WorldNow : Third World people oppressed under postcolonialism

WorldNow : Third World people oppressed under postcolonialism

By Yasushi Gunji

RABAT, July 13, Kyodo - The prominent Moroccan philosopher Mahdi Elmandjra predicted the outbreak of the Gulf War earlier than anyone else in 1990 when Iraq invaded Kuwait. He called the Gulf War the first civilizational war -- or a conflict between values -- and sees the Sept. 11 attack on the United States as the second civilizational war.

The philosopher spoke on a variety of issues at his home in the Moroccan capital, saying leaders of both advanced and developing countries are found guilty of oppressing Third World people who are living under the ''postcolonial'' system.

The following are excerpts from Kyodo News' interview with Elmandjra, which was conducted in French. The text is edited for readability.

-- After the Sept. 11 attack, there was a lot of talk about the clash of the civilizations. But you talk of the wars between the civilizations. Could you explain the difference?

The clash of the civilizations refers to the genes of violence in civilizations. But for me, it is quite the contrary, because the base of civilization is peace. And by definition, no culture is borne from aggression nor from the battle against others.

To take power means to force your system on others. Then there will be conflicts, but if one respects cultural communication, there is no reason for me to think that cultures are made to have clashes with others.

-- Americans call for the war against terrorism. What does it mean for you?

A French philosopher recently said that next wars would be semantic. If I think of the word ''globalization'' and if I define this word as I like it, I will win over you. If I use the word terrorism as the Americans mean it, I will have already terrorized you semantically.

Today there is semantic terrorism in the media. I sorry but when you read the reports of the New York Times of 19th February, you will find them semantically unbelievable.

President (George W.) Bush told us about the axis of evil and he took us to beyond the concept of the medieval devil. That is why I refuse to talk about global terrorism in his sense. Global terrorism does not exist. There is the violence and terrorism of states and they are more serious.

When you talk about the way of life, you talk about values. (What President Bush and his father wanted to say) is to keep your hands off our values. If someone talks of values, a red light will flicker in my analysis. Let's take the declaration of President Bush, he said ''our system of values'' and ''our world friends.'' This is a repetition. From the times of Romans, the superpower needs many wars in order to stay as a superpower.

The Americans have never been able to be prepared to think that someday they will become different from what they used be. President (Bill) Clinton started to realize this, but Bush has not come to realize this, and cannot realize this.

However, I am very optimistic. I believe that the United States of, say, 2004 will not be the United States of 2002. In recent times of transition, the Americans cannot help but to be different from what they are today. They will come back to the source of their own history and they will start again with better cultural communication, respect toward others. They are not respecting others now.

-- About the present situation in Palestine, the violence of the superpower seems to invite other violence. Is it also a small American model?

You told me that violence breeds violence, but who's violence was there first? Errors were made, injustice was done about what the West and the United Nations call the ''violence of defense.'' A 16-year-old girl sacrificed herself by burning herself. By acting like this, she defended something, she defended the reason. On the other side, there are F-16s, tanks and people, Sharon, the Israeli army, who like Americans, like to reduce the number of their own victims. It is the reproduction of the American model.

The leaders of the countries like the U.S. stand up and say, ''You have to stop the violence'' but which violence? You finance over $30 billion to arm a nation that is already armed to the teeth and practices state terrorism, then you ask the young girl who threw herself for the thing she believes in, instead of throwing herself from the window. Then you call her act ''terrorism!''

Those who oppress the Palestine people and the biggest enemy of the Palestine people are the Arab governments. Arab governments who produced the Camp David accord, the Madrid Peace Conference and Oslo accord, are afraid the Palestine revolution will extend to other parts of the Arab world. It is a revolt against injustice and there is no Arab countries that is not under injustice. There is no stable Arab country without support of old colonial powers and the United States.

-- Some Anglo-Saxon intellectuals think the New Colonialism is the solution to stabilize the world after Sept. 11 attack. Is this a dangerous point of view?

I was the first to use the term Postcolonialism. Postcolonialism is simply to continue the old ways. I will give you an example. In former times, there were 700,000 French soldiers, civil servants, gendarmes and a whole governmental system in Morocco. When Morocco gained independence, all was gone. France does not need its army in Morocco nor in other places. Those who quit Morocco gradually permitted local people to take matters into their own hands. Thus, France does not need to send its soldiers to Senegal, to the Ivory Coast. It does not need the information services because local people will give the information. Even on the intellectual level, France had formed local elites.

I started my book about cultural decolonialization with the following story, and this is a true story. A man said to the French, ''You can depart now because you have formed a generation who can take care of your interests in Morocco better than you.'' You can see these wrong elites...who became small French, small Italians, small Americans. They are ready to sell themselves.

In radio, the message goes from point A to point B...the information flow is parasitic. What is necessary is to be able to listen and try to understand others. To understand what others would like to say, and then to respond. This is interpersonal communication. On the international level, the cultural communication requires knowledge. You are Japanese. Go to Germany or France and ask small, simple questions about Japan. There you will find, that apart from a small group of Germans or French, many people are not interested in Japan. This is because people are satisfied with themselves. The same can be said about the authorities.

One of my friends who has been in Japan for longtime told me, ''I have been here for 25 years. I married to a Japanese woman, speak their language. And I came to understand Japan less and less.'' I responded. ''In fact, I visited Japan 14 or 15 times and on each visit I too came to understand less and less. When one understands less, then one understands that there are many things to understand. Then one is not going to generalize about people and their culture.''

Do you see what I am saying? If you are aware that you understand less, this is a positive step. Then what should we to do? This is cultural communication.

Biographical note: Mahadi Elmandjra, born in Rabat in March 1933, served as first counsellor on the permanent mission to the United Nations after graduating from Cornell University, University of London and Paris University. In 1961 he joined UNESCO and was assistant director general for the Social Sciences, Human Sciences and Culture (1966-1969) and for Programming and Future Studies (1971-1976). After his two-decades-old career at the U.N., he became professor on the faculty of law, social and economics sciences at Mohamed V University in Rabat between 1976 and 1979. At the age of 15 he joined anti-French resistance movement and was jailed. Mindful of his experience that he was labeled a ''terrorist'' at that time, he has been careful of the word ''terrorist.'' Elmandjra visited Japan more than 10 times as founding member and vice president of the Morocco-Japan Association and in 1998 gave special lectures to Japanese students as guest professor at the University of Tokyo. His publications include Interaction between Western Culture and Japanese Culture (1968) and the First Civilizational War (1991)

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