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I know it is never easy, but if we are about to have a reset then we should do the same with our perceptions of the region. Analysis of the Middle East has been dominated by two widely held beliefs: one is that conflicts are our fault because we are sectarian, and the other is that our problems are the West’s fault because we have been divided into artificial states by colonialism. Both these myths belong to an era dominated by secular nationalist ideas that academia largely favored.
For positive change to happen, we have to believe in ourselves and remind ourselves that, in our region, it is coexistence between sects that has been the norm and sectarian conflict the exception. We must also note that the Arab state system has been rather stable, especially if compared to that of Europe. Let me explain.
First of all, sectarianism is often in the eye of the beholder. Some see it everywhere because they believe it is there. They look for it in situations that we consider mostly as normal politics. Of course, there are politicians who use sectarian speech and sometimes it works in their favor: they create the problems that they then offer to resolve. Some academics even study “de-sectarianization” (my spellcheck insists that the word does not exist). It is as if there is a disease called sectarianism that can be treated by de-sectarianization. This blurred vision happens to people who expect complete homogeneity and do not understand coexistence.
The Arab proverb that says “me and my brother against my cousin and me and my cousin against the stranger” may be a source of confusion. This is often used to explain family and tribal solidarity, but in reality it is prescriptive rather than descriptive: it means you should stand by your brother against your cousin and stand by your cousin against a stranger, because it is often not the case. We all know that the most intense conflicts, since Cain and Abel, are between brothers. Family feuds or internal fights are driven by what Freud described as the narcissism of small differences. You do not really have to stand by your kin — in fact, this is how alliances and coalitions can develop across religious, tribal or ethnic boundaries.
The debate over that proverb is also that, morally, you should stand by what is right, even if it is against your own kin. Moral sentiments, or what is culturally acceptable as a norm, are the product of numerous interactions between people. A feel for what is considered right in a society develops over time and through millions of daily exchanges. That is why societies differ — what is considered normal in one is an anomaly in the other.
There are also traditional ways of resolving conflicts; sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t. In a society where they do work, you will find a diverse population living together despite their sectarian, ethnic or tribal differences. They also share norms developed through long-term coexistence. In Europe, after centuries of conflict, it was resolved that people should adopt the religion of their prince, resulting in largely homogeneous divisions. In former Ottoman lands, it is diversity rather than homogeneity that is the norm — we are children of an empire that ruled over many nations.
Someone coming from a society where homogeneity is the norm will find diversity abnormal and confusing; for them, everything becomes sectarian. We have to believe that diverse populations can coexist in states that cooperate, while respecting each other’s sovereignty.
Another misconception about the region is that the state system is artificial and therefore not viable — that we are not real nation states. This is based on the absurd notion that real states do exist and that there is a natural nation state. The whole idea of nationalism is in fact barely 150 years old and has been the cause of conflicts, rather than their solution. It is true that our borders were artificially drawn, mainly by Europeans, in the aftermath of the First World War. This was a messy affair and they did a bad job following a disastrous war and the collapse of three empires: Ottoman, Russian and Austro-Hungarian.

The idea that the European state system is stable is even more of a myth than the one we are questioning about the Middle East.

Nadim Shehadi

The idea that three politicians, David Lloyd George of Britain, Georges Clemenceau of France and Woodrow Wilson of the US, could get it right was absurd to start with. But they did a worse job in Europe and the result was another devastating war where the boundaries of Europe were again redrawn. They came to their senses after that and worked on creating what later became the EU, which now has 27 members. The idea that the European state system is a stable one is even more of a myth than the one we are questioning about the states of the Middle East being unstable. Since the rise of nation states in the 1870s, Europe has destroyed itself twice, while borders kept changing well into the end of the 20th century.
By contrast, the borders of the Arab states have been far more stable. The League of Arab States was also created post-Second World War and it has now expanded to 22 members from the original seven signatories. The Alexandria Protocol of 1944 promised cooperation in economic and cultural matters, as well as respect for each other’s sovereignty. The fall of the Assad regime promises that we can go back to that. A new beginning is possible thanks to the end of an era where Arab nationalist parties sought to suppress local identities, exploit tensions between them and claim an agenda of regional domination, while deriving legitimacy from their claim of leading the Arabs in the conflict with Israel.

• Nadim Shehadi is an economist and political adviser. X: @Confusezeus