Radicalism and political reform in the Islamic and western worlds

Over the last decade, political Islam has been denounced in the Western media and in the surrounding literature as a terrorist or fascist movement that is entirely at odds with Western democratic ideology. Kai Hafez's book overturns these arguments, contending that, despite its excesses, as a radical form of political opposition the movement plays a central role in the processes of democratization and modernization, and that these processes have direct parallels in the history and politics of the West. By analyzing the evolution of Christian democratization through the upheavals of the Reformation, colonisation, fascism, and totalitarianism, the book shows how radicalism and violence were constant accompaniments to political change, and that these components - despite assertions to the contrary - are still part of Western political culture to this day.

Reviews 1

Choice Review

Hafez (media and communications studies, Univ. of Erfurt, Germany), who frequently advises his government about the Western-Islamic dialogue, wrote this courageous, thought-provoking book in 2009, expertly translated into English by British social anthropologist Alex Skinner. Hafez evenhandedly critiques the ideological discourses of both the Western and Islamic worlds, deconstructing "Islamofascism," for instance, as well as varieties of Islamic fundamentalism. He boldly compares the Turkish military presence at the gates of Vienna (already in 1529) with contemporary Western and Israeli military occupations of Muslim territories. Just as the specter of the Ottoman Empire once facilitated the rise of Protestantism among threatened Christians, so now is Western neo-imperialism radicalizing Islam. The author "cherishes the hope" that the West may reverse gears and assume the risk of engaging Muslim radicals to promote democracy "in a largely consensual project of modernity" at the expense of incumbent authoritarian regimes. This book should stimulate thinking among Western, especially US, policy makers as well as students interested either in a more reflective comparative politics or in examining the internal contradictions of liberal international relations theory. Summing Up: Recommended. General readers, upper-division undergraduate students, graduate students, and research faculty. C. M. Henry University of Texas at Austin

Introduction	p. 1
I Modernity
1 Conceptions of Modernity: Reform, Reformation and Radicalism	p. 19
The Minimum Consensus of Western Modernity	p. 21
Secularism and Political Islam: Ideological Dualism	p. 23
Liberal Reformist Islam: Reformation Without Modernity?	p. 28
Conservative Reformist Islam: A Lutheran Logic	p. 32
The Unintentional Modernity of Islamic Fundamentalism	p. 40
A Comparative Look at Notions of Modernity: The Time-lapse of Civilizational Progress	p. 43
2 Political Cultures and Social Movements: The Social Rationality of Cultural Change	p. 45
Western Participation and Oriental Fatalism?	p. 47
Re-Islamization: From Religious Stupor to Active Community	p. 50
Islamic Fundamentalism as 'Radical Protestantism'	p. 56
The Social Rationality of Cultural Change	p. 62
II Democracy
3 The Discourse of Democratization: Grey Zones at the Intersection of Religion and Secularism	p. 70
The 'Christian Democratization' of Islam?	p. 76
Muslim World: Secular Democracy on the Margins of Global Society	p. 88
4 Political System Change: The Radicals' Democracy	p. 92
Stability and State Collapse in the Twenty-first Century: The Middle Eastern Leviathan	p. 94
Democracy and a New Social Contract in the Middle East	p. 97
The Opposition's Capacity for Political Struggle: The Crucial Role of the Islamic Fundamentalists	p. 103
Crucial Role of the Islamic Fundamentalists	p. 103
Pacts Among Opposition Groups: Fundamentalists as (in-)Calculable Risk	p. 116
The International Dimension of Democratization	p. 124
Euro-Islam or Islam-oriented Ostpolitik: Two Models of Transformation	p. 133
III Political Violence
5 Authoritarianism: Dictatorship Between Fascism and Modernization	p. 141
'Islamofascism': Dead End of Political Rationality?	p. 142
Anti-Semitism or the Risk of Ethnicization	p. 154
Democratic Polyarchies and the Changing Face of Authoritarianism: Dictatorial Temptations	p. 161
Modern Slavery: A Common Challenge	p. 168
6 Imperialism: Autocracy, Democracy and Violence	p. 170
The West in the Middle East: A Panoply of International Violence	p. 171
Western Democracy and International Violence: From 'Eternal Peace' to 'Humanitarian Imperialism'	p. 177
Islamic Imperialism: A Cultural Remnant	p. 186
7 Terrorism and Non-violent Resistance: Extremism and Pacifism Across Cultures	p. 190
A Typology of Islamic Terrorism: Is Terrorism Typically Islamic?	p. 191
Causes of Terrorism: Holy War as a Blend of Madness and Rationality	p. 200
Non-violent Resistance in Islam and How the West Ignores It	p. 206
Conclusion: From 'Holy War' to Democracy? The Current State of Islamic and Western Modernity	p. 216
Bibliography	p. 225
Index	p. 245

Available:*

On Order

Summary

Summary

Reviews 1

Choice Review

Table of Contents