Download Religion and Intercultural Dialoguenin the EU

Citizenship and Immigration Canada
Ottawa 28 April 2009
What is “radical” about Islam?
A seminar by Dr Sara Silvestri
Cambridge University and City University
London
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
My areas of work
RESEARCH:
• Interdisciplinary (across Internat.Politics and Sociology)
• mainly qualitative + collaboration on quantitative projects
ONGOING PROJECTS and INTERESTS
- Muslim political mobilisation and institutions in Europe
- European public policies towards religion and Muslim communities
- Suspect Communities (counter-terrorism effects on Irish & Muslims in UK)
- Radicalisation: secular and religious
- Migration, integration and social cohesion, gender
TEACHING:
Political Islam & Muslims in Europe
Religion in Global Politics,
EU, International Relations
POLICY-RELEVANT WORK:
consultant/advisor on Muslims in Europe, intercultural dialogue, counterterrorism (EuroMed, EU, UN Alliance of Civilisations, UK gov, think thanks)
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Religion: what it is
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Spiritual search
Answer to the mystery of death & life,
Source of ethical values
Externalised through practices and rituals which
reinforce belonging
• A way to organise society
• An element of culture or shaped by culture?
• Theologians have distinguished between FAITH
(belief, spirituality) and RELIGION (as set of
practices, anthropocentric)
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Religion: what it does
• Connects transcendent (supra-natural dimension of
immortality and perfection) with immanent
(mortal, earthly and imperfect dimension of
humans)
• Proposes a unique universal truth that provides a
comprehensive belief system, a view of world order
that also suggest how to organise human relations
• Calls for personal engagement
>> RADICAL FEATURES
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
The political dimension of
religions (esp.monotheistic)
• Refer to a holy scripture that is unchanging and
that indicates values inform family structures and
norms for social organisation
• In their effort to connect transcendent and
immanent they impinge on real life
• In time religions have enabled political leaders or
social groups embracing a particular religion to
create boundaries and to strengthen their authority
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Radicalisation (official def.)
• European Commission (2005): “Violent radicalisation” is the
phenomenon of people embracing opinions, views and ideas
which could lead to acts of terrorism
• UK Gov. (2009): “process by which people come to support
violent extremism and, in some cases, join terrorist groups”.
Contest II addresses long term causes, before radicalisation
becomes “violent”; entails monitoring adherence to ideologies
• Dutch Gov. (2004): “Radicalism is an (increasing) readiness to
pursue and/or support one’s own political or social beliefs,
which may imply far -reaching changes in society and a threat
to the democratic legal system and/or may involve the
application of undemocratic means to that end”. (2005 doc.) 3
types of radicalism: Islamist, right wing, animalists
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Radicalisation (cont.)
Research shows that:
• It is a process
• No one pattern (personal psychology,
ideology, domestic or international
causes, socio-economic conditions)
• Entails opposition, resistance, dissent
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Key terms in Islamic theology
and history used by Islamists
• Acceptance of Mohammad’s message calling for total
submission to God written in Quran by following principles
and examples of religious life provided by Quran & Hadith
(Sunna) and by adhering to the 5 pillars
• Tawhid (unity and unique sovereignty of God)
• Ummah (global, transnational community, sense of
universality)
• Tradition: Quran+Hadith (sources of inspiration and authority)
+ Salaf (ancestors)
• Societal reform based on sense of divine justice
• Recreation of the Caliphate (perfect harmonious polity)
• Sharia (set of legal principles enshrined in holy scriptures,
provides framework, point of reference)
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Islamists’ Characteristics
• Narrative: revival of mythical past,
alternative polity, resistance, identification
with oppression of Muslims throughout the
world, assimilation of third-worldist causes
• Strategy: opposition, dissent, collaboration,
undermine the establishment, adaptation
• Location: mosques, educational centres,
private associations/ civil society
• Membership: middle classes & students
(often socialised in West) + masses
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Islamist groups
(some with extreme-violent offshoots)
• Salafist family (revivalism)
• Muslim Brothers & Jamaat-i-Islami (reform,
renewal)
• Takfiri (reject politics)
• Tablighi (pietists, reject politics, traditionalists)
• Salafi-Jihadi (hybrid recent development)
• Hitz-ut-Tahrir (yes political engagement no
democracy)
• Fetullah Gulen - conservative
• Islamic Jihad, Al Qaeda & co.
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
The “radical” messages
of Islam & Islamism
• POLITICAL: Questions secular authority and power
relations. Absolute sovereignty of God
• PHILOSOPHICAL: Calls for societal transformation >
potential for dissidence, subversion, revolution
(already since Ibn Taymiyyaa, 14th cent.)
• PHYSICAL & HISTORICAL: Violence nexus in
Mohammad’s life (but needs be contextualised and
historicised) and in path undertaken by Islamist
groups once mainstream political engagement
closed
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Frame of understanding:
Orientations and objectives
• RESISTANCE Towards country of origin:
reform, against corruption
• RESISTANCE Towards country of settlement:
Islamisation, Dawah, advocacy of minority
rights, awareness of Islam
• Commitment to global transnational project
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Project on Secular and Religious
forms of Radicalisation (ESF sponsored with
colleagues at ISIM and London Metropolitan Univ.)
• Extreme right & left movements in Europe since 60s
• Interconnection between the secular, the political
and the religious dimensions
• The role of political culture and lifestyle
• The historical context (national, local,
international, + grievances & understandings of
identity)
• Global transformations of youth culture and of
established forms of authority in both Western and
non-Western societies
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]
Religion’s (&Islam’s) contribution to
Radicalisation?
• Assumption that theology and religious leaders
endorse violence – not always valid
• Political Theology (world order, authority)
• Narrative, history (events, stepping stones, figures)
• Symbols and rituals
• Socialisation (family, friends, community)
• Fluidity and osmosis – religious shopping, in and out
of networks
>> Religion as a vehicle, provider of
powerful narrative and symbols
28/04/2009
Dr Sara Silvestri
[email protected]