Cairo speech – 2parse

[digg-reddit-me]I’m struck by the similarities between the spirit of the Iranian election – and the subsequent protests – and the Lawyers Movement in Pakistan this March. In both cases, the government promised to honor certain principles and then went back on its word – in Iran, by holding an election; in Pakistan, as President Zardari promised to reinstate Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry to the Supreme Court.

Then both went back on their word – and the people, to their credit protested. They were cynical about the motives of these leaders – but they refused to react with world-weary cynicism. They knew hope – and in their hope, they gained strength.

The elite power brokers in both nations believed they could get away with whatever they wanted – apparently believing that elections and campaigns and laws were merely a cover for their power politics. But the people took these ideas seriously.

In Pakistan, President Zardari made a campaign promise to reinstate the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court known for his independence. Justice Chaudhry had been removed from his post when he appeared to be preparing to declare President Musharaff’s declaration of martial law illegal – and this act by Musharaff was considered the final straw by many in Pakistan frustrated by how the Rule of Law was constantly subverted by the elites in their power games, thus holding their entire nation back. So began the Lawyers Movement which fought to restore the Rule of Law, to remove Musharaff from power, and to reinstate the Chief Justice. After achieving some measure of the first two objectives, forcing Musharaff to resign and electing a new president, Zardari, having promised to uphold the Rule of Law and reinstate Chaudhry – the movement seemed to have won. But after months of stalling, it began to seem as if Zardari had no intention of restoring Chaudhry. Rallies continued – led by different groups across the country – building in intensity – and in a dramatic series of events, a key opposition leader broke out of house arrest to participate in a massive protest to force the reinstatement of Chaudhry. As a final show of determination, a series of rallies was supposed to culminate in a march to the Pakistani capital from all directions as the people took back their capital. In the midst of this chaos, the police and military for the first time in Pakistani history refused to control the demonstrators and stood aside. On the verge of this demonstration, Zardari gave in – reinstating the Chief Justice this March.

In Iran, the extemist mullahs panicked as the people rejected their hardline, isolationist views in favor of the offer of rapprochement with the West offered by Obama. Despite the fact that only candidates hand-picked by the Guardian Council were running – and that the reformers were led by a candidate described as an Iranian Michael Dukakis – and despite the fact that state organs and the Supreme Leader clearly favored Ahmadinejad – a grass roots movement took root on Twitter, on Facebook, in text messages, in blogs, in enormous rallies held by Mousavi in the weeks leading up to the election, and in shouts from the rooftops after the election when all other methods of communication had been cut off. And in all liklihood, according to polls by the Iranian government before the election, and leaked results after it, Mousavi won a resounding victory. And so far, the people have not backed down – as they continue to rally and agitate. After declaring the results of the election “divine,” the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamene has begun to show signs of relenting as he has ordered an investigation into vote fraud. Couple this with the rash of resignations and unprecedented public protests by top Iranian leaders and clerics, and there is the potential for real change.

It seems hard not to connect these two demonstrations for political rights in Pakistan and Iran. And to note that leading them is the exact young generation of Muslims whom we were so afraid of after September 11. One of the recurring themes of Osama Bin Laden’s rhetoric – and one of the key sources of his legitimacy – is his outrage at the corrupt dictatorships ruling the Middle East – which makes these demonstrations of the people on the edges of the Middle East reminding their leaders that they cannot tread lightly over the consent of the governed all the more significant.

And perhaps, Obama saw this before most – as he called in his Cairo speech for “a peaceful and determined insistence upon the ideals” that “government [should be] of the people and by the people sets a single standard for all who hold power.” Obama explained that legitimacy is gained “through consent, not coercion.”

It remains to be seen if the Iranian protests will be successful – though the fact that Ayatollah Khamenei has ordered an investigation into vote fraud is a slight sign to be hopeful. A stronger sign is what forced him to call for the investigation – as over this weekend in the streets of Tehran we saw a largely peaceful and determined insistence by the Iranian people on a government by consent, not coercion.

[Image from Andrew Sullivan’s blog.]

Obama’s Cairo speech is an excellent beginning of a rapprochement with Muslims around the world. Here’s a few brief comments on a few passages in the speech:

So I have known Islam on three continents before coming to the region where it was first revealed.

Very respectful tone here. But, to my mind, theologically problematic. Obama is no theologian – but if he is a Christian, then does that not mean he rejects that Islam was revealed? It’s one thing to speak in a respectful tones about another religion – but another to accept that religion’s premises that supersede your own as true.

America is not the crude stereotype of a self-interested empire. The United States has been one of the greatest sources of progress that the world has ever known. We were born out of revolution against an empire. We were founded upon the ideal that all are created equal, and we have shed blood and struggled for centuries to give meaning to those words – within our borders, and around the world. We are shaped by every culture, drawn from every end of the Earth, and dedicated to a simple concept: E pluribus unum: “Out of many, one.”

This is something Obama has done so well – to preach the exceptionalism of America. And in many ways, his own story is a symbol of this. This idea of American exceptionalism is rejected as toxic though by most opponents of America – as well as many leftists in America. At best, it is seen as a kind of crude nationalism – and at worst as a sociopathic indifference to great crimes. There are two schools of American exceptionalism – the one which suggests America is inherently better than other countries and empires – and the other which states that America’s exceptionalism can be found in how it has dealt with its ideals and its power. Obama, clearly, belongs to the second category.

For we have learned from recent experience that when a financial system weakens in one country, prosperity is hurt everywhere. When a new flu infects one human being, all are at risk. When one nation pursues a nuclear weapon, the risk of nuclear attack rises for all nations. When violent extremists operate in one stretch of mountains, people are endangered across an ocean. And when innocents in Bosnia and Darfur are slaughtered, that is a stain on our collective conscience. That is what it means to share this world in the 21st century. That is the responsibility we have to one another as human beings.

Here Obama touches on the idea of the increasing interconnectedness of the world today – and in which he seems to be suggesting an alternate explanation than greed and empire for America’s involvements around the world, as well as a collective responsibility of all to create a better world.

…more than any other, they have killed Muslims…

I wish Obama had brought this up a few times – as this is such an important point. Al Qaeda and other violent extremists (the term Obama adopted, at least for this speech) have – while speaking most about attacking America – killed mainly fellow Muslims. In a recent editorial in Dawn, Pakistan’s leading English-language newspaper, columnist Nosheen Abbas quoted a man who lived in Swat before the Taliban took over:

These hooligans come and tell us they are here to bring Islam. What? Are we not Muslims?!

This is why the most effective counterterrorism strategy that the Bush administration was able to find was to let the extremists win for a while – and let their intolerance alienate the population.

Palestinians must abandon violence. Resistance through violence and killing is wrong and does not succeed. For centuries, black people in America suffered the lash of the whip as slaves and the humiliation of segregation. But it was not violence that won full and equal rights. It was a peaceful and determined insistence upon the ideals at the center of America’s founding. This same story can be told by people from South Africa to South Asia; from Eastern Europe to Indonesia. It’s a story with a simple truth: that violence is a dead end. It is a sign of neither courage nor power to shoot rockets at sleeping children, or to blow up old women on a bus. That is not how moral authority is claimed; that is how it is surrendered.

Although this might be the right thing to say – given our interests – I am not sure this is historically accurate. It’s a rather dangerous idea – that “Resistance through violence and killing is wrong.” Clearly – Obama is not saying that with any act of violence, one cedes one’s moral authority – for then he would be condemning the police whose authority is based on their implicit ability to do violence as well as our own military – which are even now engaged in violence with various forces in the Middle East. What he is instead referring to is violent resistance – by which he clearly is referring not to violence which supports the status quo, but which opposes it, or alternately, the violence of the weak against the strong. It’s an odd thing to condemn on moral grounds – and I’m not sure how this case can be made. There are many other instances in history when resistance would seem to justify violence – the Nazi occupation, the various genocides, slavery. What I could accept is that in recent history, it has been found that peaceful mass resistance has proven to be a far more effective tool in overturning the status quo, in empowering the weak over the strong.

Too many tears have flowed. Too much blood has been shed. All of us have a responsibility to work for the day when the mothers of Israelis and Palestinians can see their children grow up without fear; when the Holy Land of three great faiths is the place of peace that God intended it to be; when Jerusalem is a secure and lasting home for Jews and Christians and Muslims, and a place for all of the children of Abraham to mingle peacefully together as in the story of Isra, when Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed (peace be upon them) joined in prayer. [my emphasis]

I am not certain – but I feel as if this passage will be cited most of all – and will be the most influential, especially the idea of Jerusalem as “the place of peace that God intended it to be.”

So let me be clear: no system of government can or should be imposed upon one nation by any other.

That does not lessen my commitment, however, to governments that reflect the will of the people. Each nation gives life to this principle in its own way, grounded in the traditions of its own people. America does not presume to know what is best for everyone, just as we would not presume to pick the outcome of a peaceful election. But I do have an unyielding belief that all people yearn for certain things: the ability to speak your mind and have a say in how you are governed; confidence in the rule of law and the equal administration of justice; government that is transparent and doesn’t steal from the people; the freedom to live as you choose. Those are not just American ideas, they are human rights, and that is why we will support them everywhere…

No matter where it takes hold, government of the people and by the people sets a single standard for all who hold power: you must maintain your power through consent, not coercion; you must respect the rights of minorities, and participate with a spirit of tolerance and compromise; you must place the interests of your people and the legitimate workings of the political process above your party. Without these ingredients, elections alone do not make true democracy.

This is almost exactly what I had hoped Obama would say. Democracy activists in the region had already expressed disappointment that Obama was going to Egypt, implying an endorsement of the regime. And some – in the aftermath of the speech – continued to complain that he had given up on Bush’s democracy promotion. Realists continue to assert that we shouldn’t bother with such niceties as democracy promotion – seeing it as mainly a destabilizing element. The neoconservatives on the other hand correctly pointed out that a great deal of the instability and resentment in the region came from the fact that most of the nations here are authoritarian. Obama is attempting to “thread the needle” here – and to my mind, did it perfectly. He adopted what I understand to be Philip Bobbitt’s understanding of a state of consent being in direct opposition to a state of terror. Accepting this formulation puts Obama’s foreign policy on stronger ground than Bush’s.

Likewise, it is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practicing religion as they see fit – for instance, by dictating what clothes a Muslim woman should wear. We cannot disguise hostility towards any religion behind the pretence of liberalism.

Am I wrong to see this as a swipe at France here?

Overall, an excellent speech – and one that was apparently well-received. The follow-up is crucial – and it remains to be seen how Obama’s focus on nations that “reflect the will of the people” differs from Bush’s democracy promotion. But the change in emphasis is key – and itself does a great deal of good.