Biook Behnam
Dr B. Behnam is a Lecturer in the Englsih Department of Tabriz Teacher Education University, Iran
The world has experienced extreme sufferings along the history, due to the lack of an appropriate context for the recognition of other rights, for the mutual understanding and genuine respect towards the ideological, moral and religious values possessed by other ethnic groups or nations. Hostility and hatred have been intensified further by cultural/civilizational ego-centricism imposed by superpowers' against other civilizations, however powerful and indispensable they could be within the whole context of human intellectual realm.
The consequence of this predominant expansionism and ego-centricism has been devastating and destructive on social groups' regional/national identity, without which no strong and sound basis can be established or even imagined for independence, self-esteem and innovation.
Given this, the main aim of this paper is to discuss the inevitable necessity of a constantly peaceful and auspiciously flourishing atmosphere for a dialogue of civilizations, as opposed to the tension-creating, sheer politically-oriented doctrines like clash of civilizations' (cf. Huntington, 1993). To achieve this goal, we will attempt first to introduce some basic concepts related to the issue of civilization with a focus on the contributions of Islamic civilization to the development of Western civilization, and then advocate the proposal of intercivilizational dialogue made for the first time by the Iranian President, Mr Khatami. We will also discuss some primary conditions for the establishment of a dialogue of civilizations, from Islamic perspective.
One logical implication of our argument about the matter would be to claim that if Man wishes to construct a world free of war, poverty and injustice, he/she will have to learn first how to negotiate and interact, thus to welcome the contributions of other civilizations to the overall development and achievements of international community, and thereby believe in the potentiality of other nations not only to develop themselves but also to put forward solutions for the most serious problems humans are now involved in.