I have been thinking about the question posed by Bernard Lewis's book What Went Wrong? The Clash Between Islam and Modernity in the Middle East. Lewis' book is an attempt to explain why the Arab world lost it's technological and cultural lead to Europe. The book is a little short on history for my tastes (the history tends to be ancedotal to illustrate a point) but it does cover the subject matter in a fairly interesting fashion. It's a pretty quick read too. This got me thinking about the question of Arab identity. Two days ago, Iraqis in Baghdad were tearing down statues of Saddam, destroying his picture and beating his image with their shoes (a horrible insult in the Arab world as shoes are considered unclean). What I found interesting has been the reaction of the Arab world outside Iraq. Stunned disbelief was very common, along with some commentators suggesting that it was staged in a Hollywood sound studio. How could there be such a disconnect between the experience of the Iraqi people and the Arab world at large? And why the sadness at a brutal dictator's fall?

I believe that the outside Arab world's reaction can be explained by looking at the larger question of Arab identity. What does it mean to be an Arab in the modern world? Arab identity is defined in opposition to the West. This means roughly pushing away from Western thought and ideas - without necessarily positing a set of values around which to build a positive identity. By continually defining oneself in such terms you hand off your identity to the very people you are trying to avoid. You have set your identity in opposition to whatever the West is producing. Arab identity no longer carries with it the positive identity of centuries past (once world leaders in culture, science and trade) but a distinct whiff of the Other. With this in mind, the disconnect between the Iraqis celebrating and the rest of the Arab world mourning is easy to understand. For the Iraqis Saddam was a brutal ruthless dictator who killed hundreds of thousands and tortured thousands. For the rest of the Arab world he stood in opposition to the West - as a symbol of that an Arab leader could successfully implement Western war methods and Western technology. So for many in the Arab world, Saddam is a symbol of themselves

Arabs must contend that their society, once so rich and so powerful - the very cradle of Civilization itself is at the very margins of culture and without oil, would be of no importance at all. The entire economic output of the Arab world excepting oil is equal to that of economic powerhouse Finland - a country of five million people. This lack of economic power very clearly translates into a lack of cultural power, further contributing to the marginalization of Arab identity.