Netherlands most optimistic western country on Islam

The Netherlands is the Western country scoring highest on the Muslim-West Dialogue Index. Overall, the Dutch came third after Bangladesh and Saudi-Arabia.

The survey, published yesterday, was carried out by Gallup among respondents in 21 Western and Muslim countries for the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The Gallup Muslim-West Dialogue Index ranked countries in terms of their citizens’ optimism about the state of dialogue based on responses to nine questions about the state of Muslim- West relations. The overall score was 37 points.

Bangladesh scored 50, Saudi Arabia 46 and the Netherlands 44. Next came Canada, Singapore, Iran, Israel, Belgium, Indonesia, the US, the Palestinian Territories, Egypt, Malaysia, Sweden, Italy, Denmark, Turkey, Spain, Pakistan, Brazil and Russia.

“Roughly 1 in 3 residents of the Netherlands believe the relationship between Muslim and Western communities is getting better, second only to Bangladesh,” the researchers commented. “The Dutch are the most likely to believe the Western world is committed to improved relations with Muslim societies (72%) and among the most likely to say they are personally concerned with this issue, though less than half (46%) believes the West respects the Muslim world.”

“Like Saudi Arabia, the Netherlands is the most likely Western country to trust in the other community’s good will; 2 in 5 say the Muslim world is committed to better relations and 1 in 3 say it respects the West. Like the other European countries surveyed, the majority of the Dutch see greater interaction between Western and Muslim worlds as a threat, but their relative optimism in other dimensions pushed them into third place.”

On the question, ‘Do you think the Muslim World is committed to improving the interaction between the Western and Muslim World’, the Netherlands scored 40 percent, the highest figure among Western countries after Sweden. On the question, ‘Do you believe the Western World respects the Muslim World’, the Netherlands (46 percent) had the highest score of all countries after Italy.

Greater interaction between Muslim and Western Worlds is a benefit, says 22 percent of the Dutch, while 67 percent says it is a threat. In all European countries, the threat-score is higher than the benefit-score however, while the reverse applies to the US and the Arab world.

Gallup considers the score for the Netherlands surprising. “Unlike Bangladesh, some might expect Saudi Arabia and the Netherlands to be among the most pessimistic about Muslim-West dialogue”, as “they were both directly affected either by military or cultural conflicts between Muslim and Western communities.”

Source: NIS News, 22 January 2008