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In “The Rest” — whether Russia with its Slavic nationalism or the Islamic Middle East with its utopian vision of a worldwide caliphate — the West is often viewed with contempt. It is seen as godless and morally bankrupt; culturally rootless; libertine in promoting homosexuality and other sexual practices deemed unnatural and perverse; and ultimately materialistic and low rather than spiritual and lofty. The Rest views itself as utterly superior to the West, something the western mind, to tragic result, does not grasp.

To us in the West, all humans are homo economicus — economic beings. In trying to deal with The Rest, we assume they’re basically like us and will respond to economic incentives. We tend to see jihadists in the Middle East as victims of poverty and assume that, if only they lived in more prosperous societies, they would be less resentful, feel less despair and be less liable to strap on a suicide belt. This western blindness — an idée fixe — is pervasive and resistant to change, regardless of the weight of evidence. Even Israelis who live side by side with hostile neighbours have for decades believed that Palestinian terrorism toward them would dissipate if only they could improve the Palestinians’ economic lot.

Not so, explains Newell, a professor of political science and philosophy at Carleton University, who finds the “despair explanation” lacking. “Usually we are told that terrorist acts, while reprehensible, can be traced to ‘root causes,’ that such acts are born of despair over lack of economic opportunity and the peaceful benefits of a pluralistic secular society. This doctrine was reaffirmed in then-candidate Barack Obama’s first major foreign policy speech, The War We Need to Win, and it has been hauled out every time a terrorist attack occurs on American soil. Yet, in almost all these cases, the terrorists were already living in a secular pluralistic society and capable of enjoying its benefits. So how can poverty and lack of opportunity be the ‘root cause’?”