Public Life Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

[Introduction] To begin with, my intention in this paper is to shed light on the issue of ‘citizenship’ and ‘participation in Public life’ within the context of the 21st century ‘Middle East’. Needless to say, it is essential in such... more

[Introduction]
To begin with, my intention in this paper is to shed light on the issue of ‘citizenship’ and ‘participation in Public life’ within the context of the 21st century ‘Middle East’. Needless to say, it is essential in such studies neither to consider the Middle East as a monolithic entity or a single unit of analysis nor to conduct any form of simplistic analysis of the issues of co-existence and pluralism.
What is the Middle East? The ‘Middle East’ (Ar. Trans. al-sharq al-awsat) is a ‘Western’ (Lewis, 1998, p. 5) / Eurocentric term’ (Selvik & Stenslie, 2011, pp. 2-3) which dates from the beginning of the 20th century; yet it has also been adopted and used by the peoples of the region to refer to their homelands (Lewis, 1998, p. 5). At present, the Middle East is conceived of being a vast area with the Arab World at heart; it extends, according to Charles Lindholm, from “the Atlantic beaches of Morocco and stretches east across North Africa, into Arabia, through Iran, and finally merges into central Asia and south Asia in northern Pakistan and southern Afghanistan” (Lindholm, 2002, p. 8). Uri Davis preferred to identify the modern Middle East as the area comprising the “former territories of the Ottoman Empire in South East Asia” (Davis, 1997, p. xxv).
The Middle East is a complex and turbulent region. Its complexity lies in the various social and cultural traits characterizing each and every society and community, which while might be shared throughout these communities may not represent the same values. Moreover, it is a turbulent and unstable (See Richards, 2006, pp. 13-36) region because of the presence of numerous and multidimensional problems; these are mainly demographic, economic, social-cultural, technological, ecological, and political that governments, societies, and communities, and individuals face in the region (See Russell, 2006; Azzam, 2002; Danahar, 2013; Elbadawi & Makdisi (Eds.), 2011). It should be noted that “during the twentieth century’s second half, the Middle East knew more international wars, repression, civil wars, terrorism, and revolutionary insurgencies than any other area in the world”, wrote Barry Rubin (2002, p. 138).
This paper, however, will only touch upon two main issues pertaining to citizenship in the Middle East: First, it will examine citizenship within the glocal (Brodeur, 2004, pp. 191, 196-197) context and benchmark its concepts and elements against respective Western paradigms. Second, it will evaluate some activities and practical guidelines for effective participation in public life and will comment on their respective paradoxes.