The Winds of War: Thoughts on a Revolution

It’s the 4th of July and our country is celebrating our independence from Britain and began a revolution that lasted 200 years. But though there have been many revolutions since then, only the American Revolution measured up to its full potential and guaranteed, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Why? And what does this have to do with democratizing Islam?

A true revolution consists of three parts - the political, economic and social aspects. Many revolutions over the last 200 hundred years failed to measure up to the full human potential promising and delivering the goal of freedom. They start out that way, the French and Russian Revolutions for example, but soon deteriorate into something less than expected because they try to implement all three aspects at once. When this happened, the revolution failed. You either have just a change in the hands of power or a change in economic philosophy.

The American Revolution succeeded because it took place over a period of 200 years. The first aspect of the American Revolution was political. A change in the hands of power from British rule to Colonial rule. Our forefathers did not change the way the economy operated (slavery in the South was the cornerstone of their economic progress) nor did they deal with the social aspects of a revolution (the Declaration of Independence declared all men were created equal but at definition of man was very circumscribed).

What made the American Revolution a success was that each aspect of a successful revolution was achieved over time and separate from each other. The political in the 18th century (the US Constitution), the economicin the 19th century (the Civil War – the Industrial Age over the Age of Slavery), and the social (Civil Rights movement) in the 20th.

This long drawn out process gave enough breathing room for the American Revolution to succeed. A time period that will be just as necessary for Islam that must not only have its ‘reformation’ – the separation of church and state – but to form a secular government that is democratic, technocratic, and respect for human rights.

That, in my opinion will take many years. Yes. I know. We were successful in creating a revolution (and removing the influence of the State religion of Shintoism) in Japan after WWII in only a decade, but that was a localized small country geographically unattached to any other country that we changed at the point of a gun.

To be a viable entity in the 21st century, Islam will have to find in its ranks a Martin Luther, a Thomas Jefferson, an Abraham Lincoln and a Martin Luther King.