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Q&A: "The Issue of Humiliation Is Tricky"

Interview with Shamil Idriss, acting director of the Alliance of Civilisations

UNITED NATIONS, Mar 19 2008 (IPS) - Launched by the United Nations in 2005, the Alliance of Civilisations (AoC) works to improve understanding and strengthen cooperative relations among nations and peoples across cultures and religions worldwide.

But it also seeks to counter the forces that fuel polarisation and extremism, says Shamil Idriss, acting director of the AoC Secretariat.

Asked about the rise in religious extremism worldwide, he noted: "If you look at what feeds extremism, it generally tends to be some combination of humiliation and hopelessness."

In an interview with IPS correspondent Erkan Kaptan, Idriss said: "The issue of humiliation is tricky. It is fostered through a perceived domination or disrespect of your community by others."

"I think that a strict line, a direct line between underdevelopment or poverty and extremism shouldn&#39t be done for two reasons: one is because it is not accurate, and second it stigmatises poor communities."

"At the same time, you have to recognise that those are the conditions within which people are very easily manipulated and people feel the hopelessness and humiliation when you have the political factors on top of it." That leads to more desperation, he added.

The AoC, which held its first annual forum on Jan. 16 in Madrid, was established under the leadership of Spain and Turkey, under the auspices of the United Nations.

The major initiatives launched at the Forum included the creation of an AoC Clearinghouse, beginning with a theme of Media Literacy Education, a Rapid Response Media Mechanism, the establishment of a Youth Solidarity Fund, a Media Fund, the creation of a global network of philanthropic foundations and private funders and the establishment of partnership agreements with various organisations.

Excerpts from the interview follow.

IPS: Is the AOC also trying to focus on ethno-religious and cultural conflicts within a given country? Is it concerned with relations between different states and governments whose citizens share different cultures and even different religions?

SI: The Alliance is primarily an initiative at the global level. [But] the more global you go, the more detached you get from what happens in people&#39s lives on a daily basis. For that reason it is important that we do not ignore and in fact prioritise action at more local levels.

IPS: What are the objectives of the AoC Clearinghouse?

SI: The Clearinghouse is meant to be an online site where different themes that go directly to the objectives of the Alliance will be featured and also who is doing what in those fields will come up. There are thousands or millions of people working towards similar ends and lessons that are learned, and we want to make sure that we provide a platform for that.

One of the themes we are looking out right now is education about religion. What have countries done in their education policies to educate about diverse religions without favouring necessarily one? This is a tricky question for a lot of governments. There are some countries who called religious leaders from diverse backgrounds to advise, and others said that this is the last thing you want to do. You want to do it from a strictly distanced academic perspective.

IPS: Are you worried that some governments might be hostile to the AoC?

SI: I think we are looking to see what is out there and allowing users to make their own decisions on what they think should be going on for their countries and communities. I don&#39t think we are going to looking to say that this country does it the right way, this country does it the wrong way.

IPS: What were the positive results of the recently-concluded AoC Madrid Forum?

SI: We are very pleased with the outcomes of the Madrid Forum for a couple of reasons. First of all, the level of political engagement was very high. There were a number of heads of states and heads of governments there. Over 40 ministers participated and that was excellent. In addition, the level of civil society engagement was very strong. It was quite interesting actually the role of women&#39s leadership in particular. If you look at the biggest announcements made on the first day of the forum in front of the plenary you see that Her Highness Sheikh Hamosa was making one announcement about the Youth Employment initiative, her Majesty Queen Noor making another announcement about the Media Fund.

There are 12 major outcomes of the forum which are highly practical. It was much more than a talk-shop.

IPS: What else can you tell us about the outcomes of the Madrid Forum?

SI: We are establishing a Youth Solidarity Fund that will promote intercultural and inter-religious exchanges. Youth organisations tend to make more money than a lot of adult-run organizations. They find interesting ways of fundraising. We are talking about small pilot schemes to mobilise action. I also should mention very importantly that we also have at the political level these national strategies that we are collecting from the member states on what they are doing within their own countries on these issues. Spain, Turkey, New Zealand and Bulgaria have all come forth at the Madrid Forum. Once we [know] more of what countries are doing, [we can better] critique them or involve them and learn from them.