Islam 4: Ismail Chapter 1: How Islamism is Normally Explained

  1. Definition of Rethinking Islamist Politics
  1. Islamist Politics: activities in the political sphere that deploy signs from Islamic traditions
  1. Islamism: encompass both Islamist Politics & re-Islamisation
  1. re-Islamisation: various domains of social life invested with signs from Islamic cultural tradition. Eg: hijab, Islamic banking
  1. Comparative to the West, Western system as definition of modernity
  • Ernest Gellner's model of Muslim societies
  • High Islam: city dwellers, scripturalist & ascetic
  • Low Islam: tribes, ecstatic
  • Modernity increases High Islam and reduces Low Islam, ruler's failure to modernise frustrates High Islam's desires for learning & upward mobility
  • Islamism opposes modernity as a meta-narrative of Western hegemony, not modernity itself
  • Shifts the issue to global political identity, not Islam vs modernity
  1. Islamism expresses a rejection of modernity OR Islamism is the way to embrace modernity 'authentically'
  1. Chronologically from Islamic History
  1. Works by 'slotting' Islamist movements into known chronological narratives
  1. Appears to be self-explanatory by virtue of basic pattern that they are presumed to embody
  1. John Esposito: Muslims shared belief regardless of sociality of everyday life in various settings
  • 1st cons: relationship between people and their governments are influenced by societal environment
  • 2nd cons: beliefs are not transhistorical, but are historically grounded
  1. J.O. Voll: Islamist movement is a continuity of Islamic history. Religious motivation, the past guides the present.
  • 4 ways of dealing with challenges throughout Islamic history: adaptationist, conservative, fundamentalist, individualist
  • revival spirit is constant in Islam
  • Muslims are bound to be unhappy if society strayed from the Golden Age
  1. Sociological & Political Economy approach
  1. Based on Durkheimian views of social change
  1. Saad Eddin Ibrahim: militant profile against a backdrop of rapid social transformation, urbanisation.
  • expressions of frustrated aspirations
  • uprootedness, disenchantment, disintegration
  • Charles Tilly's objection to Durkheimian model where societal change brings disintegration.
  • Contends that actors work base on solidarity and resources of mobilisation
  1. Eric Davis: Islamic militants seek refuge in Islam to sooth alienation from deprivation
  • transferring their hostilities to scapegoats: liberals, imperialist, Jews
  • offering categories to mediate their realities
  1. Michael Fischer: Iranian revolution is about middle class discontent
  1. Nazih Ayubi: Islamism provides counter ideology appealing to disadvantaged groups allowing expression of political and economic demands
  1. Lisa Anderson: Islamist are a byproduct created by their governments; Egypt, Iran, North Africa
  1. Peter Gan: 18th century Egypt, change in cultural production was tied to early capitalist transformation, which in the 20th century widely circulated Islam as a commodification of identity
  1. Anthropological approach
  1. cultural approach seen ahistorical, political economy approach looks at macro only missing the micro (culture)
  1. Sami Zubaida: cultural patterns are not fixed, they are reproduced at every generation in relation to different situations
  1. Talal Asad: Diversity of Muslim societies explained thru Discursive Tradition.
  • the scripture should not be used to attribute homogeneity to Muslims societies as its interpretation is subject to contestations
  • claims to orthodoxy embody the power to authorise practices and ideas as Islamic
  • basically it is about power and the struggle for hegemony
  • invocation of referents is a discursive strategy or rhetorical device, the 'Islam' position is likely to be constructed outside of the referents
  1. Egyptian and Moroccan example where Islam was the basis for reference, however the ruling did not follow the Rule. COULD IT BE DUE TO DIFFERENT INTERPRETATION OF THE RULE BY THE LAYPERSON AND THE KNOWLEDGABLE?
  1. Ferrie: Relation between religiosity and Islamism
  • religion as a part of social condition
  • Islamist sees reframing of old values to modern situation as diluting Islam
  • the emergence of re-Islamisation attests to the ideological bankruptcy of Islamism
  1. Integrated Approach
  1. Edmund Burke III: Study of movements in historical context emphasises changing social structures and patterns of actions
  • attention to context bridges macro and micro analysis
  • formation of grouping during change must be studied at local level
  1. No need to look for the start of Islamism
  • instead look for transformative processes that reorient the political field
  1. Islamist movements tied to changing social conditions
  1. Islamist movement like other social movement developed within infrastructures of actions and are geared towards particular political field
  • Basically saying that Islamist movement happened because it was the opportune moment?