Islamic Modernism, Nationalism, And Fundamentalism: Episode And Discourse

Book Summary

The Islamic world has experienced extensive social changes in modern times--the decline of traditional order, the rise of new social classes, the formation of massive bureaucratic and military states, and the incorporation of its economies into the world capitalist structure. Yet despite these changes, a national consensus on even the most important principles of social organization--the form of government, the relationship between religion and politics, the status of women, national identity, and rule making--has yet to emerge. Instead, Islamic countries experienced a sequence of cultural episodes that were characterized by ideological debates, religious disputations, and political conflicts, each ending with a revolution or military coup. An ambitious comparative historical analysis of ideological production in the Islamic world from the mid-1800s to the present, Mansoor Moaddel's" Islamic Modernism, Nationalism, and Fundamentalism" provides a unique perspective for understanding the social conditions of these discourses. Understanding how these discourses were produced is, for Moaddel, the key to understanding Middle Eastern history. Based on this premise, Moaddel unlocks for readers the historical process that started with Islamic modernism and ended with fundamentalism. The Islamic world has experienced extensive social changes in modern times--the rise of new social classes, the formation of massive bureaucratic and military states, and the incorporation of its economies into the world capitalist structure. Yet despite these changes, a national consensus on even the most important principles of social organization--the form of government, the status of women, national identity, and rule making--has yet to emerge. An ambitious comparative historical analysis of ideological production in the Islamic world from the mid-1800s to the present, Mansoor Moaddel's "Islamic Modernism, Nationalism, and Fundamentalism" provides a unique perspective for understanding the social conditions of these discourses. Moaddel characterizes these movements in terms of a sequence of cultural episodes characterized by ideological debates and religious disputations, each ending with a revolution or military coup. Understanding how the leaders of these movements formulated their discourses is, for Moaddel, the key to understanding Middle Eastern history. This premise allows him to unlock for readers the historical process that started with Islamic modernism and ended with fundamentalism.

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