AlanH

Alan Hurwitz - Opinion/Left
Alan Hurwitz, Ed. D. has consulted for the last 30 years to leaders, organizations and sometimes groups of organizations, to help them perform at their highest level to achieve important results. This work has involved diagnosing and addressing complex issues of interpersonal, group and intergroup dynamics. It has involved helping diverse individuals and groups to understand and work with perspectives very different than their own. Alan brings this interpersonal, group and systems perspective to his writing on political and social issues.

Alan has focused on political and social dynamics for many years, beginning early on, and eventually including his political science studies at Yale. After college he worked for an anti-poverty program and created and directed educational and social programs. He received a doctorate at the University of Massachusetts Center for International Education, and then began his organization development career.

Over this time he has consulted with private, government and non-profit organizations in 36 countries around the world. This experience has provided the opportunity to observe and influence the dynamics on important decisions. It has provided a rich understanding of how large systems function in many settings. This understanding provides special insights and unusual perspectives on timely political and social issues.

Some years ago his consulting career came full circle, as he began to consult with groups or “clusters” of organizations, public and private, that needed to work together on large social issues. This work solidified the idea that what we understand about organizations and systems can help us understand the dynamics of politics and larger social systems. It is a perspective unfortunately missing too often from today’s political dialogue, as well as outside analysis.

Islamic Jihadists: Successors to the Communists’ Anti-Western Role?

Has anyone noticed some familiar dynamics appearing on the international political scene over the last several years? The world again seems to be dividing roughly into two camps. Call it pro-Western and anti-Western for now. Perhaps someone will be creative enough to come up with a sexier name, something with the ring of “Communist” and “Free”.

The most explicit global conflict in town is the jihad of some elements of fundamentalist Islam against the United States and other Western countries. But the plot is rapidly thickening.

For example, China tends to support anti-Western causes in international circles, and often gets a pass from Islamic countries and their friends on many of its own embarrassments – including the treatment of Muslims in China. Russia also seems to revel in poking jabs at the U.S., and sometimes Western Europe, but its relationship with Muslims is complicated by the little province or country of Chechnya.

The Anti-Globalization Movement seems to have captured the imagination of some remnants of the ’60s generation, reincarnated for the 21st Century. G-7 meetings often have looked from the outside a little like the 1968 Chicago Democratic Convention.

There are other parallels. The persecution of Muslims and some others via Gitmo and the “legal” system in general harkens back to the McCarthyism of the 1950s. Even arguments over civil liberties are sounding familiar. It’s tough policing internal allies of an international threat. “Are you, or have you ever been a Muslim, member of a Muslim group, or perhaps a lover of Muslims?”

Especially, but not only in Muslim countries, Islamic fundamentalist groups have gained the support of many poor and marginal members of society, much like the Communists of old times. Poorer groups in many countries, including our own, have tended to hang on to religious traditions, and assimilation has often gone hand-in-hand with surrendering old-country traditions – beards, dress, language and more intensive religious observance. But this underdog connection goes beyond mere religion.

The phenomenon occurs among Muslims, in Muslim countries and in Europe. Of course there are also many wealthy, traditional Muslims. But one doesn’t see many of them throwing rocks at the Paris “Fliques”. The poor and unassimilated often identify with the Islamic movement, and often form alliances with other marginal groups, unbelievers though they might be. Fundamentalist Islam seems to be playing the old Communist role of attracting and galvanizing discontents. And the bedfellows are getting stranger all the time.

The Islamic Jihadist Movement seems to be becoming a part of a larger picture, something like the old Soviet Communists. Once again, there is a central ideology that provides a consistent and coherent (for believers) critique of Western Civilization, and is glommed onto by poor and disaffected masses all over the world, even by people and leaders who reject the theory’s main beliefs. Does this dynamic sound familiar?

The Great Powers in this current scenario are still sorting themselves out. It seems the Chinese and Russians are at odds in some ways, though joining together to create an effective tag-team partnership when making life difficult for us. Of course, other pretenders are now on the scene: India, Iran, and a few holdovers from “Old Europe”, The Europeans and some others will drift back to re-form a more solid Western front, especially when a Democratic Administration makes that more politically palatable. For others, it may depend on the success of their economies.

The Cold War was marked by great powers often working through client states and groups. History is full of evidence of great powers intervening in countries to ensure that their clients came to power.

This seems to be happening again. Witness the proxy battles in Lebanon, and oh yes, Iraq. “Who is supplying funds and weapons to the adversarial groups?” is a frequent aspect of press stories on any armed conflicts. This question may produce odd answers, as countries shuffle quickly to be a part of a winning coalition – something like the Democratic primary contest. Individuals, groups and countries seem to gravitate toward we-they patterns of association. This global dynamic has complicated the already complex Israeli/Palestinian conflict.

I often run large-group sessions, sometimes divided into smaller groups. Occasionally I need to shift the membership after the groups are already formed. This occurred once after only a few minutes, when I realized the numbers of the two divisions were out of balance. I asked a few people to switch tables and remember encountering some pretty strong resistance. “I want to stay with my group. I don’t want to be in that group”. Keep in mind these were randomly selected configurations of people who were similar demographically. Imagine the power of we-they configurations among countries.

If this theory holds any water, the dynamics will continue moving ahead until the world is divided into two more or less equal parts – probably with population high on one side and wealth on the other, whatever the rationale. Perhaps we need Martians to really bring us together.