The clash of civilizations by Huntington primarily is an extension to the Foreign affairs article that was written in 1993 by Huntington. In the 1993 report, he mainly hypothesized that there would exist a new post-cold war world order in which different societies would be divided by ideological differences preceding the end of the cold war 1 . In short, at the end of the cold war, the world will not be dominated only by two superpowers, that are the United States and the Soviet Union. In this case, various societies will fundamentally struggle between democracy and communism. However, in the Clash of Civilizations, Huntington main argument is that "The most important distinctions among people are no longer ideological, political or economic. They are cultural." 2 At the end of the cold war, various nations will start defining themselves and their place in the international community by emphasizing their cultural identities. In the article, he states that emerging patterns of conflict only occur along the boundaries of distinct cultures and modes of cohesion that are primarily found within these cultural boundaries.
In the Clash of civilizations, Huntington presents five different components that predominantly support his main argument of the importance nation’s cultural identity. His first argument is that the politics of the world has reached a point at which they are considered multipolar and multi-civilizational 3 . He argues that the world of today fundamentally contains various vital civilizations and power that interact with one another internationally. Consequently, the state that modernization mainly does not result in westernization or universalization of civilizations because when nations develop as a result of industrialization, they necessarily do not adopt western value or otherwise merge to form one common culture 4 . Therefore, in his argument, he specifies that western countries should give up their fruitless attempts at globally spreading western civilization.
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The second component centers on other nations shift away from western powers towards Islamic and Asian civilizations. He states that the current religious resurgence in the Islamic world primarily receives motivation from alienations resulting from modernizations 5 . He argues that when individuals move from their rural regions into urban areas predominantly to work in industries, they particularly lose their sense of identity. Thus because of the lack of robust community or family ties, they turn to religion as an alternative for creating new characters. To support this argument, Huntington states that the continuous rise in Islam religion overall makes Muslim civilization less stable, a factor that makes world leaders turn to religious appeals and young individuals to mobilize around various religious causes violently 6 . Although this is so, alternatively he stipulates that the demographic growth of diverse Islam communities is a factor that increases their strengths to influence global politics easily. This is because Muslims are more culturally confident and additionally are blessed with the power that is needed to promote their culture. He further states that the economic growth in Eastern Asia has consequently made nations such as China to be confident as well. With western civilizations focusing more on their own cultures while at the same time rejecting the lands of the west, the economic strength coupled with the demographic advantage of Asian and Islamic civilizations makes this possible in such a way that it was not during the Cold War 7 .
The third sections argument centers on the fact that international politics is mainly recognized along different lines of civilizations such that the significant players in world affairs become the states of each of the world seven civilizations. In his article, he gives the general structure of cultures as involving core states which has the most reliable and most influential individuals, member’s states which are aligned with various civilizations, cleft nations with more than one influential cultural group, lone countries that are culturally isolated and torn nations that shifted to different civilizations after starting out as one 8 . However, Huntington argues that societies with similar cultures will cooperate with one another in cases that involve international politics. This will, however, mean that countries with cultural differences will continuously conflict with one another. Moreover, it will prove difficult to culturally shift societies since cultural identities will become more solidified and more important.
In the fourth part, Huntington gives the reasons for conflicts between Islam and China to be as a result of the desire of western nations to dominate the world. This is because as Islam and China grow in strength and social confidence, they are unwilling to accept the dominance of western nations although the countries of the west still do not want to lessen their influence 9 . Consequently, Huntington gives a prediction that the west will be unable to influence issues such as militarization, the influx of immigrants and refugees and human rights in the western world as it once did but will instead focus on maintaining its own culture while giving respect to the boundaries of other civilizations.
In the last section, he argues that instead of the west making their civilization universal, they should focus more on accepting it as unique. More importantly, the west should at all cost strive to protect their culture from the influence of non-westerners. For instance, for America to embrace multiculturalism, they will ultimately lose their identities as a western country, and thus they will not be recognized as the United States but rather as the United Nations 10 . Preserving western culture is of most importance since it will allow all nations of the world to maintain a multi-civilization global nature of politics. Therefore he states that to avoid plunging the world into a civilization conflict zone, the west must reject multiculturalism and embrace multi-civilizational 11 .
Brooks argued that Huntington made an error by fundamentally ascribing to qualities that are mainly determined by way of context. He made an error by claiming that Arab lands are intrinsically rather than nationalistic. People in Arab nations like others in various parts of the world predominantly have authentic selves 12 . In short, at times when one set of identity emerge, other equally authentic desires and personalities will ultimately be activated when circumstances change. Consequently, Brooks state that Huntington wrongly defined culture by minimizing the power of global political values and exaggerating the influence of various distinct cultural values 13 . However, it may be stated that he did this because he refused to acknowledge the power that culture holds.
Huntington's article is one fascinating article that gives a clear picture of how the world will look like after the end of the Cold War. Culture is an essential aspect of human lives that needs to be preserved no matter the cost. By stating the importance of nations having their own cultural identities, he acknowledges how having one's own culture might impact various countries.
1 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
2 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
3 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
4 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
5 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
6 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
7 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
8 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
9 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
10 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
11 . Samuel Huntington. P, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order rep ort . New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996.
12 11. David Brooks, "Clash Of Civilizations! Huntington’s Clash Revisited - Church Citizens' Voice", The New York Times, Last modified 2011, https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/04/opinion/04brooks.html.
13 12. David Brooks, "Clash Of Civilizations! Huntington’s Clash Revisited - Church Citizens' Voice", The New York Times, Last modified 2011, https://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/04/opinion/04brooks.html.
