APPROVED FOR4 CM HISTORICAL REVIEW TOOC'RAM
TITLE: "Face" Among The Arabs
AUTHOR: Peter A. Naffsinger
VOLUME:
STUDIES IN
INTELLIGENCE
A collection ol articles on the historical, operational, doctrinal, and theoretical aspects ol intelligence.
All statements of fad. opinion or analysis expressed in Studies in Intelligence arc those of
the authors They do not necessarily reflect official positions or views of the Central Inielligence Agency or any other US Government entity, past or present. Nothing in the contents should be construed as asserting or implying US Government endorsement of an anicle's factual statements and interpretations.
down his father's favorite cherry tree, showed his sterling character by confessing to the deed. An Arab hearing this story not only falls to see the moral beauty of such behavior but wonders why anyone would ever compromise his Integrity by admitting thus his guilt. As to Washington's explanation thatannothe Arab asksan could rise to the presidency if he were not suave enough toell-concocted falsehoodactic in emergency behavior.
The values and rationale underlying these reactions are an aspect of "nationalactor said to be ofIn estimating likely courses of national action andof Importance In dealing man to man withyndrome of the Arab values can be called the face concept, an understanding of which is essentialase officer In his Interpersonal relationships with peoples stretching across North Africa and from Greece to Japan. Although we arehere specifically with Arabs, the same conceptroad way to most Muslim groups and to some Far Eastern peoples.
An understanding of the concept will help define an area of potential difficulty In personal relations and give Insight into stated and unstated Eastern attitudes. It will explain the extreme difficulty of resurrecting once-fallen politicaland getting them any public acceptance. It will show motivating forces which may be operationally useful, forInharacter defamation.
The high value which the cultural patterns of the East place upon the concept of personal dignity is central to thatfrom which the frustrated American encountering ft for the first time is likely to conclude that an Arabiving
iiniiHiiffr
"Foct"
or else deliberately perverse. Although there are many demographic and cultural subgrouplngs of thethe Arab may be an agriculturalomad ol theeafarer of the Persian Qulf,niversityideal offaceniversality among them, soeneral analysis of the concept will be pertinent, with minorto all. Yet It should be borne In mind that, sincegroups consist of Individual men, there will be Individual deviations from the generalizations drawn In the following discussion.
A society expects from all its members an adherence to its own norms and values. According to the degree to which they do so adhere, people are judged acceptable or not acceptable In that society. For the American, earning socialby maintaining his honoratter of equating honor with personal integrity. The American manifests his Integrity by an uncompromising willingness to face objective truth and fact. Personal respect and acclaim go to him whouthless search for facts regardless of bow self-damaging tbe results may be.
The American can apologize for revealed shortcomings and gain respect and prestige with an honest effort to correct bis own errors. In our culturally determined scale of values the achieving of impersonal objectivity with regard to facts and truth Is thus more Important thanan'sdignity before tbe world at large. At all times and In all circumstances the American Is culturally obliged tohis position and his person with truthfully Interpreted reality: witness the fact that the verb "to rationalize" usually has for us an ethically negative flavor.
The Arab in bis society Is likewise expected to showIntegrity In order to be socially acceptable. He, however, manifests his honor and Integrity byublic, outward impression of dignity derived from an ostensible lack of guilt. Even If facts and conditions speak to the contrary, the social veneer of non-guilt must be maintained evident and dominant If he Is to achieve the socially demanded face. Dignity and stature are granted only to those who show themselves as flawless; the society of the Arab world has no place or respect
(or one whose faults or errors come to public knowledge, lllarae. fault, or error accruing to an Arab personally brings his Immediate fall from social graceoss of dignity or face. Be therefore feels revulsion and bitterness forthat tends to compromise him In this way.
Americans and most other Western-bred persons regard It as merely socially lncortalderate or impolite to mentionerrors In public Management courses leachlogically graceful ways to correct erring employeeshurting their feelings, suggesting for example "Maybe it would be better if we did thlsjanothcr way" InsteadlunttttU eeo-damaeing "ToujareyoWould be quick to grasp the wide divergence between the two approaches. But what In American lifeatter of tact and consideration Is toighly charged socialwith many complexities and subtle ramifications of which the American would never have dreamed.
If, as becomes evident after some exposure to Araba lack of guilt la what confers on an Arab the dignity or face by which his personal Integrity and socialare measured, there must be further consequences flowing fromisplacement of criteria In the social value system as this seems from the viewpoint of Western culture. If lack of guilt gives social dignity, the Arab must maintain his guiltless appearance at all costs. Facts and circumstances can combine in many different ways to reflect unfavorably upon any man, but tbe Arab cannot afford to allow accrued facts or logic to Impute any flaw or guilt to him personally. In self-defense he must interpret tbe assembled factadeny them outright, or reject as illogical anythat leads to intimations of personal shortcomings. To tbe American this defense isistortion of truth, and therefore paradoxically destructive of Integrity, unless he can take the Arab point of view and recognizeface asigher value than fact or logic In the society.
There are. It la true, many situations In American and Western society In which this kind of defensive thinking tends to arise; but Westerners are expected to be able to recognize and admit tbe logical flaws when they are pointed out to them. Severe cases of inability to achieve objectivity are Interpreted In American society as manifesting pathological symptoms of
COHriPE*"Face"
neurosis or psychopathic personality. Not so In the Near East. In the dynamics of the Arab social system dignity or face is not compromised for the sake of the lesser values found ln fact and logic.
In an oil company Installation near the Persian Gulf, an American linguist in the training department, after drafting some exercises to be used in instructing American employees in spoken Arabic, gave them to three bilingual Saudi Arabs working for him to check for syntactic and orthographicbefore publication. The drafts were all tacitly
(
okayed, returned without change; but after they hadpublished several glaring errorsta^the,workistressed, the linguist questioned the three Arabs, whoexplained that the inaccuracies had of course been obvious to them but they did not feel It would be right to point them out and thereby cause embarrassment to their boss and good friend)
Here the Incompatible American and Arab attitudeswell the different dominant criteria of each. The American was interested solely in the objective accuracy of theatter which was of secondary importance to the Arabs. They believed In good faith that they had acted with honor as gentlemen in protecting the linguist's dignity above all other considerations.
If an American family In the Near East uses domestic help from the local populace, it may often happenase, say, is accidentally knocked over and broken during the cleaningoom. When the housewife comes upon the pieces, perhaps picked up and disposed of, her only minimally tactful "How did you break theill be mettartled look ofa sheepish grin, and then,ew hestltatlngof agonized embarrassment, likely the reply,ould never break anything of yours 1"
The housewife's account of the incident to her husband will
probably center on the outrage to her Western
aw the pieces he had the nerve to stand right there and deny It to myut the servant, though he truly regrets the accident and would not have done anything of the sort on purpose, has by bis own lights reacted naturally and properly in repelling the Immediate challenge to hisubtler approach by the housewife, merely taking notice of the debris In the presence of the servant, would probably have
elicited fromiscreet explanation of how. the vase fellas dusting the furniture" and thus graciously permitted him to save face.
In matters that may Involve him ln guilt or blame the Arab's untruths, half-truths, avoidance of reply, or other ploys that jar Westerners do not spring from any perverseto deceive; they are facets of the need to maintain that personal dignity and face which ln his system of values take precedence.
Public Image vs. Personal Conscience
s Uie American isespecttoblectivlty and facts, he Is also encouraged to reconcile his personal position with the relevant facts ln any given situaUon. From his earliest years he Is Impressed, by story and example, with Uie nobility his culture attaches to the act of admitting his guilt orfallings which have contributed to some acknowledged larger wrong. He Is Imbued with the conception that it is manly to own up to his guilt straightforwardly, even at Uie price of self-injury or extreme embarrassment.
So firmly is this Idea Imposed that every American, except the psychopathic personality, can have intense feelings ofguilt and may even lie awake nights worrying about wrongs, real or fancied, that he has done to cause hurt to others. He can relieve these guilt feelings by making anto the injured party or otherwise rectifying the wrong. The embarrassment entailed In admitting error is of lessthan Uie need to alleviate the pangs of guilt.
Christianity emphasizes the personal God within each man, who enforces an ideal of perfection in behaviour and in thought. The sacrifice of the "only begotten Son" dramatizes this personal God Interested in each individual soul. The Christian Is supposed, by prayer or confession, to ask pardon for every instance of failure to reach perfection, and It is not difficult to see how this concept couldense ofguilt and obligation beyond self. The development of conscience or capacity for feeling guilt in religious lifespills over into non-religious contexts in cultures where Christianity Is dominant and so Is evident In other acts of life.
Offering sharply contrasting principles to these, Islam-re Uglon, social force, and almost complete way of life of Uie
Arab
h Nearshapes much of the Arabs' cultural attitude. Even the Christian Arabs are immersed in aof Muslim culture. By definition and profession, Islam is the "surrendering of the self to the will ofnd itod remote, all-pervading, and wholly out of contact with the individual man. In prayers, to be sure,Implore Ood to do well by them and lead them on the right path. But all of Muslim theology conveys the feeling that God Is so all-pervading and at the same time so far above and removed from the Individual that all human actions and their consequences are but the sequels of God's doings: thendividual Is merclv-an animatehis supremelyGod, ahoveand beyond rather than within aImpresses on the Individual no requirement to accept guilt or personal responsibility for anything or toonscience differentiating between Intrinsic right and wrong.
Thusesterner tries to show an Arab that he Is to blame for something, he never really succeeds In getting the point across. Western personnel at oil Installations ln Iraq, Syria, and the Persian Gulf area are frustrated ln trying to correct mistakes of Arab trainees on industrial equipment When confronted with havingrong move that could have had the most serious of safety or technologicalthe Arab Is unwilling and unable to accept the idea that he should feel either sorry or responsible for his mistake. He dismisses both blame and censureasual "mmis fromo the remonstrance that it had better not happen again he answersIf God willsith exasperating nonchalance. -In agent work, wherecannot be so close, this indifference to personaland tendency to atomistic thinking: willbe even more troublesome.
To the Arab, all is from Allah, and If Allah does all. thecannot be held responsible. Man is required to follow the teachings of the Koran and the Had 1th and to perform his religious obligations, but he Is not answerable to an Inneronscience. Insteadense of personalfor his acts, the Arabeeply inculcated fear of outside forces; he realizes he must answer for his actions to society. This social sensitivity, together with his all-Is-from-Allah fatalism, may In some measure explain why the Arab world knows scarcely any suicides, that common aberration
of Christian living in the West. At any rate It explains why he Is more Interested in the face be presents to society than in exposing the factsituation.
The Surrogate
The Arab's need to project his selform completelyto the harsh Judgments of society renders his lace, his dignityype of surrogate as thought of In the philosophy of Jung, one In which he wraps the very essence of his being. This is another form of that transference of self in complete allegiance which is an easily accomplished ma-
has become the leader. The political surrogate with which the people Identify themselves and their very souls mustundergo deification to be worthy of their complete faith, allegiance, and devotion, and he must necessarily remain free of any conceivable flaw, unblemished In their eyes. At the first sign of failure, faltering, or political error, he immediately loses allto some new strong political personality movingsuffers his demise without anyone wondering why he was once In such high acclaim. Thereointed moral here for anyone trying to Influence politicalin Muslim countries:riarisrnatlc leader had been overthrown. It would be most difficult to arouseor popular following to place him In powerountercoup would be hawking tainted goods.
Asurrogate within tbe Individual Is the outside mask or face to which the self or ego Is transferred by the Arab, along with all his pride and setf-esteem. This faceto society at large then assumes more Importance thanl self. The finding of defects or faults In It constitutes an attack on his very being, for there is no alternativeto which the ego can be transferred. Hence the Arab whose Integrity or face Is challenged and In danger of being found Imperfect Is Inelicate position. He has to go to extremes to keep his social mask Intact, thus taking actions completely contrary to the Western ethic and bewildering to the Westerner.
The constant effort to keep up face seems almost paranoiac by Western standards. Entertaining delusions of grandeur, claiming to be persecuted, magnifying faults In others that
Arab "face
one wants to hide in oneself, calling constantly forand resurgence of pastthis Is behavior typical of paranoia, but It Is manifested ln every Arabicnewspaper and among individuals ln day-to-day socialIt cannot be considered abnormal In the Arab cultural setting. Given the Importance of face to the Arab, such behavior must be recognizedocially practical and accepted method of warding off or refuting any outsideon his integrity. The Westerner who. recognizing In the Arab tbe personality traits which Ln Western culture signify paranoia or inferiority complex. Is pleased with himself for being abje^to "sejj trickery and bis face concept In the Arab culture. It La the Westerner who has learned always to allow theraceful way to savefrom Implications of guilt when difficulties arise who will makeriend and avoid many frustrations and Impasses In the relationship.
Thereroverb In Chinese which can be roughly"Point at the chicken to scold then Its face incomprehensible to the Westerner, it means that If the dog has done something wrong you should berate the chicken In his presence in order to get at the wrong-doer without causing undue embarrassment. The chicken Is not embarrassedeveryone knows It was not he who did it, and the dog does not lose face through public shame or direct censure.
This principle was Illustrated by an episode which occurred In Teheran but could as easily have come from the Arabmall radio had been stolen from the house of an American employing two Iranianndas clearly the culprit, but direct accusation would haveuick denial ana reduced the chances for recovery of the radio.as consulted; be advised tbe American housewife to chastise Arm. severely Ln front of A. She did, and the radio was recoveredinimum of Interpersonal difficulty.
An incident cited by an American sociologist1 illustrates another kind of situation. An Arab who caught another man In bed with his wifeun at them, but instead of shooting he offered to let the man off If he would keep the af-
' Harnady. Sanla; Temperament and Character ol the jtro.br, Twayno Publishers. New Tor*,
fair secret. The man promised and was let go. Later the Arab divorced his wUe quietly, and the Incident was considered closed. The double murder that might have been the outcome In Western cultures would have made newspaperesult diametrically opposed to the Arab's priorityHis pledging the wife and cuckolder to secrecy on pain of death guaranteed that no outsiders would team of theand thus saved him an embarrassing loss of face. The quiet divorce rid him of his problem. The emotional distress which other husbands might have felt was for the Arab aof secondary importance; be could tell himself that Allah
sequels of any
that the Arab Is the reverse of the Westerner In that he feels very strongly the force of public shame In loss of face but is able to slough off the feelings of personal Inadequacy which would be acuteesterner.
Subjective tact
In Westernact Is an objective absolute notto mutation through human Interpretation. Out tne Arab mentality treats fact and truth as relative, to somea projection of the mind for the benefit of the self or ego. With this subjective processing the facts beeome what the Arab emotionally wants to believe Is true. They can thus be made to mesh harmoniously with criteria which stand higher on the value scale because connected with the maintenance of face. Neither facts nor their connotations can stand up against the Arab's facade of personal dignity or be arrayed to form an attack on his surrogate of face.
Many concepts of the philosophy of the ancient Greeks havecussed, adapted, and adopted by major Arab thinkers, but there Is little sign In present-day Arab culture that Greek analytical self-critical philosophy ever entered the Near East The motto "Enow thyself is not quoted by the Arabs; if It were. It would have to bave an entirely new meaning.oneself, to include defining and acknowledging one'swould destroy the principle that tbe surrogate of face or personal dignity must be defended at all costs andperfection maintained. The concept of self-exarclna-tlon, whether for purposes of self-management or self-improvement, could not be accepted because of its conflict with
I more honored cultural requirement of blameless dignity. The Arab Is likewise quite unacquainted with the Idea ofhis conduct to find the sources of his mistakes orIf he did engage in such Introspection he would be forced to Intensify the subjectivity of his factualin order to avoid findings which might be detrimental to his face. In short, the Arab will not find anything wrong with himself.
Many say that the Arab has no capacity forthisather shallow observation. If he lackedability, no Bedouin would ever have survived the
prime value of personal dignity that the use of subjectiveIn order to preclude embarrassing conclusions begins to give outside observers doubts about the Arab'sto reconcile himself with reality.
During the Israeli Invasion of SLnal Inhe Saudi Arabs In the on fields along tha Persian Oulf feltconcern about the plight of their Egyptian brothers. In one Instance some of thosearticular plant were much worriedews Item to the effect that In three days of fighting Israeli troops had captured five thousand Egyptians. Theyowwow, buzzing and chattering about It among themselves. After some time, however, the group broke up and all went away looking relieved and happy. Asked how they had resolved their anxiety, one of the more articulatethat they had decided Israeli troops could never havef anything, even sheep, in the Slnal region. Therefore the story was not true, and that ended the matter. All was right with the world again.
A former German army doctor who specialized In psychiatry and the diagnosis of mental disturbances was resident tn Damascus3uring thia time he was denied permission to practice In Syria, with the explanation that although medical doctors were always welcome, there waa nothing wrong with Arabs mentally and hence no need for hia services-Knowledgeable Arabs realise that their people and countries fall In some measure short of the progress and development that some other nations have achieved. Unable to findat fault for this, they are naturally led to seek the cause
ArobIII. LI IIIATL
of their troubles Ln outsidewill of Allsh. theIsrael, family and personal obligations, and many real wrongs which have been done them. This saves theface from appearing defective and allows those who can accept subjectively Interpreted facts to maintain their sense of personal dignity and self-confidence.
The lack of objective self-analysis Ln the Nearype of boasting which is honest in that there is no real discrepancy between an Arab's outward show of. say, fantastic courage and his true feelings. In the absence of analysis he does not realize thatha has weaknesses and
endeavor and boasting his own virtues ln order to give himself faith Ln his surrogate of face may make the Arab seemto the Westerner; but If the latter challenges his boasts the two are brought to an Impasse. The Arab could not be made to recognize his own weakness, and even If he could he would not admit the threat to his dignity.
Some of the secondary schools of the Middle Easternschedule athletic contests with one another, and after each game members of the losing team will get together and discuss the event. Not Infrequently they conclude that "the referee was against us" instead of acknowledging their own faulty plays or the other team's superiority.
In any situation ln which shame or guilt threatens the Arab he will be able to explain away whatever Impinges on hisdignity with an array of facts that are meant to beby the listener and not challenged. Whether the story Is believed or not and whether the facts are objective or logical are secondary considerations; It Is considered quiteto embarrass him by challenging his explanations. Many of the stories of Juha and his donkey whichrabic folklore have their point for the Arab not In thelogical or Illogical, they portray but rather In the quick wit and Inventive genius with which the hero survives each Incident.
In many phases of the Arabic cultural setting the Westerner with his fetish for objectivity la decidedly out of place,ubjective Interpretation of facts and truth Is most suitableilieu where face and personal dignity are the things of prime Importance.
"Foce"
In summation, the face concept can be said to have three interrelated aspects. The Arab's extreme effort to showblameless, an effort which seems too transparent andto Westerners. Is the product of the high value his culture puts upon personal dignity, of his feeling answerable for his conduct to society rather than to any divine conscience within himself, and of his sense of the subjectivity of fact.
Original document.
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