Dossiers Archive | Page 19 of 20

Dossiers

Jorge Mario Bergoglio’s choice of the name Francis immediately signaled the doctrinal orientation of his pontificate. Following in the footsteps of Saint Francis of Assisi, the new Bishop of Rome embraced three guiding principles: love for the poor, care for our common home, and a commitment to a culture of encounter and peace. Although critics sometimes labeled this approach as populist, Pope Francis explicitly rejected that characterization. In truth, his outlook was open, transnational, and pluralistic—the very opposite of European populist movements. From his earliest symbolic gestures—refusing the papal apartments and embracing migrants in Lampedusa—Bergoglio embodied a “Church that goes forth,” one that engages the world not with doctrinal arrogance, but with a spirit of service. His language, stripped of curial formalism, brought the papacy closer to the people, while his identity as the pope “from the ends of the earth” shifted the Church’s center of gravity away from Europe toward the world’s peripheries, fostering a new alliance among faiths, cultures, and peoples. In this dossier, we offer a series of reflections on the legacy of his pontificate and the future prospects of the Church.

New media for a New Arab World
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Politics may continue to slam the door in their faces and to suppress all dissent, but, to the citizens of the Arab world, the emergence of new media today offers an extraordinary opportunity. Satellite TV, on-line journals, blogs and Youtube are giving a new voice to Arab ‘subjects’, who escape with increasing frequency the control of regimes. A part of the credit must be attributed to the pan-Arab satellite channel Al Jazeera, which has for years been challenging the ‘single thought’ of governments, and which is changing the very nature of journalism in the Arab world. The agendas of the media have been shaken, opening up unexpected spaces for all – for Islamic opposition, but also for secularists and reformists.
The New Germans
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The Second session of the German Conference on Islam concluded with a controversial balance. No concrete results, but an undoubted symbolic success. It’s some time now that Germany has quit considering immigrants as simple Gastarbeiter, guest workers. New Germans of Turkish origins are in the Bundestag or at the top of major political parties, and they often play the main characters in German movies and TV fictional stories. Surely some problems remain if one Turkish-German out of two still searches for his wife abroad, and if every generation is still a first-generation – as the NYT Magazine wrote. But the new course has started and Germany shows to be seriously taking into account the challenge of integration.
Ayaan or Tariq?
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Over the past few months a heated debate, spread across the pages of the international press and of the website Signandsight.com, has raised the following question: Should the West support moderate yet controversial Muslims such as Tariq Ramadan, the popular grandson of the founder of the Muslim Brothers, or Islamic dissidents such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who for years has spoken out against crimes committed on women in the name of Islam, and who wrote the screenplay of Theo Van Gogh’s provocative film Submission? The two intellectuals know and cannot stand each other. And yet today, while the Italian right once again attacks Ramadan, who is still banned from the U.S., the ex-Somalian refugee here defends his right to freedom of speech, even if she claims to be completely opposed to his thinking.
Algeria, les jeux sont faits?
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Algeria prepares for the election of the National Popular Assembly, voting coming about a month after the attack – claimed by "Al Qaeda for the Islamic Maghreb" – which killed 33 people in the capital. While intelligence services warn that the likelihood of a new attack is far from remote, political parties are wearily preparing themselves for the elections. Algerians remember those of 1991, won by the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), and for this reason too, no surprises are expected. High levels of abstention are likely, which can be interpreted as a protest against the National Front of Liberation’s (FNL) hegemony, and a monopoly that is set to be confirmed in an ever more dull and monotonous democracy.
Mubarak Forever?
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On the 26th March, the reform of the Egyptian Constitution was approved by popular referendum, in which only 27% of those eligible voted (5% according to the human rights groups). Socialism is cast to one side, and the regime becomes even more authoritarian: religious parties are banned, judicial supervision of elections is eliminated, and legislation brought in for a state of emergency become permanent. President Mubarak strengthens his rule, and the possibility of the ‘monarchical’ succession to power of his son Gamal looms ever closer. In the meantime, as the American scholar Robert S. Leiken explains in an interview, the international community considers with growing interest the increasing influence of moderates within the Muslim Brotherhood, the only real force of opposition to the regime.
The French Mosaic
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France will go to the polls to elect the new President of the Republic, and it will be interesting to see how multicultural France votes. After the autumn of 2005 and the banlieue riots, and following the controversy over the threat of anti-semitism, which way will the country’s major religious communities go? The republican model of integration itself is being called into question, and whilst other European countries look on with increasing interest, there have also been strong criticisms, as was seen in the debate concerning the wearing of the Islamic veil in schools. How will the direction of French foreign policy change? And is it true that France will reject its current pro-Arab orientation should Nicolas Sarkozy and the center-right triumph?
Women, Between Veil and Capitalism
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According to the latest UN report on human development, women in Arab countries still have great difficulties in gaining access to education, health, politics, work and rights. Unemployment, Aids and domestic violence are problems which remain unresolved. However, it is not because of Islam that women rights are not respected in the Muslim world, as the American philosopher Martha Nussbaum says to us in an interview. In the Arab-speaking region, businesses led by female entrepreneurs have a larger number of employees, attract more foreign investors and export more than those led by male entrepreneurs. Is it through women that the Arab renaissance will develop?
Iran and the Paths to War
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War has not yet been waged, but both Iran and the United States are doing their best not to avoid it. The Iranian leadership continues to pursue its nuclear programme, heedless of UN concerns. The Bush administration partakes in dangerous "provocations" (Gary Sick) on Iraqi soil, and does not exclude military intervention. Between the two lies Europe. The paths to war are infinite and implicate the role of Western intellectuals, who unwittingly risk strenghtening the current regime at a time when President Ahmadinejad is at ist lowest point and there are rumours of divisions amongst Tehran’s top ranks.
The Armenian Issue
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Dispersed throughout the world, they have a history that stretches over millenniums. Today there are just over 10 million Armenians, but the early twentieth century genocide of which they were the victims has barely been acknowledged. It is a controversial question which continues to be as relevant as ever: the French National Assembly has passed a law punishing denial of the Armenian genocide; the Taviani brothers have dedicated a film to the massacre, premiered at the Berlin Film Festival; the Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was killed in Istanbul because of his origins; and the U.S. Congress is divided over the official recognition of the genocide. But who are the Armenians? And how ‘Armenian’ do the members of this diaspora feel?
Democracy and Religion
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They don’t seem to always exist in perfect harmony. Yet, in the current post-secular society, religion and democracy can’t make it without each other. That applies to the Western world, where more faiths live together in the same territory and where we face a religious revival (even though religion, to be true, never disappeared). But it is also valid for Muslim societies, where Islam needs to bring modernity, autonomous reason and science to account. Between a democracy subjugated by the ideology of secularization and one dominated by faith, is there possibly a third way?