Back to 'have your say'
Date: Thu, 29 Aug 2002 00:47:03 -0400
Deficits in the Arab world
© 2002 Copley News Service
Jack Kemp
7/9/2002
In a startling U.N. report, Arab Human Development Report 2002, a team of
Arab scholars, led by Jordan's former Deputy Prime Minister Rima Khalaf
Hunaidi, examined the following question: "Why is Arab culture, why are
Arab countries lagging behind?"
The report confirmed that during the past 20 years, per capita income
growth in Arab countries, which averaged a stagnant 0.5 percent a year, was
the lowest in the world with the exception of sub-Saharan Africa. Labor
productivity declined 0.2 percent while unemployment averaged 15 percent,
three times the world average.
The report concluded that a paucity of resources is not the problem: The
Arab world is "richer than it is developed. Arab countries have the
resources to eradicate absolute poverty in less than a generation."
Instead, the Arab report identified "three deficits" that pose "serious
obstacles to human development: freedom, empowerment of women and knowledge."
Democracy, the report found, "has barely reached the Arab states," and a
third of the adult population is illiterate -- half of all Arab women
cannot read or write. "This freedom deficit undermines human development."
Ranking countries on a widely used freedom index that encompasses civil
liberties, political rights, freedom of the press and government
accountability, the Arab world finished dead last. Women, in particular,
are oppressed, denied freedom to move about, attain an education, engage in
commerce or even receive adequate medical care.
While the report was a remarkably courageous exercise in self-examination
by Arab scholars, there was one conspicuous omission. It neglected to
recognize a fourth deficit of no less importance to the equation of social
progress: a tolerance deficit.
Tolerance and liberty are the interlocking pillars of a free society.
Liberty means having the freedom to think and advocate anything you desire
and to live your life any way you want, so long as doing so does not
encroach on other people's freedom do the same.
Tolerance means granting that same freedom to others, and the tolerance
deficit in the Arab countries is glaring. It can be measured by their
abysmal record on religious tolerance. According to a global survey of
religious freedom by Freedom House in December 2000, "The religious areas
with the largest current restrictions on religious freedom are countries
with an Islamic background." Not a single Arab country protects religious
rights, and most discriminate against non-Muslims. Some, such as Saudi
Arabia, prohibit the worship of any religion other than Islam and execute
converts.
Religious freedom is of particular importance because by maintaining that
God's will is a matter of personal faith, it ensures a society's ability to
curb the power of those who seek to impose their "truth." It is no
coincidence that in Arab countries where Islam is officially the only path
to God, oppression and violence are so often perpetuated in the name of
religion. It is in the name of religion that women are subjugated. It is
also in the name of religion that political violence is fomented.
Some Arab governments have developed sinister apparatuses of indoctrination
that use national educational, media and religious institutions to
brainwash Arabs, young and old, to hate and kill in the name of Islam --
that is, their "official" version of Islam. Two would-be "moderate"
regimes, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, stand out for stoking the flames of
intolerance.
As the intellectual and religious centers of the Islamic world, their
religious leaders have a great influence on the attitudes of the region.
Government-appointed leaders such as the new Mufti of Egypt, Sheikh Dr.
Ahmad Al-Tayyeb, have endorsed suicide-killings against Israeli civilians
as a religious duty: "The Islamic countries, peoples and rulers alike, must
support these martyrdom attacks," he declared in April.
The Egyptian Christian Copt minority is persecuted by the government, and
hundreds have been massacred by Islamist groups since 1998. Saudi
Television broadcasts weekly sermons from Mecca and Medina that praise
jihadist terrorists around the world, call Muslims to rule over the
"infidels" and preach the annihilation of Jews."
In his recent speech on the Middle East, President George W. Bush
recognized how this infrastructure of intolerance within the Arab world
feeds terrorism: "Every leader actually committed to peace will end
incitement to violence in official media and publicly denounce homicide
bombings." Western democracies and Israel have laws against hate speech and
public incitement of violence. It is time that the Arab countries did the
same.
Islamic civilization's greatest contributions to science, medicine,
architecture and the arts occurred when it showed the most tolerance toward
religious minorities. The 21st century can usher in an Arab Renaissance. By
erasing the tolerance deficit and showing respect for other religions, Arab
democracy can bloom, freedom can flourish and the full potential of the
Arab people can be unleashed to close the development gap with the rest of
the world.
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