9/11

Some first rough thoughts to provide a context for and to make a case for the pursuit of a clear coherent and consistent international economic policy by India's policy-makers.

A theoretical and analytical framework for understanding the peculiarities of US empire-building in the new millennium, particularly the current US administration's big push in the year following 9/11, and a discussion of the new themes, policies and strategic goals enunciated and their application to specific regions of the world.

The history of Islam in the US has been changed dramatically by the events of September 11, 2001. The directions now being taken reverse earlier tendencies on the part of American Muslim political organisations to narrow the boundaries of the community and to emphasise foreign policy issues at the expense of domestic ones. These new directions, however, broaden the boundaries of American Islam in other ways, drawing more widely on the religion's rich, long-standing traditions of humanistic and legal scholarship. Importantly also, the directions now being taken are being strongly shaped by non-Muslim politicians and the media in the US, in an interaction between American Muslims and the state that is, perhaps paradoxically, drawing Muslims more closely into national political life.

The world did not radically change on September 11. The reasons for that act of terror lie in the shift in the geopolitical balance of power in the past quarter of a century. The contrasts that already existed are hardening into segments of inclusion and exclusion.

The idea that the Koran and its contemporary interpretation primarily explain the social and political dynamics of diverse Islamic societies is unsupported by any theory or historical evidence. The apparently uniform and narrow theological convictions prevalent in a number of countries is really a product of the neo-imperialist attempt to control the fate of Islamic societies by specific acts of patronage and financial sponsorship. Escape from neo-imperialism is thus the first step, before socio-economic changes create the basis of new possibilities.