reviews3BY ALI ALLAWI (2009)
YALE UNIVERSITY PRESS; 320 PAGES; £18.99
Isbn: 978-0300139310

At the height of its reign the Islamic Civilization stretched from the Far East to the Mediterranean, a heaving body of scientific endeavour, manufacturing and trade. The demise and disbanding of this civilization is a  perplexing and upsetting part of our history. Understanding this is vital to rebuilding the Muslim ummah’s (nation) confidence and allowing  Muslims across the world to integrate their beliefs with modern lifestyles.

Allawi efficiently dissects the past of the Muslim world to identify the events that significantly changed the social and religious outlooks of many. While doing so he points to several flaws and clashes that occur between the now dominating western civilization and the so-called outdated Islamic belief system. In a world where the individual is viewed so much more strongly than the collective, it’s no wonder that there is such a huge divide between Muslims who try to adapt and those that choose to resist via extremism.

Key to this argument Allawi makes the point that Muslims in politics necessarily cannot practice western politics. Islam requires us to see that an individual is not an individual in the western sense; his desires and needs are not held above that of the whole. It is only possible to give Allah (swt) such a property as individuality; he is Al-Ahad (the One). Islam sees humans as one of a collection of creations, thus making the political motivations and thinking often held and practiced in the West impossible to negotiate with an Islamic background.

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Ex-Iraqi minister Ali A. Allawi

There is no place for democracy when there is no such thing as an individual. The increasingly political environment in the Islamic world today is what Allawi highlights as a growing problem, with Muslims   neglecting their spirituality to entertain western pursuits of democracy and political activism, and hence  neglecting the key factors that lead to such a worthy history.

Allawi makes the valid point that the origins of Islamic Civilization are within the self, and not the state. He makes a convincing and well worded argument that to properly revive the old great Islamic Civilization, Sharia  must be re-asserted not as a group of laws governing a state, but as a spiritual system that centers around the individual and his (or her) connection to the sacred and divine.

With the return of the spirituality and connection of the individual to Islam will come the return of the embracing of the good of the collective and hence the civilization that was once so great. It is only through this that greatness will be revived and the growing Muslim population will be at peace within themselves.