A global culture to fight extremism Maajid Nawaz
have you ever wondered why extremism
seems to have been on the rise in
muslim-majority countries over the
course of the last decade have you ever
wondered how such a situation can be
turned around have you ever looked at
the Arab uprisings and thought how could
we have predicted that or how could we
have better prepared for that well my
personal story my personal journey what
brings me to the Ted stage here today is
a demonstration of exactly what’s been
happening in muslim-majority societies
over the course of the last two decades
at least and beyond I want to share some
of that story with you but also some of
my ideas around change and the role of
social movements in creating change in
muslim-majority societies so let me
begin by first of all giving a very very
brief history of time if I may indulge
in medieval societies they were defined
allegiances and identity was defined
primarily by religion and then we moved
on into an era in the nineteenth century
with the rise of a European nation state
when identities and allegiances were
defined by ethnicity so identity was
primarily defined by ethnicity and the
nation-state reflected that in the age
of globalization we moved on I call it
the era of citizenship where people
could be from multiracial multi-ethnic
backgrounds but all be equal as citizens
in a state you could be American Italian
you can be American Irish you could be
British Pakistani but I believe now that
we’re moving into a new age and that age
the New York Times dubbed recently as
the age of behavior how I define the age
of behavior is a period of transnational
allegiances where identities define more
so by ideas and narratives and these
ideas and narratives that bond people
across borders are increasingly
beginning to affect the way in which
people behave now this is not all
necessary good news because it’s also my
belief that hatred has gone global just
as much as love but actually it’s my
belief that the people who’ve been truly
capitalizing on this age of behavior
up until now up until recent times up
until the last six months the people who
have been capitalizing most on the age
of behavior and the transnational
allegiances using digital activism and
other sorts of of borderless
technologies those who have been
benefiting from this have been
extremists and that’s something which
I’d like to elaborate on if we look at
Islamists if we look at the phenomenon
of far-right fascists one thing they’ve
been very good at one thing that they’ve
been actually exceeding in is
communicating across borders using
technologies to organize themselves to
propagate their message and to create
truly global phenomena now I should know
because for 13 years of my life I was
involved in an extreme Islamist
organization and I was actually a potent
force in spreading ideas across borders
and I witnessed the rise of Islamist
extremism as distinct from Islam the
faith and the way in which it influenced
my co-religionists across the world and
my story my personal story is truly
evidence for the age of behavior that
I’m attempting to elaborate upon here I
was by the way I’m an Essex lad born and
raised in Essex in the UK anyone who’s
from England knows the reputation that
we have from Essex but having been born
in Essex at the age of 16 I joined an
organisation at the age of 17 I was
recruiting people from Cambridge
University to this organization at the
age of 19 I was on the National
leadership of this organisation in the
UK at the age of 21 I was co-founding
this organisation in Pakistan at the age
of 22 I was co-founding this
organisation in Denmark by the age of 24
I found myself convicted in prison in
Egypt being blacklisted from three
countries in the world for attempting to
overthrow their governments being
subjected to torture in Egyptian jails
and sentenced to five years as a
prisoner of conscience now that journey
and what took me from Essex all the way
across the world by the way we were
laughing at democratic activists we felt
they were there from the age of
yesteryear we
that they were out of date I learned how
to use emails from the extremist
organization that I used I learned how
to effectively communicate across
borders without being detected
eventually I was detected of course in
Egypt but the way in which I learnt to
use technology to my advantage was
because I was within an extremist
organization that was forced to think
beyond the confines of the nation-state
the age of behavior where ideas and
narratives were increasingly defining
behavior and identity and allegiances so
as I said we looked to the status quo
and ridiculed it and it’s not just
Islamist extremists that did this but
even if you look across the mood music
in Europe of late far-right fascism is
also on the rise a form of anti Islam
rhetoric is also on the rise and it’s
transnational and the consequence is
that this is having is that is affecting
the political climate across Europe
what’s actually happening is that what
were previously localized parochialism
x' individual or groupings of extremists
who are isolated from one another have
become interconnected in a globalized
way and have thus become or are becoming
mainstream because the internet and
connection technologies are connecting
them across the world if you look at the
rise of far-right fascism across Europe
of late you will see some things that
are happening that are influencing
domestic politics yet the phenomenon is
transnational in certain countries
mosque minarets are being banned in
others head scarves are being banned in
others kosher and halal meat are being
banned as we speak and on the flip side
we have transnational Islamist
extremists doing the same thing across
their own societies and so they are
pockets of parochialism that are being
connected in a way that makes them feel
like they are mainstream now that never
would have been possible before they
would have felt isolated until these
sorts of technologies came around and
connected them in a way that made them
feel part of a larger phenomenon where
does that leave democracy aspirants well
I believe they’re getting left far
behind and I’ll give you an example here
at this stage if any of you remembers
the Christmas Day bomber
plot there’s a man called Anwar Awlaki
is an American citizen ethnically a
Yemeni in hiding currently in Yemen who
inspired a Nigerian son of the head of
the Nigeria’s National Bank this
Nigerian students studied in London
trained in Yemen born in a flight in
Amsterdam to attack America in the
meanwhile the old mentality with a
capital o was represented by his father
the head of the Nigerian bank warning
the CIA that his own son was about to
attack and this warning fell on deaf
ears the old mentality with a capital o
as represented by the nation-state not
yet fully into the age of behavior not
recognizing the power of transnational
social movements got left behind and the
kiss Christmas Day bomber almost
succeeded in attacking the United States
of America again with the example of the
far right that we find ironically
xenophobic xenophobic nationalists are
utilizing the benefits of globalization
so why are they succeeding and why our
democracy aspirants falling behind well
we need to understand the power of a
social movement to understand this and a
social movement is comprised in my view
it’s comprised of four main
characteristics it’s comprised of ideas
and narratives and symbols and leaders
I’ll talk you through one example and
that’s the example that everyone here
will become aware of and that’s the
example of al-qaeda if I ask you to
think of the ideas of al-qaeda that’s
something that comes to your mind
immediately if I ask you to think of
their narratives the West being a war
with Islam the need to defend Islam
against the West these narratives they
come to your mind immediately
incidentally the difference between
ideas and narratives the idea is the
cause that one believes in and the
narrative is the way to sell that course
the propaganda if you like of the course
so the ideas and the narratives of
al-qaeda come to your mind immediately
if I ask you to think of their symbols
and their leaders they come to your mind
immediately one of the leaders was just
killed in Pakistan recently so these
symbols and these leaders come to your
mind immediately and that’s the power of
social movements they’re transnational
and they bond around these ideas and
narratives and these symbols and these
leaders however
if I ask your minds to focus currently
on Pakistan and if I ask you to think of
the symbols and the leaders for
democracy in Pakistan today you will be
hard-pressed to think beyond perhaps the
assassination of Benazir Bhutto which
means by definition that particular
leader no longer exists one of the
problems we’re facing is in my view that
there are no globalized youth-led
grassroots social movements advocating
for democratic culture across Muslim
majority societies there is no
equivalent of the al-qaeda without the
terrorism for democracy across Muslim
majority societies there are no ideas
and narratives and leaders and symbols
advocating the democratic culture on the
ground so that begs the next question
why is it that extremist organizations
whether of the far-right or of the
Islamist extremism Islamism meaning
those who wish to impose one version of
Islam over the rest of society why is it
that they are succeeding in organizing
in a globalized way whereas those who
aspire to democratic culture are falling
behind and I believe that’s for four
reasons I believe number one its
complacency because those who aspire to
democratic culture are in power or have
societies that are leading globalized
powerful societies powerful countries
and that level of complacency means they
don’t feel the need to advocate for that
culture the second I believe is
political correctness that we have a
hesitation in espousing the universality
of democratic culture because we
associate that we associate believing in
the universality of our values with
extremists yet actually whenever we talk
about human rights we do say that human
rights are reverse Universal but
actually going out to propagate that
view is associated with either
neoconservative ISM or with Islamist
extremism to go around saying that I
believe democratic culture is the best
that we’ve arrived at as a form of
political organizing is associated with
extremism and the third Democratic
choice in muslim-majority societies has
been relegated to a political choice
meaning political parties in many of
these societies ask people to vote for
them as the Democratic Party but then
the other parties ask them to vote for
them as the military party wanting to
rule by military dictatorship and then
you have a third party saying vote for
us we will establish a theocracy so
democracy has become merely one
political choice among many other forms
of political choices available in those
societies and what happens as a result
of this is when those parties are
elected and inevitably they fail or
inevitably they make political mistakes
democracy takes the blame for their
political mistakes and then people say
we’ve tried democracy doesn’t really
work let’s bring the military back again
and the fourth reason I believe is what
I’ve labeled here on the slide is the
ideology of resistance what I mean by
that is if the world superpower today
was a communist it would be much easier
for democracy activists to use democracy
activism as a form of resistance against
colonialism than it is today with a
world superpower being America occupying
certain lands and also espousing
democratic ideals
so roughly these four reasons make it a
lot more difficult for democratic
culture to spread as a civilizational
choice not merely as a political choice
when talking about those reasons let’s
break down certain preconceptions is it
just about grievances is it just about a
lack of education while statistically
the majority of those who join extremist
organizations are highly educated
statistically they are educated on
average above the education levels of
Western society anecdotally we can
demonstrate that if poverty was the only
factor or bin Laden is from one of the
richest families in Saudi Arabia his
deputy Manas wari was a pediatrician not
an ill educated man international aid
and development has been going on for
years but extremism in those societies
and many of those societies being on the
rise
and what I believe is missing is genuine
grassroots activism on the ground in
addition to international aid in
addition to education in a dish
to health not exclusive to these things
but in addition to them is propagating a
genuine demand for democracy on the
ground and this is where I believe
neoconservative ISM had it upside down
near conservativism had the philosophy
that you go in with a supply led
approach to impose democratic values
from the top-down
whereas Islamist and far-right
organizations for decades have been
building demand for their ideology on
the grassroots they’ve been building
civilizational demand for their values
on the grassroots and we’ve been seeing
those societies slowly transition to
societies that are increasingly asking
for a form of Islamism mass movements in
Pakistan have been represented after the
Arab uprisings mainly by organizations
claiming for some form of theocracy
rather than for a democratic uprising
because since pre partition they’ve been
building demand for their ideology on
the ground and what’s needed is a
genuine transnational youth-led movement
that works to actively advocate for the
democratic culture which is necessarily
more than just elections but without
freedom of speech you can’t have free
and fair elections without human rights
you don’t have the protection granted to
you to campaign without freedom of
belief you don’t have the right to join
organizations so what’s needed is those
organizations on the ground advocating
for the democratic culture itself to
create the demand on the ground for this
culture what that will do is avoid the
problem I was talking about earlier
where currently we have political
parties presenting democracy as a merely
a political choice in those societies
alongside other choices such as military
rule and theocracy whereas if we start
building this demand on the ground on a
civilizational level rather than merely
on a political level a level above
politics movements that are not
political parties but are rather
creating this civilizational demand for
this democratic democratic culture what
will have in the end is this ideal that
you see on the slide here the ideal that
people should vote in an existing
democracy not for a democracy but to get
to that stage where democracy builds the
fabric of society and the political
choices within that
fabrica left-wing or right-wing but are
certainly not theocratic and military
dictatorship are you voting in a
democracy in an existing democracy and
that democracy is not nearly one of the
choices at the ballot box to get to that
stage we genuinely need to start
building demand in those societies on
the ground now to conclude how does that
happen well Egypt is a good starting
point the outter uprisings have
demonstrated that this is already
beginning but what happened in the Arab
uprisings in what happened in Egypt was
particularly cathartic for me what
happened there was a political coalition
gathered together for a political goal
and that was to remove the leader we
need to move one step beyond that now we
need to see how we can help those
societies move from political
coalition’s loosely based political
coalition’s to civilizational
coalition’s that are working for the
ideals and narratives of the democratic
culture on the ground because it’s not
enough to remove a leader or a ruler or
a dictator that doesn’t guarantee the
what comes next will be society built on
democratic values but generally the
trends that starts in Egypt have
historically spread across the meno
region the Middle East in North Africa
region
so when Arab socialism starting in Egypt
it spread across the region in the 80s
and 90s when Islamism started in the
region it spread across the ameno region
as a whole and the aspiration that we
have at the moment as young Arabs are
proving today and instantly rebranding
themselves as being prepared to die for
more than just terrorism is that there
is a chance the democratic culture can
start in the region and spread across to
the rest of the countries that are
surrounding that but that will require
helping these societies transition from
having merely political coalition’s to
building genuinely grassroots based
social movements that advocate for the
democratic culture and we’ve made a
start for that in Pakistan with a
movement called hoody where we are
working on the ground to to to encourage
the youth to create genuine Byam for the
democratic culture and it’s with that
thought that I’ll end and my time is up
and thank you for your time
you