Videos
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15 January 2016“Shia-Sunna conflict is not the main problem in the Middle East, the main problem is the lack of national unity, the lack of state building and the competition between Saudi Arabia and Iran not for religious but for geopolitical problems” explains Fabrice Balanche from Lyon University. But there is another split: the Maghreb is influenced by Europe and the Middle East and Egypt by the Wahhabi culture from the Gulf, which obstructs democratisation in the Region. - 15 December 2015Can lessons be drawn from 16th century France and its religious wars to today’s conflicts in the Middle East? The historian Keith Luria from North Carolina State University tells us how the concept of compromise and negotiation helped open up the non negotional character of religious hostility. But it needed an agency of enforcement. Reset-DoC interviewed Professor Luria during our conference “Religious Wars in Early Modern Europe and the Contemporary Islamic Civil War: Reflections, Patterns and Comparisons” held in New York in Fall 2014.
- 10 November 2015In Tunisia, civil society’s intervention following the 2011 revolution was decisive, explains Yadh Ben Achour, who played a crucial role in leading the country’s democratic transition process during these years. The former President of the Haute Instance pour la Réalisation des Objectifs de la Révolution and now member of the UN Human Rights Committee emphasises that « it was precisely thanks to civil society that we adopted one of the most democratic constitutions in the world as far as the protection of rights and freedom is concerned. » Interviewed before the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the Tunisian National Dialogue Quartet, Ben Achour spoke to Reset-DoC about the courage to compromise that made Tunisia’s democratic experience a unique example among Arab Spring countries.
- 7 September 2015For some, cultural pluralism has been considered a Trojan horse that endangers Enlightenment achievements, notes Ulrich Preuss of the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin. This is in part because cultural pluralism claims different kinds of reason, an idea that seems contrary to Enlightenment ideals. Interviewed during the Istanbul Seminars, Preuss contends that pluralism actually emerges from modern law, which enables freedom, conflict, and dissent.
- 2 September 2015According to Ulrich Preuss, Professor of Theories of the State at the Hertie School of Governance in Germany, Protestantism and the Reformation helped define the European nation state in terms of an ideal of unity in a territorial entity, which became the standard of modernity. But, today, this notion of the nation state is being challenged by immigration, globalization, and technological changes that demand more pluralism. Interviewed during Resetdoc’s Istanbul Seminars, Professor Preuss distinguishes between plurality as a fact and pluralism as a normative, contested idea.
- 31 August 2015For some, cultural pluralism has been considered a Trojan horse that endangers Enlightenment achievements, notes Ulrich Preuss of the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin. This is in part because cultural pluralism claims different kinds of reason, an idea that seems contrary to Enlightenment ideals. Interviewed during the Istanbul Seminars, Preuss contends that pluralism actually emerges from modern law, which enables freedom, conflict, and dissent. – Watch Part 1
- 31 August 2015According to Ulrich Preuss, Professor of Theories of the State at the Hertie School of Governance in Germany, Protestantism and the Reformation helped define the European nation state in terms of an ideal of unity in a territorial entity, which became the standard of modernity. But, today, this notion of the nation state is being challenged by immigration, globalization, and technological changes that demand more pluralism. Interviewed during Resetdoc’s Istanbul Seminars, Professor Preuss distinguishes between plurality as a fact and pluralism as a normative, contested idea. – Watch Part 2
- 26 May 2015“Is the legendary Indian pluralistic ethos once again under challenge by attempts to homogenize and radicalize society around dogmas and creeds?” asks Rajeev Bhargava, interviewed during the Istanbul Seminars 2014. He contends that the threat is real, but an entrenched pluralist ethos and a democratic tradition of checks and balances should be able to contend with it. If channeled correctly, these forces may be able to be contained within reasonable limits and even serve to strengthen Indian democracy.
- 26 May 2015According to Rajeev Bhargava, interviewed during the Istanbul Seminars 2014, Ashoka’s 7th edict is a lesson about public political morality in deeply diverse societies. It encourages people to evolve in their own respective religious-philosophical perspectives towards a mutual moral growth, by which the Other can be enriched. Today, we call this notion pluralism. Toleration, on the other hand, encourages living back to back with a lack of mutual interaction.
- 26 May 2015“We are all incomplete in some ways,” says Rajeev Bhargava. “In order to enrich ourselves and to complete ourselves, we need to mutually communicate with each other all the time.” Bhargava references the work of the Maurya Dynasty emperor Ashoka. In Ashoka’s ideal world people should mix and practice dhamma: listening to a plurality of voices, controlling the tongue, being critical – but with moderation. In the 3rd century BCE, Ashoka wrote the 7th edict, an ethical guide to pluralism, which is still valuable today. For Bhargava, interviewed during the Istanbul Seminars 2014, the edict was not about living back to back, but face to face in search for a common ground.
