Western Liberal Democracy: The Struggle of Muslims for Freedom,Equality and Dignity

The increasingly multicultural fabric of Western liberal democracies has given rise to the issue of the presence of Muslim minorities in the West, as rising hatred and hostility toward Islam and Muslims in the West undermine the three guiding principles of freedom, equality and dignity that underpin the foundation of liberal democracy, human rights and multiculturalism. Today, Muslims in the West struggle for freedom, equality and dignity to ensure their ethnocultural survival and full and equal participation within the mainstream society. Therefore, it would be quite correct to say that the endurance of liberal democracy, human rights and multiculturalism built on the Western civilization depends on the eradication of Western Islamophobia.     

The Muslim Question in Australia: Islamophobia and Muslim Alienation

Islamophobia has become a significant problem across the Western world. Australia is no exception. The emergence of far right groups and a political environment that allows anti-Islamic discourse has created an increasingly unwelcome environment for Muslims, even though multiculturalism has long been a fundamental marker of Australian daily life. The rise of Islamophobia has been damaging to Australia. This paper explores the rise of anti-Islamic sentiments in Australia and the increasing marginalization of Muslim youth, showing that Islamophobia not only breaks the bond between Muslim youth and Australian society, it also polarizes relations within Australian Muslim communities.     

Reading Islamophobia in Hegemonic Neoliberalism Through a Discourse Analysis of Donald Trump's Narratives

This paper uses the Wittgensteinian method of discourse analysis to analyze the narratives of Islamophobia in Donald Trump’s speeches and interviews. Theoretically, the analysis is informed by hegemonic neoliberal ideology. It argues that to sustain itself, hegemonic neoliberalism must contrast itself against other belief systems that it unilaterally denounces as inferior. After having done so, hegemonic neoliberalism then seeks to neoliberalize those belief systems. In this vein, this paper contends that hegemonic neoliberalism has an Islamophobic “face” because it “otherizes” Islam and Muslims in order to justify its neoliberalization of Islam and Muslims. Thus, this paper defines neoliberal Islamophobia as the conceptualization of Islam and Muslims as antithetical to neoliberal values. In all, Trump’s speeches and interviews contain five Islamophobic narratives: (1) radical Islam is the sole cause of terrorism; (2) radical Islamic terrorism is a global existential threat; (3) Muslim refugees and immigrants are a threat to American security; (4) the proposal to suspend entry of Muslim refugees and immigrants to the US; and (5) the faux humanitarian policy of establishing safe zones for Muslim refugees in Syria. The paper concludes with policy implications.     

Islamophobia and the Discursive Reconstitution of Religious Imagination in Europe

Since much of the discussion about Islamophobia has been concerned with positive-self and negative-other representations of Muslims, understanding it as a culturally racist discourse foregrounds the way Muslims are constructed as deeply threatening to the values and identities of the spaces they occupy. These representations invoke an essentialised and determinative Muslim culture that can be understood as the central organising principle of Islamophobia: the belief that relies upon binary oppositions that allow its proponents to advocate a host of positive values, while repudiating and denigrating Muslims. This paper explains how Islamophobia can be conceptualised as the racist discourse that upholds a system of Eurocentric supremacy, a historical development based on the universalising aspects of Western culture that led to the development of a racialised social system in Europe. By demonstrating the form and content of Islamophobic discourse, the paper draws attention to a wide array of issues ranging from the securitisation discourse, institutionalisation of Islamophobia, to its modes of articulation in specific European countries. It further argues that given the rise of racist, especially Islamophobic, far-right parties in European countries, combating Islamophobia becomes an institutional priority that requires outspoken and brave initiatives and persons who not only challenge this pervasive form of racism but also address structural forms of discrimination affecting Muslims or those perceived as such.     

Iconizing “Muslim Terrorism” in a British Newspaper and Public Perception

By examining a news story and reader responses published in the Daily Mail Online (DMO), our study discursively argues that this daily newspaper promotes an Orientalist perception of Islam and Muslims. The religion and its adherents are both framed and perceived as a threat to British society and its “Western values”, thus reinforcing Islamophobia within society. This study also argues that the DMO espouses the perceived Orientalist threat posed by Islam through juxtaposition, exaggeration and manipulation of facts, through lexical choices and visual images that eventually establishes the perception of a cultural clash. In addition, by examining the readers’ responses toward the news story, this study demonstrates that the vast majority of respondents perceive Islam and Muslims as a threat to “the West”. Their comments, as triggered by the text, also contribute to the discourse of Islamophobia and the perceived Orientalist view of an Islamic threat.     

The Reception of Sufism in the West: The Mystical Experiences of American and European Converts

In the last decade, Islamophobia and racism have become rampant in the West, particularly in the United States of America and Europe. Muslims, whether they are immigrants or not, practitioners or not, are frequently prejudiced and discriminated against. The observer of the world scene is more likely to note that Sufis are valorized by a large audience. Compared to cults that identify themselves with the Salafi or Wahhabi ideology, the Sufi folk are usually defined as peaceful, tolerant and moderate. It is not a coincidence then to find that the Sufi leaders are working tremendously hard to promote love and peace worldwide. The present paper is an attempt to sketch out the reception of Sufism (Islamic mysticism) in the West. More particularly, it sheds light on the experiences of some Western converts, whose attraction to and fascination with Sufism is immeasurable. Central to this enquiry is the reception theory, which claims that people receive discourse in different ways.     

穆斯林社会的非穆斯林少数族群——他们的贡献、地位、权利与义务

穆斯林社会中的非穆斯林主要包括犹太教徒、基督教徒、祆教徒、印度教徒和佛教徒等。他们尽管属于少数族群,但却是整个穆斯林社会的重要组成部分。历史上,他们为穆斯林社会的发展做出了不可磨灭的贡献,近现代以来穆斯林社会的非穆斯林与穆斯林也大多能够和睦相处。非穆斯林享有信仰自由和宗教独立、不受外敌侵略和内部黑暗势力的侵害、自由择业等方面的权利。同时,非穆斯林必须遵守伊斯兰教法,缴纳人丁税、土地税和商税。穆斯林与非穆斯林关系和睦的深层原因在于伊斯兰教的宽容性。     

The Muslim Continuum: An Analytical Model of Religiosity and Socio-Political Diversity in Muslim Minority Environments

This paper examines the challenges facing Muslim societies in the early part of the twenty-first century. The paper examines tensions between “liberal” interpretations of Islam and extreme views within a globalisation paradigm and how these are changing. Specifically, the work investigates how the spotlight on Islam and its adherents in a post-9/11 world has manifest among Muslim individuals, groups and societies and how these may change to accommodate or react to the shifting global frame of mind towards Islam and the Muslims. Analysis is provided within the context of Muslim minority dwellers, with focus on Muslims living in Britain. The paper further proposes a fundamentalism continuum based on Dekmejian’s¹ model and analyses its impact on the Muslim Diaspora.     

Muslim Faith and Work Ethic in the United States Virgin Islands

The objective of the following article is to examine why a small number of Muslims from the Middle East chose to settle in the United States Virgin Islands (USVI). Further, the article is interested in how this Muslim community has retained its work ethic and religious identity in a predominantly Christianized USVI. The article also explores the relationship between this Muslim community and the USVI particularly since the events of 11 September 2001 (9/11). The findings are startling. Unlike some Muslim minority communities that have been unable to make significant strides forward, Muslims in the USVI have achieved impressive levels of economic achievement. Muslims have effectively dominated the retail business in the USVI while largely retaining the religious ways of their homeland, despite some assimilation. Local structural issues such as the inefficient entrepreneurial skills and unstable family ties among Virgin Islanders, as well as an upsurge in investment in tourism and industry, have paved the way for Muslims’ success in the USVI. Other Muslim minority societies trying to achieve growth and development in a foreign land might look at the manner in which Muslims in the USVI have achieved success and financial security.     

Islam in Argentina: Deconstructing the Biases

Islam in Argentina: a title that may startle or evoke wonder, as it is a subject we know very little about. This paper attempts to undertake a critical analysis of the concept and the process of identity construction within the Muslim community in Argentina. It will take into account factors, such as migration and politics, in order to help identify the possible boundaries created by the community in terms of sameness and otherness within the Argentine society. Argentina has been chosen for this study because, when it comes to the exploration of image, discrimination, stereotyping, and ethno-religious identity of a minority group in a Western migratory setting, Argentina—and Latin America as a continent—has been forgotten in the post-9/11 hysteria surrounding Muslims and Islam. The Muslim community in Argentina, along with the Diaspora across Latin America and worldwide, has been subject to the Western media’s biased and faulty inferences about Muslims. This article will help to deconstruct such biases by taking us on a journey through the history of Muslims’ arrival in Argentina.     

Islamic Jurisprudence of Minorities (Fiqh al-Aqalliyyat): The Case of the Palestinian Muslim Minority in Israel

This article examines the doctrine of Jurisprudence of Muslim Minorities (Fiqh al-Aqalliyyat) in the context of the Palestinian Muslim community in Israel. The first part discusses the origins and goals of Fiqh al-Aqalliyyat. After outlining the particular historical and political context of the Palestinian minority in Israel, the article focuses on the ethno-religious political mobilization developed by the Muslim community vis-à-vis the state’s strategies of control and domination, and points out the difficulties involved in the application of Fiqh al-Aqalliyyat, as used in “Western” states, for the reality that Muslims face in Israel. The article suggests a vigilant approach toward the Jurisprudence of Minorities, as we argue that, when applying it in this context of the Muslim community in Israel, this doctrine has two substantial limitations. The first is theoretical and it concerns the doctrine’s current incapability to distinguish between different types of minorities, as well as failing to recognize a difference between various political regimes and societal lives that might be inherently less or more accommodating or even hostile to minorities, and Muslim minority communities in particular. The second limitation relates to the political dimension and the lack of consideration for the status of the Palestinian minority as an indigenous and national minority and not an immigrant minority. Their status as national minorities, at times also as indigenous peoples, who are perceived as entitled to group-based “self-government rights”, poses a serious challenge to this doctrine’s scope and viability.     

Perceptions of the processes of radicalisation and de-radicalisation among British South Asian Muslims in a post-industrial city

This paper presents the findings of a qualitative study exploring the perceptions of British South Asian Muslims in relation to the pathways towards radicalisation and the challenges of community leadership in relation to de-radicalisation. The study is based on in-depth interviews, using an ethnographic methodological framework, with a purposive sample of 30 Muslim men and women, including senior political figures, community leaders, religious figures and young Muslims (aged 18–25) from across the city of Birmingham, UK. The fieldwork was carried out between September 2005 and May 2007. Respondents reflected a general perspective that regards social exclusion, Islamophobia, lack of effective theological and political leadership, regressive anti-terror law and geo-political events as principal factors in the radicalisation and the de-radicalisation of British Muslims. These findings provide important insights into Muslims in Britain in relation to questions of ‘radicalism’ and politics, and they have specific implications for research, policy and practice in this area.     

Muslims in Europe: Citizenship,Multiculturalism and Integration

This article provides an analysis of the concerns in relation to citizenship and multicultural reforms in Europe. It examines the implications for the social integration of Muslims, who seemingly face insurmountable constitutional hurdles notwithstanding liberal institutional attempts, in accommodating a religion that, judged by its global politicisation, may pose more a challenge to multicultural societies than to others. While shedding light on recent developments concerning a wide-ranging panorama of the socio-legal dynamics of integrating Muslim communities in Europe, the article provides an overview of the multicultural idea, focusing on how some European countries address multicultural claims swiftly while others lag behind, busy with more basic issues of immigrant assimilation and integration. It is argued that while attempts are being made to improve Muslim integration, the rising tide of Islamophobia (political and media-manufactured), anti-terrorism legislations and security policies serve to provide a multi-pronged attack on civil liberties and freedoms of Muslim groups. In the concluding section, there will be general remarks concerning the future of Muslims in Europe and the commendable and realisable aim of Muslims to construct an inclusive national identity and find partners who will, like them, be determined to approve what Western culture produces in terms of its positive contributions and resist its deleterious effects on the human, societal and environmental levels.     

Religiosity,Citizenship and Belonging: The Everyday Experiences of Young Australian Muslims

Abstract

Since 11 September 2001 Muslim Diasporas have emerged as objects of anxiety in Western societies. Underlying this (in)security-driven problematisation is the question of whether Muslims living in the West have the capacity to become fully active citizens while maintaining their religious beliefs, rituals and practices. This apprehension has prompted reactionary government programmes, particularly targeting young Muslims. Such responses fail to recognise the societal capacities that practising Muslims possess, including those informed by the ethical precepts of Islamic faith. This paper argues that it is timely to explore expressions of Islamic religiosity as they are grounded in everyday multicultural environments. The paper draws on survey data and interviews conducted with Muslims living in Melbourne, Australia. We take into consideration key variables of age and generation to highlight how young, practising Muslims enact citizenship through Islamic rituals and faith-based practices and traditions. The paper will draw from key findings to argue that these performances provide a foundation for exploring ways of ‘living’ together in a manner that privileges ethics central to Islamic faith traditions.     

A Fragmented Discourse of Religious Leadership in France: Muslim Youth between Citizenship and Radicalization

Abstract

At a time when public debates about radicalization of Muslim youth in the West are taking center stage and when questions about “home-grown” security threats are increasing in the wake of a number of terrorist attacks in many émigré societies, this article provides fresh empirical insights from the perspective of religious leadership. It outlines a picture of a highly diverse Muslim religious landscape where competing religious discourses are struggling to attract and support Muslim youth facing social dislocation and identity crises within increasingly contested social milieus. The article argues that a typology of religious leadership is clearly emerging where a spectrum of faith-based orientations and religious practice emphasize, to different degrees, notions of attachment to universal ethics and individual agency. The fact that conservative, sometimes radical, interpretations of such contestations represent a minority of voices is heartening even though the actual damage by such minority is often disproportionate to its actual size within the so-called silent majority. The empirical insights provided by the religious leaders interviewed for this study offer hope that the future of Western Muslims is more positive than we are led to think, if the possibility of combining devout faith with local political engagement becomes a real and sustainable conduit towards social inclusion and intercultural understanding and if necessary support and understanding are extended by the host communities.     

Chinese–Islamic Connections: An Historical and Contemporary Overview

Following overland and maritime trade routes, early Muslims reached China within a century after the Prophet Muhammad (570–632) lived, when the Chinese and Islamic empires were the superpowers of their day, engaging each other in instances of both competition and collaboration: military, economic and diplomatic. Exchanges between China and the Islamic world have produced significant technological and cultural developments, and set the stage for ongoing relations between the two civilizations that helped shape world history and continue to influence global affairs today. The arrival of Islam more than 1200 years ago also resulted in a sizeable Muslim minority population in China, who play an important role between the two civilizations: sometimes as cultural intermediaries, sometimes as political pawns. The following is an overview of the history of Chinese–Islamic relations, including historical and contemporary involvement by China’s internal Muslim populations, with a survey of connections between China and several Muslim countries.     

“Muslims are the New Jews” in the West: Reflections on Contemporary Parallelisms

This article examines a spectrum of contemporary texts by Muslim essayists, scholars and activists based in the Arab world, in Europe and in the USA that comparatively analyzed Jewish experiences in the West as invaluable lessons for Muslim minorities. These included: anti-Semitism and the struggle against it; segregation from and integration into majority societies; and, political lobbying on behalf of the “greater nation”. The article argues that the diversity of Jewish realities, past and present, and the general sense that Jewish minorities in the West ultimately found ways to preserve their religious identity while amassing social-political influence, have rendered comparisons between Muslims and Jews an essential aspect of different (and at times contesting) arguments about the future of Muslim minorities in the West.     

Marketing an imagined Muslim woman: Muslim Girl magazine and the politics of race,gender and representation

This article examines the magazine Muslim Girl (started publication 2007) and explores how the representations on the magazine's pages construct a particular type of identity for Muslim women: an ‘idealized’ Muslim woman who is both North American/Western and Muslim. Such a woman is portrayed as liberal, educated, fashionable, a ‘can-do’ woman, who is also committed to her faith. This ‘ideal’ woman is situated squarely as a neo-liberal subject in an increasingly consumerist world: she is ‘marketable’ (and marketed) as the ‘good Muslim’ (Mamdani, 2004) and is positioned as the ‘familiar stranger’ (Ahmed, 2000) in North America. This so-called ‘modern’ Muslim (read: ‘good Muslim’) is juxtaposed both against the ‘fundamentalist’ Muslim (read: ‘bad Muslim’) and the ‘normalized’ white North American subject. Against the discourse of post 9/11 nationalism and within the context of (gendered) Orientalism, this article argues that such idealized representations present easily recognizable tropes, which serve important political, ideological and cultural purposes within North American society. An analysis of these representations – and the purposes which they serve – provides an important window into the nuances of the structured discourses that seek to control and discipline the gendered Muslim body. On the one hand, the representations in Muslim Girl focus on the so-called ‘integrated North American Muslim’ – a ‘modern’ or ‘good’ Muslim – within the context of the multicultural, neo-liberal and post 9/11 nation-state. On the other hand, these representations also highlight examples of Muslim women, who seemingly remain committed to their faith and community. Such representations of hybridized North American Muslims speak powerfully to the forces – ideological, cultural, political and social – that are at play in the post 9/11 world. In analyzing the representations found in Muslim Girl, this paper provides an insight into some of these forces and their implications.     

Muslim Family Law in Southern Thailand: A Historical Overview

Muslims have long a history of practicing Islamic law where Muslim communities are the minority. In Thailand, past governments have positively included Islamic law as a legitimate source of personal law for Muslims in the southern regions. Consequently, Muslims are governed by two different sets of laws in Thailand, one is Islamic law and the other is the secular law. However, only Islamic law is applicable for Muslims especially in settling their matrimonial disputes and inheritance. Islamic family law has a long history and has been preserved for the betterment and benefits of Muslim citizens especially in the four Muslim provinces of Thailand. This study aims to describe the development of Islamic law through the different periods of governments in southern Thailand. The development of Islamic family law and the application of Islamic law along with its judicial aspects under the administration of Thailand will also be discusssed.     

‘I grew a beard and my dad flipped out!’ Co-option of British Muslim parents in countering ‘extremism’ within their families in Bradford and Leeds

Research on the effects of counter-terrorism has argued that Muslims are constructed as a ‘suspect community’. However, there remains a paucity of research exploring divisive effects membership to a ‘suspect community’ has on relations within Muslim families. Drawing from interviews conducted in 2010–2011 with British Muslims living in Bradford or Leeds, I address this gap by examining how co-option of Muslim parents to counter extremism fractures relations within Muslim families. I show that internalising fears of their children being radicalised or indeed radicalising others, means parents judge young Muslims’ religious practices through a restrictive moderate/extremist binary. I advance the category of ‘internal suspect body’ which is materialised through two intersecting conditions: the suspected Muslim extremist to lookout for and young Muslims at risk of radicalisation. I delineate the reproductive effects of terrors of counter-terrorism on Muslims’ experiences as they traverse state, intra-group and individual levels.