Transnational Islamic charity as everyday rituals

In this article, through a case study of transnational Islamic charity, we explore the intersection between migrant development engagements and religious practices. While migrant engagement in development is well known, the intersections of these with everyday religious practices are less so. We use the prism of ‘everyday rituals', understood as human actions that connect ideals with practices. Everyday rituals not only express but also reinforce ideals, in this case those of Islamic charity in a context of sustained migrant transnationalism. The article draws on 35 interviews about Islamic charity, transnationalism and development with practising Muslims of Pakistani origin in Oslo, Norway. We argue that everyday rituals are a useful tool for exploring the role of religion in motivating migrant development engagements. This is because they include transcendental perspectives, bridge ideals and practices that connect the contemporary to the hereafter, encompass transnational perspectives, and are attentive to the ‘here’ and ‘there’ spatially in migrants’ lives.     

Transformations of Old Colony Mennonites: the making of a trans‐statal community

Through an analysis that combines the historical development of the Old Colony Mennonites, which covers their migrations from sixteenth‐century Europe to late twentieth‐century Latin America, with ethnographic field work in Bolivia and Argentina, I examine the genesis and maintenance of a religiously based trans‐statal community. I argue for the conceptual maintenance of a clear distinction between transnational and trans‐statal processes in understanding the cross‐border practices of Old Colony Mennonites. Mennonites do not move in and out of nations but between the territories over which different states claim sovereignty. I further show that the trans‐statal practices of Old Colony Mennonites are a strategic means of outmanoeuvring states in their imposition of national identities within a context of nation‐states being the dominant political formation. The case contributes to the call for a shift in emphasis from nations to faith communities in transnational and trans‐statal studies.     

Cross‐cultural civility in global civil society: transnational cooperation in Chinese NGOs

Transnational networks and organizations are often hailed as embodiments and carriers of global civil society, yet these assessments remain incomplete due to a lack of empirical research on their internal dynamics. In this article, I investigate whether or not transnational NGOs embody the cooperation across multiple social, cultural and political cleavages central to definitions of global civil society by exploring how multiple memberships are negotiated in the context of their everyday tasks. Using organizational documents and interview data with staff of two Protestant Christian development NGOs in China, I analyse how actors within these transnational organizations successfully manage their multiple memberships in national polities, national cultures, religious communities and a world culture. While multiple memberships exhibit the potential both to enable and to constrain an NGO's organizational tasks, the key to making such ties enabling are staff who act as skilful cross‐cultural brokers. Thus, the type of social capital required to render multiple memberships beneficial and not harmful to the organizations also makes these organizations true indicators of a developing global civil society.     

Toward a Cross-Cultural Understanding of Work-Related Beliefs

Although psychology's contribution to a study ofthe Protestant Work Ethic (PWE) made a slow start we nowhave an impressive array of studies which have examinedthis construct, even cross-culturally, and find that not only is this construct seeminglyalive and well, but also that it is espoused morestrongly by non-Protestant and non-Western countries.Furnham (1990b) examined a composite of seven scales designed to measure the PWE, and found thatseveral factors could be identified. A study wasundertaken to compare the meaning of work in twodifferent cultures, one Western Christian(Australian) and the other non-Western Buddhist (Sri Lankan).The results suggest that both cultures have similarperceptions about the meaning of work, but Sri Lankansseem to be more strongly committed to hard work.Although work related beliefs seem to be similar, SriLankans do not endorse the belief that hard work leadsto success as enthusiastically as Australiansdo.     

National conceptions,transnational solidarities: Turkey,Islam and Europe

In this article, I examine the interplay between the institutionalization of Islam in Europe and the transnationalism of Turkey's Directorate for Religious Affairs (Diyanet). Based on extensive fieldwork in Turkey, Austria, Belgium, France and Germany, I demonstrate not only the salience of the nation‐state prerogative on the part of both European states and the Turkish state but also the tension between national conceptions of Muslim identity on both sides amid transnational solidarities. I also argue that, to a certain extent, European policies of detransnationalizing the Muslim field in Europe also intersect with the Diyanet's transnational politics vis‐à‐vis Turkish/Muslim immigrants in their common resistance to the deculturalization of Muslims in Europe. While European countries try to nationalize their respective Muslim communities into their cultural and juridical framework through reterritorialization, the Diyanet has increasingly deterritorialized its activities to preserve a Muslim identity engrained in Turkishness – hence, the coexistence of both a tension and mutual accommodation between Europe and Turkey.     

Religious transnationalism,development and the construction of religious boundaries: the case of the Dera Sachkhand Ballan and the Ravidass Dharm

In this article, I examine the general assumption that transnationalism is creating new divisions and iniquitous social hierarchies. For caste‐based religious centres like the Dera Sachkhand Ballan (DSB), which is engaged in modes of subaltern religiosity among Ravidassias, transnationalism can be a powerful agent of religious and social change. By nurturing transnational networks, especially in the United Kingdom, the DSB has now emerged as the main driver of Ravidassia identity in Punjab. The material support of overseas followers has made this achievement possible for religious and social institutions in Punjab, and has enabled overseas Ravidassias to demonstrate to higher castes a sense of collective achievement. Transnationalism is thus central to the process of differentiating between the followers of the DSB and Sikhism. It also provided critical support for the birth of a new religion in 2010, the Ravidass Dharm.