Issues
The Shiite axis, a myth or a reality?
Mohamad Reza-Djalili, Professor at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva, and Vali Nasr, Professor at the Naval Postgraduate School talk about the rise of Shi'ism and the "Shiite crescent"Mohamad-Reza Djalili
is a professor at the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva, and at the Graduate Institute of Development Studies, also in Geneva. His fields of research are the Middle East, central Asia and Caucasia, relations between Europe and the South, religion and international relations, as well as Iran’s foreign policy. He has published many books, amongst which: The Trials of Independence and La Caspienne: une nouvelle frontière.
Vali Nasr
is a professor at the Naval Postgraduate School, Adjunct Senior Fellow to the Council on Foreign Relations, Fellow at the Belfar Center of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. His latest books are The Shia Revival: How Conflicts within Islam will Shape the Future (W.W. Norton, 2006); Democracy in Iran: History and the Quest for Liberty (Oxford University Press, 2006). He has written for The New York Times, The New Republic, Time, Los Angeles Times, Foreign Affairs, Christian Science Monitor, and The Washington Post, and he has frequently been called as an expert to make comments on CNN and the BBC. He was Carnegie Scholar in 2006.
Is the latent antagonism between the Sunni power and what is called the “Shiite crescent” determined by political factors or by religious ones?
Mohamad-Reza Djalili : In the Arab countries of the Middle East, there is a real fear as regards the increasing weight that the Shiite factor is gaining in the region. Even if this fear has a religious dimension, especially in the rigorist anti-Shiite Sunni backgrounds, it is the political aspect of the matter that concerns governments the most. In countries with an important Shia community, Sunni Muslims sometimes accuse the Shia Muslims of being pledged to Iran, but more generally, they are preoccupied by the fact that movements like Hezbollah can set new examples and standards for the Islamist currents of opposition that exist within each country. In addition to these issues, Arab governments in power also start to fear the rise in power of Iran.
Vali Nasr : The current conflict is not the consequence of religious differences but that of a timely struggle for power between communities whose identities are defined and determined by a denominational criterion. Historically, Sunni and Shia Muslims have started practising Islam in different ways early on in time, but that is not the reason why they are fighting against each other to gain power in Iraq. In this struggle for power, the Shia and Sunni identities play a similar role to the one ethnic identity plays in other conflicts.
Up to what point could the Shiite crescent actually influence power struggles in the Middle East?
M.R.D. : During the last three decades, the political equilibrium between the two main branches of Islam has progressively moved in favour of Shi’ism, although Sunnism is the religion of the majority in the Middle East. Such an evolution is the consequence of the success of the Islamic Revolution in Iran. The Shia community in the Lebanon has started changing in parallel with the Islamic Revolution. It has adopted a political structure centred mainly around the Hezbollah. Finally, the overthrowing of Saddam Hussein’s regime allowed Shia Muslims from Iraq – a majority as far as numbers go, but an eternal political minority – to regain the place they deserved on the national political scene.
V.N. : The increasing role played by Shia Muslims in national and regional Middle Eastern politics has created a new order that will have an impact on political, social and economic competition. This evolution alone will not determine the future of the Middle East, and it does not mean either that the Middle East will become the scene of a massive denominational conflict. What might happen is that states and political actors will start responding to political facts whilst bearing in mind denominational identities. Such a thing was seen during the war in the Lebanon, where a conflict between Israelis and Arabs quickly became a denominational one.
Is the Iraqi denominational conflict liable to spread to the rest of the Islamic world, and if it does, what will the consequences be?
M.R.D. : If the situation in Iraq keeps getting worse, the violence that is growing inside that country could become contagious and affect other countries. Denominational antagonisms could spread to Arab countries situated alongside the Persian Gulf, where the Shia communities are not always satisfied with the fate the ruling Sunnis reserve for them.
V.N. : What is occurring in Iraq could have repercussions on the entire Middle East and harden Sunni and Shia positions regarding each other. It could determine how they would react to political reforms, to democracy, to the Iranian power, to relations between regional actors and the United States. If Iraq were to sink into civil war, several regional actors would probably get involved in the country, and the Iraqi conflict would spread to a regional extent in a pronounced way.
Is it possible that pan-Shiism could emerge from the confrontation with the Sunni majority in the Islamic world?
M.R.D. : I don’t believe in the existence of a Shiite arc or crescent, and even less in pan-Shiism or in a “Greater Shiitistan”. If some people consider there is a Shiite arc that expands from the Eastern coasts of the Mediterranean Sea to the heart of the Indian subcontinent, they have to admit that this dotted line “arc” is broken in several places. Those fractures reveal the profound nature of Shi’ism, which has never been unanimous, whether of old or nowadays. The political instrumentalisation of Shi’ism helps divide the religious current rather than strengthen it. As a matter of fact, the situation for Shia Muslims varies from one country to the next and they react according to a national agenda rather than regarding pan-Shiite motives. Nevertheless, the Shia Muslims have a well-organised clergy with quite a good structure which has helped create transnational networks. Those help develop canals of influence, a soft power that some powers can use, including, of course, the Iranian government.
V.N. : There is no pan-Shiism nowadays, nor is there a movement or a leader (not even in Iraq) that is at the head of the Shia Muslims. What there is, and that is one thing that Shia Muslims all over the Arab world have in common, is their exclusion from power. That is why they react similarly when facing elections, political reform and power transfers. Shia Muslims share cultural bonds with each other as well as with Iran, but it does not mean that they follow the latter. Their reactions as regards the situation in Iraq are similar especially because the circumstances in the region are similar.
What are the consequences of the Shiite renewal on a short term and on a longer term on the international level ?
V.N. : It adds an extra layer of complexity to the politics of the Middle East. It makes observers and political actors adopt a new paradigm to examine the power struggles and internal dynamics in the region. There is a new power that is going to interact with existing things in an unexpected way and will give unseen results.
Information gathered by Chiara Sulmoni
Translated into English by Marguerite Cornu, Research Assistant trainee
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- Origin CERMAM
- http://www.cermam.org/en/logs/dossier/the_shiite_axis_a_myth_or_a_re/
- Publié le 15 March 2007