A senior scholar of Islamic politics, providing a corrective to a dangerous gap in understanding, explores the true nature of contemporary Islamism and the essential ways in which it differs from the religious faith of Islam.

A political, social, and cultural battle is currently raging in the Middle East. On one side are the Islamists, those who believe Islam should be the region’s primary identity. In opposition are nationalists, secularists, royal families, military establishments, and others who view Islamism as a serious threat to national security, historical identity, and a cohesive society. This provocative, vitally important work explores the development of the largest, most influential Islamic groups in the Middle East over the past century. Tarek Osman examines why political Islam managed to win successive elections and how Islamist groups in various nations have responded after ascending to power. He dissects the alliances that have formed among Islamist factions and against them, addressing the important issues of Islamism’s compatibility with modernity, with the region’s experiences in the twentieth century, and its impact on social contracts and minorities. He explains what Salafism means, its evolution, and connections to jihadist groups in the Middle East. Osman speculates on what the Islamists’ prospects for the future will mean for the region and the rest of the world.

As America struggles to understand Islam and Muslims on the world stage, one concept in particular dominates public discourse: Islamism. References to Islamism and Islamists abound in the media, in think tanks, and in the general study of Islam, but opinions vary on the differences of degree and kind among those labeled Islamists. This book debates what exactly is said when we use this contentious term in discussing Muslim religion, tradition, and social conflict. Two lead essays offer differing viewpoints: Donald K. Emmerson argues that Islamism is a useful term for a range of Muslim reform movements—very few of which advocate violence—while Daniel M. Varisco counters that the public specter of violence and terrorism by Islamists too often infects the public perceptions of Islam more generally. Twelve commentaries, written by Muslim and non-Muslim intellectuals, enrich the debate with differing insights and perspectives.

Islam features widely in the news, often in its most militant forms, but few people in the non-Muslim world really understand its nature. Malise Ruthven's Very Short Introduction, offers essential insights into the big issues, provides fresh perspectives on contemporary questions, and guides us through the complex debates.

The book examines the dynamics from the formation of Islamist politics for the struggle for hegemony to failure to become a hegemonic force in Bangladesh. The contradiction between Islamic universalism/Islamist populism, on one hand, and a politics of Muslim particularism in India, on the other, is revealed in this study.

The essays of Post-Islamism bring together young and established scholars and activists from different parts of the Muslim World and the West to discuss their research on the changing discourses and practices of Islamist movements and Islamic states largely in the Muslim majority countries.

"The aim of this book is to encourage mutual understanding between the Islamic and Western worlds. The majority of Muslims are peaceable, law-abiding citizens. However, Muslim fundamentalists, described here as ""Islamists"", presents a challenge to the valu"

Jamaat-e-Islami Hind is the most influential Islamist organization in India today. Founded in 1941 by Syed Abul Ala Maududi with the aim of spreading Islamic values in the subcontinent, Jamaat and its young offshoot, the Student Islamic Movement of India or SIMI, have been watched closely by Indian security services since September 11. In particular, SIMI has been accused of being behind terrorist bombings. This book is the first in-depth examination of India's Jamaat-e-Islami and SIMI, exploring political Islam's complex relationship with democracy and providing a rare window into the Islamist trajectory in a Muslim-minority context. Irfan Ahmad conducted extensive ethnographic fieldwork at a school in the town of Aligarh, among student activists at Aligarh Muslim University, at a madrasa in Azamgarh, and during Jamaat's participation in elections in 2002. He deftly traces Jamaat's changing position in relation to India's secular democracy and the group's gradual ideological shift toward religious pluralism and tolerance. Ahmad demonstrates how the rise of militant Hindu nationalism since the 1980s--evident in the destruction of the Babri mosque and widespread violence against Muslims--led to SIMI's radicalization, its rejection of pluralism, and its call for jihad. Islamism and Democracy in India argues that when secular democracy is responsive to the traditions and aspirations of its Muslim citizens, Muslims in turn embrace pluralism and democracy. But when democracy becomes majoritarian and exclusionary, Muslims turn radical.

This book looks anew at the vexing question of whether Islam is compatible with democracy, examining histories of Islamic politics and social movements in the Middle East since the 1970s.

Based on original research into women's participation in the workforce, this book is the most up-to-date study of women in Iran available. The Islamisation of state and society which followed the 1979 revolution involved an attempt by the Islamic state to seclude women within the home. However, the power of the state was constrained by many factors - the Iran-Iraq war, economic restructuring - and women's own responses to oppression. In spite of continual attempts by the state to strengthen patriarchal relationships, women's participation in the labour force in 1999 is greater than it was before the revolution. Women's participation in both the economy and in political movements has led to a much greater level of gender consciousness in the 1990s than at the height of westernisation in the 1960s and 70s. Religious and secular women in urban areas have demanded reforms and forced the Islamic state to return to the position of the pre 1979 reforms. Providing a history of Iran, an introduction to Islamism and an analysis of the women and Islam debate, this book will be necessary reading for students and academics of Middle East studies, women's studies and labour studies.