Since the existence of poverty, nothingness and authority within the framework of wealth are not coincidental, there are actually defining elements behind some of the things that may appear to be “ambiguous.” It is also clear that the new period before us will not be driven by “individual personalities” since the concept of “individualism projects” as a whole has now collapsed. Yes, the “era of heroes” is firmly behind us. Examples of singular personalities who have influenced the flow of history in the past are the prophets, to the extent that they were able to influence their close circles of supporters and followers who shared the same moral values as them and were also able to influence these people's development. As for class warfare, this does not explain the current situation at all, since in the West, the working class also benefits from global exploitation. So if we can't talk about individual and class states, then we need to look at what the new formats for human expression are.Powerful groups create secretive oligarchies. Aiming to exploit and dominate, these same oligarchies set up lobbies, companies and groups to wield pressure and elicit interests. These in turn are active in wide-ranging arenas. But if reciprocal dependence applies to all of these structures, the volition and acts of oligarchies are not absolute, in fact there are quite a few transparent barriers that lie before them blocking their paths.
The existence of exploitation in the Marxist sense, exploitation which runs deep and is widespread, cannot be denied, although the classic class categories are nowhere to be seen. The masses that are excluded, exploited and pushed a bit further downwards every day can no longer be defined by the traditional class-based definitions and therefore demand different identities. These are masses that are neither proletarian, nor carry the awareness of being proletarian. No, what we are facing is a different sort of exploitation.
So, is it states that possess the real voices now? This is the last possibility that comes to mind because the most fundamental development that brings about the end of modernity is the collapse of positivism. In a world where everything has become relative, where the favorite slogan is “since in the end it all goes anyway!” and where society has dissolved into subgroups and even sub-subgroups, the notion of nation loses much of its meaning. If positivism cannot illuminate everything, then national identity is no longer something that encompasses all of the many societal groups and sub-identities. A nation is already a synthetic creation, one which is kept on its feet only through authoritarian policies and totalitarian instruments. But now the walls of this particular prison have been broken down, and those who were held inside have tumbled outwards. Everyone is looking for a new asylum for themselves, and it will take a bit of time for people to realize that they are within a generous and all-embracing vault of heaven now.
People cannot live without applying meaning to their lives and to themselves. The secularization that modernity has become fascinated with has opened the path toward a deep sense of nihilism, as both Jürgen Habermas and Peter Berger have pointed out in their works. After this stage, individuals will be forced to consider their own beings. “Identity” is an insufficient word actually; “personality” is a word used by people when trying to identify their own existence. When done with the correct knowledge and with the correct education, this leads in the right direction.
No one can live alone. The state of belonging is natural; it is a need. A family that possesses a certain personality or identity becomes a member of a group. This is why, during the coming period, it will be civil society organizations and groups or sects that are going to be the active elements in society. Similarly, it will be the cities of the world that will replace the societies that have dissolved. The transition from “traditional cities” to “modern cities” will occur, with this process overseeing the transformation of the latter into more livable and more humane forms than the traditional cities of the past. Looked at from this perspective, we can say that it is the “central cities” of the world that will define the future of the global world we inhabit. Like the sun, these central cities will dominate and guide that which surrounds them, as well as seeing to the physical and spiritual nourishment of those who surround them. So here's the question: With which cities and in which format will Islam be a part of this new process?
Human history is the history of the clash between good and evil. In its current state, the international global order of life has been affected by exclusionism, by clashes and by exploitation. This effect runs deep and has been internalized in people's minds to an institutionalized and even globalized level. But the crisis we are in now shows us that things cannot continue this way.
