Alongside this urban " proletariat " there is also to be found in many countries , notably Egypt and Java , a rural " proletariat " created by the application of European technical methods to irrigation and agriculture .sx In Egypt the change from basin irrigation , which yielded one crop a year , to perennial irrigation , which allows of three crops a year , together with the introduction of cotton and other staples , enriched the landowner and depressed the cultivator to the level of the coolie .sx The social cleavage between landowner ( who is frequently an absentee landlord ) and peasant , though not to be exaggerated , is thus much greater than it was a century ago .sx Professor Berg has noted a similar development in Java in the relations between the peasantry and the Javanese aristocracy - a striking instance of similarity of development in two widely separated Moslem countries under pressure of the same factors .sx Nor , in most oriental countries , is the free or landowning peasant in much better case , .sx since he is chronically entangled in debts owing to the usurious village moneylender .sx These classes , which have felt more severely the disruptive effects of western intervention , are peculiarly susceptible in consequence to propagandist activities of all kinds .sx It is not surprising to find them supplying ready tools to-day to nationalist and communist organizers , to-morrow maybe to preachers of the Holy War ; nevertheless , their role is in the strict sense passive , although it is through them , and will continue to be through them , that the active elements seek to achieve their ends .sx Much more important , as a factor in westernization , is the growing tendency amongst Moslem employers of labour to apply European industrial methods and economic principles on their own account .sx Notable examples of recent years are the Banque Misr in Egypt and its affiliated banks in Syria , the establishment of capitalist commercial and industrial societies in India and Java , and the organization of Turkish industries under the Turkish republic .sx This economic reaction is still , however , only in its infancy , how far it will go cannot yet be seen .sx Far-reaching though the economic effects of westernization may be , a more prominent place in the public eye is taken by the application of western technical methods to the organization of government and administration .sx Not only in territories under direct .sx It has been pointed out that this was indeed the primary object of the early reformers in Turkey , and where they failed , their successors have been more fortunate not only in bringing their plans to fruition but in carrying them to still more radical lengths .sx Every Moslem government at the present day , except Afghanistan and Yemen , that most mediaeval of survivals , now has its bureaucratic departments of state under responsible Ministers , and not only for justice , foreign affairs , and education , but also for police , irrigation , public works , medical and sanitary services and the like .sx Even more significant of the westernizing current in administration is the establishment of municipalities and organs of local government on a representative basis , not only on account of their proved value as training-grounds for state administration , but because they form an entirely new feature in the organization of the Moslem state .sx It is hardly necessary to insist on the eagerness with which representative institutions have been claimed and introduced , and the gratification which they have supplied to national self-respect .sx Parliamentary government is accepted , in the present phase of political evolution , as the outward symbol of full nationhood .sx The somewhat erratic workings of the representative system in most Moslem countries do not detract from the significance of the principle .sx The theory of absolutism has been definitely discarded , and its place taken by the theory of national sovereignty .sx This marks the culminating point in the outward adoption of western models , a point which has been reached only at a very recent date .sx The early Turkish and Egyptian reformers were by no means democrats ; the full appreciation of the representative system had to wait upon political education , and it has taken nearly a hundred years of western infiltration before its appearance as an active factor in Moslem political life .sx Yet the very fact that this political system has been so recently transplanted itself suggests that its foundations must be even less stable , and its principles less thoroughly assimilated , than those of the other external features of western organization which have been superimposed on the traditional life of the East .sx Even allowing for the existence of a small European-educated minority who have grasped its real function , we cannot but regard the constitutional forms of political life in Turkey , Egypt , Persia and elsewhere as still external to their real life that is to say , as mechanical applications of western methods in the .sx field of government , exactly on the same footing as the application of machinery to industry and of bureaucratic organization to administration .sx There are critics who have gone on to assert that the representative system can never be anything more than this , that it is fundamentally alien to " the East " and can never take root there .sx The historian is indeed bound to admit that the traditions of government in the Islamic world are not of a kind which tends to develop the qualities required for the successful working of democratic institutions , but to deny the possibility of their development under new conditions is to make an irrational leap from history to prophecy .sx The argument from " racial characteristics , " even allowing it to possess any scientific value in this field , can hardly be applied to a society which embraces at least seven totally distinct races .sx In any case , the point of immediate importance for us is that , though these are amongst the most striking examples of the impact of Western Europe upon Islam , the future of westernization and the part which it will play in the Moslem world does not depend upon any of these exterior adaptations .sx The outward forms are subsidiary ; here even more than in material things , the more perfect the outward imitation the less is the interior assimilation , since with the more thorough grasp of the spirit and the principles underlying the outward forms there will usually be linked a perceptionof the adaptations required by local circumstances .sx Many of the existing western institutions may be swept away , and yet the Moslem world be no less westernized than before , perhaps even more so .sx If we are to find the real measure of the influence exerted by western culture upon Islam , we must look beneath the surface , and in the first place for ideas and movements based upon a creative assimilation of western thought after intensive inner preparation .sx All the rest is superficial , and however difficult the task may be , we must make an effort to distinguish from the mass of imported and often shoddy western materials that now clutter the domain of Islam those which really form the first courses of a new cultural edifice .sx The main indeed , if the word is taken in a wide enough sense , the only sound agent of westernization is education , and it is by the criterion of its education in western thought , principles , and methods that the extent of the westernization of the Moslem world is to be judged .sx But this education is of many kinds and carried out by many agencies .sx At bottom , of course , there must be a western education in the narrow sense , at school , technical college , and university ; without this , nothing else is possible .sx We have seen the stages by which education of this kind was introduced into the various regions of the Moslem world , and the influence which it has exerted on the mentality of the secular leaders and some few of the .sx religious leaders of Islam .sx Yet , if we are to accept the usual statement that ninety-five per cent .sx of Moslems are illiterate ( though for the rising generation this must be a serious underestimate , in view of the rapid extension of elementary education in all Moslem countries the most recent figures show that over 500,000 children are now attending elementary schools in Egypt ) , and must further allow that at least half of the literates have enjoyed an education on traditional lines only , the remaining fraction of western-educated men is clearly too small , in spite of their leading position , to account for the general westernizing tendency found in nearly all parts of the Moslem world .sx On the other hand , with increasing literacy there will , under present conditions , be an increasing impetus towards broadening and deepening the current of westernization , especially in con-junction with the other educative agencies which are impelling the Moslem peoples in the same direction .sx Amongst these we may reckon the effects produced by the mere existence of some at least of the outward adaptations of western forms described in the pre-ceding paragraphs .sx The part played in this respect by the introduction of European industrial methods has already been remarked .sx Similarly , the fact of administration on western lines is bound to result in the acceptance by the administered of a western standard in administration , and in the demandfor it .sx No modern Moslem government , for instance , can afford to neglect the provision of medical services or the extension of educational facilities .sx The existence of representative institutions is , in the same way , the first step in the political education of the electorate .sx Admittedly the institutions themselves form no more than a first step ; they give no guidance as to the means by which to ensure efficient administration or to control political action .sx For this further development , without which the outward forms must remain mere surface display , it is necessary to rely not only on the provision of elementary and secondary education , but still more on the creation of an instructed public opinion .sx This is the special province of yet another educational instrument inspired by the West , the Press .sx The rapid rise and extension of journalism in the Moslem lands has both a debit and a credit side to its account .sx On the one hand , it has , without question , succeeded in creating the elements of a political sense amongst the mass of the people , and has been the principal agent in raising the general intellectual level .sx Journalism in the literate West may sometimes be a narcotic ; in the illiterate East it is rather a stimulant .sx Against these services must be set the occasional abuse of its immense influence , and some inherent weaknesses due to the recency of its growth and its lack of stability .sx Nevertheless , the printing press is far and .sx away the most revolutionary and influential of all the contributions of Europe to the Moslem world .sx Already the number of journals issued in all the languages of Islam exceeds one thousand , and the list continues to lengthen .sx Professor Kampffmeyer has indicated the variety of interests represented in Egyptian journalism , which , especially since the war , holds pride of place in the Moslem literary world , but there are other centres which do not lag far behind Cairo .sx To keep in touch with this vast mass of ephemeral publication which is , after all , the truest mirror of current ideas and tendencies is beyond the powers of anything short of an organized institution .sx Even the Italian Istituto per l'Oriente , which has the merit of publishing , in the monthly journal Oriente Moderno , the most valuable , and indeed indispensable , survey of current Moslem affairs , does not include Central Asian , Indian , and Indonesian journals among its sources .sx We can , however , pick out some general characteristics which have a bearing on our problem .sx The directors of the daily Press generally belong to the most advanced sections of opinion in their respective countries , and the outlook of most of the daily journals is in consequence dominated by western influences .sx They are the protagonists of constitutional movements and the chief critics of internal administration , as well as of European governments in Islamic lands .sx Not only do they help powerfully to mould public opinion in regard to local affairs , but by maintaining an adequate news service , by articles explaining European political and economic movements , and by translations from European journals , they keep their public informed of events and opinions in Europe and their repercussion on the East .sx