The ideal state,
statehood, citizenship, democracy and governance have been themes studied and
debated by famous political thinkers, starting from Socrates, to Hobbes to Duverger.
Civilizations, both based on philosophical grounds and religious doctrines (and
more recently civic and judicial foundations) have all tried to come up with
the supreme state-model, a blueprint for a happy and well-functioning society,
an ideal type of governance and relations between citizens, nations and
political class. Achieving a euphoric state is not a logical objective, but the
quest is. Nations make sure that they constantly reform, modify, update, analyse
and test their policies and governance strategies, all with the objective of enhancing
the quality of the state and statehood in question. As modern as this may sound, this activity
has been actually long practiced, starting as early as the fifth century BC Greece.
Plato believed that a
good man must be a good citizen who in return could not exist without a good
state. He believed that no law is more powerful than knowledge, rejecting laws
and customs that people accept at face value and without a critical eye. Aristotle
believed that reason cannot be separated from a good state that is incarnated
in both law and customs of the community that is being governed. Moral ideals,
supremacy of the law, liberty and equality of all citizens and law-based governments
have all been the supreme ends of any state. The pleasure seeking Epicureans
for their part believed that a state is found with the sole objective of achieving
security, protecting men from other men’s egoistic interests. They lectured that
considering that all men are selfish and seek personal happiness and joy, and
that men would do anything to achieve such happiness, men in communities agreed
to form ab agreement that protects them from harm caused by one another. Men,
therefore, adopt a plan to respect the rights of others with the objective of
having their own rights protected. Antisthenes and his school of Cynicism
preached liberal thoughts of refusing society, laws, traditions and prejudices,
focusing on the inner merits of
individuals; rich men, poor men, Greeks, barbarians, citizens and foreigners
booth free and slaves, nobles and villainous are all equal and should all be reduced to a common level of
indifference. With the expansion of the Greek empire after Alexander the great,
the Greek philosophy also became more universally oriented, where the concepts
of universal state and universal citizenship became clearer. The Romans
inherited the philosophies of their Greek neighbours and new philosophers, such
as Cicero, began preaching the universal natural rights, universal states governed
under the law of God and the equality of all men under this eternal celestial law.
He strongly believed that only bad habits and false opinions impede men from
being equal. Seneca (the Roman Stoic philosopher)
then emphasized the importance of benevolence, tolerance, morals and equality
of men, a set of thoughts that spread in the Roman Empire and inspired the Christian
thought. From there, and since Christianity was adopted by the Roman Empire in
380 AD and Islam came to preach abut equality of human kind and that races, no
matter how much they differ in color, language, and conditions, are all equal
before a benevolent God. Empires then followed and the ideals kept on developing. Good. So what happened later? How could this string of
intellectual progression of human political thought get destroyed by political
leaders and fanatical ideological ideals? How could it be that a community in
Roman and Greek empires preached and believed in equality of citizens, reason and
subjection to a common law that would protect their interests, while now, in the
21st century, we are rebelling against, law, common sense, and
humanity itself?
A quick review of last
week’s Middle East’s headlines read as follows: Iraq: Al Qaeda aims at suffocating
Sunni Cities; Dozens dead in a series of blasts in different Sunni cities; Two
car bombs kill 17 Shiites in south Baghdad during Karbala religious ceremony; Muslim Brothers students in Egypt’s
convert universities to conflict zones with security forces; MB to boycott referendum
on constitution; Jihadists chop head of three Alawi men in Adra next to
Damascus. What is not being broadcast but is somehow general knowledge is that Jordanians
frown upon Palestinian presence in Jordan; Palestinians are oppressed by
Israelis; Israeli Jews discriminate against anyone who does not carry pure Jewish
blood; Iranians want to annihilate the Zionist nation; Iraqi Shias
sympathize with Iran's quest to spread Shiism; Lebanese Shias agree and feel oppressed
by Sunni co-citizens; Sunnis want to join hand with anyone against Iran; Christians
and Muslims doubt each other’s intentions; Kurds still deprived of full autonomous
rights in Syria, Turkey and to a certain extent Iraq; Alawis are not Muslims nor
are the Druuz say fundamentalists…and the list goes on. We seem to be living in
a conflict zone, a moral, intellectual and religious conflict zone. Respect to
human rights, freedom and dignity has evaporated, and pure fundamentalism is
taking their place instead. Tolerance is no longer acceptable and is in fact
considered a sign of weakness. Any comprise or deal made without bloodshed,
without compensation, without wars and trials and destruction would be considered
a humiliating defeat. We ridicule leaders who sit down with enemies and listen,
we judge citizens who try to picture the other point of view, and we disapprove
of any deviation of the accepted political/religious/social doctrine. We are
living under the slogan of vengeance, when the history of our region, whether
political, intellectual or religious has demonstrated elsewise throughout
history.
I lamentably
believe that the calls for virtue, thought, subjection of laws to human
intelligence, tolerance, patience and intellectual activity are being attracted
by a number of actors with political agendas. What the Pythagorean cult
believed in “harmony as a basic principle in music, medicine and politics” is ridiculed
by our modern actors who champion rigid compliance to a sole doctrine. What
Socrates believed in respect of virtue as being a learned and taught knowledge is
now considered as blasphemy and a challenge to religious laws. Any intention to
find a way for harmonic existence is being fought and won by such
fundamentalists. Against the backdrop of mutual suspicion against anyone who
does not belong to the exact school of thought, religion, set of beliefs,
political orientation and affiliation and of course racial roots, and the
failure to find any solution, I have a suggestion. I say we divide the region into
small patches of land, each governed by a family. Black sheep can find their own
patch. This way we can go back to prehistoric times – as we are on the way
there by the way – and each family finds a settlement that calls it home. From
there, let’s start anew. Let us start to learn how to think, live and progress. Let's learn how to develop our morals and respect for diversity and co-existence. Let us learn how to forgive and tolerate. Let us erase all the ugliness we have seen in our modern days and go back to a more developed past.
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