Modernization has a very broad meaning, one of them is covering the process of obtaining a new image as the image on the direction of change or the image of possible development.[1] The limits of modernization are only focused on the change of aspects in technology and economics. However, as stated by Manferd Halpren, modernizing revolution actually involve the transformation of all previously existing systems in society, political system, social, economic, intellectual, religious, and psychological.
2. Modernization, Globalization, Industrialization, Urbanization and Secularization
Globalization shows the rapid development in communications, technology, transportation and information, which makes the world more narrow because everything is easier to achieved. The process of globalization is also formed by the exchange of information and culture.
The relation with the western world, there are several theories about modernization. For example Daniel Lerner, assume that the modernization is identical with westernization, secularization, democratization, and liberalization. But there is something which makes a dichotomy between modernization and westernization, which is modernization kind of technological and westernization consist of value oriented. But this dichotomy in some ways is not appropriate. For example, aircraft and cinema is a creation of the West, but we can accept the plane but we can not accept cinema. Beside that, in several studies of sociology said that in some areas, industrialization is part of the modernization. This means that modernization has implications for the emergence of industrialization. However, in some other countries, there are some different thinking, which industrialization give implications for modernization, so there is a statement that modern age is due to the industrial revolution.
Historically, in fact the two terms above are closely related, but not synonymous. Modernization is more inclusive, due that modernization can occur regardless of industrialization. As stated by Apter, that modernization in the West preceded by commercialization and industrialization, while in the non - Western, commercialization and modernization preceded by bureaucracy, so Bendix defines that modernization as a whole social and political changes that accompanied industrialization in most countries which follow western civilization. So Modernization can be seen regardless of Industrialization. In conclusion modernization has established a fundamental change of behavior and belief in the economic, political, social organization, and forms of thought.
Economic field, the change can be seen in the form of industrialization and economic growth, the emergence of the need - the need for large amounts of capital, the growth of science and the emergence of class - a new class and social mobilization. Actually Islam’s impact on economic performance is a particularly contested terrain.[2] At the most basic level of individual psychology, one can cite Qur’anic verses that would appear to counsel a fatalistic acceptance of destiny and discourage the kind of striving, experimentation and innovation thought to underlie economic advance (for example, “Believing men and women have no choice in a matter after God and His apostle have decided it” [Sura 33:36]). Yet one can also cite verses that could be reasonably interpreted as encouraging effort and enrichment (“When the service of prayer is over, spread out in the land, and look for the bounty of God” [Sura 62:10]). The Prophet Mohammad himself was a merchant, and some scholars go so far as to argue that of the major world religions, Islam is the most consistent with economic advance. It means that Islam has a possibility to do a modernization based on the economic.
In politics, marked by the emergence of the political parties, units and youth groups. We can see in Mawdudi’s effort.[3] Sayyid Abu al-A‘la Mawdudi (1903–1979) was the one influential Muslim Thinkers. He was the most systemastic thinker of modern Islam. This article is started with a change in the Egyptian Government which led to the release of most Muslim Brethren from emergency detention and also the banning of Ikhwan Organization. The Egyptian Prime minister Mahmud Fahmi and the founder of Ikhwan, he was Hasan Al Bana was dead in that time. Because of that assassination, some of the university students and graduates began to ask themselves questions such as: Are we on the right track of true Jihad to establish Islamic justice through an Islamic state that enforces a God’s Law? Before Bana’s assassination Bana often have writings and speechs which present Islam as a way of life in very broad lines.
After that in Cairo around 1950 a small committed group among those puzzled youth released from detention established a modest bookstore which contained of Mawdudi’s concise writings for example al-Din al-Qayim ( The True or Right Religion ) the Mawdudi’s writing became popular among arab readers. Mawdudi’s also visited and lectured in many cities in the Arab world. Moreover Mawdudi’s writings spoke the aspirations of puzzled Muslim youth, then they trust him as the Islamic thinker and leader who believed not only in the vital role of the educated Muslim youth in the revival of Islam but also in addressing their particular intellectual interests side by side with their spiritual and moral needs and by involving them in social and political activities. So that’s why Arab youth committed to the revival of Islam found and would continue to find enlightenment for their minds and hearts in Mawdudi’s words. Mawdudi believed that negatives and failures must be objectively and honestly presented in the same manner as positives, and he applied this to the political history of Islam, including the period under the last two of the four Caliphs: Uthman (644-56) and ‘Ali (656-61) known as the “fitnah”. He also applied this concept to the history of Islamic revivalist endeavors Mawdudi understands ‘social movement’ as a deliberate, collective endeavor to promote change in certain directions by certain means, an effort by an organized group founded with conscious volition, normative commitment to the movement’s aims and beliefs and active participation on the part of followers and members.
Mawdudi underscored the grievances that Muslims all over the world had against Christian European and American support of Israel against the palestinian people in his response to Pope Paul in 1967. Since the Balfour Declaration in 1917 and the British mandate on Palestine after the end of World War One in 1918, Jewish immigration to Palestine had increased enormously, and culminated in the establishment of Israel in 1948. Israel then carried on subsequent aggression and expansion in Palestine and neighboring lands. Palestinians lost their land and their lives. The Vatican’s suggestion was to put all Jewish settlements under British mandate. Referring to this bitter experience, Mawdudi asked the Pope how one might expect good and friendly relations between Muslims and Christians.
That were the example of Mawdudi’s thinkings and writings which contribute to the development of of Modern Islamic Thinking in The Arabic Speaking World which can rise the emergence of political parties and youth groups in Islam age.
In the social field, a change in the relationship between the opposite sex, mass communication, and urbanization. And modernization also cause diffusion of rational secular norms culture.
Peter Berger states that there are five pillars of modernization:
a. Abstraction, the lifestyle in the form of bureaucracy and technology.
b. Futurity, that the future becomes the principal orientation in the activity and imagination, as well as lifestyle set by time.
c. Individualization, the separation of the individual from any sense of collective entities and forming alliances.
d. Liberation, that worldview is dominated by choice rather than necessity, which means that everything beyond the needs, can be realized.
e. Secularization, a slump in the field of religious belief.
Andrew Rippin mentions factors which have a very big impact in the Islamic world:
a. Ascendasy and Dicline, which means that with the strength of Europe and America in the world, the world of Islam in all parts of the developing world oppressed.
b. Nationalism and Socialism. Modern political ideology by some circles is not the cause of the problem deterioration, but also an attractive modern thought.
Emmanuel Sivan stated that television is one of the primary means and a symbol of an invasion of the modern world, as the most effective means to perform propagation modernization. Meanwhile, DJ Dwyer stated that the town became the center of social change and modernization. Indeed there is a thorough study on the structure of the city, as was done by Terry McGee, said that the city was not a center of renewal, modernization, or changes of society, so there is the theory of dualism within urban communities, which distinguish between modern and traditional sectors. However, the study was conducted in an underdeveloped society, where this kind of life lived by those who come from inland, and in big cities they live in semi village. The city is referred to as the center of civilization and modernization, because of the continuous movement by the people of the village to the town (urbanization), which is based on the desire to achieve live changing in economics, and social changes better. Then Daniel Lerner, in theory, stated that urbanization is preconditions for modernization and development or progress. However, many experts are less optimistic towards urbanization. The city is no longer seen as the center of change and progress, but as a regional crisis, as the center of social problems, disease, crime, and poverty. In the end, poverty is a major cause of social tensions and threatens to divide a nation because of the issue of inequalities, in particular income inequality.[4] This happens when wealth in a country is poorly distributed among its citizens. In other words, when a tiny minority has all the money.The feature of a rich or developed country for example is the presence of a middle class, but recently we've seen even Western countries gradually losing their middle class, hence the increasing number of riots and clashes. In a society, poverty is a very dangerous factor that can destabilize and entire country. The Arab Spring is another good example, in all of the countries concerned, the revolts started because of the lack of jobs and high poverty levels. This has led to most governments being overthrown). So that is why we have to think critically with modernization.
[1] Tim Reviewer MKD UIN Sunan Ampel. 2014. Pengantar Studi Islam.
[2] http://www.worlddialogue.org/content.php?id=302 , accesed on December 22th 2014
[3] Brian, Ghofar, Wulan. 2014. The Review of Article Mawdudi Thinking in Arabic Speaking World. A review for mid term assignment of Introduction to Islamic Studies in Sunan Ampel Islamic State University
[4] http://www.poverties.org/effects-of-poverty.html ,Accessed on December 24th 2014
