Dom Mintoff’s credo regarding security in the Mediterranean is still relevant to today’s unarguably more complex globalised world. European solutions should not disregard the political situation in the Middle East, least of all the role of its major powers in the region. Likewise, it’s high time contemporary intellectuals face up to the inherent contradictions of their own narratives.
Back in the 1970s, during the Helsinki European Security and Cooperation Conference, Dom Mintoff, at the time prime minister, frankly declared – to much hullabaloo – that “Europe is today advocating peace in the Mediterranean because, without peace in the Mediterranean, Europe cannot prosper”.
His vociferous efforts led to the judicious inclusion of a new chapter on security in the Mediterranean in the 1975 Helsinki Final Act.
A few months down the road, the Colombo Statement on the Mediterranean, issued by The Non-Aligned Movement – to which Mintoff was a keen adherent – expressed “its concern over the increasing tension in the Mediterranean” while stressing that “security of Europe, the Mediterranean and the Mideast are closely interrelated” and that, hence, “it is of imperative importance to make new efforts to remove the causes of tension and attain peace and security in that area”.
The Euro-Med Conference, hosted in Malta in April 1997, during the Sant government – which featured a memorable meeting between Palestinian Yasser Arafat and the then Israeli foreign affairs minister David Levy – was a concrete renewal of Mintoff’s pressing concerns a propos the repercussions of extensive civil unrest in the Mediterranean region.
The key political players back then were largely different from our globalised world scenario. At that time, there was the US and Nato versus the Soviet Bloc and its Warsaw Pact allies, with both blocs drawing on different parts of Europe as potential spheres of influence.
Nowadays, to name a few, we have Libya, Syria, Iraq, Yemen and a menacing jihadist insurrection in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Iran, not to mention organised terror groups such as Al Qaeda and ISIS.
I still hold, nonetheless, that Mintoff’s ethos is as pertinent today as ever, particularly vis-à-vis the recent terrorist Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris. I believe, accordingly, that besides considering the contradictions inherent within the prevalent normative values underpinning the pluralistic paradigms of our ideology, European intellectuals, political leaders and analysts alike would better not fail to place these turbulent events in a broader context.
No one stands to gain if the European socio-political landscape had to succumb to the weight of history
The former is a vital task that has to take place, perhaps largely but certainly not exclusively, within the regrettably sidelined confines of European intellectual circles. The latter calls on European leaders to engage in a revision of the EU’s anti-terrorism policy that should, one would presume, bring about some zero tolerance amendments to our Common and Foreign Security Policy.
Furthermore, it should question fair and square the often equivocal foreign policies of the EU’s major powers regarding the Eastern Mediterranean. Any possible European endeavour in this regard that overlooks the political situation in the Middle East – in all frankness – and the unarguably dubious roles of the Western world in its vicissitudes would be nothing short of impolitic.
Likewise, contemporary continental intellectuals – in particular those of a pluralist persuasion who tend to function within post-modern spectra – would better beware any residual modernist biases that might still be compelling them, come what may, to cling on to certain absolutist meta-narratives of yore.
In this regard, certain liberal attitudes towards some aspects of freedom of expression – such as the notion of the categorical right to blasphemy – could provide us with an adequate platform for frank philosophical reflections about the conceptual debris that has actually outlived the demise of modernity in post-modern times.
Simply put, one would have to consider to what degree such a value is still altogether tenable amidst these mounting normative tensions on our soils.
Equally, Third Way adherents could also engage in an analogous exercise by re-examining the successes and failures of their utopian-realist frameworks within the aptly-called ‘high opportunity, high risk society’.
I would propose, in this respect, a sensible engagement with the flexible attitude of meta-modern paradigms – a refreshing intellectual approach that, at least up to my knowledge, has lamentably not yet made great strides in mainstream European thought.
Back to Maltese politics, I would say that the judgement spelled out by Prime Minister Joseph Muscat soon after the Paris mass rally strikes me as somewhat ambiguous.
While subscribing to his advice that “what has happened must not lead to clash of civilisations”, I believe, nevertheless, that in lieu of simply marching side by side with the likes of Benjamin Netanyahu, David Cameron and Nicolas Sarkozy – whose political conduct and human rights track record are, lest we forget, far from spotless – our political class should be bold enough to call a spade a spade.
It’s not clear to what extent Muscat’s position bears resemblance to that of previous Labour administrations. Should we limit our political stances to rhetorics that merely rebut the usual blanket statements uttered by the average xenophobe we might well soon end up being found guilty of not seeing the wood for the trees.
No one stands to gain, bar hardcore Islamists and extreme right opportunistsif the current European socio-political landscape had to succumb to the weightof history.
This is not to say, however, that the horrendous Charlie Hebdo assassinations should not foster a climate of camaraderie and solidarity.
Admittedly, notwithstanding my issues with Mintoff, I would have rather went marching, with him in mind, down the boulevard of the Champs-Élysées than indulging in superficial Manichean dichotomies setting the Charlies against the not-Charlies, not to mention the Ahmeds minority.
So, by all means: let’s show solidarity, but frankly so.
Let us all be Frank.
Kevin Saliba’s main fields are continental philosophy, translation studies and literature.