (1992; 1994), Kymlicka (1997; 2000; 2001)] that cultures should be preserved as distinct entities, and if need be, they should be given their own enclaves in order to redress and remedy historical or institutional patterns of domination, oppression and/or symbolic injury involving the disrespect, un- or mis-recognition, or mis-treatment of some cultures by others. Examples of such cases abound not only with regards to one multi-cultural or multi-national country, but between “cultures” across the world. They were particularly acute during the times of colonialism and imperialism. These examples constitute today the fertile ground for the kind of moral problems and dilemmas stemming from “multiculturalism” and “cultural diversity.” While we all can agree that they must be addressed, justly and fairly, we may however disagree over the liberal recommendations and policy initiatives put forth for doing so, and in particular, over the underlying conception of “culture” that serves to underwrite them. Thus, I doubt that proposals which encourage and promote “cultural enclavism” and “cultural preservationism” are the way to go.10 [For a compelling critical analysis of both Taylor’s and Kymlicka’ views,

see Benhabib, (2002: 51-57; 59-67)]. On the Right, we are told that cultures should be preserved so as to keep peoples and groups separate because cultural confrontation is a real threat, perhaps even the only threat we need to concern ourselves with in the aftermath of the Cold War and the so-called “end of ideologies” (Huntington, 1996).11 Furthermore, we are told that cultural hybridity can only produce tensions, instabilities, and eventually lead to serious conflicts. It is believed that the “clash of civilizations” (or “cultures” broadly construed) can be avoided somehow by the establishment and reinforcement of political alliances that closely follow cultural-ethnic identity rifts. It does not take much political ingenuity or sophistication to recognize that such a goal is unrealistic, and cannot be borne out by the political realities of any given country, let alone the world. The political-cultural-ethnic map is to say the least often scrambled in surprising ways –in a given society and all the more so across the globe. And there may be some lessons to be learned here from attending to the particular ways in which such a map is often scrambled in different parts of the world – and to the reasons why it is thus scrambled. Only a naïve and unsophisticated political theory could surmise that political alliances would always necessarily follow cultural, ethnic or racial lines of demarcation or, for that matter, gender or even class distinctions (see Nussbaum, 1999, 2000; Benhabib, 1995, 2002; Sen, 1999; 2006). Is it possible to articulate a more plausible and politically sound as well as more sophisticated position, one which does not encourage a happy and easy surrender to the comfortable numbness of being ourselves, locked up in compartments in our respective “cultural trains” (Levi-Strauss) running on different tracks and cultivating cultural deafness to each other, nor rests content with maximizing gratitude and gratification by way of condescending and patronizing “contrast-effects” narratives (Rorty) with other cultures -- of the kind perhaps that V.S. Naipaul and Salman Rushdie have presumably become famous for? In short, is it possible to articulate a view that is neither normatively ethnocentric nor relativistic? I believe not only that we can, but we should do so urgently and in earnest (see Chokr, 2006; 2007). 3.2. A "Poor Man's Anthropology or Sociology of Culture" To this end, the analysis sketched out above is intended to suggest that the characterizations and defenses of “cultural diversity” on both the Right and the Left seem to be burdened by similarly faulty assumptions, premises, or theses. If “conflict



avoidance” is one of the rationalized motivations behind Huntington’s kind of “descriptive and normative ethnocentrism”, “cultural renewal” and “moral creativity” is the other rationalized motivation for the kind of ethnocentrism defended by Levi-Strauss (1985) and Rorty (1989, 1991) for example. (For a more detailed analysis, see Chokr, 2006, 2007). The faulty or questionable assumptions on which such views are based can be summarized as follows: (1) Cultures are clearly delineable wholes, somehow congruent with peoples or population groups. [Cultural Essentialism/Monism/ Holism/Hermeticism]. (2) A non-contested, uniform description of the culture of a given people or group can be given, which operates uniformly on its members or carriers in that it strictly determines their outlook and identity in a homogenous, cohesive and stable manner. [Cultural Idealism/ Determinism/ Reductionism]. (3) The facts of “cultural complexity” do not constitute or pose any serious problems or moral dilemmas in terms of cultural politics in a multicultural and multinational society –or are readily amenable to just anf fair and sustainable solutions. [Naïve and Unjustified Political Optimism]. The line of reasoning leading up from (1) to (3) is in fact a direct one, and can therefore easily be undermined by putting in question the empirical validity of the first step. Thus, regarding (1), it suffices to point out that because of a shuffling process which has been going on for quite some time, and which is, by now, approaching extreme and near universal proportions, social and cultural boundaries coincide in fact less and less closely. As for (2), it is doubtful that a uniform, non-controversial and non-contested description can be given of any culture. A culture can never fully capture all the beliefs and values that are held to be internal to it at a given point; similarly, a culture can never fully capture the present and future commitments and attitudes of its members or carriers. Finally with regards to (3), it should be pointed out that the political optimism of many multiculturalists or preservationists as well as ethnocentrists or relativists is unjustified in that it is underwritten by a naïve approach to cultural analysis which fails to properly countenance “cultural (and political) complexity”. By the latter, I mean here to underscore among other things the often neglected fact that cultures and peoples (or groups) may not and do not actually stand in a neat one-to-one correspondence; there is often more than one culture within a given people or group, and furthermore, more than one people or group may possess the same or similar cultural traits or features. Examples of both kinds of cases abound in the world. The assumptions, premises, or theses listed above serve arguably to underwrite what Benhabib has called a

“reductionist sociology of culture” (2002: 5). In this regard, Turner is right when he states that a conception based on such assumptions, premises, or theses

risks essentializing the idea of culture as the property of an ethnic group or race; it risks (i) reifying ‘cultures’ as separate entities by overemphasizing their boundedness and distinctness; it risks (ii) overemphasizing the homogeneity of cultures in terms that potentially legitimize repressive demands for communal conformity, and by treating cultures as badges of group identity, it tends to fetishize them in ways that put them beyond the reach of critical analysis (1993: 412).

These last two consequences cannot be stressed enough. It is arguably a test of the adequacy of a given conception of culture if, from a normative point of view, it does not validate any of these consequences. It is thus a fair assessment to say that much of the current thinking in moral and political philosophy and in contemporary debates on cultural politics is still often saddled by such a highly objectionable conception. Needless to say, this has serious normative (moral as well as political) consequences for how we think culturally-based or motivated injustices among peoples or groups should be dealt with or remedied, and how we address the problem of “cultural diversity”. In a minimal sense, it implies that a defensible approach to the latter must factor in “cultural complexity” and a morally normative and evaluative stance – from the diverse contesting points of views both within and without. Besides, it cannot consist in measures and policies that merely seek to preserve “cultural enclaves” at any and all costs, regardless of the consequences that some cultural practices, beliefs and values may have on the dignity, freedom, and well-being of individuals and groups. Ethnocentric (or relativistic) views are but different versions of a rather common “to-each-his-own-morality” view on “cultural diversity” whose significance (if any) lies perhaps in the fact that it provides us, to use Bernard Williams’ distinction, with “alternatives to us” as opposed to “alternatives for us” (1985). But doesn’t such a view make both rather more and rather less of the fact of cultural diversity than it should? On the first score, doesn’t it seem to suggest that a person has somehow a real practical option, about which s/he must make a decision, as to whether s/he can have a different life than the one s/he has – by choosing to be born in a different culture? On the second score, doesn’t it seem to obscure the power of cultural diversity to transform an individual’s sense of what it is like for a human being to think, feel, value, believe, act and behave, etc? The problems and challenges raised by



the fact of cultural diversity have less to do with whether we can escape preferring our preferences or avoid being committed to our commitments. “We are, by definition, so committed as we are to having our headaches” (Geertz, 2000: 75), They have more to do with our capacity to understand different forms of life, learn foreign or alien language-games, feel our way into other forms of sense and sensibility, appreciate unfamiliar sensitivities and modes of thought we do not possess, and are not likely to acquire very easily or readily. This being said, I don’t think it is impossible, In another context, I have argued forcefully against the thesis of strong (cross-cultural) incommensurability –from a logical, empirical and normative point of view (Chokr, 2006; 2007). The implications of the position articulated and defended herein do not bode well for the “we-are-we” and “they-are-they” approach to things cultural. The most important of these is that the problems and challenges raised by cultural diversity do not merely arise at the boundaries of our societies and cultures, where one would expect them under such an approach, but at the boundaries of our own selves. As Geertz puts it quite aptly “foreignness does not start at the water’s edge, but at the skin’s”. (2000: 66). Our socio-cultural world does not seem (pace Rorty) to be divided up “at its joints”, so to speak, into perspicuous ‘we’s’ with whom we can converse and empathize, however much we differ with them, and enigmatic ‘they’s’ with whom we cannot converse or empathize, however much we would like to defend their right to differ from us. Only a misconceived form of cultural analysis, underwritten by a misconstrued conception of social constructivism based on an excessively socialized and culturally deterministic and reductionist view of self and group identity, can lead us to think, I argue, that human communities or cultures are “windowless monads” (Bernstein, 1991). It is arguably more plausible to hold instead that the real boundaries of societies, cultures, groups and selves are to be found in the gaps and asymmetries that exist between what ‘we’ do, think, feel and believe and what ‘others’ do, and that make it possible to locate where we are now in the world and how we are thus situated, at what sort of angle, and according to what particular modality. Clearly, the presumed ‘we’ and ‘others’ should here be drawn out in dotted lines, provisionally, so to speak, in a way that is mindful of the facts and dynamics of cultural complexity. What ethnocentrism or relativism does, and is arguably designed to do is “to obscure and relegate these gaps and asymmetries to the realm of ignorable difference, or mere unlikeness” (Geertz, 2000: 78), and thereby locking us up within our respective cultures. In

doing so, it does take away from us the possibility of changing not only our minds, but our ways and practices as well – in short, of more or less radically changing our way of life and being-in-the-world? In this regard, we are better off keeping in mind what Richard Falk reminds us of, namely, that “[a]ll cultures evolve in relation to experience, being influenced partly by intra-cultural and inter-cultural interaction, as well as through their participation and reflection upon wider normative frameworks…” (1995: 49). A cursory survey of the history of each and all peoples around the world (as well as for that matter the personal history of each and all individuals) would attest to the fact such a history has been one involving such changes, usually slowly, sometimes more rapidly – as when a “crisis” occurs, or following a more or less radical questioning and revision of one’s web of beliefs and values. This has arguably always been the case, but it is even more so today, in this era of globalization. 4. Globalization and Cultures: Lessons Learned? What exactly has the phenomenon of ‘globalization’ revealed about “cultures” which must be taken into account by any empirically and normatively adequate analysis? Most writers on the subject, as I pointed out at the outset, typically focus on the cultural uniformity and homogenization, and the so-called “threat to cultural diversity” that it has presumably brought on. But while globalization can indeed produce homogeneity, it also constitutes a threat to homogeneity –as anyone who kept informed about world affairs since the 90s onward and who travels a bit around the world can attest to. Just as there are good reasons (that need not be rehearsed here) for maintaining and protecting ‘bio-diversity,’ there are equally good (or perhaps even better) reasons for being concerned about “cultural diversity, and for taking appropriately conceived and implemented measures, as suggested earlier, to counteract any serious or real threat to it – assuming of course that it already constitutes a “clear and present danger”, or will soon become one. In the meantime, and “political correctness” aside, we should perhaps also ask ourselves how much cultural diversity is still realistically possible or even desirable at this point of world history. Furthermore, one should not underestimate the resiliency and adaptability of cultures around the world, and their ability to endure and continue to thrive as viable and dynamically creative and evolving cultures have always done, and that is, by adopting and incorporating new forms and ways, new values and ideals while preserving what must (can or should) be preserved. This is not a covert or implicit argument for some sort of “cultural survival of the fittest.” We should be wary about any approach



straightforwardly seeking to “biologize” cultural phenomena. However, I believe that we must properly countenance what we have learned from the history of cultures, i.e., from a properly conceived materialistic and historicist perspective on the “evolution” of cultures, namely, that there are good reasons why some cultures endure over time and others don’t. 4.1. The Facts of ‘Cultural Complexity’ There is another fact about ‘globalization’ that is less readily acknowledged, and that is, it has also brought home the facts of “cultural complexity”, i.e., it has revealed the diversity, multiplicity and plurality inherent in “each” culture,12 as well as the similarities/ dissimilarities/ differences, points or areas of more or less convergence or divergence between cultures. Taking this fact into account in our analyses is bound, I contend, to have some important theoretical (philosophical) as well as practical (political) consequences. How can it be otherwise? – This is arguably the most significant point of this essay.13 In any case, Clifford Geertz puts it well when he writes (2000: 246) that there is a paradox, little reflected upon about the current world scene. The world is both more global and more divided, more thoroughly interconnected and more intricately partitioned at the same time. Affirmations of greater unity and integration of the world are immediately met by vehement proclamations of renewed and reinforced nationalisms, sectarianisms, religious and cultural fundamentalisms of various kinds. In such a world, we must acknowledge that cosmopolitanism and parochialism (or provincialism) are in fact no longer opposed, but rather linked and mutually reinforcing. In fact, paradoxical as this may sound, as one increases so does the other. In view of this, the expression “global village” is perhaps best viewed as an over-blown and inflated metaphor, not yet borne out by the reality of the world today, since the so-called “village” has neither the requisite solidarity nor tradition, at least not yet, and even lacks the desired wholeness and cohesiveness. “Globalization” is in fact accompanied less by a reduction of cultural differences and loosening of cultural demarcations than by their reworking, multiplication, and intensification. Richard Falk’s comment in this regard is right on the mark, and worth quoting in full:

One important consequence of the globalization of social, political and economic life, he states, which often goes unnoticed is cultural penetration and overlapping, the coexistence in a given social space of several cultural traditions, as well as the more vivid interpenetration of cultural experience and practice as a consequence of media and

transportation technologies, travel and tourism, cross-cultural education and a logarithmic increase in human interaction of all varieties. (1995: 46; italics added).

The demands that such a reality makes of us are distinctive and pulling us in opposite directions: on the one hand, we must strive to respect cultural differences (and thereby seek to sustain diversity properly conceived under appropriate provisions); on the other hand, we must strive to acknowledge various degrees of similarity or sameness (and thereby seek to re-establish perhaps some universalist normative order – albeit different from the traditional Western-centric kind.14 In effect, we must contend “with this always-shifting interplay between the valuing of difference and the quest for sameness” (Falk, 1995: 46). In such a context, we are better off heeding Geertz’s warning:

The discrimination of cultural breaks and cultural continuities, the drawing of lines around sets of individuals as following a more or less identifiable form of life as against different sets of individuals following more or less different forms of life – other voices in other rooms—is a good deal easier in theory than it is in practice. (2000: 247; italics added; see Kant [1793/1994] for an enlightening discussion of the political implications of disconnect between theory and practice).

Against the currently predominant view, Geertz goes on to add quite pertinently, I believe:

Whatever we might wish, or regard as enlightenment, the severalty of culture abides and proliferates, even amidst, indeed in response to, the powerfully connecting forces of modern manufacture, finance, travel and trade. The more things come together, the more they remain apart: the uniform world is not much closer than the classless society (2000: 248; italics added).

It quickly becomes evident to anyone who cares to really look that “the lived universe of cultures always appears in the plural” (Benhabib, 2002: 41). Everything is motley, porous, mixed, conflicted, inter-penetrated and dispersed; the search for totality or uniformity is an unreliable and uncertain guide, and the sense of closure unattainable.

[W]e have come to such a point in the moral history of the world (a history that is anything but moral) that we are obliged to think about diversity rather differently than we had been used to thinking about. If it is in fact getting to be the case that rather than being sorted out into framed units, social spaces with definite edges to them, seriously disparate approaches to life are becoming scrambled together in ill-defined expanses, social spaces whose edges are unfixed, irregular, and difficult to locate, the



question of how to deal with the puzzles of judgment to which such disparities give rise takes on a rather different aspect – confronting landscapes and still lifes is one thing, panoramas and collages quite another (Geertz, 2000: 85; italics added ).

To consider a couple of commonly cited visual metaphors in cultural studies, suppose, as it has been suggested, that we look at “cultures” as dots or tiles (see Fleischacker, 1994, chapter 5 for a discussion of what is called the configurational model or conception of culture). This would not be helpful either in dealing with the puzzles now confronting us. One would arguably still be held captive by misleading pictures which fail to capture the cultural complexity and diversity in the world today. Geertz is right on the mark, when he states:

A picture of the world as dotted by discriminate cultures, discontinuous blocks of thought and emotion – a sort of pointillist view of its spiritual composition – is no less misleading than the picture of it as tiled by repeating, reiterative nation-states, and for the same reason: the elements concerned, the dots or the tiles, are neither compact, nor homogeneous, simple nor uniform. When you look into them, their solidity dissolves, and you are left not with a catalogue of well-defined entities to be arranged and classified, a Mendelian table of natural kinds, but with a tangle of differences and similarities only half sorted out [if at all, one might add] (Geertz: 249; italics and brackets added).

4.2. Cultural Identity/Difference, Originality/ Distinctiveness In the face of the kind and degree of fragmentation, dispersion, intermingling, cross-fertilization, and contamination characteristic of the world today, “the view of culture, a culture, this culture, as a consensus on fundamentals – shared conceptions, shared feelings, shared values – is hardly tenable, except perhaps for the so-called “guardians of cultural integrity and ethnic purity” (e.g., intellectual elites, leaders, nationalists, cultural ideologues, or fundamentalists) who would want us to believe otherwise. Instead, it seems that it is the fault lines, discontinuities, fissions and fissures that mark out and best serve to characterize the configuration of “collective selfhood”. The “cookie-cutter conception of culture” with its focus on consensus, type and commonality must give way to the “compositeness and heterogeneity conception of culture” for which culture is always already ineradicably plural, compound, inconstant and multiply contested – both from within and without.

Again, what is worth noting here is not merely the fact of cultural heterogeneity as such and how much more visible it is than at any other time in our history, but, as Geertz points out, “the enormous variety of levels at which such heterogeneity exists and has an effect” (2000: 252). Thus, one can hardly find an allegedly common outlook, form of life, behavioral style, material or symbolic expression that is not either itself further partitioned into smaller, enfolding and inclusive ones, or incorporated and patched into larger and more complicated encompassing ones. There is hardly a case in which one can say without qualification or trepidation this is the point where consensus ends or begins. If one considers the cases of countries like Indonesia, India, Brazil, Nigeria, the United States, or even China, for example, we don’t find separated ‘cultures’ or ‘peoples’ or ‘ethnic groups’ as so many lumps of sameness and uniformity marked out by the limits of consensus and homogeneity. Instead, we find various modes and modalities of involvement in a collective life that takes place on many different levels, scales, domains, and realms at once. Under such an analysis – which, by the way, applies to countries and societies North-South, East-West, the crucial point has to do with the way in which, and the degree to which, the contrasting effects of a given overall “cultural complex” are represented in the formulation of a group’s identity. Perhaps, as it has sometimes been suggested, it is less a matter of consensus that is at issue than finding a viable way of doing without. In almost all parts of the world, we see great cultural traditions which are rich, complex, distinctive, and historically deep coexisting with one another, in an almost endless progression of differences within differences, as well as multiple forms and degrees of similarities, overlappings, criss-crossings and cross-cuttings. This realization compels us, Geertz argues pertinently, to confront the following questions which can no longer be dismissed as inconsequential:

How is it, in so multifold a world, that political, social and cultural selfhood comes to be? If ‘identity without unison’ is in fact the rule – in India or the United States, in Brazil or Nigeria, in Belgium or Guyana, or even in Japan, that supposed model of immanent like-mindedness and essentialized uniqueness– on what does it rest? (Geertz, 2000: 225; italics added.

More than likely, there are as many ways in which identities are put together as there are materials and elements with which to put them together, and reasons and motivations for doing so. Just like “cultures”, the identities of peoples can no longer be grasped as coherent, seamless unities, or unbroken wholes. We



should be suspicious and even outright critical of all conceptions which try to reduce matters of identity to uniformity, conformity, homogeneity, to like-mindedness and consensus. More often than not, the answers given to identity-queries about ‘who (what) we are’15 do not form an orderly, cohesive or coherent structure, nor even a stable one over time. Whatever unity, sameness, coherence, or identity there is, it is probably going to be negotiated and produced out of differences, and vice-versa. As Amartya Sen argued in his most recent book, Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny (2006), each of us contains in fact multitudes. “The same person can be, without contradiction, an American citizen, of Caribbean origins, with African ancestry, a Christian, a liberal, a woman, a vegetarian, a long-distance runner, a historian, a school-teacher, an environmental activist, a tennis fan, a jazz musician, etc.” One’s cultural identity is not one’s destiny. We can choose from a myriad of identities, emphasizing those we share with others rather than those we do not. Admittedly our choices will be limited by external circumstances. Still, to concede that identity choices are constrained is a far cry from the claim that (cultural) identity is destiny. By arguing for the freedom to choose one’s identity affiliations, Sen’s proposal is perhaps best viewed as an antidote to the divisive extremism of nationalists and fundamentalists alike. He sees Huntington’s thesis of cultural conflict as yielding a one-dimensional approach to human identity, and leading ultimately to the “civilizational and religious partitioning of the world,” which can only occasion and bring about great global disorder.16 In a world increasingly interconnected in so many ways and so thoroughly, the range and catalogue of available identities or identifications for members of a given community is constantly expanding, contracting, changing shape, ramifying, multiplying, intensifying, and developing in unexpected directions. This overall complex picture of “cultural identity” that emerges is one best viewed as “a force field” in which differences and similarities confront one another at every level – from the family, the village, the neighborhood, the region, to the country, nation-state, and beyond. Though clearly derived from physics, the above mentioned metaphor is here used for political reasons and meant to convey the struggles involved in the politics of identity and recognition, as well as the possibility of reconfiguring one’s identity by privileging and counter-posing one component over another within a given cultural complex, e.g., ethnicity, race, religion, gender, class, language, conception of the good life, etc. In any case, whatever solidarities or divisions, convergences or divergences we may find at every level, they are more than likely to be mutually or contrastively sustaining

and defining of one another. This is arguably what is going on everywhere around the world as we know it today. 5. In Defense of an Alternative Conception of ‘Culture’ If we countenance the kind of understanding and appreciation of ‘cultural complexity’ sketched out thus far, then we could say that whatever ‘originality’ and ‘distinctiveness’ a given culture and form of life may have (relatively speaking), it arises out of the ways in which the variety of conceptions, values, and practices which make them up are positioned, configured and composed. The italicized terms are here used under erasure (in a proper deconstructive manner) so as to avoid lapsing back into the essentialism that language seems to imply and dredge back up. We should also keep in mind that cultures have always borrowed (more or less) from one another, and will continue to do so. In many instances, it is often hard to ascertain clearly what belongs distinctively and originally to what culture. This is even more the case today than ever before (see Amartya Sen, 2000, 2005, 2006 for various striking examples strewn throughout his discussions).17 However, by adopting and extending Wittgenstein’s image of a “rope” in the Philosophical Investigations (1953), we could say that whatever originality and distinctiveness a given culture and form of life has does not arise from a single thread running all the way through it uniformly, and thereby defining it and making it into some kind of homogenous whole. It arises instead from various threads, differing in kinds, in some respects or others, overlapping, intersecting, entwining, and intertwining, crisscrossing, and cross-cutting, some taking up where others break off, some stretching through and through, while others are running short, with all of them contra-posed in effective tensions and contrasts with one another to form a heterogeneous and composite complex. To pursue this image further, an adequate analysis of any culture today must at least consist in teasing out its various threads, characterizing their contrastive differences in kind and respects, bringing out their overlappings, ascertaining their points of intersections, intertwinements and entwinements, their connections, tensions and contrasts, probing the very compositeness and heterogeneity of the cultural body, its deep internal diversity and degree of complexity. It should be clear by now that the articulation of an epistemologically and methodologically sound conception of “culture” must be supported as much as possible by the best anthropological and sociological evidence and underwritten by reasonably pragmatic and



defensible political assumptions. Such a conception would enable us to more effectively address the kinds of problems, challenges and dilemmas we are confronting within our respective societies, and between them, across a world deep in the throes of globalization and glocalisation. Unfortunately, there is still a widespread tendency to write as if “culture” were a homogenous, uniform, coherent, cohesive, bounded, tightly woven, seamless whole, a unified or unitary entity with a distinct nature and a clearly delineated set of identifying and distinguishing features whose identity-determining and constitutive role on individuals and groups is uniform, un-contested, continuous and stable. This is an encapsulated-summary formulation of what I would like to call a fundamental misconception of “culture” which, I contend, must be jettisoned and done away with (Chokr, 2006). In contrast, I would like to submit an alternative conception of “culture” which is arguably more compelling, both empirically and normatively: “Culture” is always already a network of sometimes overlapping (consensual) and sometimes diverging (dissensual) tendencies making it through and through a multi-fold nexus of contestations, protests, and debates both from within and without. It is thus an open-ended and ‘rhizomatic’18 network involving both convergent and divergent processes, cross-cut and criss-crossed by various local, regional, national, and global influences, and affected by the ‘memes,’19 values, institutions, practices and behaviors of differently situated actors or agents (and diversely constituted groups thereof) in specific and concrete, materially constrained contexts, who are furthermore enmeshed in complex “webs of meanings, narratives, and interlocutions”20 and power relations and struggles. This alternative conception would enable us, I argue, to better understand and account for the complex internal dynamics of cultures as well as the diverse relationships that obtain (or not) between them at this juncture of our history. Here I mean to say, given a proper and judicious assessment of what the era of ‘globalization’ has brought on or revealed, i.e., the lessons learned which are however not yet fully acknowledged. These include: the diversity, multiplicity, and plurality inherent in each culture; each culture is multiply contested, negotiated and re-interpreted not just from without, but from within; apart from obvious differences, the similarities and points or areas of considerable convergence or overlap that (may) exist between apparently different cultures; the relationship between the local and the global is not, as is often surmised by simplistic accounts, merely a one-way affair; we have to contend with what some have called

“glocalisation” –that is, that global influences are invariably adapted, re-interpreted, and transformed to suit local conditions and particularities (Appiah, 2006a).21

6. Cultural Analysis: Empirical and Normative Considerations What follows from this entire discussion with regards to cultural analysis generally speaking from both an empirical and normative point of view? What follows more specifically with regards to the problems and issues announced at the outset? --We should certainly ask, even though I cannot in the present context elaborate my answer on this question? (For details, see Chokr, 2006, 2007). 6.1. Social Constructivism Revisited In accord with the alternative conception of culture articulated above, an appropriately conceived version of ‘social constructivism’22 must be adopted as a comprehensive explanation of cultural differences/ similarities, and against attempts in normative moral and political theory that reify cultures and cultural groups and their struggles for recognition. And subsequently, a critique of ‘cultural essentialism’ and “cultural determinism/ reductionism” must be articulated, which will prove to have significant implications as suggested from the start for how we deal with general issues of stemming from the politics of (self or group) identity, cultural differences and recognition, multiculturalism, cross-cultural (in)commensurability, as well as with the problem of cultural relativism vs. moral universalism, generally speaking, and more specifically, with regards to concrete issues. An adequate approach to cultural analysis must be based on an appropriately construed social constructivism which focuses on and seeks to shed some light on the processes by which cultural purity is transformed into impurities, mixtures and hybrizations, and what is said to be fundamental and immutable into historically contingent achievements, always subject to further changes. It would view the dynamic and evolving interplay between structural and cultural imperatives as not only possible but desirable. It would keep in view the functional as well as structural imperatives of “material systems of actions and practices” such as economic systems of production, administrative and bureaucratic apparatuses of control, management instruments and procedures, and various other disciplinary technologies in their dynamic and intricate relationships with the symbolic imperatives of “frames of meaning” or “systems of cultural signification and representation”. Finally, it would pay



close attention to the power relations and struggles that members of a given community are often enmeshed or embroiled in. Hence, an adequate approach to cultural analysis --whether carried out from an empirical or normative standpoint-- must, I believe, countenance, in addition to (1) the distinction introduced earlier (in the Preliminaries) between material and symbolic levels of production and reproduction, the following distinctions: (2) between the internal and the external (or critical) point of view: participants vs. observers; and (3) identity-ascription by others vs. self-ascription as well as inscription and shared community building [see Seyla Benhabib (1995, 2002) and Pierik (2004) respectively]. 6.2. Point(s) of View: Participants vs. Observers Participants in a culture (or more accurately, in a given “cultural complex”) experience from within, as it were, their ways, practices, beliefs, traditions, stories, rituals and symbols, tools and material living conditions through more or less shared narrative accounts – albeit always already contested and contestable. From within, a culture need not and usually does not appear as a unified, coherent and clearly bounded whole because the required distance is absent. Rather, it may seem to form a multiply partitioned and divided, crisscrossed and cross-cut “horizon of understanding and practice” that somehow escapes our grasp or recedes each time one approaches it or seeks to apprehend it in a totalizing way. In contrast, observers take a view from the outside, and may include ethnographers, anthropologists, sociologists, philosophers, travelers, narrators, chroniclers, military generals, linguists, educational reformers, business persons, secret agents, development workers or volunteers, etc. They are the ones who (together with ‘local elites’ and the so-called ‘guardians of cultural integrity’) seem to be interested in imposing unity and coherence on cultures as ‘observed and observable entities’ for the purposes of understanding and perhaps even control, depending on their particular interests and purposes. From such a perspective, “cultures” are then conveniently viewed or taken as clearly delineable and bounded wholes. The point that needs to be stressed here is that, apart from being a participant, an individual can also become an observer of her own culture and way of life if she acquires a critical distance from it and begins to question or challenge its normative, moral order. She can acquire, in other words, a kind of “social reflexivity” which allows members of a given culture and society to engage in “internal criticism”, and to question and challenge their beliefs and practices in the name of some newly acquired, or differently interpreted,

normative standards – from within or from without, or from both perspectives. Such a possibility represents presumably a permanent feature of the so-called transition from tradition to modernity – or more accurately, to post-modernity. The significance of the participant-becoming-critical observer lies in the fact that it serves readily to undermine the thesis of “cultural determinism/ reductionism”: individuals are not strictly or blindly determined by their respective culture, and their lives are not therefore shaped by their culture “as a cake-mold shapes a cake, or gravity our movements” (Geertz, 2000: 13). Besides, it enables us to easily explain why cultures present themselves through narratively contested accounts, and are thereby always created, recreated and negotiated from both the individual’s and the group’s point of view.

6.3. Processes of Identity-Formation: Ascription by Others vs. Self-Ascription, Inscription, Community Building Identity ascription by others involves a process of attribution by outsiders of certain characteristics, behaviors, practices, and beliefs to individuals or groups who are deemed to share certain attributes (e.g., lifestyle, ethnicity, religion, gender, language, sexual orientation, etc). As a result of such a process, individuals or groups are conveniently placed in different categories and labeled accordingly. Though the individuals or groups thus categorized may not necessarily identify themselves with the attributes associated with them by outsiders, and though they may not even share common beliefs, norms or values, such processes of ascription nevertheless influence their situation and lived experiences, and may even determine their life-prospects. In contrast, identity self-ascription is a voluntary process of categorization involving a more or less constrained choice of the identity one wishes to adopt for oneself--as an individual or as a group-- among the plural identities available at a given point in our history, and which consists in assigning to oneself a number of attributes, beliefs, practices, norms deemed more important or valuable for one's purposes --given one's conception of the good life. Such a process could take different forms: In the case of individuals below the age of reason (i.e., children), it could occur implicitly or imperceptibly as when certain beliefs, characteristics, behaviors and practices are passed on to new members of a social group by socialization or acculturation. In this case, we might talk of inscription --in order to characterize the process in which social norms and expectations are inscribed and thereby transferred to children through socialization and acculturation in the family, at school, through peer groups in the community



or in society at large, etc. For the individual involved, it implies the internalization of shared beliefs based on distinctions between various social categories. In the case of groups, it could also occur explicitly as when a given community organized itself around a (more or less) shared set of beliefs, practices, norms and values and seeks thereby to give its members a sense of togetherness and belonging. In this case, we might talk of a shared community building --in order to characterize the self-categorization process by which members of a community distinguish themselves from others. Shared community building processes can take place around a particular comprehensive conception of the good life, religion, language, ideology, nationality, ethnicity, or any number of these. These kinds of processes are obviously dependent on the process of inscription discussed above, as the latter constitutes the way by which the conception of the good life, religion or language is passed on to the children of that community. Though I have distinguished the processes of identity formation for analytical purposes, in the way I have done above, it must be noted that they in fact always interact, and rarely if ever occur separately, or one to the exclusion of the others. The key point to emphasize here however is this: despite the processes of ascription by others, or of inscription and shared community building, an adult individual always has the option of accepting or rejecting any one of them upon due reflection, and choosing to forge (under some constraints) her own identity --from the range of possible identities that her life-history has made available to her. 7. Conclusion: Inescapable Double Hermeneutics --Narratives and Evaluations In the approach to cultural analysis advocated herein, it is assumed, on the one hand, that "human actions and relations are formed by a double hermeneutics: we identify what we do through an account of what we do; words and deeds are equi-primordial, in the sense that almost all socially (or culturally) significant human action is identified as a certain type of doing through the accounts the agents and others give of that doing." (Benhabib, 2002: 6). This is obviously even more so when there is a disagreement or misunderstanding between doer and observer, because the latter requires the former to explain and justify his actions. On the other hand, it is further assumed that, in addition to being constituted through narratives that together form “webs of narratives, interlocutions, meanings,” human actions and interactions are also constituted through the actors’ evaluative stances toward their doings, whereby second-

order narratives are taken to entail a certain normative attitude toward accounts of first-order deeds. In view of these assumptions, we may then conclude that "[w]hat we call 'culture' is the horizon formed by these evaluative stances, through which the infinite chain of space-time sequences is demarcated into “good” and “bad”, “holy” and “profane”, pure and “impure”. Cultures are formed through binaries because human beings live in an evaluative universe" (Benhabib, 2002:7; italics added). In effect, they “live, are suspended or thrown” into the webs which they themselves have spun and woven at least in part. In this sense, they always (implicitly or explicitly) make evaluations (in a weak or strong sense) of what they say and do, what they do by their words, statements, and stories, what they say by their doings, actions and behaviors – and, of course, what they hear others say or see them do, etc. Naturally, the evaluations human beings engage in will vary and include the simple and more common expressions of preference, approval and disapproval (weak sense) to the articulation of well-reasoned and principled normative, moral judgments (strong sense). Consistently with such a perspective, we might then say that “acculturation” consists in “growing up in the midst of, or among narratives”, one’s own, those of our parents, teachers, schoolmates, friends, religious and political leaders, authority figures, and various other sorts of what Saul Bellow once called the “reality instructors”. As Jerome Bruner once put it, “we live, in other words, in a sea of stories” (1996: 147). Telling stories, about ourselves and about others, to ourselves and to others is “the most natural and the earliest way in which we organize our experience and knowledge…” “We represent our lives (to ourselves as well as to others) in the form of narratives”. “[We] make sense of the world by telling stories about it – by using the narrative mode for construing reality”. Stories are tools, i.e., “instruments of the mind on behalf of meaning-making (Bruner, 1996: 121; 130; 40-1). Acculturation (and one might as well add, education and socialization) involves therefore a complex intra-cultural dialogue putting into play various stories and narratives, from a diverse range of sources – some homegrown and endogenous, some exogenous and foreign, and others, a mixture thereof. As a result, the boundaries separating cultures and the peoples that are their members or carriers are extremely contested, fragile, not easily delineable or always clearly demarcated. Nevertheless, it may be still meaningful to maintain that “acculturation” in a particular ‘cultural complex’ marked by a predominance of certain stories and concomitant narrative modes and styles makes one an insider (as opposed to an outsider),



i.e., a participant member – who retains however the ability of becoming a critical observer of his or her culture. What this implies is that it is also possible for an observer to become a participant in some sense, provided she is subjected to the appropriate 'acculturation'. These possibilities may be helpful in explaining why the so-called “guardians of cultural integrity” are vigilant in keeping the boundaries of culture always securely guarded, their stories and narratives purified, their rites and rituals carefully monitored, and their practices protected and vehemently defended in order to maintain some presumed ‘distinctiveness’ and ‘originality.’ Lest we adopt a naïve, and thereby impeachable, approach to cultural analysis, we should not forget that “cultural boundaries circumscribe power in that they legitimize its use within the group or community” (Benhabib, 2002: 7; italics added). The kind of analysis advocated herein does not imply in any way that cultural differences are shallow, superficial, or somehow unreal. Quite to the contrary, cultural differences are considered to be substantial, deep and real. For even if the boundaries between cultures are imagined, as they often are, they nonetheless have the force of reality that even imagined things have in the mind of those who imagine them (see Anderson, 1983). Even though what is believed to be true is not necessarily so, this epistemological truism is here irrelevant in that political and cultural realities do not always succumb in a simple or straightforward way to the strictures of philosophical epistemology and logic. Assuming then that it is so, should we always (or ever) take at face value or for granted the cultural stories or narratives of individuals or groups? Arguably, we should not always. Our analysis stands to gain in explanatory power, empirical and normative perspicuity if we endeavored to understand the broadest socio-political-economic, historically contingent context, of which culture is only an aspect—albeit an important one, which admittedly matters (see Huntington and Harrison, 2000) without however being essentialist, deterministic, or reductionist about it. If we were to put to work the “analytical dispositif” sketched out here, we might then say that cultures and societies must reproduce themselves materially and symbolically first and foremost from the standpoint of their participants or members if they are to survive and endure. The continuing identity of a culture and society must therefore based on its capacity to deal with internal challenges (e.g., from participants turned “critical observers”) as well as external challenges and other contingencies (such as encounters with other forms of life, and possible ensuing confrontations, or cross-cultural dialogues and evaluations),23 while at the same

time retaining somehow the unforced belief in its normative order of those who claim to be its members or carriers, and who accept to claim allegiance or affiliation to it in terms of their individual and communal identity. Suppose, in a somewhat pedestrian manner, we characterize “culture” as the sum total of all the solutions –at both the material and symbolic levels– to the problems in terms of production and reproduction encountered by a given group of people in its environment. Then we can expect that as their problems change both in nature and kind, and as they confront new problems in a changing and changed environment, the solutions to these problems will also change. Naturally, we should also expect that there will be different interpretations of the problems encountered as well as different, conflicting or even opposing, proposed solutions. More often than not, transformations come about a result of social and cultural systems confronting various kinds and degrees of internal and external threats, and adapting to more or less severe “crises”, that is, commensurately with their ability to change and thereby avoiding being swept away into the dustbin of history. This is usually what happens following a ‘real confrontation’ between cultures (as opposed to notional one) – to use another of Bernard Williams’ useful distinctions (1985: 160ff). Strong normative evaluations are bound to happen and are even to be expected in the former, while they may be absent or minimal in the latter. And there are today many more such confrontations than in any previous period of world history. While recognizing this fundamental vulnerability, the challenge for each culture consists in finding in itself (and elsewhere, if need be) the resources necessary to demonstrate the kind of “imaginative excellence” in re-interpreting its conceptual and symbolic framework, which would enable it to purchase a form of “radical hope” into the future, so that the ‘culture’ (as a historical entity) endures, even when, in the worst case scenario, its conceptual and symbolic framework no longer make sense, or allows its members to make sense of their lives, under the radically changed circumstances and historically new conditions they may be confronted with.24

* This paper was prepared for the 12th International Conference of the International Association for Intercultural Communication Studies on the theme: “Globalization, Communication, and Identity” held in San Antonio, Texas, USA, August 2-4, 2006. I thank Rodopi Publications for granting me permission to use results established in an essay titled “A Fundamental



Misconception of ‘Culture’: Philosophical and Political Implications” previously published in a collection of essays edited by Thorsten Botz-Bornstein and Jurgen Hengelbrock, Re-Ethnicizing the Minds? Revival of Culture in Contemporary Thought, Amsterdam, New York: Rodopi, 2006, chapter 22 (pp. 401-435). I would like acknowledge my deepest gratitude to Li Xiaolin for providing me with the necessary support and encouragement to complete my larger project. "On the Uses and Abuses of 'Culture' In Contemporary Philosophy," from which this essay is derived.

Notes. 1. According to a widespread “consensus”

characterization of ‘globalization,’ the phenomenon is assumed to be something fundamentally new. Some authors however question such a characterization by putting forth what they deem to be a more historically informed and nuanced perspective. In their view, it would be more accurate to talk of the nth wave of globalization, where n is determined based on the historical periodization adopted. See, for example, Donnelly (2000: 239n1); Appiah (2006ab); see also Avineri (1970) for an insightful discussion of Marx’s classical analysis of the phase of globalization stretching from the 15th to the 19th century. Whatever historical parallels or antecedents one could bring up to qualify or mitigate the absolute novelty of globalization and that we are well-advised to take into account, one must nevertheless recognize that the accelerated pace of change, as well as the quantitative and qualitative differences in this era of ‘globalization’ (characteristic of the decades on either side of the year 1990) are distinctive features which cannot be diminished or dismissed. Which of these distinctive features one choose to focus on will vary and depend on one’s purposes and objectives. Our analyses might arguably gain in both empirical reality and normative power if we were prepared however to countenance and adopt a not-so-simplistic perspective, in which ‘globalization’ can be viewed as a process or an outcome; as a comprehensive whole or as a contingent clustering of disparate and separable elements or components. In this last respect, we could perhaps further advance and fine-tune our analyses by specifying the domain(s) or “scapes” (to use Appadurai’s term) within which it operates, and the particular modalities according to which it does so, viz., “finanscapes, tradescapes, technoscapes, ideoscapes, mediascapes, etc. Interestingly enough, most authors on the subject prefer to see it as a process rather than as an end-state, as an integrated holistic process characterized typically in a ‘monochromatic’ manner rather than as a clustering

of largely independent or semi-independent components. For some other insightful alternative analyses of globalization, see also Arjun Appadurai (1996), Peter Berger and Samuel Huntington (2003), Fredric Jameson and Masao Miyoshi (1998).

2. Upon closer scrutiny, the UNESCO document reveals contradictions and tensions. For example, it affirms both the necessity of protecting cultural diversity and the importance of the free flow of ideas, freedom of thought and expression, and human rights. But as we know, the latter values will become universal only if we chose to make them so. And it is manifestly unclear how to best arrive at this desirable result. In this context, shouldn’t we ask the difficult question: What is really important --cultures or peoples? Shouldn’t the most pressing question be instead: How can we articulate a viable ethics of globalization –judiciously and properly understood in its complexity? A defensible global ethics is arguably going to be one that tempers the respect for difference with a respect for the freedom of actual human beings to make their own choices.

3. A worthwhile project might consist in sketching out (1) the Modern view, how it evolved in the past 50-60 years, and gave way to (2) the (anthropological) Received View. For a brief yet substantial treatment in this regard, see Chokr, 2006, 2007 (forthcoming); see also Geertz, 2000; Benhabib, 2002.

4. In their classic compilation of the various definitions of “culture” that have appeared in the literature since the 19th century, Kroeber and Kluckhohn had found 171 distinct definitions, which could then be sorted out into 13 categories.

5. In recent years, ideas from ‘complexity theory’ have had a substantial impact on various disciplines outside the “hard” sciences from which they originated, in particular in sociology (e.g., Urry, 2003; Byrne 1998), organizational sciences (Stacey et al, 2000, Stacey, 2001; Richardson, 2005), and in anthropology (e.g., (Fikentscher, 1998; Hannerz, 1993; Denton, 2004). However, their impact on mainstream philosophy has not been as significant as one would expect. This is surprising given that the related domains of cognitive science and evolutionary theory have inspired plenty of philosophical investigations. In a recent paper, titled “Complexity and Philosophy,” Heylighen, Cilliers and Gershenson (2006) give at least three reasons for this, and they go on to show how (postmodern) philosophy could benefit from taking complexity seriously on a number of issues, including the structure of complex (social) systems or systems of meaning, the distinction between boundaries and limits, the problem of difference, the idea of the subject in political philosophy, ethics, relativism, life,



mind, consciousness, and in turn how complexity theory could be further enriched by philosophy. They write: “Complexity is perhaps the most essential characteristic of our present society. As technological and economic advances make production, transport and communication ever more efficient, we interact with ever more people, organizations, systems and objects. And this network of interactions grows and spreads around the globe, the different economic, social technological and ecological systems that we are part of become ever more interdependent. The result is an ever more complex ‘system of systems’ where a change in any component may affect virtually any other component, and that in a mostly unpredictable manner. The traditional scientific method, which is based on analysis, isolation, and the gathering of complete information about such a phenomenon, is incapable to deal with such complex interdependencies. The emerging science of complexity (Waldrop, 1992; Cilliers, 1998, Heylighen, 1997) offers the promise of an alternative methodology that would be able to tackle such problems. However, such an approach needs solid foundations, that is, a clear understanding and definition of the underlying concepts and principles (Heylighen, 2000).” Despite the fact that concepts from complexity have not yet gone very deeply into philosophy, the process is already under way. Apart from the works of Derrida (1988) and Deleuze (1987) which are often mentioned in this regard, it is also worth noting those of Morin (1992), Cilliers (1998, 2004, 2005), Rescher (1998), and Taylor (2003).

6. For the purpose of social and cultural studies, it might be useful to distinguish between ‘social groups” and “cultural communities” –along the lines proposed by Pierik (2004: 535-537). The former prefer for the most part to integrate in mainstream society, but feel wrongly excluded because of a distinguishing characteristic or attribute (e.g., sex, sexual preference, skin color, etc). The latter differ significantly from mainstream society because of their different conception of the good life (e.g., Muslims in Western societies) or the language they speak (e.g., the Quebecois in Canada), and for the most part prefer, in contrast, to maintain their distinction and preserve their distinct collective identity. Generally speaking, one could say, Pierik argues, that the latter differ from the former in three respects: identity, social structure, and interdependence. “The identity criterion refers to the collective awareness of the members of a cultural community as a distinct social entity; they perceive and define themselves as a community that shares a common identity. The criterion of social structure refers to the stabilized and organized relations

between members. Moreover, a system of role and status differentiations exists and relations within such cultural communities are regulated by shared norms and values that prescribe beliefs, attitudes, and conduct in matters relevant to the group. The interdependent criterion implies that members should be positively interdependent in some way. The transition of a social category to a cultural community implies a ‘virtually organic moment’ that occurs after the creation of a shared character ‘strong enough to define a meaningful aspect of each individual member’s social identity. As such, culture ‘materializes’ and becomes incorporated in cultural practices” (2004: 536).

7. Pierik (2004: 524) has a different way of making this kind of analysis. He writes: “Cultural groups are taken for granted as distinct entities, internally homogenous, externally bounded, and seen as basic constituents of social life. Such a conceptualization runs the risk of falling prey to the culturalistic fallacy.” He quotes Bidney (1953: 51): “The culturalistic fallacy may be said to be committed when one defines culture as ideational abstraction and then proceeds to convert or reify this ens rationis into an independent ontological entity subject to its own laws of development and conceived through itself alone.” He then distinguishes three aspects of the culturalistic fallacy as follows: “First, the reification of culture: to regard something abstract as something material or concrete. Second, the compartmentalization of culture: the tendency to view cultures as discrete entities with sharp borders. Third, the essentializing of culture: the tendency to see culture as an autonomous and immutable entity, in which individual members are regarded as only the passive bearers of culture.” He goes on to add: “The extreme essentialist and naturalized descriptions are nowadays generally dismissed. Over time, we have seen a shifting emphasis from ‘natural’ to ‘cultural’ descriptions of groups, phrased in terms of ‘blood’ via ‘race’ and ‘ethnicity’ to ‘culture.’ It is generally accepted now that culture is a socially constructed concept. On the other hand, constructivism dissolves into reductionism when it denies that culture is a real phenomenon in society, and merely sees it as a ‘narrative discourse,’ a ‘process,’ or as an identity.” I am not as certain as Pierik that the essentialist construal of culture is as widely rejected as he suggests. And while I agree with the social constructivism’s construal of culture and the danger of falling into reductionism, I would still want to point out that it matters a great deal what particular version of social constructivism (among the wide variety thereof) one opts for. See section 6.1, note 22.



8. In a polemical and highly critical introduction to Patrick West’s The Poverty of Multiculturalism (2005), Kenneth Minogue writes: “As the doctrine of tolerance began in the 1960s to turn into a morality of acceptance and inclusion, it also began to make claims about reality, and turned into multiculturalism, the belief that all cultures are equal in value. The doctrine is that we must, on pain of committing discriminatory racism, regard every individual, and every culture in which individuals participate, as being equally valuable” (p. vii). In the same piece, titled interestingly enough “Multiculturalism: A Dictatorship of Virtue,” he adds:“The multiculturalists explained to us that all cultures were equal. This vague expression might mean, what an anthropologist would certainly think, that every culture must be understood as a human response to a context and therefore as having moral value and intellectual interest in its own terms” (pp. xi-xii). Given however the remainder of his discussion, it is obvious that he does not agree with such a view.

9. As noted earlier, ‘diversity’ and ‘freedom’ may often be at odds, and the tensions between them are not always easy to resolve. The rhetoric of preservation and diversity does not seem of much help in dealing with the contradictions that emerge. Let us consider a couple of provisions included in the UNESCO convention on cultural diversity (2001). Take for example the principle affirming equal dignity and respect for all cultures. Does this mean each, any and all cultures, or what? Does this mean affirming the equal respect for each and all components or aspects of a given culture? Do the cultures deserving protection for diversity’s sake include the KKK and the Taliban? Take also the principle affirming the importance of culture for social cohesion, and its potential for the enhancement of the status and role of women in society. Doesn’t cohesion argue for uniformity or conformity? Wouldn’t enhancing the status and role of women involve changing, rather than preserving, some cultures –at least in some important respects? Unquestionably, human variety and cultural diversity matter --not for their own sake or in themselves, but because they offer people different options to which they are entitled in order to flourish (see Mill, 1860/1982). If however we would want to preserve a wide range of cultural and human conditions because it gives free people more options, and subsequently the best chances to make their own lives as they see fit, can we thereby justify enforcing diversity by trapping people within differences that they themselves long to reduce and seek to escape?

10. According to Appiah (2006ab), it may be useful to distinguish between ‘preserving cultural artifacts’

produced by different cultures over time from ‘preserving cultures.’ It is hard to see how one could object to the former –commensurately with one’s means and resources. But it is not clear how much we can or should preserve cultures as such –as if they can be preserved ‘frozen in time’ like ‘pickles in a jar’ if they are unable to survive through changes and adaptations and endure, if only as a historical entity. Let’s not forget that cultures are made of continuities through changes, and the identity of a culture (as a historical entity) typically survives through these more or less radical changes. A culture which does not survive through various kinds of changes is not more authentic, but merely dead. The so-called ‘preservationists’ often make their case by invoking the evil of ‘cultural imperialism.’ The picture underlying their position can be depicted, in broad strokes, as follows: There is a world system of capitalism. It has a center and a periphery. At the center –in Europe and the United States—is a set of multinational corporations. Some of these are in the media business. The products they sell around the world promote the creation of desires that can be fulfilled only by the purchase and use of their products. They do this explicitly through advertising, but more insidiously, they also do so through the messages implicit in movies and in television drama. Leading critics of media-cultural imperialism claim that ‘it is the imagery and cultural perspectives of the ruling sector in the center that shape and structure the consciousness throughout the system at large.’ From a certain (experiential) point of view, this theory seems to be borne out at least in part, but it is doubtful whether a sociological analysis of evidence (in due form) would corroborate this picture in an unmitigated way. Recent studies in this area show interestingly enough that people around the world respond to these cultural imports differently depending on their values, needs and priorities in their respective cultural contexts. In short, it seems that adaptations, re-interpretations, transfers and filterings are taking place in so many different ways. Besides, doesn’t talking of cultural imperialism ‘structuring the consciousness’ of people living in the so-called periphery treat them like blank slates on which global capitalism unfettered writes its subliminal messages, leaving in its wake only ‘cultural automatons or zombies.’ Isn’t this deeply condescending, apart from being unsupported by the complexities of cultural interactions and exchanges around the world in this era of both globalization and glocalisation? I will return to this point in due course.

11. In a recent book, Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny (2006), Amartya Sen takes aim at the logic



of conflict underlying the reductionist approach pitting “us-vs.-them” (the West vs. the Rest) found in the work of Huntington, and in which members of different cultures seem to be locked up in ‘little boxes’ from which they cannot escape. Interestingly, or rather ironically, Huntington’s outlook is shared by those ‘radical Muslim fundamentalists’ against whom his analysis seems to be aimed. Along similar lines, Jean-Francois Fayart, in The Illusion of Cultural Identity (2005), argues that the “clash of civilizations” is not unavoidably our fate. We come to believe otherwise only if we adopt a problematic and objectionable conception of cultural identity as natural.

12. During the drafting of this essay, I have become increasingly aware of what may be called a double-bind situation. On the one hand, I am endeavoring to deconstruct the received view of culture, and, on the other, I am struggling to find the most appropriate expressions to put across an alternative conception that in my view better reflects the reality of the world today and the facts of cultural complexity. However, as it appears above, I find myself unable to completely jettison the essentialist, monistic, holistic language characteristic of the fundamental misconception of culture here under attack. Is it because, as Derrida repeatedly warned us, the language we use is perhaps inextricably caught up in the logocentric metaphysics of presence of the Western philosophical tradition, and therefore always already underwritten by a series of fundamental binary oppositions and essentialist assumptions?

13. During a graduate Seminar on “the Philosophy of Human Rights –from a Cross-Cultural Perspective” at Shandong University, Jinan, China (February-June 2005), I gave my students the following recommendation: “As you read each of the required or recommended papers and articles for this seminar (or any other seminar, for that matter), always ask: what is the underlying or explicit conception of culture that the author is putting into play? On what assumptions is it based? Is it empirically valid, historically real, and normatively compelling? Does it reflect the facts of cultural complexity and fully countenance the lessons of globalization-cum-glocalisation in a nuanced and qualified manner? Etc. Each time, they were subsequently able to quickly point to the shortcomings and failures of the various analyses provided, and raise serious objections against the arguments and views defended. This presumably testifies at least to the usefulness of the kind of analysis I advocate as a critical tool.

14. See for example Chokr (2006; 2007) for an articulation and defense (around the issue of human

rights) of what may be called “a pluralistic, historically enlightened ethical universalism” that could be arrived at as a result of an unforced “overlapping consensus” based on the normatively justifiable resources and contributions of the main cultural and philosophical traditions of the world. I argue that if we could in principle draw a meaningful distinction between the ‘what’ and ‘why’ of things, it is quite possible such an overlapping consensus with a universal ethical force could be achieved on what --a set of rights, or of values, ideals, and principles between individuals and peoples differently situated and with divergent comprehensive doctrines or conceptions, even if there may still be some substantial disagreement about the justification (or the why) for these agreed upon rights, values, ideals, and principles. This line of reasoning inspired by Rawls’ work has also been adopted by philosophers as diverse as Jacques Maritain, Charles Taylor, and Martha Nussbaum.

15. As Appiah observes in The Ethics of Identity (2004), the question of ‘who we are’ has somehow always been linked to the question of ‘what we are.’

16. Jean-Francois Fayart has argued along similar lines in his book, The Illusion of Cultural Identity (2005). He claims that the concept of ‘cultural identity’ has become for many a convenient explanation from most of the world’s political problems. He offers a sustained critique of this rationalization by dispelling the notion that fixed identities do, in fact, exist. In his view, the very idea of cultural identity prevents us from grasping the cultural dimensions of political action and economic development. Identities, he argues, are fluid, never homogeneous, and more often than not invented. The conflicts we read about in the news draw their murderous force from the supposition that a ‘political identity corresponds to each so-called ‘cultural identity,’ which is in reality illusory. What the facts indicate is that each of these identities is often a recent construction. There is no ‘natural identity’ which imposes itself to us by the sheer power of things. There are only ‘identity strategies,’ rationally produced by actors easily identifiable, and identity dreams or nightmares to which we adhere because they either seduce or terrorize us. In any case, Fayart argues, we are not condemned to remain prisoners of such devious manipulations. The “clash of civilizations” need not be our fate. Also, worthy of note in this context is the essay by Amin Maalouf, In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong (2001), in which he offers a philosophical exploration of what a culture without entrenched identities, or tribalistic forms of identities would be like. Writing from a position of multiple identities,



which, he claims, to share with many people around the world, he addresses such complicated and timely issues as how we judge religious traditions that have embraced violence and brutality, modern manifestations of ‘otherness,’ how language facilitates and breeds nationalism, and most importantly, the contradiction between stark identity-based political conflicts and how the same identity-based cultures can be shared by different groups. In the end, Maalouf does not naively demand that personal identities be dismissed, but suggests a number of ways in which identities can remain intact and might form not a “meaningless sham equality” but “rather the acceptance of a multiplicity of allegiances as all equally legitimate.” While “the wind of globalization” could lead us to disaster, he writes, it could also lead us to success. Maalouf envisions a globalized world in which our local identities are subordinated to a broader “allegiance to the human community itself.” And in this regard, he may be viewed as a proponent of what Appiah (2006b) calls “a rooted cosmopolitanism.”

17. Many of the ideas, ideals, values, practices and institutions which are today commonly deemed to be Western had antecedents or precursors, or even originated in Non-Western cultures and civilizations, e.g., in India, China, the Arab world, Africa, or elsewhere. These include: deliberative and participatory democracy, human rights, religious tolerance, rational and argumentative reasoning, governance, atheism, skepticism, materialist thinking, etc. We could also include the numerous contributions made in mathematics (trigonometric sine function, the zero), astronomy, linguistics, medicine, architecture, and political economy made by both Indian and Arabic cultures and civilizations. It is safe to say that many of the culinary practices for example associated with a particular culture today originated in fact elsewhere. Etc.

18. By using this term derived from Deleuze and Guattari (1987) I do not intend to endorse all the specifics of their work, nor all the diverse uses to which it has been put by these authors and their followers. However, I do wish to convey some of the connotations commonly associated with it, namely, connectivity, heterogeneity, multiplicity, constant creation and recreation of networks as they expand, contract, emerge, and recede. For Deleuze and Guattari, multiplicity celebrates the many and plurality in contradistinction to unitary, binary, and totalizing models of Western thought. Their interest in “rhizomatics” is to extirpate roots and foundations, to thwart unities and break dichotomies, and to spread out roots and branches, thereby pluralizing and

disseminating, producing differences and multiplicities, and ultimately, making new connections, which is the essence of creative living.

19. This neologism was originally defined as “a unit of cultural transmission or imitation” to convey analogically to the ‘gene’ of biological evolution the self-propagating, self-replicating, and circulating unit of cultural evolution. It is believed that it might prove useful in explaining various recalcitrant aspects of human behavior and cultural evolution. “Memes” have as their fundamental property ‘evolution via selection’ in that replication, mutation, survival and competition influence them. In more casual parlance, a ‘meme’ refers to any piece of information or meaning regardless of its mode or medium of expression that circulates, is reproduced and passed from one mind to another. Examples might include thoughts, ideas, theories, practices, habits, songs, dances, and even moods, etc.

20. These expressions [respectively from Arendt (1958/1973), Benhabib (2002), Weber (1917/1949) and Geertz (2000)] are here used interchangeably to convey a “narrative view of the self and identity” in contrast to the traditional conception which characterizes the latter in terms of a “substantive, constitutive and essentially defining core.”

21. According to Appiah (2006a), the ideal of “contamination” has few exponents more eloquent than Salman Rushdie. The novel that occasioned the fatwa issued against him by the Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran is said to celebrate “hybridity, impurity, intermingling, the transformation that comes of new and unexpected combinations of human beings, cultures, ideas, politics, movies, songs. It rejoices in mongrelisation and fears the absolutism of the Pure Melange, hotch-potch, a bit of this, a bit of that is how newness enters the world.” This fact notwithstanding, we must still entertain the possibility that there can be spurious forms of utopian contamination, just as, we now recognize, there are spurious forms of utopian purity and authenticity? Is the larger human truth is on the side of contamination—the endless process of imitation and revision, or on the side of purity ---and the endless process of purification and preservation? What does history teach us? Whose history, one might ask?

22. Social constructivism is a very broad category and movement that covers various theoretical orientations and methodological strategies –ranging from postmodernism to critical social theory, from postcolonial studies to Marxist or non-Marxist functionalism. Generally speaking however, it is fair to say that these strategies have for the most part failed to explain identity-based movements in a



satisfactory manner. In particular they could not explain the fact that these movements and the activists within them picked up various “cultural shreds and patches” (Gellner, 1983: 56) from the cultures surrounding them and were thus able to address or resolve some of the more enduring identity dilemmas confronting them in boldly creative and imaginative ways. Like other contributions to the politics of identity and difference, they seem to have been “afflicted by the paradox of wanting to preserve the purity of the impure, the immutability of the historical, and the fundamentalness of the contingent (Benhabib, 2002: 11).

23. As I have sought along with others to object forcefully to the "logic of conflict" underlying the so-called "clash of civilizations" thesis, I have also been brought to examine more candidly the underlying logic --presumed or tacit and unacknowledged-- of the opposite thesis, namely, that of "cross-cultural dialogue." Thus, I now question more specifically the underlying conception of 'culture' that such a position assumes, and wonder if it is not one covert-variant of the fundamental misconception that I have identified herein --fundamentally an essentialist, determinist, and reductionist conception? Is the thesis of "cross-cultural dialogue" consistent and compatible with the alternative conception of 'culture' advocated in this essay? How does such a conception constrain (or not) the nature of the 'dialogue' envisaged here between 'cultures'? These kinds of questions have to be taken up in another context.

24. I borrow here the felicitous terms of Jonathan Lear. In his most recent book, Radical Hope: Ethics in the Face of Cultural Devastation (2006), Lear provides a powerfully argued and masterfully constructed analysis of the case of the Crow Indian Nation and Culture facing devastation and possible extinction at the hand of the white settlers In the mid-west plains of the US in the 19th-20th century. It is focused on the leading role played by the last of the Great Crow Chiefs, Plenty Coups, in creatively and imaginatively articulating the necessary conceptual and ethical resources which enabled his people, the Crow nation and culture to endure with radical hope --despite being irrevocably and irremediably changed and transformed in the process. There are here lessons and insights of general and broader import that are worth pondering by members of any and all cultures.

Correspondence to: Nader N. Chokr Professor of Philosophy & Social Sciences School of Philosophy and Social Development Shandong University, 5 Hong Jia Lou

Jinan, Shandong Province, China 250100 Email: [email protected] / [email protected] Office: +86-0531-88377982 References

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