On Samuel Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations vis-à-vis John Blair and Jerusha McCormack

By

Bright Mhango

(D2019008)
Samuel Huntington was an American alarmist, academician and political ‘scientist’ who is
best known for his Clash of Civilization Theory. The theory was a response to his former
student’s theory which purported that in the fall of the Soviet Union was the ‘End of History’
and that from that point on the world would have one superpower and Western liberal
values would rule the game.

Huntington responded to this by saying in the new world there will be no more ideological
conflict and that conflict would instead emanate from cultural differences. He seemed to
zoom in specifically on the impending clash between Christian and Muslim cultures. The
theory has drawn a lot of controversy especially at the end of the 20th Century.

His book is important because in the wake of the fall of the Soviet Union, many had been
wondering what was to be and he sort of filled the gap with his theory. To some, he correctly
predicted Russia’s taking of Crimea, he correctly predicted the rise of Islamist issues in West
Asia1. The September 11 Attacks in the USA made his theory very salient amongst the talking
heads on TV. With George W. Bush making Islamic terrorism a central theme of his reign, it is
hard not to acknowledge how many could easily draw inspiration of Huntington’s theory.

Blair and McCormack in their book Western Civilization with Chinese Comparisons (2010)
agree with Huntington on the definition of Civilization, but deplore his focus on religion as
more salient a feature of cultures than others such as language. The focus on the Christian
versus Islam dichotomy leaves out most of Africa and Asia and emanates from what the
authors call ‘West-centric.’

The authors then opine that Huntington focuses too much on conflict and that his ideas in
his Clash of Civilization theory were canonised by some events such as the 9/11 attacks. The
authors think this way of looking at comparative studies is not the best. They instead
propose that while differences in cultures be acknowledged, they should inform dialogue
and understanding and not division.

The problem, the authors argue, is that Huntington argues in the Aristotelian way: putting
things in categories. This, style makes people blind of the links and similarities between
phenomena and instead makes them over-emphasize on the differences.

1 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qu5M9q4sR8s
As a solution and as his favourite approach, the authors propose Ludwig Wittgenstein’s
approach which they say improves Aristotle’s approach. Wittgenstein in his Games and
Family resemblances approach says just like nobody expect members of the same family to
look exactly the same, and just like how humans enjoy both competitive and non-
competitive games, there is more to understanding and describing phenomena than sticking
to strict categories about them.

Blair and McCormack are right in their criticism of Huntington, who has a penchant for the
controversial and shows some racist undertones having advised the Apartheid regime in
South Africa and his last book being very anti-Latino if not blatantly white supremacist.
Huntington is indeed always looking to and most often too easily boxing phenomena into
simplistic monoliths and then making wild and unscientific claims about them to fit his
agenda.

Using the family resemblance instrument one can still use it to back Huntington by saying
even though Western Civilization is divided and diverse, there are certain things that are true
about the people in it that cannot be found in people in other civilisations such as the
Japanese civilisation.

In their criticism of Huntington, the authors seem too focused on using comparative cultural
anthropology for good ends. they seem too eager and ready to prescribe their feelings over
all people who compare cultures. This is a bit unwarranted because as it turns out, the big
flashpoints in the world since the Cold War have been, among others, about cultures
clashing (Rwanda, Al-Qaida and the rise of ISIS or right-wing violence in the West).

While not scientific and while also too Aristotelian, Huntington is still saying something and
even if it is not something that brings forth peace or understanding, it is still a theory we
must contend with.