There has always existed a sizable gap between what leftists in the West wanted states and movements in the rest of the world (both the Second and Third Worlds) to be and what they really were. The gap was mostly manageable, however, for most states and movements in the rest of the world in the 20th century were more or less secular, more or less socialist. Liberation theology was a bit of challenge to leftists in the West, but most of them overcame their prejudice through working with religious leftists, Catholic and Protestant, for liberation theology of Latin America was rooted in the religion -- Christianity -- with which they were familiar.
Today, wherever leftists in the West look at in the Middle East, there is no viable political force they can support, for viable political forces are either Islamists or (still arguably) secular dictators (who are gradually accommodating Islamist ideas while still repressing Islamists and any other dissidents who exist). Nada. This situation may be called a kind of "clash of civilizations." So, one might say that Samuel P. Huntington's thesis proved to be a performative speech: the Western power elite have given the thesis a force of reality.
There are secular cosmopolitans in the Middle East, to be sure, but they are few, and many of them tend to be neoliberals due to their class backgrounds or "line themselves up fairly squarely behind the imperial project," as Tariq Ali put it:
<blockquote>MJ: You've called for an Islamic Reformation. Where do you see the best prospects for such a movement?
TA: I used to hope—and I've still not given up on it—that a big reform movement could arise in Iran, which in some ways is one of the most cultured Islamic countries, with a very long pre-Islamic tradition as well which hasn't been completely wiped out. But when the United States and Israel behave in the way they do, then that sets it back. So I'm quite despondent on that particular front at the moment. That's one problem.
The second problem is that in many parts of the Islamic world, secular forces, where they exist, tend now to be so unsure of themselves, so lacking in self-confidence, that in many cases—not in all—they line themselves up fairly squarely behind the imperial project and that then creates a big vacuum in which the Islamists become the dominant power because they are the only ones then who are seen as resisting. And that I think has been a very, very dangerous development in the Islamic world. And when I go often I meet very, very good people—intellectuals, writers—just sitting completely despondent, trapped between the American hammer and the Islamist anvil, not knowing which way to turn. (Paige Austin, "Tariq Ali: Toward A New Radical Politics," 9 August 2006, <http://www.motherjones.com/interview/2006/08/tariq_ali.html>)</blockquote>
I've been saying that what leftists in the West should do is find relatively modern Islamists and secular dictators and back them against truly dangerous Islamists and imperialists, but, as you can see, I have yet to go very far in selling this heretical notion. :-> -- Yoshie <http://montages.blogspot.com/> <http://mrzine.org> <http://monthlyreview.org/>