Framing Civility in the Middle East: alternative perspectives on the state and civil society

Abstract

The notion of civility, although commonly invoked in narratives about the Middle East and the Muslim world, fails nonetheless to be adequately framed and investigated in analyses of political change in the region. This contribution confronts this problem by considering, first, how far traditional ‘Western’ notions of civility are relevant to analyses of civility in polities where liberal normativity is not for the most part shared by those individuals and communities involved in everyday civic interactions. It then distinguishes the role that civility is commonly said to play in civil society and, via civil society inthe state-sanctioned framework for a ‘good’ society, from the relevance of civility for society itself. From this perspective the contribution emphasises the importance ofintersubjectivity in the communication of practices of civility, and de-emphasises the primacy of formal liberal norms and values for the recognition of the ‘other’ and the articulation of peaceful societal interactions.