The Clash of Emotions: Fear, Humiliation, Hope, and the New World Order

Author(s): Dominique Moïsi

Source: Foreign Affairs, Vol. 86, No. 1 (Jan. - Feb., 2007), pp. 8-12
Published by: Council on Foreign Relations
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20032208
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 The Clash of Emotions

Fear,Humiliation,Hope, and theNew World Order

DominiqueMoisi

Thirteenyearsago,SamuelHuntington able to concentrate on creating a better

argued that a "clash of civilizations" was futurefor themselves.
about to dominateworld politics,with These moods, of course, are not uni
culture, along with national interests and versal within each region, and there are
politicalideology,becomingageopolitical some areas, such as Russia and parts of
faultline ("TheClash of Civilizations?" Latin America, that seem to display all
Summer 1993). Events since then have of them simultaneously.But theirdy
provedHuntington'svisionmore rightthan namics and interactions will help shape
wrong. Yet what has not been recognized theworld for years to come.
sufficiently is that today theworld faces
what might be called a "clashof emotions" THE CULTURE OF FEAR
aswell. The Western world displays a The United States and Europe are divided
culture of fear, theArab andMuslim worlds by a common culture of fear.On both sides,
are trapped in a culture of humiliation, and one encounters, in varying degrees, a fear
much of Asia displays a culture of hope. of the other, a fear of the future, and a
Instead of being united by their fears, fundamental anxiety about the loss of
the twin pillars of theWest, theUnited identityinan increasingly complexworld.
States and Europe, aremore often divided In the case of Europe, there are layers
by them-or rather, divided by how best of fear.There is the fear of being invaded
to confront or transcend them. The culture by the poor, primarily from the South-a
of humiliation, in contrast, helps unite the fear driven by demography and geography.
Muslim world around itsmost radical Images of Africans being killed recently
forces and has led to a culture of hatred. as they tried to scale barbed wire to enter a
The chief beneficiaries of the deadly Spanish enclave inMorocco evoked images
encounter between the forces of fear and of another time not so long ago, when
the forces of humiliation are the bystanders East Germans were shot at as they tried
in the culture of hope, who have been to reach freedom in theWest. Back then,

DOMINIQUEMOISI is a Senior Adviser at the Institut FranSais des Relations

Internationales (IFRI) in Paris.

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 The Clash ofEmotions
Germans were killed because theywanted quarrel over the Spanish version of
to escape oppression. Today, Africans are theAmerican national anthem echoes the
being killed because theywant to escape debate over thewearing of headscarves
absolutepoverty. and veils in Europe.
Europeans also fear being blown up by Used to rates of growth significantly
radicalIslamistsorbeingdemographically higher than those inmost European
conquered by them as their continent countries, Americansdo not feareconomic
becomes a "Eurabia."After the bombings decay theway Europeans do (although
inMadrid in 2004 and London in 2005 theyworry aboutoutsourcing). Yet they,
and the scares this past summer, Europeans too, are thinking of decline-in their
have started to face the hard reality that bodies, with the plague of obesity; in
their homelands are not only targets for their budgets, with the huge deficits; and
terrorists but also bases for them. in their spirit,with the loss of appetite for
Then there is the fear of being left foreignadventures andagrowingquestion
behind economically. Formany Europeans, ing of national purpose.
globalization has come to be equated with The United States'obsessionwith se
destabilization and job cuts. They are curityafterSeptemberu isunderstandable
haunted by the fear that Europe will and legitimate. But what has it cost in
become amuseum-a larger and more terms of U.S. influence and image in the
modern version of Venice, a place for world? From the difficultiesforeign
tourists and retirees, no longer a center travelershave entering U.S. territory to the
of creativityand influence. human rights scandals of Guantainamo
Finally, there is the fear of being ruled Bay, terroristshave at least in part succeeded
by an outside power, even a friendly one inunderminingtheUnited States'claims
(such as theUnited States) or a faceless of moral superiority and exceptionalism
one (such as the European Commission). by promptingsuch reactions.
What unites all these fears is a sense Whereas Europeans try to protect
of loss of control over one's territory, themselves from the world through a
security, and identity-in short, one's combination of escapism and appease
destiny. Such concerns contributed to ment, Americans try to do so by dealing
the no votes of the French and theDutch with the problem at its source abroad.
last year on the referendum on the pro But behind the Bush administration's
posedEUconstitution.They alsoexplain forceful and optimistic rhetoric lies a
the return of strong nationalist sentiments somber reality, which is that the U.S.
inmany European countries-on display response to the September u attacks has
during the recentWorld Cup tournament. made theUnited States more unpopular
Some of the same sense of loss of than ever. The U.S. intervention in
control is present in the United States. Iraq, for example, has generated more
Although demographic fears aremitigated problems than it has solved. Iraq is de
by the largely successful integration of scending into civil war, and U.S. actions
Hispanics (compared with thedifficulties there have tipped the balance of power
surroundingthe integrationofMuslims within theMuslim world to itsmost
in Europe), they are clearly present. The radical Shiite elements.

FO R E IG N AF FA I R S January/February 2007 [9]

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 Moisi
Dominique
between Hezbollah and Israel has rein
THE CULTURE OF HUMILIATION forced a sense of outrage inmany Muslims
Europeans started to reflect on their own that has been fully exploited by Iran and
decay afterWorld War I: "We civilizations its allies. In awar of images and symbols,
now know ourselvesmortal,"theFrench Shiite extremists can appear to embody the
poet and philosopher Paul Valery wrote spiritof resistancetohumiliation,getting
TheMuslim world,meanwhile,
in 1919. stronger with each blow they endure.
has been obsessed with decay for centuries. Globalization,meanwhile,has con
When Europe was in itsMiddle Ages, tributed to the problem. Every day, the
Islam was at the peak of itsRenaissance, Middle East is confronted with the
but when theWestern Renaissance started, contrastbetweenglobalization's winners,
Islam began its inexorable fall. From its essentially theWestern world and East
defeat by aChristian fleet at the Battle of Asia, and thosewho have been left behind.
Lepanto, in 1571,to its failure to capture The cultureof humiliationisnot limited
Vienna in 1683, to its final disappearance to theMiddle East but extends to the
afterWorld War I, theOttoman Empire Muslim diaspora in theWest aswell.
slowlyshrankintooblivion. The riots that took place in France
The creation of the state of Israel in during the fall of 2005, for example, had an
themidst of Arab land could only be seen essentiallysocioeconomic origin,but they
byMuslims as the ultimate proof of their were also a lashing out by the disaffected
decay. ForJews, the legitimacy of Israelwas against a society that claims to give them
manifold;itcombinedtheaccomplishment equal rights in principle but fails to do so
of a religious promise, the realization of in practice.
a national destiny, and compensation by The gap is also, in part, the product of
the international community for a unique incompatible worldviews,stemmingfrom
crime, the Holocaust. For Arabs, by con different historical eras.As societies in
trast, itwas the anachronistic imposition Europearebecomingincreasingly secular,
of aWestern colonial logic at the very the importance of religion in the daily
moment decolonization was gettingunder life of theMuslim world is increasing.
way. In their view, crimes of the Christian When Europeans look at Islam today,
West, fallen into barbarism against the they are reminded of their own zealotry
Jews, were being unfairly paid for by and wars of religion in the sixteenth and
theMuslim East. seventeenth centuries. This gap inmind
The unresolvedconflictbetweenIsrael set exists between theUnited States and
and its neighbors has helped turn the theMuslim world aswell, but it is less
culture of humiliation into a culture of profound because theUnited States remains
hatred. Over time, the conflict's national deeply religious and has even experienced
character has shifted to its original religious a religious revival lately.Yet fundamen
basis-a conflict between Muslims and talismwithin Islam is unique in the sense
Jews, if not a clash between Islam and the that it is animated by a dual sense of
West at large. revenge: by the Shiite minority against
The combination of the deepening civil the Sunni majority and by the fundamen
war in Iraq and the fighting in Lebanon talists against theWest at large.

[10] FOREIGN AFFAIRS Volume86No.z

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THE CULTURE OF HOPE Foreign Affairs
As theWest and theMiddle East lock
horns,confidenceinprogresshasbeen ASSOCIATE EDITOR
moving eastward.An art exhibit displayed
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After two should be sent to:
centuries of relative decline, China is
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FOREIGN AFFAIRS
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avoiding conflict seems to be working,

earning Beijing both material benefits and
internationalrespect.
As for India, for the first time in its
modern history it has stepped onto the
world stage as both an independent and an
important
power.Cooperatingdiplomati
callywith theUnited States andmaking
economicdealsinEurope,theemerging
Indian elites are displaying evenmore pride
and optimism than theirChinese counter
parts.The world's largestdemocracy will
soon emerge as themost populous country,
and it seems to know no limits.
Of course, Cassandras may rightly
point out that strategic, economic, social,
and political difficulties abound and that
the culture of hope could easily collapse
on itself like a house of cards.Asia has yet
towitness the reconciliationbetween
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 DominiqueMoisi
of the past evokes the situation of Europe In that regard,the Israeli-Palestinian
in the l950S. (China seems to have set conflict appearsmore than ever as amicro
double standards in this respect, never cosm of and possibly a precedent forwhat
forgettingJapan'scrimeswhile never re theworld is becoming. Israel is theWest,
membering its own.) North Korea is a surrounded
by thecultureof humiliation
dangerousroguestate.And
particularly and dreaming of escape from a dangerous
arms races and nuclear proliferation in region and of reentry into a culture of
East Asia could set the region up for a hope. But itmust find a solution to the
terribleconflictdown the road. Palestinianproblemfirst,or else theescape
The gap that exists inChina between will not be possible. So, too, Europe and
the dynamism of the economy and the theUnited States seek to permanently
near incapacity or total reluctance of the
banish their fears but will be able to do so
presentleadershipto implementthemost only by finding away to help theMuslim
elementaryandnecessarypoliticalreforms world solve its problems.A
does not bode well for the peacefuil evo
lutionof the country.Yet despite these
concerns, there is hope among both leaders
and publics across the region, and it seems
likely to last as long as growth continues.

WHAT IS TO BE DONE?

In confronting this clash of emotions,

the first priority for theWest must be to
recognize the nature of the threat that
theMuslim world's culture of humiliation
poses to Europe and theUnited States.
Denying the threat's existence or respond
ing to it in thewrong way are equally
dangerouschoices.Neither appeasement
normilitary solutionsalonewill suffice.
The war that is unfolding is one that the
culture of humiliation cannot win, but
it is awar nonetheless and one that the
West can lose by continuing to be divided
or by betraying its liberal values and its
respect for law and the individual. The
challenge is not figuring out how to play
moderate Islam against the forces of
radicalism. It is figuring out how to instill
a sufficient sense of hope and progress
inMuslim societies so that despair and
anger do not send the masses into the
radicals' arms.

[12] FOREIGN AFFAIRS* Volume86No.1

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