History
Question 1: Discuss the relationship between religion and state under the Ottoman and Safavid empires.
The Ottoman and the Savafid Empire were all rooted in the Islam religion from different branches. The Savafid Empire religion was based on the Shia Islam while that of the Ottoman was based on the Sunni Islam. In the ancient times of around 15 centuries, the two Islam religion branches brought much attention to the notion of high level of rivalry since they were very antagonistic in nature. A closer look at the government structure of Ottoman, the Ottoman dynasty was that of a monarchy. Their system of government was such that there was high level of dictatorship. This is evidenced by the ruler ship of Mehmed the second who led the army of the Ottoman Empire into a war where they conquered the Constantinople on the southern Europe. The context of monarchy made the power to inherit from one royal king to the next royal kin.
In as much as the monarchy instituted by the Ottoman Empire was powerful, the system of governance of the state was very poor. This notion was evidence by the lack of high level of constructs of the constitution to guide on the succession of the leadership. This mismatch in the advent of clear succession role of every king or queen that reigned in the empire led to their weakening. On the account of the Savafid, the ruler of the savafid was a religious leader called the Shai. The religious leader as connoted by the Savafid was to represent the truths that the Quran postulates and hence they to be guided by the connotation of Allah. In this prospect, the Savafid had no tolerance for the non Islams which were quite different from those of the Ottoman who had some tolerance for the non Muslims.
One most important fact about the Ottoman was that there was a clear distinction between the religion and the state leadership. In the savafid, this distinction was minimal since the leader of the savafid was a religious leader. Conversely there was a twist of the inculcation of well trained army for the savafid who controlled the whole empire from any intrusion. One of the similarities that we see in the management structure of the tow empires was that they were manned in accordance to the Muslim faith. The Muslim religious tradition dictates that the Muslims should not fight among each other except for the when bringing on board inception of moral law where some group would want to defy. Both the Ottoman and the Savafid empires relied on the ties that emanated from the Islam to accentuate their individual’s regulations, rules and policies. This notion shaped the way the two empires related at the around 15th and 16th century when they were raging wars against each other. The relationship between the savafid and the Ottoman empires started at around the early 16th century at the point where there was the founding of the Savafid dynasty located in Persia the country of Iran.
The first Savafid- Ottoman rivalry brought out the battle of Chaldiran in the year 1514. This war culminated into the conflict across the borders where these two empires were situated. The transcending effect of this notion was that the Ottoman Empire and the Savafid Persia entered into a treaty called the Zuhab Treaty. The main aim of this treaty was to recognize the fact that Iraq was under the control of the Ottoman Empire. While these negotiations were going on, the Islam religion played a critical role in allowing peace to reign for these two antagonistic empires. This raging wars and conflict continued up to the 18th century where the Ottoman who believed in Sunni version of Islam and the Savafid Persians who believed in Shia Islam came to compromise. The Ottoman – Persian brought out a new relationship concept in the inter-Muslim relations where the supreme states would be deemed to coexist as self governing parts of the Muslim world society. This type of relationship allowed the two empires to coexist in the same region with no quarrels. However, there emerged some indifference due to the advent of internal weakness of the enemy within and how to handle certain revolts that were brought out by each party of the account of suspicion. The treaties like the Erzurum treaty was some of the peace deals that these two empires entered into in order to promote the continued existence of peace in these war tone regions.
It is therefore quite clear that there were two sets of issues that shaped the relationships of the two empires. One was the fact that these two empires had the background of Muslim religion in them and therefore their rules and regulations were mostly coined from the Islam tradition. This coherence reduced the amount of conflicts that they had over the centuries. In specific terms, the rule of law as stipulated by the Islam where one is not allowed to fight with his Islam fellow permitted an advent for negotiations among these noble states. Additionally, the peace treaties that these two empires entered into gave an opportunity for them to dialogue and find the best permanent solution for their unending conflicts.
Muslim law prohibits the conflict against each other. It was only a religious need that would bring conflict while trying to enforce a sacred law. In the question try spur up the conflict, Selim I who was the sultan of Ottoman Empire would use the various justifications from the Muslim law to unprecedentedly, raise conflicts with the Savafid Empire. Selim used the most educated fellows in his empire to cause the truss that would try to eliminate the Savafid who were under the control of the Ottoman Empire. This notion was because; the sultan saw an impending revolt that was to be staged by the Savafid dynasty. The sultan succeeded in labeling the Shah Ismail who was the ruler of the savafid dynasty and his followers as going against the various precepts of the Muslim laws and teachings. The transcending effect this labeling was that Selim authorized his soldiers to execute those who sympathized with the ruler of the Savafid dynasty. This operation was carried both in the entire Ottoman lands and the Constantinople.
In a nutshell, the religion played a critical role in the construct of the two empires. They relied on the Islam laws for guidance on the ruler ship of these states. Again Islam religion determined the peaceful coexistence of these two states and the advent of war for the same. Although the two empires had poor structure of management and internal weakness, the support they got from the religious stance of Muslim religion allowed them to coexist peacefully.
Question 2: Clash of civilizations
The notion of clash of civilizations as connoted by the Huntington postulated the post cold war would be majorly spearheaded by the notion of the conflicting ideology that emanates from the differentials in terms of civilizations. Every community across the world has their own ideology in term of civilizations in which they are deemed to adhere to certain code of conduct as they carry out their daily activities. Religion has been noted to be at the center of the inception of various civilizations. Huntington goes ahead to give an overview of the various religious pacts that would eventually lead to the cold war in the future. A closer look at the western world connotes that it is predominated by the western civilization. The western civilization is seen to be spearheaded by the notion Christian values norms. They are deemed to have a high sense adherence to Christian life with the motive of shunning down other religious connotations.
The western civilization comprises of many countries. These countries are those located in the Europe and America. On the account of the eastern world, there is a mixture of civilizations. These civilizations include the Buddhists, Hindu, Chinese and Japonica civilizations. it is important to note that in these civilizations, there are various norms and statutes that the people bounded by these civilizations believe in. in trying to uphold the connotations that these civilizations portend, the populace that are affected by these civilization tend to abhor other civilization. They try to refute the interest of others and this culminates into conflicts of interest. Huntington gives a descriptive effect of this conflict of ideology and tries to provide a leeway for which the potential war and unprecedented high level of fights across the world.
A good example of the civilization clashes is between the west and the rests of the world. It is a profound thing that the western civilization has the core norms embedded on Christianity. The beliefs and the stories that surround these people are routed in the fact that most of the Christians have a negative picture of the Muslims and other religions as well. In so believing that their values are the correct ones, they tend to spread these values to the rest of the world through the missionaries. The clash would emanate at the point where the western civilization contradicts those values that are tightly held by other civilizations for exams the Buddhism.
In the conquest of conflict, the transcending effect of this notion is that the conflict is war. The war that happened between Iraq and the US is one that has its roots on the differing religious stances between the west and the east. It is important to understand that most of the countries in the west have the same belief that the Muslim religion is uncouth and quite violent. And with this in mind, they tend to undermine this religion and hence try to have a high sense of disregard to the various stipulations brought out by the values of the Muslims. The clashes come on board at the time when every civilization would want its values to prevail across the globe. In so doing they try to trigger the war among these countries between the west and the rest of the world.
On the other hand, I tend to believe that in as much as the clash of civilization is the factor in creating the future wars, there are also other pressing factors that needs to be looked into one of them is the control of power. With power a country or a continent is safe from any brutal attacks. The power comes in the form of economic, the financial, political and social. Every society and country would want to be economically stable. Additionally, the societal upholding of values is also very critical in ensuring that the country stable. To a large extent, the cultural background of country exemplifies the type of rich culture it has and hence how disciplined the country and the communities are in upholding this rich culture. As it stands, the corruption of the ideologies brought forward from other culture will in most cases bring much alteration to the preserved cultures across these communities. A potential conflict I deemed to crop up in the event that these cultures do not blend and people clash due these differentials.
In terms of the economic power, conflict always arise at the point when countries wants to gain the control of resourceful territories which they believe would make them more economically stable. Some countries would go to an extent of causing conflict among the various member states in order to tap their resources. For example, the war between Iraq and the US was meant to destabilize the Iraq country from making the nuclear weapon. The weapon is deemed to be quite substantial in being a super power where they would be deemed quite invincible. This was a move that the US government would not take lightly and in the long end they tried to capture the kingpins to this unprecedented move by the country in order to remain the most powerful country in the world.
Some of the main reasons why the civilizations will clash is because the fundamentality of how these civilizations are differentiated. The civilizations are differentiated in terms of the culture, the marriages, the tradition, the religion and by history. With this notion in mind, it is important to note that these differentiating factors are quite basic. They form the basic notion for which the human being lives. In this sense, it would be very difficult to change one’s civilization and hence the clash will occur due to the disagreements. Additionally, with the advent of globalization and the technological advancements, the world is becoming small village and hence various persons are becoming aware and quite conscious of the various connotations brought out by other civilizations. With the increased awareness of these civilizations, it the clash would be easily spread across nations and continents with keen concern of trying to measure up their civilizations with the others. The transcending effect of this notion is that the countries will have to clash at very high rates since they are aware of every civilization brought forward. Furthermore, the social and economic modernization has made it in such a way that most people are quite separated from the various longstanding advents of local identities. This move has allowed the inception of the religion to fill this gap. Thus in the current context, most people identify themselves through the religious values regardless of the countries where they are, be it foreign or native country. With this in mind, the clash is deemed to occur quite easily where the religion will dictate whose side one is; either Christianity or Muslim. A good example is the killings that occurred in Kenya where the Muslims slain Christians at the Somalia Kenya border by telling by separating them from the Muslims who were on board as well. The test for killing was based on the ability of a person to read the Quran.
Question 3: Globalization
Globalization is the process for which many countries across the world are able to exchange various ideas, their views and various aspects of cultures. Globalizations have brought lots of advantages as well as the disadvantages. One of the merits that the globalization has brought is the economic integration which has seen various countries which were underdeveloped, now developing to a higher stance. It should be noted that as the technological advancement takes place, there are various issues at hand that needs to look into in order to understand how globalization has brought much economic empowerment to various countries. a closer look at the various factors of production, the sharing of ideas between on how to economically utilize certain resources has made the cost of production to be reduced at a great deal for example, in Africa technology from the western countries have been used in making sure that there is optimal utilization of the economic resources such that these countries are deemed to have a high sense of growth in terms of their gross domestic product.
Additionally, through globalization, there has been the interchange of the cultural norms and values across the globe. It this pint you will find that the blending of the various cultures into one formidable one will ensure that the cultures that do not act as per the moral standards would be wiped out and the true culture that embraces the human morals will be exemplified. The resultant effect of this exchange of cultures will help the humanity understand each other in the most appropriate way possible. The humanity has the yearning of ensuring that they peacefully coexist with each other. This coexistence is deemed to be made possible through the blend of ideas which will eventually make them to be at par with each other. Humanity will therefore intermarry; they share cultural rites of passage and traditions among others. Globalization has enabled the humanity to have a rich variety of culture that makes them unique at every point. The uniqueness is seen when the humanity is given the choice of knowing what other communities also does in terms of upholding their norms and comparing it with theirs. The comparison is very important especially in the understanding if various personalities across the board.
The role of globalization in creating unity among the various countries the world is quite evident. As globalization of factors of production takes place, there is a high chance that most countries will have many ties with the other countries. These ties are very critical in ensuring that no country does for the other any harm. For example if USA investors through globalization has realized a business opportunity in Russia and actually invested in Russia, the advent of war will be reduced since the USA knows that it has stake in this country and starting a war with them would mean that their investment in this country will be deemed lost. Such ties are very evident with many countries across the global and this has the transcending effect of creating stability in the economic market and the political arena.
Conversely, globalization has far reaching disadvantages. One of these demerits is the notion of high level of exploitation. Through the direct foreign investment, foreign countries might use the notion of globalization to exploit the resources of the host country for their selfish gain. In the long end the resources of the host country will be deemed exhausted by the foreign country. This has the effect of reducing the economic growth of the developing countries. There would in the long end be a high disparity between the developed countries and the developing countries. Additionally, it should be noted that as the globalization of the factor of production takes place, the international market would be deemed liberalized. The liberalization will allow the import of goods into countries which still incur high cost of production for the same goods imported. The prices of these goods are deemed to reduce. The reduction will hence make the demand for the similar goods produced locally to reduce drastically due to high prices they postulate to uphold their production costs. The ultimate effect of this is that the local industries are deemed to close due to high competition from the international market brought about by the notion of globalization.
Another serious disadvantage of globalization is the advent of the exchange ideas about the cultures revolves around the marriage, the language, and the rites among others. This exchange will eventually become almost the same hence there will be no distinction of the humanity in terms of the culture. The only way people will distinguish each other is through religion which according Huntington has far reaching effects on the notion of clash of civilization. With the advent of globalization and the technological advancements, the world is becoming small village and hence various persons are becoming aware and quite conscious of the various connotations brought out by other civilizations. With the increased awareness of these civilizations, it the clash would be easily spread across nations and continents with keen concern of trying to measure up their civilizations with the others. The transcending effect of this notion is that the countries will have to clash at very high rates since they are aware of every civilization brought forward.
Furthermore, the social and economic modernization has made it in such a way that most people are quite separated from the various longstanding advents of local identities. This move has allowed the inception of the religion to fill this gap. Thus in the current context, most people identify themselves through the religious values regardless of the countries where they are, be it foreign or native country. With this in mind, the clash is deemed to occur quite easily where the religion will dictate whose side one is; either Christianity or Muslim. A good example is the killings that occurred in Kenya where the Muslims slain Christians at the Somalia Kenya border by telling by separating them from the Muslims who were on board as well. The test for killing was based on the ability of a person to read the Quran.