Abdullah al Andalusi – Liberalism’s unsolvable problems – with Dr Graham Oppy

			To learn more about how to critically engage and understand Western political philosophy, and its
attendant political and ethical systems, courses are available by the Quran Institute, which can be
accessed via the link. I'd say that Islam actually manages plurality better than liberalism, but
those who don't believe in the Islamic purpose of life, Islamic law, while it might underpin the
security of the lands and the state, and hence will prevent robbers and invading armies and things
like that. It's not there to make Jews, Christians, and Zoroastrians, and others better Muslims
because they're not Muslim. So in Islam, Christians and Jews could actually have their own law
		

			courts, their own law courts their own, in some cases, even their own police and semi autonomous
areas, no one was telling them that they're against the they are not following the values of the
state, or they're not integrating it or assimilating into the into the wider society, there was no
such challenges in liberal societies. However, the idea of a one law for all sounds very laudable at
first, but when you actually think about how you apply this, you're basically saying that one law
might be determined by the majority that say, or at least representatives of the majority, will will
basically impose one particular law system on everyone, including the minorities that might disagree
		

			with those the law system, and basically that that can involve a form of intolerance, where
communities are told that you can't do these certain practices, because it doesn't conform with the
law of this country, or you're not allowed to have your own law system, because that is in
derogation of the of this one law for all what you find is that Muslims and historically Jews, but
as sometimes also Catholics, their own law systems were viewed as active threats to the state right
now. It's Muslims, Muslims, a practice of just even voluntary Islamic law courts or more like
tribunals are not really slimy. They're not courts, really, they're just tribunals
		

			are viewed as a threat to the state and the state. Now, state must clamp down upon these or regulate
it or, or get involved in their religious life and affairs, because it is viewed as a as a fret. So
those are the issues that liberalism has a problem with tolerance of multiple ways of life other
than its own, I'd say in practice, whereas Islam actually allows separate law systems for Jews and
Christians and others, to practice their own laws amongst themselves. Islam kind of offers more
tolerance than liberalism only because Islam doesn't view itself. It can't view itself as imposing
itself on everybody. Because the purpose in life is to voluntarily choose the to worship the Creator
		

			to recognize his existence, and to follow His commands it must be done voluntarily can't be done by
imposition. Whereas liberalism believes that liberalism itself is universal justice for mankind. And
so it's universal justice for mankind, and every human on this earth has a right to liberalism,
whether they like it or not. And so it means that we're currently be one law for all in every
liberal state. But it could also mean that liberal states can exercise colonialism as it's called to
export its ideology to the world, because it believes that every human being has a right to what it
calls with its own definition of human rights, irrespective of whether those people like it or not,
		

			or agree with it, or accept it, and so on so forth, colonialism was justified from a liberal rubric.
I mean, I think that there are a few things to keep separate in the discussion. One thing is about
the distinction about the laws that you apply within a state, and what you think governs the
behavior of states. And liberalism was a doctrine about what happens within a state. It wasn't a
doctrine that spoke to relationships between states. And there's a kind of, and there are kind of
very obvious differences here. Because within a state, you've got a government, all the citizens are
subject to the government, the nations are not subject to any kind of ruler. And so you shouldn't be
		

			thinking, as you very quickly said, that liberal theory was used to justify colonialism. That's
actually I think, not true. He said that liberal theory was never used to justify colonialism,
because states in their international relations, were not subject or beholden to laws, whereas
domestically, they're beholden to their own laws.
		

			I think I would disagree. John Stuart Mill of you with many wrote many, many tracks about how
colonialism can be justified and why and why it's a good thing and what should be the policy of
liberal states and concerning foreign relations with quote unquote, barbaric nations, eventually
they will have to be subdued, and they will have to be controlled with an iron fist until they are
able they adopt liberalism, then they they can be independent and autonomous and they've reached
much maturity. Now, the thing is this that when any state goes to war, the state has to explain to
me
		

			As people why it's going to war, it can't just say, Hey, we're going for money, we're going for well
for fame that people just wouldn't accept specially, in, in representative systems whereby, you
know, political parties want to get reelected. So they make excuses like, or that they have to give
some justification that the people will accept the very least. Whether it be civilizing the natives,
we're doing it for their own good, we're educating them for their own good, we have to go over there
and give them superior enlightened values. So, liberal theory has been used justified colonialism
very much. So
		

			Tocqueville mentioned discusses this, as well as many others. So I would, I would very much
disagree. That liberal theory has not been used to justify cronyism, indeed, it was centrally
located in justifying colonialism, because the people wouldn't accept any other any other reason why
you going around the world and sending British troops to die. For what purpose? Graham, what do you
make of it? I, one thing is to distinguish between liberal theory, what the theory says, and what
liberal theorists have said, when they're speaking about other matters. And when it comes to the
question. I mean, when when I said, Look, liberal theory is a theory about the state. It's not a
		

			theory about international affairs. And you started talking about what some liberal theorists said
about international affairs, that doesn't mean that what they were giving you was some consequences
of liberal theory, they were just giving their independent views about how they thought
international affairs should go. And it's that's just got no consequences for liberal theory as a
theory of the running of the state. There's another thing is that
		

			liberalism, like Islam has a very long history. And I
		

			you have to draw a distinction. One distinction is between theory and practice, what the theory
tells you another thing is, this is another point about history, that, certainly with liberalism,
there's a development over time. And the theory improves, and their ideas that were had by the
founding fathers, people like Hume, and Locke, and can that have been disavowed by subsequent
generations of liberals, and you can't prove anything by appealing to things that they said that the
professor says quite, quite
		

			aptly that there is liberal theory and as liberal theorists, and so just because one of the founding
fathers of America might have slaves, it doesn't mean that that liberalism believes in slavery,
which I totally would concur with him on that. But then this brings us to the fundamental problem of
actual liberalism itself. What is the holy book of liberalism, the texts that we can refer to the
limits of the amount of interpretation that can come from, from liberalism, a set A parameters to
it? Well, there isn't any. So then what then makes something liberal what so what is liberal theory?
It's not a platonic form that floats around that we can access and refer to but liberal theory is,
		

			is anything that liberals say it is, is my point. And when I was talking about John, we're not
talking about sorry, people, liberal theorists advocating colonialism or what have you. It wasn't
perhaps them just saying, I think colonial colonialism is a good idea. They wrote detailed tracks,
relating their own thinking, the thinking there on the books, and in fact, on liberty, the classical
book by John Stuart Mill talks about imperialism and colonialism and justifies it in his own book on
liberty, which is viewed as a great reference for for classical liberals. But for social liberals,
mostly, I say, we under Social liberalism today, as the most dominant form of liberalism. Today, we
		

			know this as liberal interventionism of a different kind. So be spreading democracy is also a key
argument or spreading freedom was also used to justify the war in Afghanistan. You could also want
to read other books by John Stuart Mill like on the treatment of barbarous nations. He discussed
that in bit more depth, but you can see his justification for colonialism and imperialism in his
book on liberty, which is a very seminal book of political philosophy by John Stuart Mill you if
ever you're going to study the political philosophy John Stuart Mill, upon which much of the current
game modern liberalism or social liberalism is at least from the Anglo Saxon perspective is
		

			certainly based upon on liberty is the most preeminent book of his there is no separation between
liberal theory and liberal theorists, if the liberal theorist is using is making a philosophical or
politically political argument about something related to their their other ideas, then it's part of
liberal theory, I would say, there is no set there's no holy book of liberalism, which is why you'd
probably get more diversity in interpretation.
		

			and hence more lack of clarity in political philosophy than one where you have a holy book which at
least limits the amount of possible interpretations that one can can produce as to the practice of
the Prophet Muhammad Sallallahu wasallam sayings to the actions of Muslims. We can make a quite
definitive border between those two things we concern circumscribe that the Prophet Muhammad
Sallallahu Sallam is, as we believe is a prophet, and his sayings are the basis of our ethics of our
law. But Muslims activities or actions are not and can never be. And so if the prophet muhammad
sallallahu sallam said if the Quran says something, it has absolute authority, from our perspective
		

			and, and overrides anything else that we might want to bring later on. And I think that is a good
thing. Having laws and ideas founded upon immovable and immutable bases prevents people from
abrogating these ideas later in, in in a civilization.
		

			I guess Bella's making the claim that there's a sensuality that the Islamic tradition has that we
can sort of put a discreet boundary around, right. So this is within the tradition, this is not.
This is history, history is not legal precedents. This is legal precedents, legal precedents is in,
let's say, the form of their heads, or whatever jurisprudence that we have. And that perhaps
liberalism and this is one of the questions that was asked
		

			is it true then that liberalism fails to have this first principles approach of creating a boundary
by which it defines what is and isn't liberalism, and in failing to do so, carves open the space
for, I guess, projects like the colonial project, which was to enlighten the rest of the world with
a very Eurocentric vision of what it means to be the good Okay, so there's a few things I wanted to
respond to and if I.
		

			To learn more about how to critically engage and understand Western political philosophy, and its
attendant political and ethical systems. Courses are available by the Khan Institute, which can be
accessed via the link