Minorities in the Middle East

I have to confess that I am not extremely familiar from the academic point of view with the history and reliable references of minorities from the Middle East. I have a limited direct knowledge of the area and I had the occasion to meet in person or to have professional dialogues with people from the region, with various minority background. But I am reading very often media reports - with a careful scientific distance - and I see how often the minority issue is raised, used and misused. I am also trying to write currently an article about the possible comparisons between the approach to minority issues in various regions, as the South-Eastern Europe, Black Sea Region and, last but not least, the Middle East. My main idea is that without the pressure of joining in a near future global alliances and organizations as EU and NATO, offering subsequent economic and symbolic advantages, the situation of minorities will not receive soon a proper legal framework.

The recent conference held in Berlin by prof. Mordechai Zaken, author of a book about the Jewish communities in the Middle East, was a perfect challenge to orient my academic interests towards different historical, cultural and geographical space. The main focus on the conference was to explain the misuse of the comparison between the situation of the Kurds and of the Palestinians. Among the most important there are: different demographic data, lack of political will from the part of the states to get involved in supporting the Kurdish case, geopolitical and political opportunism in abusing the "Palestinian case", but also the lack of trained and organized elites and of a clear political manifesto and ways of action (in the Kurdish case). Repeating the same patterns or accepting various involvement from outside must be balanced once the clear interests are set. The religious aspects might be important, but the smart and targeted actions and the creation of valuable elites will give, by far, more weight and support for a coherent and, at the end, successful action.

Dealing with the German past

Before starting to write this post, I had a long moment of thinking: what is the category to include this post about the newly published book about the German diplomats during the IIIrd Reich? First choice was to include in a post on foreign affairs and politics - because, as usual, the decision to create a commission to investigate the past is foremost a political decision and this was the red line followed during the discussions taking place yesterday, at a full Haus der Kulturen der Welt. But, after deliberations, I decided that it have to deal with memory and recent painful history and included in my history blog. I bought the book yesterday and I will be back with an extensive

review as soon as my German will allow me to do it. This is the reason why I will focus on a couple of remarks about the issue at large. Using myths in building identity narratives is common place in the history. The role of historians is to document and diversify the sources in order to do not allow the misuse of identities for political reasons. The truth is not pleasant, welcomed or desired. But it have to be followed and exposed. Being relatively familiar with the ways of working of a foreign minister, I continue to be astonished about the surprise of discovering the strong connections between the Foreign Ministry and the Third Reich. Diplomats, in every political regime, as the interface of the home politics and their actions are following a clear political mandate. It was never different and will never be different. The access to the documents to explain certain situations is problematic always, for this reason and you need political will for offering the proper conditions for academics to do their work.

It was interesting for me to watch Joschka Fischer's interventions directed against the idea of "elitism" of the diplomats. He is the product of his times, of a stormy German post-war youth, accusing their parents of the frustrations of a complicate present. Understanding this past is a good insight of understanding various directions of the present, including the diplomatic stances at certain moment regarding the situation from the Middle East. Can't wait to start reading.

France - The change of paradigm?

I was very happy the last week to be able to attend the Mona Ozouf's conference in Berlin. I had the occasion to read many of her books since I was at the university, together with the works of Pierre Nora being valuable tools in guiding me across the complicate world of national symbolism and painful national identities. In the last months I followed the various political interventions from France regarding the national paradigm and its possible crisis or, at least, the lack of adaptability to the daily reality from the Hexagone.

The conference was interesting and useful as an update of reevaluating the crisis from the point of view of the possibilities to go beyond the current conflict at the level of mentalities. Because, as Mona Ozouf outlined by various examples, the theoretical reality included by the political definitions of identity don't correspond to the daily and human reality of nowadays France. A ministry of national identity will not solve the increasing tensions by symbolic interventions in the educational system, as singing the Marseillaise or preaching about the common identity.

On the other hand, the messianic vision of a France fighting for universal values is contradicted by the daily reality of the diversity - regional, religious, ethnic. You might not recognize the idea of minority - of any kind - but it doesn't mean those minority don't exist or will accept to give up their identities. The structures and histories of the communities you have to deal are diverse and with different relations to modernity and various reasons - economic and political mainly - to choose France as their home country. Theoretically and simplified, if you are entering my house, you have to accept the rules of the house, isn't it? But you cannot impose me what to say or what to dress or what to eat! It is against the general value of human rights. And if you are not able to convince me by your "soft power" that I have to adjust my attitude, it is, perhaps, an error in the projection of the whole system, isn't it?

Purposely I will not refer to specific situations and cases: as the burqa prohibition. Our secular Western values and societies are in obvious contradiction with some values preached in the anti-Western religious communities from the Middle East. The dramatic tension is the result of two opposite standpoints, refusing any kind of dialogue and critical thinking.

But the daily human, social and political reality is different of the historical projections from the history books. The "glorious past" of France is not the necessary liaison to reinforce a national profile. We are living global, this is obvious, but our global world is made up of various networks and communities, created by individuals with different backgrounds. You can be in the same time European, France citizen, Hindi speaker and with a strong Corsican identity. It might be contradictory in some cases, hard to understand, but there we need first to map the reality, to understand it and after to find solutions, new solutions for new realities.

Another kind of academic diary

My wonderful PhD paper is ready for almost one year and already went through minimum three rewriting processes. Most probably, for the book I am intending to write - a good reason to return more often to this dear neglected blog - I will rewrite at least twice the whole material, beyond the translation process and the need to adapt and rewrite fragments and chapters, in order to better address the Western audience.

To recap: I am ready and prepared to face the defense, to answer the questions and to present my arguments and ideas. (I even went intensively to a couple of Toastmasters sessions in order to improve my public speaking skills.)What I am waiting for? For finishing the long and extremely annoying process of filling papers, going with a file from a building to another, correcting various bureaucratic formulae. And the most part of the fun is that I have only three more weeks until the established deadline for entering the final stage of the PhD - the defense - and still I am jumping around nervous, more and more nervous from a day to another, giving desperate phone calls and trying to solve - from thousand-kilometer away, because I cannot go back home every week - problems I hope to delete from my brains 1/2 second after the whole chaos is over.

I very often remark that I would better write another 600 or more pages paper+the research, than to face this grotesque system. But, thanks to some brilliant ideas, I will succeed. Can't wait. To start a new project, of course.

Colourful but colourblind

It is time to know more the Roma. We are very often ignorant who they are and what their culture represents.

The newest initiative is a project of Transitions covering Romania, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia and Bulgaria.

I welcome any piece of information that might help to go beyond our daily stereotypes and narrow-minded ways of judging the other - belonging or not to a different ethnic, national or linguistic community. On the other side, for what concerns the case of Roma, I cannot stop observing how keen we, the Westerners are to listen to their music, to dance or to watch them dancing. But this wave of enthusiasm doesn't mean that we are more open to fight the discrimination they are facing - surprise, in many of the countries who supported by loud public declarations their integration - or to stop thinking about them in discriminative terms.

Mitläufer

Mitläufer - is a follower of a group, supported by his or her presence as organic part of the group. Even not agreeing with the ideas and the ways in which these ideas are put into practice, the Mitläufer is prefering to be rather "in" than "out", by reasons of personal security - keeping the job and the money, advantages for the the members of the family etc. He or her are voiceless - of their and other people's dissatisfactions.

The term was used recently by Herta Mueller, in Bucharest, in relation with the mainstream attitude of Romanian intellectuals during communism. A position I fully agree. Otherwise, how it would be explained the overall silence, and absence of the real dissent during Romanian dictatorship?

Hungary? Again?

Orban Viktor is back and very much in the business. With almost the same agenda he had previously, in a country facing serious economic problems countered at a very rhetorical level.

New tensions to be expected with the neighbours.

Orban promised to crack down on Magyar Garda, a paramilitary movement, but is stating this after a meeting with the representatives of this organization!

Next to come/hope not the best!