The Civic Politics of Islam (original) (raw)
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A new form of political discourse hostile to Islam has been gaining ground in Europe. Initiated by neo-nationalist parties it appeals to liberal values and is now penetrating mainstream politics. The recent French presidential campaign threw light on the way Centre Right parties vying for government are increasingly instrumentalizing hostility towards Islam to respond to the political crisis triggered by the problem of public debt across the European Union. Critics are approaching this phenomenon through the lens of Foucault's notion of governmentality, questioning the assertion that Muslims cannot integrate in European societies because of their religion and highlighting the failure of European nation states to treat them as citizens and promote their socio-economic inclusion. This perspective yields valuable insights: it shows how the presence of Muslims challenges the belief of European societies in their self-perceived rationality and tolerance, resting on their commitment to secularity as epistemic category. The strident defense of secularism that accompanies Islamophobia is part of the discourse of securitization that characterizes the neo-liberal form of contemporary governmentality and promotes the de-politicization of social problems. The notion of governmentality, however, cannot account fully for the root-cause of Islamophobia: the loss of collective purpose that has triggered a crisis of government and seen the concern for efficient governance to erase the goal of collective self-determination. At heart, Islamophobia constitutes a manifestation of the European states' crisis of democratic legitimacy.
Public Spheres, Public Islam, and Modernities: Report on Workshop 24th - 25th of October 2002
2005
This report presents papers and discussions from the workshop "Public spheres, public Islam and modernities", which took place on October 24 th and 25 th 2002 at the University of Bielefeld. The Workshop was organised by the Sociology of Development Research Centre (SDRC) and was realised in cooperation with the Italian sociologist and expert in Islamic Studies Dr. Armando Salvatore, who was invited by the International Graduate School in Sociology (IGSS) as a special guest and resource person. Armando Salvatore is lecturer at the Institute of Social Science at the Humboldt University in Berlin, and formerly worked at the European University of Florence. The workshop was attended by approximately 25 participants. The presentations given by the guests, staff members, doctoral students and post docs of the Research Centre were based on empirical fieldwork in Muslim societies and raised questions about the specific constitution of the public sphere in these contexts and the importance of political religion in a globalised world. Methodological issues such as comparative sociology and theoretical issues such as the classical concepts of public sphere and social space were re-problematised and discussed from a critical post-colonial perspective, taking into account the historical conditions of processes of knowledge production, which underlie these concepts. %ULQJLQJ VRFLRORJ\ EDFN LQWR GHYHORSPHQW 3XEOLF 6SKHUH &LYLO 6RFLHW\ DQG *HQGHU &XUUHQW 'HEDWHV DW WKH 6RFLRORJ\ RI 'HYHORSPHQW 5HVHDUFK &HQWUH The workshop was opened by *XGUXQ /DFKHQPDQQ who gave a general introduction to the concepts of public sphere and civil society, in order to discuss their ongoing significance in the research about Muslim societies, but also their shortcomings and contradictions. She focused on the way these concepts are used in the work of Bielefeld researchers and paid special attention to the concept of social space.
This article examines the kind of relations which exist between Islam understood as a universalising tradition and the social space over which the French Republic asserts its sovereignty. Following Tsing (2005), I will emphasise in this paper the interdependence of the universal and particular: something becomes universal through engagement with a particular setting. Through such kinds of engagement, new channels of circulation and communication are created which can open up to webs of " global connections across difference and distance " such as that of the Islamic umma. I analyze this kind of process by looking at the case of Sofiane Meziani, a writer and activist from a major French Islamic federation which is related to the Muslim Brothers.
The Public Sphere and Muslim Identities
European Journal of Sociology, 2002
Cite as: Eickelman, Dale F. , and Armando Salvatore. 2002. “The Public Sphere and Muslim Identities,” European Journal of Sociology/Archives européennes de sociologie, 43 (1): 92-115. Abstract: The historical and contemporary development of certain informal and formal articulations of Muslim social and political identities and forms of association in Muslim-majority and Arab societies has facilitated the emergence of a public sphere and limited the coercive power of state authority. This article suggests how a greater focus on religious ideas and forms of association can enhance the concept of the public sphere so that it better accounts for developments in these societies and in European societies themselves.
Quote as: Salvatore, Armando, and Mark LeVine (eds). 2005. Religion, Social Practice, and Contested Hegemonies: Reconstructing the Public Sphere in Muslim Majority Societies, New York: Palgrave Macmillan. The volume examines how modern public spheres reflect and mask—often simultaneously— discourses of order, contests for hegemony, and techniques of power in the Muslim world. Although the contributors examine various time periods and locations, each views modern and contemporary public spheres as crucial to the functioning, and thus understanding, of political and societal power in Muslim majority countries. Part I of this volume analyzes the various discourses and technologies operating within Muslim public spheres; part II investigates how they impact and interact with the construction of moral and legal arguments within Muslim societies.