Bureaucratizing Islam

Bureaucratizing Islam PDF Author: Ann Marie Wainscott
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316510492
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 287

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Book Description
This book analyses Morocco's unique response to counter-terrorism through the development of a religious bureaucracy to define and disseminate Islam. It will appeal to those interested in Middle Eastern politics and state-society relations in the Arab world, as well as policymakers interested in security studies and counter-terrorism policies.

Bureaucratizing Islam

Bureaucratizing Islam PDF Author: Ann Marie Wainscott
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316510492
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 287

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book analyses Morocco's unique response to counter-terrorism through the development of a religious bureaucracy to define and disseminate Islam. It will appeal to those interested in Middle Eastern politics and state-society relations in the Arab world, as well as policymakers interested in security studies and counter-terrorism policies.

Sufism in Morocco's Religious Politics

Sufism in Morocco's Religious Politics PDF Author: John C. Thibdeau
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000896927
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
This book outlines the role of Sufism in Moroccan politics in the twenty-first century through a comparative study of contemporary Sufi organizations. The author begins his analysis by highlighting the strategies employed by the Moroccan state over the past twenty years, aimed at regulating and producing an authorized ‘Moroccan Islam’ in the kingdom. Despite these policies of spiritual security and spiritual diplomacy, including the state sponsorship of Sufi organizations, the author argues that this has not decreased diversity nor produced a banal interpretation of Islam, but rather given rise to diverse articulations and performances of this religiosity. Through a comparative analysis of three Sufi organizations based on eighteen months of fieldwork – two of which have never before been studied – the author brings into relief the spaces of creative enactment of Sufism as an ethical tradition. Ultimately, it is argued that each Sufi organization reflects a different refraction of iḥsān, a concept emphasising the cultivation of public piety which underpins the Moroccan state’s formulation of Islam. Focused on both theoretical contributions to Islamic studies and topical treatments of geopolitical issues like spiritual diplomacy, the Western Sahara, and Morocco-Algeria, the book spans multiple disciplines, including anthropology, religious studies, sociology, and political science.

Islam and Politics (3rd edition)

Islam and Politics (3rd edition) PDF Author: Peter Mandaville
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351044133
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 435

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Book Description
This book is an accessible and comprehensive account of political Islam in the contemporary world. Providing a broad introduction to all major aspects of the interface of Islam and politics it combines an accessible style with sufficient depth for the academic classroom. Drawing on insights from comparative politics and Islamic studies, this book explains the complex interaction between Islam, society, the state, and processes of globalization. Preserving the previous editions’ strong focus on key concepts from Islamic history as they relate to contemporary political Islam, this new edition includes coverage of important developments and updated country overviews from the Middle East, Central and South Asia, Southeast Asia, Europe and North America. Features include: Two new case studies on Southeast Asia and Europe. Exploration of the origins and development of ISIS, Al-Qaeda and various regional affiliates of the global Salafi-Jihadi movement. Coverage of contemporary debates about radicalization and violent extremism. Examination of questions of Islam’s compatibility with democracy; the role of women; and Islamic perspectives on violence and conflict. Discussion of major theoretical debates in the literature on political Islam, the debate on Islamic exceptionalism and whether Islamist politics can be understood using the conventional tools of comparative political science and International Relations. These updates ensure the book remains the single best introduction to the topic of political Islam for students and scholars, foreign policy professionals and the general reader.

The Divine Bureaucracy and Disenchantment of Social Life

The Divine Bureaucracy and Disenchantment of Social Life PDF Author: Maznah Mohamad
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 9811520933
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 339

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Book Description
This book traces the expansion of Islamisation within a modern and plural state such as Malaysia. It elaborates on how elements of theology, sacred space, resources, and their interactivity with secular instruments such as legislative, electoral, and new social technological platforms are all instrumentally employed to consolidate a divine bureaucracy. The book makes the point that religious social movements and political parties are only few of the important agents of Islamisation in society. The other is the modern and secular state structure itself. Weber’s legal rational bureaucracy or Hegel’s ethical bureaucracy predominantly characterises a modern feature of governmentality. In this instance an Islamic bureaucracy is advantageously situated not only within an ambit of modernity and therefore legality, but divinity and therefore sacrality as well. This positioning gives religious state agents more salience than any other form of bureaucracy leading to their unquestioned authority in the current contexts of societies with Muslim majority rule. One of the requisites of this condition is the homogenisation of Islam followed by ring-fencing of its constituents. The latter can involve contestations with women, other genders, ‘secular’ Muslims, non-Muslims as well as dissenting Muslims with their differing truthful ‘Islams’.

Coping with Defeat

Coping with Defeat PDF Author: Jonathan Laurence
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691172129
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 606

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Book Description
"How do centralized, institutional religions make peace with the modern state's displacement of their traditional prestige and power? What are the factors that can promote the mutual acceptance of religious communities and the secular rule of law? These are the questions posed in Jonathan Laurence's new book, which argues that Roman Catholicism and Sunni Islam have trod surprisingly similar paths in their respective histories. Contemporary Roman Catholicism and Sunni Islam both descend from religious states and empires, the Papacy in the case of Catholicism and the Caliphate in the case of Islam. As religio-political orders, the Western Church and the Islamic Caliphate ruled vast territories and populations. Each set of religio-political institutions made law, controlled land, and governed people for roughly four centuries. Yet both suffered three similar upheavals and challenges: the end of empires, the rise of the modern national state, and significant outward migrations from the "home base" of the religious tradition. Laurence suggests that the historical experience of Catholicism offers a useful model for those concerned about the contemporary Sunni Muslim leadership's attitude toward the modern state. Just as Catholicism worldwide benefited from the survival of the Vatican micro-state and its ability to exert guidance over the religious belief and practice of Catholics worldwide, so (argues Laurence) Muslim-majority states should continue exert control over mosques, imam-training, and religious education -- to reconcile Islam with the rule of law and thus with the authority of the secular state. This book is based on prodigious archival research in Vatican and Ottoman Archives and on interviews conducted with senior officials responsible for Islamic affairs or public religious education in Algiers, Ankara, Casablanca, Istanbul, Oran, Rabat, Tunis; and with senior interior ministry and foreign ministry officials in various European capitals responsible for relations with North African, Turkish, Qatari, and Saudi ministries of Islamic and religious affairs"--

Islam in Malaysia

Islam in Malaysia PDF Author: Syed Muhd. Khairudin Aljunied
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
ISBN: 0190925191
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 345

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Book Description
This book surveys the growth and development of Islam in Malaysia from the eleventh to the twenty-first century, investigating how Islam has shaped the social lives, languages, cultures and politics of both Muslims and non-Muslims in one of the most populous Muslim regions in the world. Khairudin Aljunied shows how Muslims in Malaysia built upon the legacy of their pre-Islamic past while benefiting from Islamic ideas, values, and networks to found flourishing states and societies that have played an influential role in a globalizing world. He examines the movement of ideas, peoples, goods, technologies, arts, and cultures across into and out of Malaysia over the centuries. Interactions between Muslims and the local Malay population began as early as the eighth century, sustained by trade and the agency of Sufi as well as Arab, Indian, Persian, and Chinese scholars and missionaries. Aljunied looks at how Malay states and societies survived under colonial regimes that heightened racial and religious divisions, and how Muslims responded through violence as well as reformist movements. Although there have been tensions and skirmishes between Muslims and non-Muslims in Malaysia, they have learned in the main to co-exist harmoniously, creating a society comprising of a variety of distinct populations. This is the first book to provide a seamless account of the millennium-old venture of Islam in Malaysia.

State and Sufism in Iraq

State and Sufism in Iraq PDF Author: David Jordan
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000508757
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
State and Sufism in Iraq is the first comprehensive study of the Iraqi Baʿth regime’s (r. 1968–2003) entanglement with Sufis and of Sunnī Sufi Islam in Iraq from the late Ottoman period until 2003 and beyond. For far too long, the secular and authoritarian Baʿth regime has been reduced to the dictator Saddam Husayn and portrayed as antireligious. It’s growing political employment of Islam during the 1990s, in turn, has been interpreted either as an abstract Baʿthist-nationalist Islam or as an ideological U-turn from secularism to a form of Islamism that ultimately contributed to the spread of Islamist terrorism after 2003. Broadening the narrow focus on Saddam Husayn, this book analyses other leading regime figures, their close entanglement with Sufis, and Baʿth religious politics of a state-sponsored revival of Sufi Islam and Iraq’s broad and distinct Sufi culture. It is the story of a secular regime’s search for "moderate" Islam in order to overcome the challenges of radical Islamism and sectarianism in Iraq. The book’s two-pronged interdisciplinary approach that deals equally with politics and Sufi Islam in Iraq makes it a valuable contribution to scholars and students in Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, Religious Anthropology and Sociology, Political Science, and International Relations.

The Muslim Brotherhood

The Muslim Brotherhood PDF Author: Joas Wagemakers
Publisher: Amsterdam University Press
ISBN: 9048556708
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 291

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Book Description
The Muslim Brotherhood is often represented in mainstream media as a theocratic organisation that preaches Qur'an-based violence and is out to grab power in the West. As this book shows, such representations are wrought with prejudice and oversimplification; the organisation is in reality much more dynamic and diverse. Its goals, ideology and influence have never been static and vary greatly amongst its descendants in both Europe and the Middle East. Joas Wagemakers introduces the reader to this fascinating organisation and the major ideological and historical developments that it has gone through since its emergence in 1928.

Deadly Connections

Deadly Connections PDF Author: Daniel Byman
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9781139445955
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 432

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Book Description
Thousands of people have died at the hands of terrorist groups who rely on state support for their activities. Iran and Syria are well known as sponsors of terrorism, while other countries, some with strong connections to the West, have enabled terrorist activity by turning a blind eye. Daniel Byman's hard-hitting and articulate book analyzes this phenomenon. Focusing primarily on sponsors from the Middle East and South Asia, it examines the different types of support that states provide, their motivations, and the impact of such sponsorship. The book also considers regimes that allow terrorists to raise money and recruit without providing active support. The experiences of Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and Libya are detailed here, alongside the histories of radical groups such as al-Qaida and Hizballah. The book concludes by assessing why it is often difficult to force sponsors to cut ties to terrorist groups and suggesting ways in which it could be done better in the future.

The Geopolitics of Religious Soft Power

The Geopolitics of Religious Soft Power PDF Author: Peter Mandaville
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 019760580X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
"In 1947, Myron Taylor, the United States (US) envoy to the Vatican and an ally of President Truman, met with several European religious leaders. In that meeting, Taylor called on "people of all faiths" to "unite upon a universal two-point declaration embodying the spirit of belief in God and belief in human liberty" (Inboden 2008, 124). The political significance of this statement is clear from the context: Taylor held this meeting to gain European support for the emerging struggle between the US and the Soviet Union. While much of Truman's early Cold War policies involved military and economic might, he also hoped to build up the America's "soft power" by appealing to common religious values and identities among allies. The role of religion in Truman's diplomacy should not be a surprise to anyone who studies (or engages in) US politics. As observers since Alexis de Tocqueville have noted, religion is an essential element of America. It infuses debates, and influences political struggles, and therefore it ends up also becoming an important element of US foreign policy. The idea of Manifest Destiny, which guided the country's early expansion, included a belief in the providential backing of the new United States of America. Religious rhetoric and imagery popped up repeatedly throughout the Cold War while continuing to influence US priorities in the 21st century, from debt relief to religious freedom promotion. Few, then would take issue with the claim that religion influences American politics, both domestic and international. But can religion actually be a tool for policy-makers? That is, can US leaders draw on faith to advance US interests?"--