In God We Trust

Arab spring is in full swing with demise of Gaddafi and protests in Syria. Yemen is also on the boil. New York Times in its article today claims that the struggle in new countries like Egypt, Tunisia and Libya is not between Islamists and Secularists but between traditional and liberal Islamists. The struggle is between the model offered by Taliban & Wahabbis on one end and that offered by Erdogan on the other. Even members of Muslim Brotherhood are breaking away from the premise that Koran should serve as the basis of future constitution.

I find the debate fascinating. Two leaders that shaped the ethos of modern India had very divergent views on religion. For Gandhi, religion was an important part of political discourse and important medium for mobilizing the population. For Nehru, religion had no space in politics. As Karl Marx would say : "Religion is the opium of the poor". I wonder if Nehru had given religion the required breathing space, would we have the RSS annoyance as we see today. Interestingly we have seen dictatorships from so called secularists all over the world: Shah of Iran, Saddam Hussein, Hosni Mumbarak and before him Anwar Sadat, Ben Ali and even Muammar Gaddafi.

So are we moving towards a world in which the state recognizes the role religion plays in shaping beliefs of the population, incorporates certain aspects of it and rejects the extremes so that focus remains on development. Turkey is an example. Even in US, Republicans have made religion their election plank against Democrats (though I would say that some positions on abortion, evolution and stem cell research are plain naive).

What is fascinating is how this would shape Arab world.Traditionally, Israel and US have supported governments that ruled with iron hand, were secular and implicity/explicity supported right of Israel to exist. Prominent countries that would fall in this category today would be Jordan and Saudi Arabia. A few months back, Egypt was also in this category. For this support, Arab population still hates US. If liberal Islamists come to power in elections in Egypt, Libya and Tunisia, it would be interesting to see how things shape up for Israel & US. I think this would create a more lasting peace in the middle east.

Microcredit is(gets!!) Noble

After 2 days of somewhat mixed bag of news, I am very happy writing this entry. When everyone is sleeping here in the US, news is trickling in on BBC that Muhammad Yunus has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for this year. This award would definitely contribute in its own small way in providing visibility to the concept of microcredit. The bank has helped inspire an estimated 7,000 micro-lenders with 25 million poor clients worldwide. Mr. Yunus deserves every bit of it and lets celebrate the moment together.
( By the way, I just ordered my copy of "Banker to the Poor: Micro-Lending and the Battle Against World Poverty" by Muhammad Yunus in paperback and I am sure the word hasn't spread. It is still available for $10.20..pretty sure, the price would shoot up in another 5 hours when people on the East Coast start reaching their offices!!)