Is There a Middle East?
Page 13
Nationalist movements in the Maghrib predated the Second World War and incorporated various tendencies and objectives that ranged from national independence to full French citizenship. However, whether Moroccan, Algerian, or Tunisian, the earliest nationalist intellectuals did not use the term “Middle East” at all. Since the term only became popular after World War II, this is not surprising. Nationalists articulated their opposition to French colonialism by using categories such as “Muslim,” “Berber,” “Arab,” and “Maghrib/North Africa.” In many arenas, they still do so today. However, and as I suggest above, even if these categories were older than French colonialism, they were refitted and remade into new, modern, colonial categories that constituted colonial and then nationalist ideology.18 This is not to say that colonial discourse was the sole source of the various nationalisms. However, because nationalist intellectuals grew up in a context in which colonial discourse was dominant, quite naturally their thinking reflected some of its elements. One of these was the practice thinking of Maghribis as distinct from Middle Easterners.
Although brief and incomplete, this description of the Middle East and the Maghrib clearly shows that the regional category of the Middle East did not emerge in the Maghrib. Nor was it the result of the concerns of Maghribi intellectuals. However, once it entered the official language of international relations, the “Middle East” made its way through the newspapers and radio broadcasts of the colonial administration. Those who read French-language newspapers could find in the international section references to the Middle East and the actions of the great powers there. Relaying the official language of governments, journalists made the “Middle East” a popular category among the literate public. However, this public in large part consisted of Europeans and a small number of educated Maghribis.
GRAND RE-BEGINNINGS
In 1956, Morocco and Tunisia gained independence from France. In 1962, after a protracted and bloody war, Algeria joined them. The independence of these countries took place at a time of broad geopolitical realignments as part of the Cold War. This international context was particularly important in shaping the economic, political, and ideological orientation of the new Maghribi states. Critically, and in its relations with the broad public, the newly independent governments followed patterns established by the French colonial state. This was especially the case when it came to the content of mass media. Official media dominated and was very active in maintaining the idea that the Middle East was far to the east of the Maghrib and that Maghribis were not Middle Easterners.
An important effect of Cold War rhetoric was that it reinforced and universalized the use of the term “Middle East.” For both the U.S. and Soviet governments, this regional category was part of the official language. It described the terrain on which they pursued strategic goals. These governments’ activities further consolidated the name, conferring upon it a new layer of objectivity. Cold War politics also explain the appearance of Arab sheikhs, Iranian shahs, radical leftist heroes, and the slew of social statistics that measured the competition for national development. These were the figments of the Cold War Middle East. The “culture industry” in capitalist countries absorbed them and, adding them to the existing repertoire of typified representations, produced new associations and commonplace points of references. This immediately expanded the use of the term beyond governmental circles. Of course, this did not make the new form less political; it merely added an important site of production for the idea of the Middle East. In the socialist bloc, the Middle East remained largely an official category, and pre-Cold War mythologies about the region were similar to Western ones. Significantly, the newly independent Maghribi states did not have culture industries capable of shaping the evolution of the meaning of the “Middle East” on the international scene. Instead, they were clients that more or less purchased finished cultural products and distributed them to their populations. Their input was limited to administering distribution of the idea of a Middle East produced elsewhere.
In contrast to their marginal contribution to the categories and nomenclature of world politics, governments of the newly independent countries of the Maghrib had some say in the ways these ideas were promoted nationally. Through the organization of their bureaucracies, these governments institutionalized a particular vision of the world mostly by compartmentalizing (or perhaps departmentalizing) their actions in it. An analysis of the administrative organization of the foreign ministries in the three countries shows, however, that the term “Middle East” has been consistently absent.19 There are no Middle East desks and no Middle East specialists at these ministries. Instead, there are specialists of the Arab world, Muslim countries, and international organizations, and there are specialists of individual non-Muslim countries and specific issues such as the Palestinian question. Yet, significantly, the non-Arab countries of the Middle East have garnered little interest on the part of these governments. In this light, the “Middle East” was used as a way to talk about the Palestinian question without directly referring to Israel. For Turkey, Iran, and other Middle Eastern countries, Maghribi officials simply used the name of the country.
In the same vein, “Middle Easterner” has not been an integral part of the official nomenclature in the Maghrib, and thus has not been necessary to the articulation of foreign policy in any of these countries. This does not mean, however, that Maghribi diplomats have not used the term privately or in discussions with non-Maghribi diplomats. They most certainly have.20 Although it is difficult to categorize their use of the term in those contexts, it is fairly certain that none of these diplomats would think that he or she was included in the category “Middle Easterner.”
In addition to the Foreign Service, the educational systems in the Maghrib sponsored an official understanding of the world. Predictably, curricula and textbooks for geography and history in the three countries do not refer to Middle Easterners. Teachers and other functionaries of the educational system have had no use for the category and have tended to use the names of countries or large umbrella categories such as “Arab world,” “Islamic world,” or variants thereof. This does not mean that Maghribi governments were trying to prevent their employees from conceiving of the Middle East and Middle Easterners; they did not, and given their inability to control their bureaucracies, they probably would have failed to do so if they had tried. Instead, the Middle East was simply not an official category. Moreover, even when they might have used the term “Middle East” in class, teachers simply did not think of themselves or their students as Middle Easterners. Consequently, high-school graduates were unlikely to have come across these terms in a book and were just as unlikely to have written them in an essay—at least not in school. In this sense, there have been no Middle Easterners in Maghribi schools.
Given the youthfulness of these countries’ populations, school-age children represent a large proportion of the total. Only a small portion of students goes on to pursue university-level education, and it is very unlikely that those who did not graduate from secondary school would ever have used the term “Middle Easterner.” The reason behind this is very simple: there was no context for them to do so. There is little chance that an agricultural worker in the Atlas Mountains, a maid in Casablanca or Algiers, or a fisherman in Djerba would have ever used the term—or ever uses the term today. Furthermore, with current illiteracy rates equaling 30.1 percent in Algeria, 47.7 percent in Morocco, and 25.7 percent in Tunisia, a sizable portion of these populations still cannot even read or write the term “Middle Easterner.”21 Of course, this alone does not prove that they have never heard the term, that they do not know what it means, or that they do not use it in conversation. However, the likelihood that they would use it differently from newspapers or television newscasts remains rather slim.
Newspapers in the three Maghribi countries have used the terms “Middle East” and “Middle Easterner” on a regular basis. Furthermore, television programs, especially the news broadcasts, have us
ed these terms frequently. This means, at least, that the public has been aware of their existence. However, the adjective “Middle Eastern” (sharq awsatī/iyūn and moyen-oriental/aux) appears only rarely, and when it is found, it does not refer to people. For instance, through the entire year of 2008 the two Algerian newspapers al-Khabar (Arabic) and El-Watan (French) did not once use the adjective to describe people. Instead, the adjectives modified abstractions such as economic and political relations.
At the university level, there are no departments of Middle East studies in the Maghrib, although this may change now that American universities and centers are opening in the region.22 Within the national university systems, departments of history, Islamic studies, and international policy teach the courses offered by Middle East studies programs in the United States. It is at the university level, however, that it becomes possible to find the terms “Middle East: and “Middle Easterners”—if not in the subject headings and titles of theses and courses, then at least in mostly foreign books read by students and faculty. In other words, whereas schoolteachers do not tend to use the category, university professors, especially those specializing in international affairs are likely to use it on occasion. Again, one is more likely to hear the term “Middle East” than to hear the term “Middle Easterner.” In addition, and although it is difficult to establish empirically, “Middle Easterner” is never used to describe an individual person but describes only the inhabitants of the Middle East in general. Even those who might describe Iranians, Turks, and Kurds as Middle Easterners (sharq awsatiyūn or moyen-orientaux) would not describe the Ayatollah Khomeini as a Middle Easterner.
Adding to the generic, perhaps even disembodied, character the category “Middle Easterner” has in the Maghrib, the description of an individual woman as Middle Eastern (sharq awsatiya or moyen orientale) is extremely rare. The use of the generic plural, which is masculine in both Arabic and French, and the absence of Middle Eastern women, tends to place Middle Easterners into a male category. When Middle Eastern women are considered specifically, they tend to be markers of social development. Just as for “Middle Eastern” men, the term “Middle Eastern” is never used to refer to women as individuals. Actual persons such as the famous Egyptian singer Umm Kulthum and the Palestinian politician Hanan Ashrawi are never “Middle Eastern.”
Furthermore, and here again it is difficult to show empirically, the term “Middle Easterner” in the Maghrib tends to appear in French rather than Arabic. From my discussion with a great many Maghribis, the term moyen-orientaux is used many more times than the term sharq awsatiyūn. Even when accounting for bilingual speakers, the number of people who use the French term is much greater than the number of people who use the Arabic one. Those who speak French, even intermittently, are more likely to use these categories, even when they operate in fields other than journalism and government. There is no doubt, however, that whenever Maghribis do so, they do not think of themselves as such. They do not think that they are Middle Easterners as a group or as individuals; consequently no Maghribi would ever describe another Maghribi as a Middle Easterner.
The Maghribi governments’ monopolization of the educational systems and their ability to use the media to disseminate their ideas do not help Maghribis feel any more Middle Eastern. Instead, the official production of a discourse on commonality and historical ties with people in the Middle East has not resulted in widespread use of the term by the greater public. For all their opposition to French colonialism, nationalists’ discourse in the Maghrib has retained colonial ways of distinguishing between themselves and Middle Easterners. The integration of pan-Arabist rhetoric into official discourse and its gradual and almost complete evisceration over time did little to change the situation.
THE NATIONAL MAGHRIB
If colonial scholars used the premodern history of the Maghrib as a foundation for a discourse on cultural difference, authenticity, and belonging, post-independence intellectuals developed a discourse on the desire to go beyond colonial discourse.23 In the post-independence period, intellectuals played an important role in the nationalization of society. The newly independent governments proceeded to nationalize the educational systems, the media, and, more generally, the public sphere. Naturally, they also nationalized the past.24
By its very nature, nationalist discourse establishes the nation as the main referent and, consequently, identifies distinguishing features that characterize it. For nationalists, the Maghrib is constituted by distinct nations that share a history but are not, and could not be, identical. The idea of a shared history is, however, not simply a polite recognition of one’s neighbors. Maghribi nationalist movements trace their evolution back to the L’Étoile Nord Africaine (North African Star), an umbrella organization founded in 1926. And the historical sources that have supported the nationalization of premodern Algerian, Tunisian, and Moroccan history were often the same. Nevertheless, nationalist intellectuals unwittingly maintained a colonial framework by building on its basic epistemological structure and eliminating disparaging references to the populations.25 Interestingly, when they integrated their nations into broader units, such as the Maghrib, Maghribi intellectuals still did not consider including them in the Middle East. They thought of themselves as Arabs, Muslims, Africans, and as developing nations but not as Middle Easterners.
It is critical here to note that the ideas of an Arab world, Islamic world, Africa, and Third World all shared an important feature: they were ideas whose objective existence was generated by governments and limited to the bureaucratic organizations they created.26 Of course, the official platforms of these organizations expressed the desire to increase socioeconomic, political, and cultural relations between members. Because they were formed by nation-states, these organizations reinforced the idea of nation among Arabs, Muslims, and Africans. They also made development a national priority.
After independence, the Maghrib was rearticulated based on the idea that nation-states that shared a common historical and cultural heritage would face social, economic, and political difficulties together. In other words, it was based on the thought that national interest would be best served through regional cooperation. Yet, when one analyzes the conditions of the production of the idea of a united or unified Maghrib, it becomes clear that it generally points out the bad faith of neighboring brethren.27 Officials have produced this Maghrib to reinforce nationalism and the national state. Since the 1960s, they have remade the Maghrib into a national Maghrib whose socioeconomic organization, political direction, and cultural expression express this nationalist, but not regional, orientation. Governments have expended enormous resources to do so. Recognizing the ideological dominance of the national Maghrib explains the reason that Maghribis tend to see themselves primarily as Algerians, Moroccans, and Tunisians. It also explains why they see the Maghrib as an unrealizable pious dream and a myth. Although the creation of the Arab Maghrib Union (AMU) in the late 1980s created an enthusiasm among the populations for this idea, it has since faded. The failure of governments to implement stated goals and projects is nothing new. It is important to see that the idealized Maghrib generated by governments is the outcome of the national Maghrib.
The dominance of the Maghrib of nations should not itself be exaggerated. The long-standing inability of governments to produce the social goods they have promised their populations has chipped away at the broad popular support they had following independence. The idea that those who govern the country should be accountable to the people or that the people should have a say in the direction the country has never truly developed. Instead, governments have behaved much like their colonial predecessors did. In this light, the national Maghrib is the product of the relations between rather limited official circles. For the broader population, official ideas have been both ever-present and beyond reach. It is not the case that official institutions have not relayed official ideology. In spite of their many inadequacies, they generally have performed their function. It
is just that there has been no sense that the population should have an input in the matter. As an artifact found in official discourse, the “Middle East” is both familiar and yet alien to most Maghribis. Living in the national Maghrib, they have little use for a term that does not include them. The idea that they might be Middle Easterners does not fit the circumstances of a national Maghrib they experience daily.
STANDING IN THE WAY
There are more than three million French citizens and immigrants of Maghribi origin in France.28 Beginning in the nineteenth century, Maghribis migrated to France for work. They did again in great numbers after World War II. After the independence of the Maghrib, migration to France continued to involve a great many families on both sides of the Mediterranean. These immigrants are now referred to, among other things, maghrébins (Maghribis), a relatively new category in French public discourse.29
The experience of Maghribi immigrants in Europe, especially in France, constitutes a basis for solidarity among Maghribis and their distinction from Middle Easterners who are not as numerous in France. In fact, even those Middle Easterners who are present, such as the Lebanese, Turks, and Iranians, tend to espouse markedly different strategies of integration and are seen as properly Middle Eastern.30 In contrast, West African immigrants, whose so-cioeconomic and political status have been closer to that of the majority of Maghribis, tend to be closer to Maghribi immigrants than they are to Middle Easterners. Such processes have supported the rearticulation of difference and distance between Maghribis and Mashriqis (Arabs from the lands of the eastern Mediterranean) in France. Of course, the distance between affluent Lebanese professionals, for example, and poor maghrébins in the banlieues has little to do with the historic differences between Mashriq and Maghrib or the geographic closeness between Northwest Africa and West Africa. However, because these immigrants are tied to their home countries, their experience has further amplified the idea that Maghribis are different from the Arabs and other Middle Easterners. Maghribis, many of whom are French speakers in the Maghrib and in France, thus participate in producing the Moyen-Orient as something that does not pertain to them.