Sharīʻa, Islamism and Arab support for democracy

Berger, Lars

doi:10.1080/13510347.2018.1527316

Cited by 16 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 57 publications

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“…By ‘secularism’, we mean the idea that ‘religion as a source of authority in social and intellectual questions is not privileged over other sources of authority in societies internally differentiated’ (Al-Azmeh, 2019: 8). Then, in Sunni-majority societies, secular political forces are those that oppose the deep effective translation of the above-mentioned narrow conception of sharī‘a into positive law (or at least its limitation to the realm of family law), even if they can express a generic support for the word sharī‘a (Berger, 2019) and accept its symbolic role in the Constitution (Blouët and Steuer, 2015). This is the case in Egypt, whose Constitution states in its Article 2 – since 1980 – that the principles of sharī‘a are the main source of law.…”

Section: Review Of Literature and Definitionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Consequently, all the Egyptian parties need to have at least some Christians and some women among their members. The issue is particularly critical for Islamist parties because the sharī‘a tends to elicit conflicts with gender equality and religious equality (Berger, 2019: 3–5). Yet, during the past half-century, many Islamist organizations have shifted from condemning women’s public presence to seeing women as agents of the Islamization and moralization of public life (Jad, 2018; Rock-Singer, 2019: 154–178).…”

Section: Review Of Literature and Definitionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Law and political Islam’s transformations: Egyptian Islamists and the notions of a civil state and a religious party

2023

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Two notions have been at the center of the Egyptian constitutional debates since 2011: the ‘civil state’ and the ‘religious party’. The Muslim Brothers have played on the ambiguity of the notion of a ‘civil state’ as being neither secular nor theocratic, just as their understanding of an Islamic state. The Salafi al-Nūr Party has long refused to embrace the notion. Nevertheless, in 2019 it obtained from the Parliament’s Speaker a definition close to the one defended by the Muslim Brothers and endorsed it as a victory against the secular interpretation of the term. The same ambiguity appears regarding the notion of a ‘religious party’. The al-Nūr Party tried to prevent the interdiction of such parties in the 2014 Constitution. At the same time, it distances itself from the notion, and abides by the law, including Christian members, presenting female candidates, and organically separating political and religious activities.

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Section: Review Of Literature and Definitionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Review Of Literature and Definitionsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Law and political Islam’s transformations: Egyptian Islamists and the notions of a civil state and a religious party

2023

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“…When a positive correlation between embracing Islam and violence does exist, the relationship is driven by a particular understanding or interpretation of Islam and the concomitant personal obligations they believe Islam establishes for Muslims (Haddad 2004; Fair et al 2012; Fair et al 2018a; Berger 2019).…”

Section: Drivers Of Individual Support For Islamist Violence: What Th...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Support for Domestic Islamist Terrorism in Bangladesh: Insights from a Novel Survey

Fair

Patel

2022

Politics and Religion

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We employ regression analysis of 2017 survey data from 4,067 Bangladeshis to exposit the lineaments of individual support for domestic Islamist violence. Our dependent variables derive from measures of public support for the stated goals and violent means of three Bangladeshi Islamist terrorist groups. Our study variables include participation in communal Friday prayer; indexed measures of other pietic practices; preferences for Shari'a and secularism; and gender. We include several well-established control variables. We find that participation in communal Friday prayers significantly correlates with diminished support for militant groups while having no effect upon support for their violent means. In four (of 10) models, we find that respondents who view Shari'a as being coterminous with scriptural literalism and harsh physical punishments are significantly more likely to support the groups' goals. Finally, we find women to be consistently more likely to support the goals and means of the militant groups.

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“…Most of this work yielded null or inconclusive results. For example, a pooled analysis of data from 12 Arab countries suggested that, contrary to conventional wisdom, support for sharia laws increased support for democracy (Berger, 2019; the opposite effect was found for belief that sharia constitutes the word of God in this study), while other analyses of data from different samples of Arab countries showed that it is negatively associated with democratic support (Spierings, 2014) and with openness to diverse political ideas (Tessler, Jamal, & Robbins, 2012).…”

Section: The Religion‐democracy Puzzlementioning

confidence: 99%

Religion and Democratic Commitment: A Unifying Motivational Framework

Bloom

Arıkan

Vishkin

2021

Political Psychology

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There is no easy answer to the question of whether religiosity promotes or hinders commitment to democracy. Earlier research largely pointed to religiosity as a source of antidemocratic orientations. More recent empirical evidence is less conclusive, however, suggesting that the effect of religiosity on democratic commitment could be positive, negative, or null. We review the existing approaches to the study of religiosity and democratic commitment, focusing on support for the democratic system, political engagement, and political tolerance, by distinguishing accounts that examine a single dimension of religiosity from accounts that adopt a multidimensional approach. We show that multidimensional approaches, while effective in accounting for the effect of religiosity on discrete democratic norms, fall short of accounting for some of the inconsistencies in the literature and in identifying the mechanisms that may be responsible for shaping how religiosity affects endorsement of democratic norms as a whole. To fill this gap, we propose the Religious Motivations and Expressions (REME) model. Applying theories of goal constructs to religion, this model maps associations between three religious expressions (belief, social behavior, and private behavior) and the religious motivations that underly these expressions. We discuss how inconsistent associations between religiosity and elements of democratic commitment can be rendered interpretable once the motivations underlying religious expressions, as well as contextual information, are accounted for. We contend that applying goal constructs to religion is critical for understanding the nature of the religion‐democracy nexus.

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Sharīʻa, Islamism and Arab support for democracy

Cited by 16 publications

References 57 publications

Law and political Islam’s transformations: Egyptian Islamists and the notions of a civil state and a religious party

Law and political Islam’s transformations: Egyptian Islamists and the notions of a civil state and a religious party

Support for Domestic Islamist Terrorism in Bangladesh: Insights from a Novel Survey

Religion and Democratic Commitment: A Unifying Motivational Framework

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