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Bangladesh’s Revolution: Challenges, Opportunities and the Umma

Description

The recent popular ousting of Sheikh Hasina comes as a bright spark, instilling hope, albeit tempered by many challenges and past experiences. Amidst such hopes and fears, our guests explore the ummatic implications, challenges, and stakes of the revolution, addressing questions about Bangladesh’s role and potential in the broader ummatic context and Islam’s impact on political reform. Additionally, this colloquium discussed the opportunities and risks for the caretaker government, managing international relations, and how the wider Umma can contribute to Bangladesh’s flourishing. This exploration aims to shed an analytical lens on this new chapter in the history of the third-largest Muslim-majority country in the world.

Dr. Mahmudur Rahman is a prominent figure in Bangladeshi political life with notable achievements in various fields. He is one of the owners and acting editor of the Bengali daily newspaper Amar Desh. Beyond journalism, Rahman has a background in engineering and business that allowed him in the early 2000s to serve as the executive chairman of the National Investment Board and later became the national energy adviser for Bangladesh. Since 2008, he has been a vocal critic of the government through his newspaper, leading to numerous defamation and sedition cases against him that were characterized by international human rights groups as judicial harassment. Rahman is the author of several books in Bangla and English, the latest of which is “The Political History of Muslim Bengal: An Unfinished Battle of Faith.”

Dr. Rafik Abdessalem is a Tunisian politician and an Executive Committee member of Ennahda party. He served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs between 2011 and 2013, representing Tunisia’s first democratically elected government under Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali. Dr. Abdessalem played a prominent role in founding The Tunisians Student General Union in 1980s. He is the founder and director of the London-based Centre for Strategic and Diplomatic Studies (CSDS), the founder of The Magreb Centre for Research and Translations, and the former chair of the London Platform for Dialogue. Dr. Abdessalem also worked as a senior researcher and head of the Research and Studies Office at the Al Jazeera Center for Studies. He holds a PhD in politics and international relations from the University of Westminster and is the author of several books.

Dr. Tanzeen Doha is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of Pittsburgh. He is the founder and general editor of the journal-magazine Milestones: Commentary on the Islamic World, along with being the founder and host of the podcast Everything is Fire. He holds a PhD in Anthropology from the University of California, Davis and was the “Global Racial Justice” postdoctoral fellow at the Einaudi Center for International Studies at Cornell University.

Dr. Usaama Al-Azami, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam moderated the discussion and subsequent Q&A session.

Saturday, August 31, 2024, at 11 AM ET.

 

 

Summary

Presentations

Dr. Mahmudur Rahman on the Geopolitical and Historical Context
  • Since independence, Bangladesh has been caught in power dynamics between its neighbors, particularly India. For 15 years, Bangladesh under Sheikh Hasina’s regime was effectively under Indian hegemony, which led to human rights abuses, extrajudicial killings, disappearances, and suppression of democratic freedoms.
  • India, as a strategic partner in the US’s “war on terrorism,” hegemonized Bangladesh, ending it’s 15-year experiment in democracy (1991-2006).
  • India views Bangladesh as crucial to its regional strategic interests and security against perceived threats like China and political Islam.
  • Notwithstanding India’s comparatively larger strategic investment in Bangladesh, the failure of Indian hegemonic designs there is akin to earlier failures in Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Afghanistan.
  • There are parallels between Bangladesh today and the Arab Spring. Both movements were initiated by youth protests against authoritarian regimes and sparked by the martyrdom of iconic protestors. To avoid the mistakes of the Arab Spring, Bangladesh must focus on regaining sovereignty and transitioning to democracy.

Dr. Tanzeen Doha on the Question of Islam
  • The question of Islam’s role in Bangladeshi state and society remains unresolved. While Dr. Rahman describes the previous regime as “fascist,” Dr. Doha describes it as a “secular necropolitical regime” centered on constitutionally-grounded death-dealing. Reflected in the 1971 independence narrative, Bangladeshi nationalism identified itself against the Umma and Muslim political subjectivity.
  • To secure the revolution, there must be a critical reevaluation of the political genealogy of the question of Islam in Bangladeshi state and society.
  • Premature tendencies to talk of “post-Islamism” and “post-ideology” are attempts to leave this question unresolved.

Dr. Rafik Abdessalam on the Nature of the Revolution and Its Democratic Prospects
  • While acknowledging the uniqueness of each event, parallels between the Bangladeshi revolution and the Arab Spring reflect a shared ummatic consciousness.
  • The Bangladesh Revolution must dismantle old regime structures, including the judiciary and security forces, lest the revolution be co-opted or reversed. The electoral revolution should be delayed until the old regime is dismantled and a new political foundation is established, avoiding pitfalls of premature electoral politics seen in Tunisia and Egypt.
  • Ethnic, religious, and sectarian divisions must be overcome for the sake of national unity, avoiding pitfalls witnessed in Syria, Libya, and Yemen.
  • Political and ideological polarization, under the title of conflict between secularists and Islamists, must be overcome, circumscribing the potential for repression under the guise of countering “Islamic terrorism” and “political Islam.” The conflict is rather between democrats and tyrants.
  • Bangladesh must build regional and international alliances to support its democratic transition. In the Arab Spring, a lack of external support contributed to the revolutions’ failure in the face of a counterrevolutionary axis. Bangladesh faces similar challenges, especially in countering India’s influence and finding allies who respect Bangladesh’s sovereignty.
  • While a comprehensive ideological program is not needed, there is a need for a clear vision and priorities that can unify political forces. There is a need to balance the desire for freedom and democracy with the need for stability and rule of law. Too much chaos could lead to a popular backlash and public longing for the stability of the old regime.

Q&A and Discussion

Revolution
  • While changes in Bangladesh are significant, it remains to be seen whether they constitute a revolution. A revolution would entail substantial and enduring changes to the political and social system, beyond merely replacing figureheads, as takes place in uprisings.
  • The 2013 Shapla protest movement, in response to the government-sponsored Shahbagh movement, was an example of a failed uprising that did not translate into a revolution. The state deployed its full coercive power against Madrasa students protesting insults directed at the Prophet ﷺ under the pretense of the then-relevant claim of countering terrorism, thus securing Western support. The class dimension reveals that whereas educated urban middle classes support the current uprising, they did not support the rural madrasa-led 2013 uprising.
  • In Bangladesh, the need for revolution is reflected in the fact that those depicting themselves as secularists are in fact viciously Islamophobic. This is rooted in a narrative of Bengali nationalism whose starting point is the British-led, Hindu-centered, 18th century Bengal renaissance, in which the Muslim majority is depicted as outsiders. The challenge is to create an alternative Bengali Muslim narrative, perhaps grounded, as Dr. Rahman suggests, in the 13th century Bengal Sultanate.
  • Securing the revolution requires regaining sovereignty by undermining Indian state and security apparatus influence at all levels of Bangladeshi government and society.

Democracy
  • Democracy, long accepted and advocated by Muslim theorists, need not only mean Western liberal democracy, to the exclusion of Islamic democracy.
  • Whereas in Western liberal democracy the red lines are liberalism and liberal values, in Islamic democracy, the red lines are Islam and Islamic values.
  • Even liberal democracy is precluded in the Muslim world due to its potential for liberation. Whereas for the Muslim masses, democracy is a tool of liberation, for international powers, it is a tool for intervention and liberalization.
  • Whereas secularism elsewhere is associated with enlightenment and freedom, its genealogy in the Muslim world is linked to despotism and authoritarianism against popular aspirations.

Nation-State
  • The nation-state is a hegemonic concept, whereas the Umma is currently an aspirational myth with no tangible reality.
  • While there has been success in combining the mutually antagonistic values of Islam and nationalism in some contexts, such as Turkey, even these examples provide a stark illustration of the severe limiting effect of nationalism on ummatic solidarity and action, as reflected in the Turkish response to the Gaza genocide.
  • In Bangladesh, disrupting the nation-state narrative would involve reassessing the 1971 narrative highlighting: 1) oppression and exploitation by Pakistani ruling elites was not directed solely at Bengalis, but rather all disempowered ethnicities; 2) India’s role in exacerbating the conflict for its own interests to bifurcate Pakistan, the main challenger to Indian hegemony; 3) Bangladesh Jamaat-e-Islami must clarify its position regarding 1971: while it may have been politically correct to oppose partition, the error of supporting the Pakistani military must be acknowledged.

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