Globalization is a term that is used to refer to spread and amalgamation of social-cultural beliefs such as customs, cultural beliefs and ideological beliefs from one region of the world to another due to social interaction between different people across the globe. This interaction of different cultures has accelerated recently due to modern development of technology. Middle East region is known to have been dominated by Islamic Culture due to its dominant Islamic religion in the region (Amina, 2005). However, due to globalization Western culture has penetrated its roots in the region. This has led to adoption of western ideas, beliefs and religion which are greatly known to be antagonistic with the Islamic culture given the diversity of religious beliefs between Islam and Christianity which mainly dominates the western culture. In Middle East, this spread of western culture has been referred in Arabica as “awlaama”. (Arabiya, 2007) Due to this diversity of religion which forms the foundation for cultural beliefs of different communities, conflicts has risen over cultural, racial, political and economic superiority .The proponents of this cultural beliefs have been citing the few positive impacts mainly due to economic globalization that has resulted ignoring the adverse and deep conflicts that it has eroded among different people across the world. Globalization has brought more harm than good in Middle East as we are going to discuss.
Globalization has led to evolution of a bitter struggle due to cultural and political conflicts
Middle East is known for long to have a conservative culture that is based on Islamic teachings of Prophet Muhammad (Arabiya, 2007). The intrusion of western culture has seen emergence of anti-globalization movements that are mainly based on the strict religious observance of Islamic teachings. This includes the famous terrorism group of Al-Qaeda which has its roots and origins in Saudi Arabia, the center of Islamic religious beliefs considering that Millions of Muslims have to converge in the capital city Mecca every year to fulfill one of the main pillars of Islam observance of Hajji (Rubin, 2003). The former Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden was quoted justifying the acts of the movement as holy acts to preserve Islamic teachings and culture against erosion by the western culture. Emergence of this religious terrorist movement has been as a result of threat of their culture by western culture. Consequently, this conflict has led to wars that have left thousands of people dead and millions of other displaced. According to the report released by the United Nations, over 77 million people had been displaced from their homes and many live as refugees and greater percentage of this have been from the Middle East (Altwaijri, 2008). Political globalization has led to massive protests across countries such as Yemen, Egypt, and the current serious political crisis in Syria that has led to eruption of Civil war in the country. Negative impacts have been experienced across the world considering the ensuing enmity between anti-western movements and western governments and a good result of this can be evidenced by the terrorist acts in New York and Washington in 2001 that left more than 5000 people dead and tens of thousands of others maimed (Kellner, 2005). Therefore globalization has not been of any importance since it has left many countries torn in war and many people languishing in poverty due to displacements.
Globalization has led to erosion of the culture in Middle East.
Islamic culture holds some of the best values and its rules are based to counter the effects of morality and antisocial acts among people for harmonious living. Taking some simple statistics, the spread of HIV/AIDS in the world since its discovery in 1981 has been at a very high rate and this has mainly been in those countries that have embraced western culture. This spread has been at a very low rate in Islamic countries especially in Middle East where very small percentage have been infected and this are mainly people who have borrowed western ideas. The cultural beliefs in Middle East define the common way of living. For example Women are supposed to be dressed fully in Hiqaabs and Niqaabs, they are not supposed to interact with people of opposite gender in a way seemed to be immoral, they are supposed to teach the young children moral and cultural values and take them to madrasas classes to learn Islamic laws (Arabiya, 200). Acts of drug trafficking, drinking of alcohol, rape, murder, and blasphemy are completed outlawed and their penalties imposed as death for anybody who breaks them. As a result, these acts have been reported in less numbers and it is said they never existed before the intrusion of western culture which was ushered in the Middle East by western powers after successful fight of a Middle East war. Western culture has led to intrusion of immoral and antisocial behaviors in Middle East such as drug trafficking, atheism, lesbianism and homosexuality, rape, poor dressing codes, existence of sexual workers and abuse of drugs. This has greatly affected the great moral principles that Muslims in the region uphold and thus development of an immoral society which is full of evils.
The western propaganda of empowering women and fighting for what US has been calling the position and rights of women has erupted a lot of negative reactions and formation of anti-western movements such as Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan are mainly to fight against this propaganda. As opposed to its initial intends by its campaigners which included US as the main proponents, it was meant to bring peace while conserving culture of people but this has never been achieved.
Globalization has led to Emergence of dictatorial political and economic systems fueled by the western powers.
Recently, the US president His Excellency Barrack Obama announced that US was going to finance the rebels in Syria to topple the government of the Syria’s president his Excellency Al hasad Bashar. The same move has been fueled in Egypt which saw the downfall of the democratically elected government and put into custody of the President. In the push of their agenda, the western powers have been using the political systems in these Islamic countries as a channel for implementing them and those rulers who against this move to implement Islamic agenda are toppled through rebel groups financed by the western powers. These rebel movements have led to death of many people and immersed the countries into civil war. The results have been devastating. Many people dying, economic system destabilized, displacement of people from their homes leading to increased number of refugees and untold suffering among millions of people. As evidenced by these acts, globalization on middle East has led to human suffering and poor living of standards among the people and anybody will curse the effects of globalization if they happen to visit war ton countries like Syria .For example the United Nations estimated that buy the end of 2012 which marked more than 2 years of civil in Syria, more than 60000 people had been killed and more than 1 million people fled to the neighboring countries such as Yemen causing serious refugee problem. The effects calls for necessity to regulate the effects of globalization since this actions of the western powers have been the elicit of a lot of criticism by the elites in these Islamic countries leading to emergence of terrorism movements in the world such as Al-Qaeda and Taliban movements which defend their ideologies in the name of fighting Jihad (Holy war) as one of the teachings of the holy book of Koran (Clement, 2005). The results have been more counter act movements leading to more deaths in the western countries.
However, the proponents of globalization have cited out several benefits that have been associated with it. Economic and technological globalization has led to the revolution of world economies and Middle East is of no exception. For example Saudi Arabia is regarded as a major historical site that has over the years attracted more people especially from the west. This has boosted the economies of these countries through tourism income. At the heart off Middle East lie the rich oil fields (Assammak, 2001). Accordingly, more than 80% of gross domestic product in these countries is attributed to income from oil. In fact the king of Saudi Arabia is named among the world’s most wealth people due to the huge income he generates from the several oil fields which he owns .The main countries in which middle east trades with re the western powers chief of them being United states .By the end of 2006 for example, US had spent more money than any other country in the world in buying of Oil from the middle east. This involved several trillion dollars. As a result of this trade, Middle East countries economies continue to flourish pushing their per capita income upwards and hence improved living standards among the citizens.
Conclusion
The negative impacts of globalization surpass all the positive impacts which proponents of globalization have been pointing at in order to continue campaigning against this destructive wave. However, globalization is a wave that the Middle East countries cannot stop given its political, economic and cultural pressure that is being imposed to the people. However, they have an opportunity to resist cultural globalization and conserve their cultural values and holy teachings of the Holy book of Koran. This will depend on the solidarity which the people of Middle East exercise and how they will continue voicing their thoughts and beliefs considering the destructive effects that they have been exposed to as a result of globalization. They will also have to develop strong economies in order to reduce their dependence to the organizations that are guardians of western entities such as the World Bank. Through this way, the effects of globalization in Middle East will be reduced pushing way for reinstatement of the old customs, traditions, beliefs and ideas that have always had a positive influence on the people’s way of life
References
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