I’m not a big fan of the Huntington thesis because I think it oversimplifies. I think the… The Huntington thesis essentially believes that there is a monolithic culture, which is the West, and there’s another monolithic culture, which is Islam, and that the two of them are in collision with each other. It’s obviously true that there’s a kind of West, which is in conflict with a kind of Islam.
There’s obviously a certain kind of fanatical Islam that’s hostile towards the West. And there has been a certain kind of militant, or militarized western response to that. So, that’s obviously true, you can’t deny it.
But the West is not one thing, the West is many different things. And there are many arguments, and disagreements, and conflicts inside the West. Even about the subject of how it should respond to Islam.
And the Muslim world is also very fractured, by no means monolithic. If you look at what happens in terms of the conflict happening there, most of the conflicts are between Muslims and other Muslims. Most of them are between Sunnis and Shias, or whatever it might be.
So, I just think. . .
it’s too easy to say that there are these two big blocks. Like two giant bulls attacking each other. The blocks don’t exist.
They’re much more fragmented than that. And to understand what’s happening in the world, you have to look at that fragmentation, you have to look at it with more nuance. That’s my problem with the Huntington thesis.
I feel that it lacks a kind of necessary nuance.
