Recently I published a piece in Middle East Law and Governance 3 (2011) 171–180 Aesthetics and Transcendence in the Arab Uprisings
The Obama administration seems to have signed off on the execution of Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen who fled to Yemen from where he mobilized terrorists in order to attack America. A few months ago, Osama bin Laden, arch-terrorist master-mind was also killed in an operation in Abbottabad in Pakistan.
Both these events are a cause of concern for human rights activists and right-thinking people around the world. The question is this: if the American government opens the door to extra-judicial executions of its enemies, what prevents other countries and other non-state actors from pursuing this same line of activity? The US has opened a very dangerous door in its actions and this threatens global security. My fear is that if this becomes a pattern, very soon there will be similar retaliation against US citizens in a similar manner. This is the slippery slope to the law of the jungle and it will very soon become difficult to put the genie back in the bottle again.
Apprehending criminals and bad guys is the duty of all law-abiding citizens and societies. But how we apprehend them and bring them to justice is more important than the penalty meted out in the final instance.
What one cannot fail to notice is that days after the unpopular president of Yemen, Ali Abdullah Salih returns to San’aa after several months of recuperation in Saudi Arabia, his forces in cooperation with US forces target Awlaki. Is Salih trying to buy some time for himself? Did he make a deal with Washington? Did he tell Washington: Don’t press me to implement democracy and do not reproach me when my armed forces kill unarmed and peaceful protesters!! One wonders. All this does not augur well for America’s role in encouraging democracy in the Middle East when US security concerns trumps long-term regional security and flourishing.
My interview with Charlie Rosealong with other colleagues from Duke and around the US and several prominent intellectuals and political leaders from around the world was aired a few days ago. My segment starts at around 42 minutes.
Ebrahim Moosa with Charlie Rose after the interview
Beirut during this time of the year is sheer magic. The weather is fantastic and my stay at the American University of Beirut (AUB) for four nights was just enchanting. I had the good fortune to stay on campus as the guest of the AUB provost, Professor Ahmad Dallal, author of Islam, Science and the Challenge of History, which made it all the more pleasant.
I gave the keynote address at the symposium on “Cartoons and Minarets” dealing with Islamophobia and Muslim protests on Friday 1 April, 2011 hosted by the Heinrich Böll Stiftung. The evening I participated in a talk on the perceptions of the uprisings in the Middle East with Tariq Ramadan. The Beiruti crowd was attentive and exacting. I raised the question whether the uprisings were not a Black Swan moment, following Nassim Taleb’s idea that rarity, extreme impact and retrospective predictability are the features of major global events. I also suggested that communities in places like Egypt and Tunisia consider instead of the politics of identity which is limiting perhaps pursue a politics of recognition, following Jacques Ranciere. Recognition is at least of three kinds: intimate-love, abstract-law and concrete-social status. It requires a focus on aesthetics, the ability to enhance our perceptions, to feel, to sense and to touch. It was fascinating to see how people in the region began to express their feelings in such dramatic ways once they got rid of the dictatorships. A politics of recognition requires that the theater of politics never end and continuously requires discussions, debates and polemics. Perhaps a politics of love might find a way to heal the suffering of the past under dictatorships. I also said that in order to install a culture of accountability that people in the region consider the South African model of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission where the wrongs of the past are disclosed by the various actors in exchange for amnesty and indemnity from prosecution and retribution. But the wrongs of the past and those who perpetrated harm must disclose and take accountability for what they did. That is a much more solid foundation to build on than merely sweeping the ugly things of the past under the carpet. Then one will not enjoy the carpet but constantly walk on the dirt below it!
