Islamic Exceptionalism

April 11, 2016
Starting with the premise that Islam is distinctive among all other world religions due to the primacy of transnational political goals, Hamid (Temptations of Power) attempts to untangle the knot of current Islamist statecraft throughout the Middle East. While considering different models of political formulations of Islam—in Turkey, Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, and Iraq—he problematizes simplistic conceptions of Islamism (which he defines as a project reconciling “the premodern Islamic tradition with the modern tradition of the nation-state”) and delineates how Islam and democracy might coexist in an age of insurgent ideology and the current “clash of values” between Islam and “the West.” Hamid believes the path forward is complex and messy, contending that Islam is exceptional in its political manifestations and must not be compared to secular notions of liberal democracy. Hamid’s work offers a tempered, well-researched analysis of Islamism in its current state and offers tentative hopes for those seeking a new way through the intricacies of Islamic politics in the Middle East.

April 15, 2016
Why can't the Islamic world be more secular and liberal like "we" are? Atlantic contributing writer Hamid (Temptations of Power: Islamists and Illiberal Democracy in a New Middle East, 2014), senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and vice chair of the Project on Middle East Democracy, asks some obvious yet startling questions regarding the debate over Islamism. Many Westerners assume that the cataclysm in the Middle East following the Arab Spring and the rise of the Islamic State group in Syria and Iraq will eventually smooth into a secular, liberal future, because this is the way it has played out in the West--e.g., the Protestant Reformation allowed Europe "to shed its religious demons" and paved the way for the Enlightenment and modern liberalism. This is progress, Westerners assume, yet Hamid argues sagely that Islam is uniquely resistant to these forces because it already underwent a "reformation" in the late 19th century as a response "to the challenges of secularism, European colonialism, and the creeping authoritarianism of the late Ottoman era." Boldly, the author argues that Islam is perhaps the most modern religion of all, since Mohammad, "armed with God's speech," instituted a "fierce egalitarianism" that allowed women to own property and earn their own income; mandated charity, redistribution of income, and social security for the elderly; and, most strikingly, stressed direct access to God without intercession of church or formal clergy. Moreover, Hamid asserts, the Islamic tradition already has a rich tradition of democracy--i.e., shura, or consensus. While Christianity never had a built-in conception of law, governance, and state-building--in fact, it was opposed to state legitimacy--Islam fashioned an organic political framework. Islam, in short, does not function like Christianity, and why should it? The faith of these believers remains remarkable, and Hamid emphasizes how in Indonesia and Malaysia the Islamists thrive in a pluralistic democracy. The author looks especially at the role of the Muslim Brotherhood in trying to work (unsuccessfully) within secular state bounds. Fresh, provocative thinking on the "Arab problem."

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December 1, 2015

With the caliphate long Islam's dominant form of governance, the Ottoman Caliphate's abolition in 1924 has meant a continuing struggle for a legitimate political order in the Middle East. As a result, says Hamid, director of research at the Brookings Doha Center, Islam has a unique take on the role of politics in religion--and vice versa.

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