These days, there are few who still agree with Sir Bernard Lewis, Samuel Huntington, and those others who treat all Muslims as if they were of one violent sect; who treat Islam as an inherently intolerant belief system. As Huntington once put it, "Some Westerners...have argued that the West does not have a problem with Islam but only with violent Islamist extremists. Fourteen hundred years of history demonstrate otherwise..." The question, however, still stands: what is the way to characterize Muslim beliefs and those who hold them? At issue is finding the best way for the West to approach Islam.

As I see it there is no clash of civilizations but a clash within each civilization; namely, between the moderate people who reject violence (from terrorism against outsiders to imposing their beliefs on their own people) and those who legitimate it. In Christianity, it is the division between those who see Christ as a prince of peace and those who see him as the sword. In Judaism, between rabbis who interpret "an eye for and eye" as a call for compensation and the Jews who interpret the text as a call for revenge. It is a division equally found in secular belief systems, for instance within Socialism between Fabians and Stalinists.

Islam is no different; there are Muslims who see Jihad as a spiritual journey of self development, and those who view it as a war on all infidels. (It takes me fifty pages to fully document this point in my book Security First). However, it is important to note that many of these religious and politically moderate Muslims do not favor the full plethora of human rights and Westminster democracy. Still, they can and do serve as reliable partners in peace, working against terrorism and for curbing the spread of nuclear weapons. In the words of Barak Obama, "If we could win a battle of ideas against the communists, we can stand with the vast majority of Muslims who reject the extremism that leads to hate instead of hope." You will find such Muslims in Turkey, as the majority party (the Justice and Development Party); in Morocco (the Party of Justice and Development); they are the majority of the citizens of Indonesia, Bangladesh and many other Muslims countries.

The May 2008 issue of The Cambridge Review of International Affairs (http://www.cria.org.uk/) includes an exchange by prominent scholars of religion on this thesis: that the majority of Muslims are 'illiberal moderates'--opposed to violence and terrorism, but not necessarily in favor of a secular, liberal democracy--and that the major clash is within each civilization between the warriors and the preachers rather than among civilizations. Many important questions are raised in this exchange, some of which follow:

Some dispute the argument that all religions are equally susceptible to moderate and immoderate interpretations. For instance, Jean Bethke Elshtain of the University Of Chicago writes: "...in the Christian just war tradition, there are criteria through which one must go--barriers, in effect, to the deployment of armed force--you have to justify force; in Islam, you must search for ways to refrain from force."

I am not fully convinced that all of Christianity does not legitimate violence. I will not rehash the complicated question of the role the Church played in Nazi Germany and during various communist regimes, and look merely at the role of the Church during the military dictatorships in Argentina and Chile. Here, the Church unquestionably legitimated the torture, execution and 'disappearances' of hundreds of socialists, liberals, and others because it considered the war against communism to be a holy one.

Also, I am particularly concerned by any implications that 'Islam' is monolithic, subject to one overarching interpretation as being in favor of violence.

Others raise questions about the justification, stability and longevity of any alliances with 'illiberal moderates,' given that there is a lack of fundamental agreement on basic moral principles. Mohammad Fadel of the University of Toronto writes that the only way to justify supporting 'illiberal moderates' is the prospect that, by doing so their views "evolve from merely formal democratic commitments to more principled ones."

I agree with Professor Fadel that in the longer run, merely formal commitments from 'illiberal moderates' will not do. The history of the EU illustrates this point. It was initially founded to ensure that there would be no furthermore wars between Germany and France, but eventually moved to much higher levels of transnational integration. The EU is now facing serious problems in part because, although it formed shared institutions, laws, and regulations, it failed to form a thick enough set of shared values to legitimate these state-like developments and to provide a normative underpinning for their policies involved.

We should neither continue to support authoritarian regimes (such as in Saudi Arabia) nor should we pursue a policy of externally-imposed regime change. We should, as Fadel suggests, favor and support internal changes especially by reformist forces. But, one must keep in mind--if one begins political reforms with free elections, these non-moderate groups are likely to win, leading to a situation where there is one person, one vote, but for one time only. Hence free elections are best preceded by other steps such as rewriting the constitution, freeing of the press, allowing rival parties, and maybe some measure of economic development.

Amitai Etzioni is a professor of international relations at The George Washington University. For more discussion, see Security First (Yale 2007). To contact him, write comnet@gwu.edu. www.securityfirst.com