ISLAM'S POTENTIAL FOR DEVELOPMENT

Hello,

Today's topic we will learn how much potential Islam has for development.

The Islamic approach to development is to reconcile moral and

religious values with economic advancement. The growing importance

of Isalm insistently demands a greater degree of understanding of

this faith on the part of the West.

Islam is ascendant in Morocco, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia

(where the only contest is its relative purity), and Sudan and has

some legitimacy as a political actor in Jordan, Syria, Lebanon,

and Yemen. Even Algeria, Egypt, Palestine, and Tunisia, where

its legitimacy is contested, most observers would concede either

the inevitability of its dominance or its eventual great importance.

The increasing political and economic importance of the Islamic

non-Middle Eastern states of Pakistan, Malaysia, and Indonesia

is part of this process. In short, in areas of the world where

the United States and the West have enormous strategic interests- in

energy supplies, trade, and the security of Israel- Islam is in the forefront.

It is also important to stress that Isalm's most distinctive feature

at present is its modernist character, not the alleged reactionary

nature so often cited in the Western press and sometimes in American

policy circles. In this respect, just as the religion is emerging politically

it is also undergoing profound internal self-examination as it adjusts

to modern political and development challenges.

Until the 1990s, the West either ignored Islam or, on the basis of

long-established historical animosity and prejudicial stereotypes,

opposed it. In U.S. policy and intellectual circles, a residue of this

sentiment remains. Islam must be examined without preconceptions

and understood as an expression of each country's political circumstances.

In general, Westerners believe that the Islamic world is intrinsically

unable to modernize or develop economically. This view overlooks

the economic achievements of Turkey or, more dramatically, of

Malaysia and Indonesia, whose economic growth rates are among

the highest in the world.

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