Between the State and Islam

Until recently, the study of the Middle East has focused almost exclusively on Islam and on the regime, especially on its non-democratic aspects. It has done so at the expense of accounting fully for the forces of scepticism, liberty, and creativity that struggle against Islamic conformism and state hegemony. Strangely, there seems to be no scholarly awareness of the simple fact that however influential religion appears in word and deed, however evident the trappings of state authority, people come into being, thrive, marry, raise families, think, laugh, and cry without regard to - indeed, sometimes in utter defiance of - the strictures of religious or state authority. This volume examines how Middle Eastern peoples in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries lived and flourished while trying to shape their political and religious surroundings outside the formal structures of established religion and the state.

Introduction: between the State and Islam Charles E. Butterworth and I. William Zartman; Part I. The Nineteenth Century: Preface Charles E. Butterworth; 1. On what is between, even beyond, the paradigms of the State and Islam Charles E. Butterworth; 2. The impact of technology change on the nineteenth-century Arab world Antoine B. Zahland; 3. An Islamic political formula in transformation: Islam, identity, and nationalism in the history of the Volga Tatars Serif Mardin; 4. Muslim opposition thinkers in the nineteenth century Said Bensaid Alaoui; Part II. The Twentieth-Century: Preface I. William Zartman; 5. Against the taboos of Islam: anti-conformist tendencies in contemporary Arab/Islamic thought As'ad AbuKhalil; 6. Democratic thought in the Arab world: an alternative to the patron state Iliya Harik; 7. Political parties between state power and Islamist opposition Ibrahim A. Karawan; 8. Liberal professionals in the contemporary Arab world Timothy J. Piro; 9. Daniel Lerner revisited, the audio-visual media and its reception: two North African cases Jean Leca, Meriem Verges and Mounia Bennani-Chraibi; 10. Islam, the state, and democracy: the contradictions I. William Zartman.

Traditionally, the study of the Middle East has focused on Islam and on the regime, without accounting for the contrary forces of scepticism, liberty, and creativity. This volume examines how Middle Eastern peoples in the past two centuries lived and flourished outside the structures of established religion and the state.