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Middle East scholar discusses the importance of a vibrant middle class for stability in the Middle East. (1:32)
 

Full Interview (13:07)
 

Tavis: Vali Nasr is senior fellow at Harvard's Belfer Center and a widely read author whose books include "The Shi'a Revival." Recently he has joined the team of U.S. Special Envoy Richard Holbrooke as a senior adviser at the State Department.

His latest book is called "Forces of Fortune: The Rise of the New Muslim Middle Class and What it Will Mean for Our World." He joins us tonight from Washington. Vali Nasr, nice to have you back on this program, sir.

Vali Nasr: Good to be back, thank you.

Tavis: Before I get into the text, let me start with the Holbrooke work that you're doing. What are you doing, specifically, with Richard Holbrooke?

Nasr: Well, I'm working on his team as part of the experts that provide him with regional expertise as he does his planning and work for the Obama administration, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

Tavis: This is a big question, but what is it most importantly, the two or three things that our government at this moment needs to understand about that region that you spend your time talking about?

Nasr: Well, I cannot comment on current policy, but generally it is for any good policy that we should have, in terms of the conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan, it's necessary to have firm knowledge of culture, history, and political dynamics in that part of the world, and the expertise that other colleagues of mine or myself bring to the table is to provide that, to provide a context, historical, political, and cultural, as well as religious, for our policymakers so that they would have much more targeted decision-making.

Tavis: What are the primary differences now, the changes now that we need to be mindful of that we're dealing with now as opposed to eight years of the Bush administration?

Nasr: Well, those eight years obviously changed a lot of context. In other words, there were things that were possible in that part of the world eight years ago that are not possible now. There's eight years of history, there is facts underground that it's created, there are opportunities that were missed by the previous administration, and the current administration had to start from where it did.

For instance, the Taliban forces gained strength during the past eight years. The situation on the ground in Pakistan changed. The government in that country changed. So we're dealing with a very different set of factors and we cannot enter any set of issues around the Muslim world, not just in this region, as if the past eight years have not happened, that there's no legacy of the previous administration's policies, and that we're dealing with a very different economic, political, social dynamic.

And also on top of all that there's been a global shift in economics and finances, the global financial downturn of last year has made for a very different context in approaching a lot of these issues.

Tavis: To your earlier point, Vali Nasr, about missed opportunities during the previous eight years, what was the primary missed opportunity as you see it during the Bush years?

Nasr: Well, in both Afghanistan and Pakistan we could have followed a very different policy that would have brought sort of state-building and establishment of stable governments much more likely had they been done eight years ago when - right after the Taliban were overthrown in Afghanistan. There was much more opportunity to stand up a functioning government and state that would have been capable of providing security throughout its territory, and we wouldn't have faced an insurgency the way we do today.

Tavis: In your new book, "Forces of Fortune: The Rise of the New Muslim Middle Class and What it Will Mean for Our World," let me start by asking when you say the new Muslim middle class, compare and contrast for me what their middle class looks like and what you mean when you refer to their middle class versus the middle class that we talk about here in America, assuming that we know what that means anymore these days.

Nasr: Well, the old middle class in the Middle East was very secular but was a product of government policies. It was created top-down through education, through forced cultural change, and economically it was dependent on salaries or entitlements or government handout.

The new middle class that I'm describing in the Middle East is coming from below. Its values are much more religious and maybe conservative, but it's tied to commerce and trade and to private sectors and market forces. In fact, the new middle class in the Middle East is much more like the middle class that we find in the heartland of America that might be religiously conservative, believes in piety, but at the same time is economically mercantile.

It's attached to commerce, it's wealth-generating, it's commercial values are tied to market forces. This is something new in the Muslim world, because the Muslim world for a very long time, in many parts of it, has had authoritarian governments that are ruling over closed economies and therefore real market forces and commercial activities tied to the global economy have not been present.

Tavis: That means ultimately what? As they become more tied to commercial interests, it means what for us and for them, for that matter?

Nasr: Well, it means a completely different mind-set because a middle class that is prosperous, that is wealth-generating, that is tied to the global economy promotes - is much more likely to promote values that also middle classes everywhere else around the world do.

And secondly is that whenever we look around the world, we look at Latin America, we look at Asia, we look at Eastern Europe, we cannot find a stable, prosperous democracy that does not have at its heart a middle class that dominates culture, politics, and that middle class is tied to global markets, it's tied to commerce, it's tied to trade.

Even in Western history the great transformation of the West happened with the rise of commerce and the rise of the middle classes that then transformed society, politics, and ultimately religion in the West. And therefore the rise of this same middle class that transformed the West, that transformed other parts of the Third World in the Muslim world probably is the best promise for integrating the Muslim world into the mainstream of global economy, culture, and politics and also defeating extremism.

Tavis: So how do we now engage that new reality?

Nasr: Well, we have to think a lot more about economics and economic engagement of Muslim societies. We think about religion and politics and military issues much more often, but we need to think about economics much more. We need to think about how you can open up economies of Muslim countries so that they would integrate into the global economy so they would create space for commerce and trade and private sectors.

So you would have the rise of the same middle class that is transforming India, that is transforming China, and that has transformed other parts of the emerging markets in recent years as well.

Tavis: I can give you any number of countries, starting with China, and we know - I think the average American can pretty much tell you what the rationale is, at least what we're told, for why we have to engage China. We know they're a behemoth, we know they're growing, we know the money they control, we know they finance our debt, quite frankly.

So we can make the case for why we need to do a - those who believe, at least, that we've got to be engaged with China, we understand the case for that. What's the case for the United States engaging this region of the world economically, which is the centerpiece of your book, essentially?

Nasr: Well, even in engaging China the picture that you describe is only about engaging of economics and governments. But the only force that really can transform China in the direction of an open democracy and a stable economy with which we can have much better relations politically and culturally is the middle class in that country, which is up-and-coming.

It has become wealthier, and as it's become wealthier it wants greater political openness, it wants legal reform, and it wants greater integration into the global economy.

Now, the reason for engaging the Muslim world is that we constantly complain that we have problems with the Muslim world, that they are too anti-American, that they oppose or politics, that they are too partial to extremism. If all of this is true, we should look for the one force that can change the mind-set there, and that's not going to come by us preaching to them or by the force of bayonet from their own government.

It's going to come from below. It has to be a force that is created by markets and economic incentives and ultimately a middle class that has vested interest in the global economy and in coexistence with the rest of the world, similar to the Chinese middle class, Indian middle class, or Brazilian middle class, for that matter.

Tavis: It strikes me as an interesting irony, I'm curious as to your take about the fact that you were writing a book here about the rise of the Muslim middle class and in the campaign that we just endured a year ago for the White House we heard both candidates talking about the fact that we've got to do something to shore up our middle class in America. We're witnessing the decline of the middle class. What do you make of that irony?

Nasr: Well, that actually supports the same argument - namely, stability, prosperity, and democracy needs a large middle class tied to the market. So its decline in America is not a good thing and its absence in the Muslim world is not a good thing either. So the Muslim world needs much more of that middle class that the United States has had for a very long time, and the United States needs to preserve that middle class in order to be able to maintain the stability of its democracy and the prosperity of its society.

Tavis: For those who would say that it's got to be more than just about money in the Middle East and in America, for that matter, your response is?

Nasr: Look at Western history. We talk about enlightenment, the rule of reason, the technological transformation, but ultimately those impulses in the West became dominant because of the rise of economic power in the West, because of the power of the markets.

Market forces are one of the most powerful transformative forces in history, and they have changed the culture, religion, politics of vast areas of the world, beginning with the West, and that's the force that I believe will ultimately transform the Muslim world as well.

Tavis: But that same argument about market forces just crashed our economy and the American people have spent billions of dollars to help Wall Street celebrate now, bailing them out, with that same argument, let the market decide.

Nasr: Well, that, we're looking at a very short run. There is no doubt that capitalism has violent shifts. It has had it throughout history, and that all kinds of government regulations and government institutions have come about throughout history to control the violent shifts in the markets.

But that does not take away from the overall historical impact that the rise of capitalism has had on the West and other parts of the world. In other words, capitalism last year had a violent shift that has damaged many families and our economy, but when you look at the long duration of Western history going back to the 1500s, capitalism has played a tremendous role in changing the character of the West, in changing religion, in changing politics, and it's what accounts for prosperity and wealth and economic domination of the Western world.

And then the rest of the world has been embracing it as well. So we should not sort of mistake the historical impact of market forces with the fact that they ought to obviously be regulated and they ought to be contained.

Now, there is a difference in the Muslim world and the West. The West is having too much capitalism, and it has to deal with the excesses of capitalism. In much of the Muslim world we have too little capitalism and the absence of capitalism has other problems with which we have also had to deal, namely the presence of extremism, excessive anti-Americanism, and a lack of harmonious coexistence between the Islamic world and the West.

Tavis: The new book by Vali Nasr is called "Forces of Fortune: The Rise of the New Muslim Middle Class and What it Will Mean for Our World." Vali Nasr, nice to have you on the program.

Nasr: Thank you for inviting me.