The came into its own this week with the second Beacon for Freedom of Expression conference bringing together sundry Arab viewpoints No venue could have been more appropriate. At the this week, "thinkers" from around the Arab world gathered to debate the issue of expression -- its means, requirements and obstacles -- both in the region and beyond. "Genuine democracy requires guaranteed freedom of expression in all its forms, topmost among which is freedom of the press, audio-visual and electronic media," the Alexandria Statement had declared earlier this year, "and eliminating any form of censorship of intellectual and cultural activities to support freedom of thought, augment creativity and free it from any religious, traditional, private, or political authority under the pretext of public interest. The advance of nations depends on guaranteeing freedom to all intellectual and creative thinkers." Amid the tumult of the region, however, and the skewed global perspectives on power and understanding, such freedom might easily reduce to an abstract ideal. "These days there is much talk of reform," said parliamentarian and professor of political science Mona Makram Ebeid, chair of one of the first of 13 sessions held during this 3-day event. "In fact, talk of reform has reached its peak with the initiation of the Greater Middle East idea, the debates surrounding [secularism]. Everyone is interested in reform except the Arabs themselves, it seems!" Such statements were met with a mixture of laughter and applause. "We have reached a policy crossroads, and we need to take a stand," she continued. "People are voicing it vociferously -- change must come about, we can not give in to obstacles in the way of reform." Yet many academics, writers, sociologists and journalists were eager to distinguish between the words and deeds. The discourse of reform, they agreed, is "but air", its attendant actions harnessed by the Arab leaders' deep-rooted fear of thought, expression and difference. "Reform will only be achieved by a movement towards transparency and accountability," Ebeid stressed. "Emergency laws must be abolished, as they centralise censorial authority and give impetus to arbitrary arrests. Those who make the laws refer to security threats, namely Israel. But the reality is that emergency laws create a situation in which even those threats cannot be adequately opposed." In the next two days nearly 100 attendees were to debate a plethora of interconnected issues. Jordanian Saeeda Kilani of the Arab Archives Institute, for example, spoke of the region's history of censorship. "The rulers and religious leaders have historically used blasphemy as a means to persecution, hampering the creative development of the region. We talk of reform and legislation against the suppression of freedom of expression. The cases of Naguib Mahfouz and Nawal El- Saadawi are classic examples. They were persecuted, their lives threatened. Why did the government remain silent? Why is the issuing of religious fatwas tolerated? We condemn verbally at times, but it is clearly an artificial condemnation, for no action is ever taken. No fatwa is ever revoked. When questioned, the authorities give us the usual, clichéd response about 'safeguarding against terrorism and extremism'. Is this really why such hindrances are kept in place?" Like Kilani, the Libyan human development expert Farida El-Aghali stressed the integration of the principles of free expression and human rights into school curricula and textbooks. "But before that," she said, "we must introduce the young to the history of freedom of thought in Islam, and the impact it has had on the nation. Of 10 school books in Jordan," she pointed out, "only three mention that the nation had a history of fighting for free thought." But some participants shrugged off history as something of the past. "Freedom of expression is the cornerstone of any change towards democracy," Palestinian writer Azmi Bishara said. "We've heard much talk of the historical context -- but this is not 'a historical debate', we do not have a history per se, because if you dig in Islam, then you must dig in Christianity. Freedom of expression is a modern concept that arose with the Renaissance," he emphasised. "It is a concrete subject that must be tackled as a product of a historical phase which is modernity." To Bishara, chairing a panel on "Models for the protection of authors' rights", the debate is really about the present. For his part, in this context, Hassan Hanafi of Cairo University took up one point of question within the "concrete" realm of the present: that of intellectual creativity, its rights and duties. "What must be examined," Hanafi offered, "is the relationship between the subject and ownership. Property can only used in reference to things, whereas ownership is about feelings, ideas, emotions. The idea of property rights ... I propose an alternative concept: that [intellectual creativity] is both a responsibility and a duty. Your production is linked to its [historical, cultural] sources -- your peers, your teachers, your ancestors. The individual is a product of his culture. You own your motivation, your desire, your feelings, and on a most basic level, if you have nothing else you own your body; it is up to you to give it up, to sacrifice it. But the absolute right to ideas is debatable." Our predecessors, Hanafi pointed out, are part of who we evolve into as individuals; that is why ideas cannot be said to belong to us as individuals at a given point in time. "Ideas come through reason, through the cosmos, through debate and through nature. The concept of ownership comes from the West, where everything is owned and subject to the market and the rules of the market. The West is about goods, about the producer, consumer, director. It's a capitalist culture. The power of creativity lies in the freedom to draw on the thought of others. If one owns his thoughts, then you, I or he must request permission to ponder the achievements of Galileo and Socrates." Freedom of expression, speakers and participants agreed, is pivotal to both reform and the advent of democracy. They concurred that the creation of ideas, of thoughts, of concepts, is not only a basic human right but, equally, a duty. "Intellectual creativity is actually a duty rather than a right," Hanafi went on to reiterate. "As an individual you must fulfil that duty, the obligation to create, because it is through it that you contribute to making the world a better place: I belong to mankind, therefore I must serve mankind. But how to distribute rights of ownership in this world of ours? Who owns the invention of the plane? The entire world uses it. People take the basic model and continually improve it, sharing it with the rest of the world, and so on." Hanafi argued that awareness of the fact that we belong to a single entity, humankind, will prove inescapable. Yet in the context of Africa, the gradual erosion of identity politics may not be the priority. At the panel "Focus on Africa", speakers debated specific obstacles in the way of freedom of expression, and hence development. "Poverty is the biggest hindrance; the daily grind of existence means that people do not have the time or capacity to deal with issues of freedom of expression," one participant said. "Democracy is very nice, they say, but it doesn't feed our children, it doesn't make us healthy, it has not stopped the HIV epidemic. So how is Western-style multi-party democracy going to benefit Africa when there is total breakdown in the healthcare and educational systems?" The key, many thought, is in the collective mentality -- making freedom of expression a given, a mindset. "Freedom of expression is not a luxury," Kilani argued in response. "It's a very, very, very basic right. Prior, even, to food. Freedom of expression provides food." The solution, El-Aghali thought, is simple enough -- mainstreaming. "It must be mainstreamed like all other priorities on the national agenda," she said. "Knowledge has been too macro, too closed and elite-oriented. We need to see the joining of hands of all players. We need to see freedom of expression as part of healthcare, education, women's rights, environmental agendas. It needs to be infused into every element of national and regional thought. It must be a national priority. It must become a given." Kamel Labidi seconded her opinion, adding that only thus will humanity be able to avoid another atrocity like that of Darfur. "The government could have prevented Darfur," he insisted, "had it simply let the journalists go ahead and do their job."
