Society for Comparative Studies in Society and History
The New Religious Politics: Where, When, and Why Do "Fundamentalisms" Appear?
Author(s): Nikki R. Keddie
Reviewed work(s):
Source: Comparative Studies in Society and History, Vol. 40, No. 4 (Oct., 1998), pp. 696-723
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The New Religious Politics:
Where,When, and Why Do
"Fundamentalisms"
Appear?
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
Universityof California,Los Angeles
The reasonsfor the recentand simultaneousappearance,or rise in influence, in
much of the world of "fundamentalist"
or doctrinallyand socially conservative
religiopoliticalmass movementshave been analyzedfor individualgroupsbut
rarelyin a way that comparesall the main religions and the regions in which
they are strong.' Rarerstill have been analyses of why such movementshave
expandedin most areasonly since the 1970s, what causes exist in areaswhere
these movementsare strongand why they differfrom those regions wherethey
areweak or nonexistent,andwhat,aside fromreligion,producesdifferenttypes
of movements.Here we will try to see if thereare common factorsin time and
in space that help explain these movements and will look for causes of their
similaritiesanddifferences.Explanationspresentedhere will stressdifferences
between religious nationalism (or communalism) directed primarilyagainst
other religious communities and conservative religious politics directed primarily against internalenemies. Differences between types and levels of preexisting religiousbeliefs will be examinedto suggest why some areashave such
movements and others do not. World-widefactors that help to accountfor the
recent rise of religious politics will also be explored.
To deal with such large problemsin one essay requiresthe simplificationof
complex and variedmovementsand permitsonly a brief treatmentof theirhisThanksgo to the following readersof this essay: HouchangChehabi;HenryMunson,Jr.;PerryAnderson,CharlesTilly, Val Moghadam;and to RaymondGrew for all this help.
I Most comparativevolumes on fundamentalismare collections, with most authorsdiscussing
one area. Exceptions are MarkJuergensmeyer,The New Cold War?Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State (Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1993) and Bruce B. Lawrence,
Defendersof God: TheFundamentalistRevoltagainst the Moder Age (San Francisco:Harperand
Row, 1989). Useful collections include the five volumes of the FundamentalismProject of the
AmericanAcademyof Artsand Sciences, editedby MartinE. MartyandR. ScottAppleby andpublished by the Universityof Chicago Press (Chicago, 1991-95; full referencein note 3); RichardT.
Antoun and Mary Elaine Hegland, eds. Religious Resurgence: ContemporaryCases in Islam,
Christianity,and Judaism (Syracuse:SyracuseUniversityPress, 1987); Lionel Caplan,ed., Studies in Religious Fundamentalism(Albany,SUNY Press, 1987); John StrattonHawley, ed., Fundamentalismand Gender(New York:OxfordUniversityPress, 1994); and Contention,4:2, 3, and5:3
(1995, 1996), sections on comparativefundamentalism.
0010-4175/98/4501-0320$9.50 ? 1998Societyfor Comparative
Studyof SocietyandHistory
696
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
697
torical backgroundand development, much of which has been well covered
elsewhere.2 These movements, arising as they do from many countries with
very differentreligioustraditionsandregionalhistorieswhich affecttheirshape
and nature,have severalvariations.This essay explores those factorsthatmake
the movementscomparabledespite majordifferencesin the religions, regions,
and circumstanceswhere they appear-factors that arise largely from modem
developments, especially of the past three decades. Emphasizedare generalizations;detailed treatmentsof each movementmust, because of space, be deferred.
THE TERMINOLOGY OF RELIGIOPOLITICS
Although I accept only some of the objections to the term fundamentalism,I
preferto employ, when possible, a more neutralterm, New Religious Politics,
shorteningit to religiopolitics or NRP.This termdoes not cover all recentreligiopolitical movements but can be applied when movements exhibit certain
specific features.These featuresinclude, first, an appealto a reinterpreted,homogenized religious tradition,seen as solving problemsexacerbatedby various forms of secular,communal,or foreign power. Second, these are populist
movements that aim at gaining political power in orderto transformgovernments on the basis of their religiopoliticalprogram.Third,they are not led by
liberalsor leftists and have predominantlyconservativesocial views. For most
groups this includes patriarchalviews regardinggender,family relations and
social mores, althoughthere are a few exceptions analyzedbelow.
Using the categoryof NRP avoids some problemsof employingthe termfundamentalist,includingthe connotationsof its U.S. Protestantorigin, the inclusion of apoliticalreligious groups,or the implicationof extremism.3My terms
involve a specialized use of the broadterm "religiopolitics,"but no satisfactory short alternativenow exists; terms like religious (or Islamic, Christian,or
Hindu)revival or resurgenceare unsatisfactoryin stressingthe religious at the
2 Basic informationon most such movements is found in the relevant
chaptersof the five volumes edited by MartinE.Martyand R. Scott Appleby, FundamentalismsObserved, Fundamentalisms and Society, Fundamentalismsand the State, FundamentalismsComprehended,Accountingfor Fundamentalisms(Chicago:Universityof Chicago Press, 1991, 1993, 1993, 1994, 1995).
Overall,the descriptivearticlesare very good and are superiorto many of the generalizingpieces.
My analyses often differ from those found in the four summarychaptersat the end of Fundamentalism Comprehended.For a debate about the series see Henry R. Munson, "Not All Crustaceans
areCrabs:Reflectionson the ComparativeStudyof FundamentalismandPolitics,"Contention,4:3
(Spring 1995), 151-66; R. Scott Appleby, "ButAll Crabsare Crabby:Valid and Less ValidCriticisms of the FundamentalismProject,"ibid., 195-202; and Henry Munson, "Responseto Appleby," ibid., 207-9.
3 Mark Juergensmeyer,"Response to Munson: Fundaphobia-The IrrationalFear of Fundamentalism,"Contention,5:3 (Spring 1996), 127-32 argues that in popularuse "the term fundamentalismhas become a political weapon,"comparedin the West to communismand in India to
Naziism (p. 128). Adherentsof the U.S. ChristianRight also oppose being called fundamentalists.
See Pat Robertson,The TurningTide(Dallas:WordPublishing, 1993), 141-2.
698
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
expense of the political.4The proposedtermshave the advantageof neutrality
andof makingclear both the political contentof the movementsthey cover and
theircontemporarynature.5The word fundamentalistwill be used rarely,with
implied quotationmarks.This does not indicatethat the use of fundamentalist
by othersnecessarilyreflectsanyparticularbias or vitiatestheirscholarlywork;
some of the best work in the field has been done by writerswho use this term.6
No single term would be acceptableto partisansof these movements, who
often call themselves "Muslims,""Christians,""Hindus"and the like, and do
not include politics in their terms for themselves. Participantsin these movements do not see themselves as partof a world-wide trendbut, rather,as true
followers of their own religions. To adopt their terminologywould renounce
comparisonand deny true religion to others, as their favored terms, including
"Christian,"and "Muslim,"imply thatonly they are truebelievers. (The widely used "Islamist"is disliked by some as it appearsto privilege "Islamists"as
the trueMuslims.)7While those who follow universalistbeliefs like democracy, socialism, or communismacceptidentificationby a single termworldwide,
those who stress the boundariesof their belief want to be called by a particularist name. It may thus be fruitless to seek a term acceptableto various religiopolitical movements.Clearly,a single comparativetermcannotfully define
any movement,each of which must be understoodin termsof its own context,
ideas, and actions. Comparabilitydoes not mean sameness.
The informative volumes published by the FundamentalismProject of
the American Academy of Arts and Sciences found fundamentalist or
"fundamentalist-like"
religious movementsin most of the world, but many of
these do not have the featuresemphasizedhere, such as the stress on a homogenized common doctrine,which is presentedas the truereligious tradition(al4 I proposed"New Religious Politics/NRP"at the Middle East StudiesAssociation meetings in
1995, where it was well received;whetherit will last is anotherquestion.Regardingscholarlyuse
of "fundamentalism"until an alternativeis accepted, I would, however, echo what Gyanendra
Pandeysays of "communalism."Saying why he continuesto use the term,withoutquotationmarks,
"in spite of my argument . . thatit is loaded and obfuscating.The answeris thatthe needs of communication,and of a convenientshorthand,have dictatedthis. The termhas passed into the political andhistoriographicalvocabulary"(The Constructionof Communalismin ColonialNorthIndia,
[Delhi: OxfordUniversityPress, 1990], viii.) This explanationalso covers my use of "communalism" below.
5 The term New Religious Politics might also end some confusion among scholars as to the
meaningof fundamentalism.Scholarsdiffer on such points as whetherfundamentalistmovements
mustbe politicalor involve gender.Some use fundamentalismonly for pre-modernmovementslike
the Wahhabisand call later ones neo-fundamentalist;some use fundamentalismfor both early and
recentmovements;and some reservethe termfor recentones. ErvandAbrahamian,in an otherwise
excellent book, defines fundamentalismby criteriafew scholarsaccept,andconcludesthatKhomeini was no fundamentalistbut rathera populist (surely only a partialdefinitionof him) (Khomeinism [Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1993], ch. 1).
6 It is clear from my notes for this essay that I have profited greatly from the works of many
scholarswho use the term fundamentalism.
7 See, e.g., Henry Munson, Jr., "IntolerableTolerance:WesternAcademia and Islamic Fundamentalism,"Contention,5:3 (Spring 1996), 99-117.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
699
though it is in fact new in many ways) or, especially, a high level of political
activism,ultimatelyaimedat takingpower.(The latterwas not importantin the
first wave of fundamentalismin the United States during the 1920s, which
would not meet the definitiongiven above.) Here a more limited group,seen as
more similar and significantly comparable,will be discussed; and a different
analysis will be made of the reasonsfor the rise of religiopoliticsin certainareas, afterfirst noting relevantfactors thatexist in much of the world.
WORLDWIDE
TRENDS
FAVORING
RELIGIOPOLITICS
Commonfactorsbehind these movementsmay be found in recent world-wide
trends.8Some of these trends also exist where these movements are weak or
nonexistent, somethingwhich can be explained. Such distinctionsare needed
to distinguishcauses thatare necessarybut not sufficientandrequireotherfactors if a phenomenonis to occur.9Many of the socioeconomic andpoliticalreasons often cited for the rise of these movements are in this necessary but insufficient category, as these reasons are also present in areas without such
movements.Factorswidely presenteverywherehelp explain the nearly simultaneous rise and timing of contemporaryfundamentalistmovements, influenced by world-wide socioeconomic, political, and culturalchanges, although
more is neededto explain why these factorshave led to movementsin some areas but not in others.
Globaltrendsthathave favoredthe recentrise of religiopoliticsareoften cited when discussing particularmovements. There follows a list of trendsthat
have favoredreligiopoliticsin many areas.Some have been felt stronglyalmost
everywhere,while others are mitigatedin some areas,such as the first two for
East Asia until 1998. These trendsinclude:
First, recent expansive developments in capitalism (the main element of
globalization),which have increasedtotal productionbut arehighly uneven by
region, class, race, and gender.Income distributiongaps have grown in most
areas, along with job insecuritiesand forced migration-all factors in discontent or concerns aboutidentity.
Second, economic slowdowns, stagnation,and insecurityin the developed
world, the Middle East, much of South Asia, Africa, and LatinAmerica have
encourageddiscontentand right-wingpopulist movements, which tend to nationalism in some areas and to religiopolitics (often combined with nationalism) in others.
Third, increasing migration,which may improve living standardsbut produces certainother strains.Urbanizingand internationalmigrantsexperience
prejudice, which can encourage counterideologies. Some religiopolitics first
8 World-widetrends
favoring new religious politics, including in Iran, Israel, and the United
States are discussed in Peter Beyer, Religion and Globalization(London:Sage, 1994).
9 A work that fruitfullyuses this method of comparisonis HenryMunson,Jr.,Islam and Revolution (New Haven:Yale University Press, 1988).
700
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
centerabroad,as with Sikhs in Canada."Fundamentalist"
ideologies may seem
more familiarto uprootedrural-urbanmigrantsthansecularnationalism.There
are also anti-immigrantreligiopolitics.
Fourth,greaterchoice for women in lifestyle, jobs, marriage,and motherhood, while reducingpatriarchalproblems,has led to new stresses, such as rising divorce, inadequatechild care, and disputedchallenges to male prerogatives. This encouragesnostalgia in some for the way things used to be. Other
recent changes in family structuremake young people more independentand
eager to find new identities.
Fifth, the continued growth in secular state power, while bringing social
gains, favors some groups but creates regulationsopposed by many. Governments are blamedfor socioeconomic change. With a failure-both by capitalist and socialist systems-to solve some problems,there is a tendency to turn
to ideologies both new and familiar,whether right-wing nationalismor religiopolitics.
Sixth, educationand urbangrowth allow many people to express their discontentmentmore effectively. This favors religiopolitics,which seem familiar,
can claim a moral high ground and are independentof discreditedstates and
parties.
Seventh, global culturalhomogenizationbrings reactionsbased on identity
politics, includingnationalismand religiopoliticsbecause they are seen as expressing needs betterthan the currentsecularorder,which favors universalist
modem western values. In some areas (such as Sri Lankaand the formerYugoslavia) religious and ethnic or linguistic divisions coincide, increasingdivisiveness. Many also perceive a crisis in moral terms, one that requiresa religious solution.
Eighth,in the Global South improvementsin healthhave led to increasesin
population.Populationgrowth has broughtnew strainsand skewered the demographicsof the populationtowardvery young age groups, groups that are
the main supportersof religiopoliticalmovementsin this region.
No movementarises simply as a reactionto such generalfactors;all involve
active individualsmoving in ways that are unpredictable.In orderto be comparative,this articlemust stressgeneralfactorsat the expense of individualfeatures. 10
WHY
HAVE
RELIGIOPOLITICS
ARISEN
WHERE
THEY
HAVE?
If we look for movements expressing New Religious Politics, we find important ones chiefly in the United States, South Asia, the Muslim World,and Israel. Among Muslims the strongestmovementsare in the Middle East; movements in Southeast Asia, Africa, and CentralAsia till now are less salient.
10 An alternativeand
thoughtfuldiscussionof world-widereasonsfor fundamentalism,some of
which overlap with mine, is William H. McNeill, "Fundamentalismand the Worldof the 1990s,"
MartyandAppleby,eds., Fundamentalismand Society,558-73.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
701
LiberationTheology, strongestin LatinAmerica, is differentin not being traditionalistin ideology and in being more, not less, liberal or socialist than the
official church or doctrine. Neither liberal nor socialist movements fit the
NRP's stress on conservatismand homogeneous religious doctrine, so Christian Democraticpartiesand others who accept existing liberalor social democratic states are not included,even thoughthe borderbetween them and moderate fundamentalistsis not rigid. Although many Roman Catholicsdo fit part
of the above definition,only the small numberwho belong to movementsthat
aim at takingpower in a statein orderto enforce theirinterpretationof doctrine
qualify-and the same is truefor otherreligions. There are otherreligiopolitical movementsthatalso fit the definitionin LatinAmerica,Africa,Europe,and
non-MuslimEastAsia; but their scale and importanceis smallerthanin the areas stressedhere.
Some scholars, based on differentdefinitions of fundamentalism,limit the
concept to those who follow monotheistscripturalreligions, so they put Hindu
and Buddhist revivalists into anothercategory.11Given my emphasis not on
monotheistscripturalismbut on religiouspolitics, conservatism,andpopulism,
however, I include nationalistHindus, Sikhs, and Buddhists.The communalism or religious nationalismfound in South Asia has many parallels among
monotheistsin countrieswith a recenthistoryof communalstrugglesfor power or territory,includingIsraeliJews, andMuslimsin SoutheastAsia, Palestine,
and some other areas.Although there is no rule as to what is comparable,it
seems useful to include Hindus,SouthAsian Buddhists,andthe partiallyscriptural Sikhs in New Religious Politics, since their religiopolitical movements
meet the NRP definition.OmittingSouthAsia would sacrifice the understanding of New Religious Politics thatcan be gained from studyingcommunalism.
The first major ideologist of Islamic fundamentalism,Maulana Maududi,
emerged from and reflected a communalenvironmentand background12(the
earlier Egyptian Muslim Brethrennot having produced such an overall systematic ideology). Maududi,who first theorizedkey concepts such as the Islamic state, greatly influenced the main activist theoreticianof Egyptian and
Arabreligiopolitics, Sayyid Qutb.13
Looking at the United States, SouthAsia, Israel, and the Muslim world, one
11
Comparisonsof only Islam, Christianity,and Judaismare found in Antounand Hegland,Religious Resurgence;Lawrence,Defendersof God;andGilles Kepel, TheRevengeof God,Alan Braley, trans.(UniversityPark:PennsylvaniaState UniversityPress, 1994). HenryMunson,Jr.,"Not
All CrustaceansAre Crabs,"also explicitly excludes Hindumovements.
12 See the relevantdiscussions in
Seyyed ValiReza Nasr,"CommunalismandFundamentalism:
A Re-examinationof the Origins of Islamic Fundamentalism,"Contention,4:2 (Winter 1995),
121-40; idem, Mawdudiand the Making of the Islamic Republic (New York:Oxford University
Press, 1996) and The Vanguardof the IslamicRevolution:TheJama'at-i Islami of Pakistan(Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress, 1994).
13 On Maududiand Qutb, see especially LeonardBinder,Islamic Liberalism(Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress, 1988); and Sayyed Qutb, Islam and Universal Peace (Indianapolis:
AmericanTrustPublications,1977).
702
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
is struckmoreby majordifferencesamongthese areasthanby similarities.Several religions are represented,as are nations with very differentlevels of development and histories. The United States is an economically developed superpowerthat has dominatedother regions; Israel is developed and combines
a history of persecutionwith that of dominance;South Asia and most of the
Muslim world are much poorer,less developed, and have a historyas colonies
or semi-colonies. While these differences are reflected in these regions' religiopolitics, with the thirdworld's being anti-Westernand seeing Judaismand
Christianityas the culturalarmsof neo-colonialism,thereare nonetheless major similaritiesin theirreligious politics. Is it just an accidentor a trendof the
times that New Religious Politics is found in these very differentareas, especially since there seems to be little direct influence from one fundamentalist
cultureto another?Or have we not looked in the right places for comparable
features?
The featuresleading to New Religious Politics include those listed above,
such as a search for a secure identity in the face of rapid socioeconomic and
culturalchanges; growing income gaps; changes in the status of women, the
family, and sexual mores; and the growing and often unpopularpower of secular centralgovernmentsand their failure to meet the economic and cultural
needs of their subjects. Such factors arejustly stressedin discussions of NRP
movements,but many exist as much in countrieswithoutstrongmovementsas
in those thathave them.These factors,thus, do not answerthe questionof why
these movementsappearwhere they do. Hence, despite theirimportance,they
will not be reiteratedbut will be assumed as a backgroundcommon to many
countrieswith and withoutthe emergenceof significantNRP movements.
To state in advancean explanatoryhypothesis:SignificantNRP movements
thus far tend to occur only where in recentdecades (whateverthe distantpast)
religionswith supernaturalandtheisticcontentarebelieved in, or stronglyidentified with, by a large proportionof the population.In addition,either or both
of the following must also be truein recenttimes: a high percentageof the populationidentifieswith the basic tenets of its religioustraditionregardingits god
or gods, its scripturaltext, and so forth.The only single word for this phenomenon is a term,normallyused differentlybutrecognizable-religiosity. Orelse,
or in addition,at least two strong religious communitiesexist; and there is a
widespreadquasi-nationalistidentificationwith one's religious communityas
againstothercommunities.This second varietywill be called religious nationis still used even by
alism or "communalism,"which, like "fundamentalism,"
to refer to it in one
it
is
the
dislike
it
because
who
way
only
appropriate
many
word.
The factors of religiosity or communalismare often the main ones distinguishing communitieswith or withoutsignificantNew Religious Politics; religiosity in the above sense distinguishesthe United StatesfromWesternEurope,
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
703
and Muslim countriesfrom Confucianones, for example.14 Such factors have
rarelybeen discussed by scholarsexcept in discussions over whethermonotheistic scripturalismis necessary to fundamentalism,a question which does not
explain the contrast in levels of fundamentalismbetween the United States,
where levels of belief and churchmembershipare high, and WesternEurope,
where they are low.15For all the pitfalls in discussing levels of religious belief
and identification,which vary over time and region, such levels are often recognizable enough to supportgeneralizationsin the contemporaryperiod when
New Religious Politics develop.
Both communal and fundamentalistgroups have been mobilized by steps
taken by secularizing governments and hegemonic elites. The measures offending many believers of these groups include the U.S. SupremeCourtdecisions since 1962, affirmativeaction programsin the United States and India,
and reforms in law, education, and gender and family mattersin the Muslim
world and elsewhere. Therehas also been widespreaddisillusionmentin many
regions with seculargovernmentsthat have come to power because they have
been unableto meet majorproblemsin manyregions, whetherthe governments
are socialist or capitalistin orientation.
Both rapid and often unpopularrecent socioeconomic and political change
andreligiosityor communalismseem necessaryfor fundamentalismto become
strong. Religiosity and communalism strongly influence whether a strong
movementof New Religious Politics will develop in an areathatfits an appropriate socioeconomic and political profile, but socioeconomic and political
causes appearto be the most importantfactor in explaining when they occur.
Further,major religiopolitical movements have occurredfrom the 1970s on
only after certain socioeconomic and culturalchanges typical of these recent
decades have taken place in areas with a recent history of religiosity or communalism.
LatinAmerica(and some otherareas)may be a case for the future,since that
region has both religiosity and many of the requisitesocioeconomic and political problems.There,however,the fundamentalistsare mostly Protestantswho
are not yet orientedtowardoverthrowingold power centers. To date, Roman
Catholics, even in believing areas, have resisted fundamentalism,aside from
14 Socioeconomic distinctionsexist but are insufficientto accountfor differencesin religiopolitics. East Asia has developed more rapidlythan the Middle East, but this was far less true when
religiopoliticsfirst expandedin the 1970s; anddifferencesin socioeconomic egalitarianismandthe
social safety net between WesternEuropeand the United States were also less salient then.
15 Churchmembershipstatisticsaccordingto a 1981 Galluppoll asking "Areyou affiliatedwith
a churchor religious organization?"saw 57 percentof Americansanswer yes, but only 4 percent
of the French,5 percentof Italians, 13 percentof West Germans,15 percentof Spaniards,and 22
percentof the British.The gap betweenAmericansandEuropeanson religion's importanceto them
was also great. Reportedin BarryA. Kosmin and Seymour P. Lachman,One Nation under God:
Religion in ContemporaryAmericanSociety (New York:Crown, 1993), 9. Otherpolls also show
this large gap between the United States and WesternEurope.
704
NIKKI
R. KEDDIE
"integralist"traditionalistmovementsthatarenot politically significant.Those
Catholics whose traditionalismcenters on questions stressedby the Pope can
supportthese policies without joining a Catholic fundamentalistmovement,
while a full-fledged ideological movement would probablychallenge Rome.
Roman Catholicism is the only major religion with a single doctrinalleader
(there were Shi'i rivals to Khomeini), a dynamic which may inhibit the flexibility needed for local fundamentalisms.'6Inhibitingfactors may also exist
elsewhere, so thatwhile the factorsmentionedearlierseem necessaryif strong
fundamentalistmovements are to emerge, their presence does not guarantee
that a strongmovementhas appeared.
Religiosity or communalismhelp to explain why NRP is foundboth in more
(United States) or less (third-world)economically developed countries.17The
relative weakness of NRP in EastAsia reflects both a lower degree of religiosity, as defined above, and higher levels and more egalitariannatureof that region's economic development, when comparedto areas with strong NRP at
least until 1998. Religiosity contributesto the gender-conservativeideologies
of most NRP movements, which see patriarchalpracticesas having religious
and scripturalsanction.
Most of the socioeconomicandpoliticalfactorslisted aboveexist in countries
with strongNRP movements.(This list excludes some countriesin Africa with
weak statesand development;it partlyexcludes some EastAsian and European
countrieswith income distributiongaps that have not widened significantly.)
Until now, the emergenceof strongNRP movementsrequiresboth a series of
socioeconomic and political developmentscharacteristicof the recent decades
of globalizationand a strongbackgroundof religiosityor communalism.
Many persons who participatein religiopolitics may have either mainly religious or mainly political motives and ideas, but their movements combine
both. Not all the movements consideredhere have continuedto grow: Some
have been suppressedor weakened due to governmentaction, improved socioeconomic or political conditions,revulsion from extremistacts, or internal
political errors.
COMMUNAL
RELIGIOPOLITICAL
MOVEMENTS
Until this point, communalismwas listed together with other trends,but the
most striking subdivision among religiopolitical movements is probablybetween those wherecommunalism(religiousnationalism)is primarywith the focus directedmainly againstothercommunitiesand those where the movement
16 On Catholics, see William. D. Dinges and James Hitchcock, "RomanCatholicTraditionalism andActivist Conservatismin the United States,"in MartyandAppleby,eds., Fundamentalism
Observed,66-141; andDaniel H. Levine, "ProtestantsandCatholicsin LatinAmerica,"Martyand
Appleby,FundamentalismsComprehended,155-78.
17 One scholarsuggestedto me in early 1996 thatthe weakness of social insurancein the United States causes fundamentalism.While it may contribute,the difference from other developed
countriesin fundamentalistreligious backgroundis more directlyrelevant.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
705
is primarilydirectedagainstone's own governmentbut only secondarily,or not
at all, againstothercommunities.
SouthAsia is the largest and most variegatedarea with a majormoderndevelopment of communalismor religious nationalism.The colonial and postcolonial period saw the development of quasi-ethnicidentificationwith constructednationalistversions of Hinduism and similar constructions,partly in
reaction to Hindu nationalism, followed in Islam, Sikhism, and Buddhism.
These versions had roots in nineteenth-centuryreligious modernismsbut developed especially afterthe two world wars and were alternativesto the secular nationalismof the IndianNational Congress and the later Congress Party.
Religious nationalismdeveloped in part out of nineteenth-centuryHindu reform movements like the Brahmo Samaj and Arya Samaj and similar movements in otherreligions.18
In the interwarperiod the Hindu-centerednationalistideology was developed especially by the RashtriyaSwayamsevakSangh (RSS), foundedin 1925.
Its ideology centeredon the concept of Hindutva,put forth in a 1922 book by
that name by the RSS leader, Savarkar.The book and the RSS, followed by
some laterHindunationalists,arguedthatHinduswere all who lived in, and acknowledgedculturalties to, ancientIndia.This often includedSikhs, Jains,and
untouchables,with only Muslims and Christiansregardedas enemies. Some
RSS publicists suggested that the best analogy to their understandingof nationhoodwas found in Zionism.19
Althoughit lost much popularityafterit was associatedwith MahatmaGandhi's assassination,the RSS has since been greatlyrevived andhas contributed
to two newer Hindunationalistorganizationsin the past two decades,the Vishna HinduParishad(VHP) and the BharatiyaJanbaSangh (BJP)political party.
The recent growth of Hindu nationalismis in partdue to disillusionmentwith
the acts of seculargovernments.Most scholarsconsiderthe key initialpoint for
the contemporaryefflorescenceof religiopoliticalnationalismin Indiato be the
1975-77 emergency rule of IndiraGandhi, a time when civil liberties were
curbed,opponentsjailed, and Congresslost its popularity.As the RSS entered
more actively into politics undernew leadersin the 1970s, some of its leaders
helped form the new religiopolitical groups. The RSS and some other religiopolitical groupsin Indiado not demandparticularacts of worshipor beliefs
so much as an overall belief in Hinduism.The RSS has also been notable for
having a separateand militantwomen's organizationsince 1936 which combined traditionaland modernideas.
18 On moder Hindumovements,see the fine
summaryarticleby Daniel Gold, "OrganizedHinduisms: From Vedic Truthto Hindu Nation," in Marty and Appleby, eds., FundamentalismsObserved, 531-93.
19 Ainslie T. Embree,"TheFunctionof the RashtriyaSwayamsevakSangh:To Define the Hindu Nation,"Marty and Appleby,Accountingfor Fundamentalisms,617-52; WalterK. Andersen
and ShridharD. Damle, TheBrotherhoodin Saffron:TheRashtriyaSwayamsevakSangh and Hindu Revivalism(Boulder:Westview Press, 1987).
706
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
RSS membersand severalHindureligious leaderswere among the founders
of the VishvaHinduParishad(VHP,or WorldHinduCouncil)in 1984. The RSS
has been heavily involved in the VHP, which also includes independentreligious leaders.One of its aims is to bringtribalpeople anduntouchablesinto the
Hindu fold (which would thus be much enlarged).Like the RSS, the VHP has
a broad definition of Hinduismthat includes all but Muslims and Christians,
seen as foreign and hostile. The VHP uses the Hindunationalistargumentthat
an ancientjust Hindu society was conqueredby foreign oppressors,first Muslim and then British.Hindureligious inclusiveness is called tolerance(following some western scholars), while Muslims are seen as fanatical and bigoted
and secularistsas anti-nationalagents of the West.
The growing popularityof the VHP is partly due to, and expressed by, its
mass religiopolitical rituals. These have included processions of "chariots"
(trucks)with images of MotherIndiaand holy Ganges water.The processions'
popularitycontributedto a movement to rebuild Hindu temples allegedly demolished to build mosques. The Babrimosque in the pilgrimagecenter,Ayodhya, alreadya site for conflict between Hindusand Muslim,became the center
of action.VHP pressurebroughta 1986judicial rulingthatthe disputedsite for
the mosque should be opened to the public, a decision which resultedin communalviolence all over India.The religiopoliticalBJPparty,which also had direct ties to the RSS, enteredheavily into the issue from 1986 on.20The issue
culminatedin the destructionof the mosque by a Hindu crowd in December
1992, followed by terribleHindu-Muslimriots in several cities.
Anti-Muslim agitation,including a focus on such issues as Kashmirseparatismand Rajiv Gandhi'sconcessions to Muslim pressurein favor of Muslim
family law in the 1980s, has been the mainfeatureof recentHindunationalism.
Hindu identificationhas also been increasedby television series dramatizing
the ancientHinduepics. Anotherpoint of Hindunationalistagitationcame after V.P.Singh's governmentin 1990 increasedthe reservationsfor "backward
castes"in educationand government(while some nationalistswantedto make
these people moreHindu,most did not wantto give upjob privilegesfor them).
The governmentwas seen as favoring Muslims and borderlineHindus above
true Hindus.
Indian scholars have shown how Hindu fundamentalismgrew out of antiMuslim Hinducommunalism,which in turnwas in large partan evolving and
interactiveresultof Britishimperialism.21Hindunationalismfits betteras New
Religious Politics than as a fundamentalism,since it has the main NRP char20 Peter van der
Veer,"HinduNationalismand the Discourse of Modernity:The Vishva Hindu
Parishad,"Martyand Appleby,eds., Accountingfor Fundamentalisms,653-68.
21 Recent subtle discussions include TapanRaychaudhuri,"Shadowsof the Swastika:Historical Reflections on the Politics of HinduCommunalism,"Contention,4:2 (Winter1995), 141-62;
GyanendraPandey, The Constructionof Communalismin Colonial North India; and SandriaB.
Freitag,CollectiveAction and Community:Public Arenasand the Emergenceof Communalismin
NorthIndia (Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1979).
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
707
acteristicsbut not always religiously fundamentalistones. Hindu nationalists
have constructedmodem thoughpolitically conservativedoctrinesand organizations:They are intolerantof otherdoctrines,includingboth those defined as
religious Othersand secularism;mobilize militantsarounda creed that claims
to be traditionalbut is mostly novel; and seek state power in the name of this
creed. They are also highly concernedto have Hindu control of both territory
and culture,while they are hostile to minorities,especially Muslims, who are
seen as threateningthat control. Pre-colonialHinduismwas neithermonotheistic nor scriptural,and some scholarsdeny thatit was even a single religion,22
but Hindunationalism,buildingon Hindumodernism,supportsa creedthathas
become far more like the monotheistic,scripturalreligions it fights thanthatof
the decentralizedHinduismof the past. This is partlydue to the large presence
in Indiaof non-Hinduscripturalistreligions, Muslim and Christian,seen as effective enemies by Hindu nationalists,and also due to the need for a unified
doctrineto supporta unified movement.To organizenationalmovements and
combat non-Hinduscripturalreligions, Hindunationalistscreateda more unified set of doctrinalpropositionswhich privilege a partof theirliterature.23
A parallel development toward a unified scripturalismis seen in modem
Sikhism,which formerlyhad a varietyof doctrinaltrends,some of which were
seen by theirfollowers as compatiblewith Hinduism.In recentyearsSikhs have
become far more doctrinallyunified, scriptural,and nationalist,with many advocating a separateSikh nation to be carved out of Sikh-majorityterritoryin
the Punjabregion.24IndiraGandhi'sviolent suppressionof nationalistSikhs in
theirGoldenTemplein 1984 did not reduceSikh nationalismbut resultedin her
assassinationby a Sikh bodyguard.(The assassinsof MahatmaGandhiandRajiv Gandhialso had religiopoliticalmotives.)
Anotherpartiallyparallelreligiousnationalismin pre-partitionIndiais found
among IndianMuslims. It is seen in the increasinglyseparatistprogramof the
Muslim League, which early in the twentiethcenturydemandedonly Muslim
representationvia separateelectoratesand afterWorldWarI carriedout joint
projects with the Indian National Congress stirringup agitation against the
British.ManyMuslims belonged to the Congress,but theirsentimentschanged
especially afterthe experienceof Congress-majorityprovincialgovernmentsof
the late 1930s. In this period and especially afterpartition,Maududi'sideology favoring a revived Islamic politics and state and his Jama'at-i-Islamiorganizationwere importantin the developmentof religious nationalism(although
neitherhe nor certainulama organizationsfavored the formationof Pakistan
22 See
especially the chaptersby GuentherD. Sontheimerand RobertEricFrykenbergin GuentherD. Sontheimerand HermannKulke, eds., HinduismReconsidered(Delhi: Manohar,1989).
23
Among the writings on such questions, see Juergensmeyer,The New Cold War,and Robert
Eric Frykenberg,"HinduFundamentalismand the StructuralStabilityof India,"in MartyandAppleby, eds., Fundamentalismsand the State, 233-55.
24 HarjotOberoi, "Sikh Fundamentalism:TranslatingHistory into Theory,"Fundamentalisms
and the State, 256-85.
708
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
until faced with a fait accompli).The Pakistanmovementand the formationof
Pakistanin 1947 embodied a latentcontradiction.Althoughthe chief founder,
MuhammadAli Jinnah,did not favora religiousstate,the very existence of Pakistan as a Muslim state opened the door to an increasednumberof Islamic interest groups.The influence of Islamic nationalistgroupshas grown in recent
decades, especially since the movementagainstZulfiqarAli Bhuttoin Pakistan
in the 1970s focused resentmentagainst high-handedactions by secular governments.25The succeeding governmentof Zia al-Haqqintroducedmany features of Islamization,including several Islamic punishments,the collection of
Islamic taxes throughbank accounts,Islamic bankingpractices,and new judicial rules. Althoughtherewere movementsthatresisted these changes, particularlythose of Shi'i and women's organizations,and althoughsome rules were
alteredas a result, most of the legal changes remained.Islamic identity,especially thatpartopposing HinduIndia,is today the only real unifying force in a
Pakistantornby sub-nationaland Islamic sectarianconflicts.
Ideologically, religious nationalism contains about as many novelties in
South Asia's Islam as in Hinduism,even though Islam is more amenableto a
single set of beliefs andpracticesshapedandfocused by legislation.The whole
concept of Pakistanwas novel: While it favors Muslim rule in conqueredterritory,Islamic traditionhas nothingto say aboutcarvingout a state from territories with a Muslim majority.In addition,the idea stressedby Islamists everywhere-that the shari'a should be the state's fundamentallaw code in all
spheres-is a novelty, althoughsome steps towardcodificationwere takenby
the nineteenth-centuryOttomanstate.Traditionallythe shari'awas more analogous in its proceduresto Westerncivil law, since shari'acases were brought
by individuals,and not the state, againstotherindividuals.
In the postwarperiod, fierce ethnic and social conflicts in Sri Lankaand in
the Sikh areasof the Punjabhave addedto SouthAsian religiousnationalism.26
Religious nationalismdoes not always involve a high level of belief (though
many of its adherentsare very religious) but utilizes or invents increasingly
popularreligious symbols andsuccessfullyidentifiesreligionwith the nation.27
A communalbackgroundwith analogies to the SouthAsian situationis also
25 RafiuddinAhmed,"RedefiningMuslim Identityin SouthAsia: The Transformationof the Jama'at-i-Islami,"MartyandAppleby, eds., Accountingfor Fundamentalisms,669-705; and Nasr,
Vanguard.
26 T.N. Madan,"TheDouble-edgedSword:Fundamentalismandthe Sikh Religious Tradition,"
594-627; Donald K. Swearer,"FundamentalisticMovementsin TheravadaBuddhism,"628-90,
both in Martyand Appleby,eds., FundamentalismsObserved;R. Gombrichand G. Obeyesekere,
BuddhismTransformed:Religious Change in Sri Lanka (Princeton:PrincetonUniversity Press,
1988); S.J. Tambiah,Sri Lanka:Ethnic Fratricide and the Dismantlingof Democracy (Chicago:
Universityof Chicago Press, 1986); JamesManor,"OrganizationalWeaknessand the Rise of Sinhalese BuddhistExtremism,"MartyandAppleby,eds., Accountingfor Fundamentalisms,770-84.
27 An originaldiscussion of religious nationalismin SouthAsia is found in Petervan der Veer,
Religious Nationalism: Hindus and Muslims in India (Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress,
1994). In MarkJuergensmeyer'sThe New Cold War,the term "religiousnationalism"is used differentlythan I do, since he includes Islamic and othermovements.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
709
found in some other societies with large minority religious communities, including Israel-Palestine,Nigeria, Malaysia, and Sri Lanka(all on the territory
of ex-Britishcolonies).28Communaldefense of one's religion againstrivalsbecame political andwas often tied to a defense of inventedtraditionsthatfavored
groupsandclasses who felt left out by secularmodernization.This groupingof
those "left out"crossed class lines and included, in differentareas,lower- and
middle-classpeople disruptedby modernizationandsecularization,classes tied
to the traditionaleconomy, and some special groupslike the Hinduuppercastes
favored by religiously sanctionedpractices and disfavoredby affirmativeaction programsand Israeli OrientalJews, who feel discrimination.
While communalismis often consideredonly for SouthAsia, it can also be
identified, whethercalled communalismor not, in several Britishex-colonies,
partlyas the result of British policies defining people by religious groups and
assigning them alternatefavors based on these categories.
Three special features of religious nationalism are notable. First, similar
movements have arisen from very differentreligions, suggesting that moder
circumstancesmay be as importantas the originalreligious material.In South
Asia, early Buddhistdoctrinewas not militantor religiously exclusive; yet the
Buddhistsof Sri Lankacreateda militantmovement againstwhat they saw as
a HinduTamilthreat.29Hindus,who began the nationalisttrendin SouthAsia,
had in pre-colonialtimes very little unity in theirdoctrineand no unified leadership, but Hindu nationalistgroupsproducedboth later,when needed. Stress
on the centralityof Hindu-Muslimdifferencesbeganwhen colonialistsandearly Hindu reformers,then other religious groups, took similar positions. The
communalists'creationof more unified doctrines,boundaries,and leadership
is striking;along with setting newly rigid boundaries,these movements and
their ideologies, by a dialecticalprocess, came to appearmore alike.
Second, the religious nationalistor communalwing of NRP has had a longer,
more varied,and more gradualevolution thanhas the non-communalwing. In
India, Hindus have had over a centuryof religionationalistorganizations,and
Muslims and Sikhs became increasinglynationalistin the course of this century.Elsewhere,religiousnationalismamongZionistswas importantfromthe beginning, and developed and subdividedover a century.The turningpoint toward strengtheningNew Religious Politics, however, happened during the
1970s for SouthAsia andIsraeljust as it hadfor the non-communalMiddleEast
and United States. Even areaswith older communalismshave experiencedan
upsurgein religiopolitics in recent decades, along with the invention of newly
militantideologies.
Third, some communal religiopolitics differs from non-communal religiopolitics in that less stress is placed on mores, including the enforcementof
28
Religious nationalistidentificationsare also importantelsewhere, as in Irelandand former
Yugoslavia,but neitheryet has importantmovementsthat meet my initial definition.
29 See
especially Swearer,"FundamentalisticMovementsin TheravadaBuddhism."
7I1
NIKKI
R. KEDDIE
patriarchalcategoriesthatfundamentaliststend to stressas partof religion.The
role of gender among South Asian communalistsis importantbut also varied
and complex:While two majorcommunalissues of the 1980s, one concerning
Islamic divorcelaw and the stateand the othersati, involved defense of gender
traditions,the RSS and some otherHindu nationalistshave mobilized women
in a partiallymoder manner.30For some Hindunationalists,more equal treatment of women has become an anti-Muslimweapon.The IsraeliGushEmunim
put much less stress on patriarchyand social mores thando more orthodoxIsraeli movements. Those advocatingcommunalreligiopolitics, which appeals
both to more andless religious persons,often put less stresson religion as such
and speak more of culturalheritageor the like, as does the BJP,the chief religiopolitical partyin India.
This reduced stress on mores, patriarchy,and even religion arises largely
from the communalistmovements'goal of strengtheningone communityat the
expense of othercommunities.Insistenceon conformityin religious belief and
practice can interferewith this goal by alienatingothers in one's community.
For example, PalestinianHamas startedwith a straightMuslim Brotherhood
programbut over time have stressednationalismmore andIslamicrules less.31
Certainrules, such as Islamicdressfor women, areenforced,however,andhave
even become almost a visible badge for those in these movements, whether
communalor non-communal.
Although communalreligiopolitics tend to have a longer evolution and put
less stress on religious conformitythan do non-communalreligiopolitics, it is
useful to consider them togetherbecause the lines between the two are often
blurredand because in many areas one spills or changes into the other.Those
in Sudan, Palestine, Lebanon, Israel, and elsewhere who fight against other
communitiescombine featuresof communaland non-communalfundamentalism.32As noted, communalismlay behind the first ideological formulationof
Islamic fundamentalism,by Maududi,a developmentthathas influencedMuslim fundamentalistselsewhere.
Communal(nationalist)factors exist in Islamic, Christian,and Jewish religiopolitics even thoughcommunalismis often unfairlyreservedfor SouthAsia.
30 PeterJ. Awn, "IndianIslam:The ShahBano Affair";JohnS. Hawley,"Hinduism:Sati andIts
Defenders,"in John S. Hawley, ed., Fundamentalismand Gender;and the articles by Paola Bacchetti and AmritaBasu in a special issue of the Journal of Women'sHistory, 10:4 (Winter1999),
on women and the new religious politics, Nikki R. Keddie and JasaminRostam-Kolayi,eds.
31 Communicationof WalidAtalah,UCLA 1996, who has done researchon this movement.On
Palestinianmovementsand theirmovementtowardnationalismand militancy,see ZiadAbu-Amr,
Islamic Fundamentalismin the WestBank and Gaza (Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
1994).
32 See JohnO. Voll, "Fundamentalism
in the SunniArabWorld:Egypt and the Sudan,"FundamentalismObserved,345-402; Abu-Amr,Islamic Fundamentalism;FouadAjami, The Vanished
Imam:Musa al Sadr and the Shia of Lebanon(Ithaca:CornellUniversityPress, 1986); idem, The
Arab Predicament(New York:CambridgeUniversity Press, new ed., 1992); and Ehud Sprinzak,
TheAscendanceof Israel's Radical Right (New York:OxfordUniversityPress, 1991).
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
711
The elements of communalismin Islamist theories, in ultra-Zionism,and in
some othermovementsarereflectedboth in hostility to othercommunitiesand
in a focus on communalcontrolof territoryand of centersof power and influence. The Zionist righthas strongcommunalelements supportingits exclusive
identity againstanothercommunitycompetingfor the same territory.
SouthAsian communalistswere in a sense pioneerswhen they organizedeffective right-wingreligiopolitics, having a history now of a centuryof organization, action,andideology. This may be why some scholarsof SouthAsia hesitate to place a movement that to them is both historically familiar and
nonscripturalin a class with recent scripturaland noncommunalmovements.
Recent SouthAsian movementsdo, however, display NRP novelties-chiefly
an unprecedentedpolitical organizationandstrength,includingprovincialelection victoriesandpluralitiesfor the BJPin the nationalIndianelections of 1996
and 1998-which make them partof the internationalresurgenceof religious
politics. A BJP-led governmentfrom March 1998 toned down its anti-Muslim
rhetoric,in partto secure allies from otherparties.
Communalreligiopolitics focuses on controlling territoryand suppressing
othercommunities.In SouthAsia, Hindu,Buddhist,and Sikh nationalistsconcentrateon such programsof control and suppression;in Israel,religiopolitics
stresses controlover disputedterritoriesand denies Arab claims; and in Palestine religiopolitics calls for Muslim Arab control of all formerPalestine. The
primacyof territorialand power issues sometimes means paying less attention
to religion.
In some areasreligious and ethnic communalismare intermixed,as in Nigeria andMalaysia,whereMuslimscompriseabouthalf the populationandwhere
most non-Muslimshave differentethnicities.Muslims therehave had less education and less opportunityto enter moderneconomic sectors, and Islamist
claims have helped strengthenthe economic and political clout of Muslims.33
Although it has earlierroots, communalismis tied to colonialism and continues to be so in the post-colonialperiod.As noted previously,communalism
is especially characteristicof British colonies and to the playing of communal
politics by British colonizers. It was also a part of the backgroundof the Islamist Moro revolt against U.S. colonialism in the Philippinesbut apparently
was less importantin France'scolonies, possibly because of the Frenchpreference for universalismin theireducationalsystem and in some otherpolicies.
CommunalistNRP trendsare less religiously cohesive than are movements
with a greaterbackgroundin religiosity.In Hinduismthis is often attributedto
the lack of a single god, scripture,andritual;but this is also trueof the very varied trendsin political Judaism,where thereis one scriptureand one God. Like
Hindu nationalists,the newer Israeli groups like Gush Emunim and Kach fo33 See Nikki R. Keddie, "Ideology,Society and the State in Post-ColonialMuslim Societies,"
ch. 1 in Nikki R. Keddie, Iran and the Muslim World:Resistanceand Revolution(New York:New
YorkUniversityPress, 1995).
712
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
cus on nationaland territorialgoals; while older groups,like the traditionalist
Haredimandthe religiousparties,stressreligiousstrictness.34The emphasison
nationalismandterritoryleads some to exclude Jewish andHindupolitics from
fundamentalism.Given the definitionhere, both belong, however, to the New
Religious Politics, even thoughsome communalor religious nationalistmovements have fewer religious requirements.These movementsare especially distinguishedby hostilityto otherreligious or religio-ethnicgroupsandby a stress
on the controlof a territoryby theirown religious group.Hostilityto theirown
government,based largely on that government'ssecularismand its supposed
complaisanceto the main targetgroup,is often a secondarytheme.
NON-COMMUNAL
MOVEMENTS: SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES
There are two majornon-communalor less-communalreligiopoliticalgroupings: those in the Muslim world and those in the United States. These differ
from communalmovementsbecause they place a greaterstresson religion and
reflectconservativepositionson genderandfamily issues, andon replacingevil
governments rather than taking or controlling territory.While communalnationalist religiopolitics have a significantly similar set of causes, noncommunalreligiopoliticsin the Muslimworldandthe UnitedStateshave rather
differentcauses for similarresults.While Islamismhas appealedto many differentkinds of Muslims, the U.S. ChristianRight has generallyappealedonly
to an evangelical Christianminority.Christianand Muslim religiopoliticsmay
thus be seen as separatesubcategories,to be differentiatedbelow.
AlthoughIslamhas not, contraryto whatis often said, always unitedreligion
and politics, the Muslim world has been open to NRP,mainly because of three
elements. First,early ties between Islam and politics have continuedas a model even after being much reduced in practice since the early rise of nonreligious hereditaryrulers;and Islamic institutionshave also long controlled
law, education, and social services, which has made secularizationdifficult.
Second, mass movementsof oppositionto existing governmentsin the Muslim
world have usually had religious ideologies. Third, hostile contacts with the
West, includingits backingof Israeland interventionsto protectoil and strategic interests,have generatedstrongfeelings of resentmentleadingto some hostility to westernideas. The strengthof Islamic movementsis suggestedby their
victories in Iranand Sudan,and theirnear victory in Algeria.35In Turkeydur34 See Aviezar Ravitzky,Messianism,Zionism,and Jewish Religious Radicalism,M. Swirsky
and J. Chipman,trans.(Chicago:Universityof Chicago Press, 1991), and Ehud Sprinzak,TheAscendance of Israel's Radical Right (New York:OxfordUniversityPress, 1991).
35 There is a vast bibliographyon Islamist movementsin the Middle East. For generalworks,
see especially John O. Voll, Islam, Continuity,and Change in the Modem World(Boulder:Westview, 1982); Nazih Ayubi, Political Islam (London:Routledge, 1991); EmmanuelSivan, Radical
Islam (New Haven:Yale UniversityPress, 1985); John L. Esposito, Voicesof ResurgentIslam; R.
HrairDekmejian,Islam in Revolution(Syracuse:Syracuse University Press, 1985); Dale Eickelman andJamesPiscatori,MuslimPolitics (Princeton:PrincetonUniversityPress, 1996);FredHal-
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
713
ing 1996 the IslamistWelfarePartygained a plurality,and its leaderwas-until mid-1997-prime ministerin a coalition government.Elsewhere, Islamist
movements are also powerful, especially in the Middle East.36
Islamistmovementsareoften salientwhere socioeconomic andpolitical discontentsare great, such as in the Middle East and Pakistan,and are growing in
CentralAsia, but not until 1998 in the moreprosperousSoutheastAsia or in the
weaker states of Africa. (While the relativeweakness of Islamism in Malaysia
and Indonesia is sometimes attributedto governmentsuppression,that same
kind of suppressionhas been less successful in some Middle Easterncountries,
such as Iranand Algeria.) Islamism comprisesmany differenttypes of groups
but can be roughlydivided both into Sunni and Shi'i and into moderate(stressing organization,persuasion,andelectoralpolitics) andradical(legitimatingviolence).37Key dates in the developmentof these movements are the founding
of the EgyptianMuslimBrethren(1928), the Israelidefeatof Egypt (1967), and
the victory of the IranianRevolution (1979), all of which gave impetus to the
spreadof religiopolitics.38The IranianRevolutionin particular,which showed
that organizationand activism could topple a powerful rulerand install a governmentseen as Islamic, encouragedorganizationand agitationin many Muslim countries.The special featuresof Iran'sShi'ism were rarelyconsideredby
oppositionistselsewhere.
Otherprecipitantsto the spreadof activistIslamisminclude Saudifinancing
of Islamic institutionsand teachings abroad,which inadvertentlyencouraged
oppositional Islam, and the anti-Soviet struggle in Afghanistan during the
1980s, supportedby the United States via Pakistan.This version of Islamism
traineda numberof prominentactivists, some implicatedin terroristacts in the
United States and worldwide.39These built upon other precipitantsof Islamism, such as grievancesagainstthe West and the failureof indigenousgovliday,Islam and the Mythof Confrontation(London:I.B. Tauris,1996); and Sami Zubaida,Islam,
the People and the State (rev. ed., London:I.B. Tauris,1993). On Algeria, see especially the relevant chaptersin John Ruedy, ed., Islam and Secularism in NorthAfrica (New York, St. Martin's
Press, 1994).
36 An extensive
contemporarysurvey covering several countriesand stressing militantmovements is JudithMiller, God Has Ninety-NineNames: Reportingfrom a MilitantMiddleEast (New
York:Simon and Schuster), 1996. An earlierbut still valuable survey is EdwardMortimer,Faith
and Power: The Politics of Islam (New York:RandomHouse, 1982).
37 On Shi'i
movements,see JuanR.I. Cole andNikki R. Keddie,eds., Shi'ismand Social Protest
(New Haven:Yale UniversityPress, 1986); MartinKramer,ed., Shi'ism, Resistance,and Revolution (Boulder:Westview Press, 1987); andAjami, The VanishedImam.Sunni movementsare covered in other notes and, along with Shi'i ones, in James Piscatori,ed., Islamic Fundamentalisms
and the Gulf Crisis (Chicago:The FundamentalismProject, 1991).
38
Among works covering the Egyptian events are Gilles Kepel, Muslim Extremismin Egypt
(Berkeley:Universityof CaliforniaPress, 1986); RichardP.Mitchell, TheSocietyof MuslimBrothers (London:Oxford University Press, 1969); and Abdel Azim Ramadan,"FundamentalistInfluence in Egypt:The Strategiesof the MuslimBrotherhoodandthe TakfirGroups,"in MartyandAppleby, eds., Fundamentalismsand the State. On Iran,see note 39, below.
39 See the extensive
reportin the Los Angeles Times,with the overall title, "Afghanistan:Legacy of Fear,"Aug. 4, 1996, A1 if., andAug. 5, 1996, A1 f.
714
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
ernmentsandpriorideologies to meet nationalneeds, which a politicized Islam
has promisedto do. Among socially conservativeMuslims (as well as Christians), changes in family structure,and particularlythose giving new independence to women, were especially resented;and governmentswhose laws supported such changes were considered evil and targets for radical change or
overthrow.
Although each country's Islamist movements have special features, some
generalpoints aboutthe strengthof Islamists'oppositionto their own government's unpopularpolicies and excessive ties to the West can be seen by making a close examinationof any of the majorIslamistmovements.Here, a brief
examinationof Iranwill point up similaritieswith otherMiddle Easterncountries despite special featurescenteringon the developmentof Shi'ism and its
powerfulclergy in Iran.The governmentsof severalMiddle Easterncountries,
particularlyin the 1970s, were seen as too complaisantto the West and to Israel, not meeting the needs of those who did not profit from the Western-tied
economy,being too autocratic,andtryingto suppressIslamic law andpractice,
especially in the realmof genderandthe family.The wealthandpower of newly westernizedgroups were resented,especially given rapidurbanizationand
the increasedspreadof educationto rural,small-town,andpopularclasses, who
became more politically articulatebut could not take full economic advantage
of theirurbanor educatedstatus.
Iranfelt manyof these problemsandcontradictionsin especially acuteform.
Virtuallyall the modernizationthat occurredin Irantook place in a brief half
century,from 1925 to 1978, under the rule of the two Pahlavi shahs. The rapidity of socioeconomic change was, underthe late shah, especially fueled by
oil income, a director indirectfactorin many Middle Easterncountries.Rapid
modernizationof the economy,with its accompanyinginternalmigration,populationgrowthand youthfulness,and growing gaps betweenrich and poor and
between traditionaland modernsectors, was not accompaniedby political democratizationbut, rather,by increasingautocracy.Both shahs took on the typical secularmodernizingrole of wresting control from the clergy over education, social services, andlaw, with a controversialchangetowardgreatergender
equality,especially in the FamilyProtectionLaw of 1967/75. The Pahlaviscarried a penchantfor westernizationand confrontationwith Islamic leadersfurtherthansome otherMiddleEasternrulers,with Reza Shahbeing the only such
rulerto outlaw veiling (althoughthis lapsed afterhis 1941 abdication),and his
son's arrestand exile of the leader of the oppositional ulama, Khomeini, in
1964, initiatinga scurrilousnewspaperattackon him in early 1978.
The associationof the shahwith secularism,pro-westernism(he was seen as
a puppetof the United States), and relationswith Israel, meant that effective
oppositionwas increasinglyassociatedwith totalrejectionof these policies and
that in this opposition Islamist ideologies had great advantagesover secular
ones. By the 1970s, Islamistsin Iranand elsewhere, dissociatedfrom the peri-
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
715
od manydecades earlierwhen Islamhadbeen largelytied to old regimes, could
presenta new vision of Islam as a socially egalitarian,just, and indigenousanswer to westerncontrol. In Iranthe oppositionalclergy, chiefly Khomeini and
his studentsanddisciples, could also build on the groundworkfor Islamismlaid
by non-clericalintellectualsand activists like the writerJalal al-e Ahmad;Ali
Shariati,the ideolgical hero of the educated youth; Mehdi Bazarganand his
FreedomMovement;and the Islamic leftist "urbanguerillas,"the Mojahedine Khalq.
Sections of the ulama in Iran,owing partlyto the way IranianShi'ism had
developed since the eighteenth century,had a traditionof independenceand
participationin anti-governmentmovements, notably the constitutionalrevolution of 1905-11. The structureand modem historyof IranianShi'ism created a situationin which a clerical leader,Khomeini,and his immediatefollowers could take the leadershipof a mass oppositional movement in a way not
duplicatedin other,Sunni-Muslimcountries.But Sunni movementshad many
ideological similaritiesto the Iranianone, and all were hostile to existing governments.
The shah, who had deliberatelyfragmentedhis leading supportgroups,had
also lost muchof his class-basedsupportwith his landreformsof 1962-63 and
hesitated to crack down early on the opposition. He was forced, in February
1979, to give in to the largestmass-basedrevolutionin MiddleEasternhistory.
By this time much of the Iranianpopulationhadutopianexpectationsof a newly defined Islam and of Khomeini-expectations thatwere largely,thoughnot
entirely,belied in the revolution'saftermath.40
In other Islamic, especially Middle Eastern,countries, there was little understandingthat a strong independentclerical traditionin Iranmade a certain
type of Islamic revolutionpossible therebut not elsewhere. On the otherhand,
the Iranianrevolutiongave an impetusto the furthergrowthof Islamistmovements, which were nearlyalways headedoutsideIrannot by ulamabut by men
with western or westernized educations and which in countries like Algeria,
Egypt, and Sudanbecame very strong.
Nearly all the movementsin the Muslim world aredirectedprimarilyagainst
theirown governments:The strengthof the Iranianmovementlay largelyin its
being directedagainstthe shahandhis policies; the Egyptianmovement,in being against Sadatand Mubarak;and of the Algerian movement,in its hostility
to the seculargovernmentand its policies. To be sure, communalismalso en40 In the
huge literatureon Iran,see especially ShaulBakhash,TheReign of theAyatollahs(rev.
ed., New York:Basic Books, 1990); E. Abrahamian,Khomeinism;Said Amir Arjomand,The Turbanfor the Crown(New York:OxfordUniversityPress, 1988); Nikki R. Keddie,Roots of Revolution (New Haven:Yale UniversityPress, 1993); H.E.Chehabi,Iranianpolitics and Religious Modernism:TheLiberationMovementin Iran underthe Shahand Khomeini(Ithaca:CornellUniversity
Press, 1990); David Menashri,ed., The IranianRevolutionand the MuslimWorld(Boulder:Westview Press, 1990); JohnL. Esposito, ed., TheIranianRevolution:Its Global Impact(Miami:Florida InternationalUniversityPress, 1990).
716
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
ters into Islamismwhere religious minoritiesare strong,such as Christianminorities in Egypt, Sudan,Lebanon,Nigeria, and ethnic-religiousminoritiesin
Malaysia;butIslamismcan flourishas muchwherereligiousminoritiesarenot
numerous,such as in NorthAfrica or Iran.Hence religious nationalismis not
key to the rise of Islamism, while opposition to governmentsseen as secular,
westernized,and oppressiveoften is.
The United States presentsa differentpicture,one in which only a religious
minority,Evangelical Christians,have been prone to fundamentalism,though
NRP now attractssome Catholicandeven Jewish allies. Welcomingsuch allies
is a trendof recentdecadesanddemonstratesa realizationthatsuchgroupsneed
allies to attainpolitical majorities.ThoughEvangelicals are growing, they remain a clear minority.Understandingthe New Religious Politics in the United
Statesrequiresa focus on the discontentsof the involved minoritiesmore than
on those of a largergroup,as in many Muslim countries.Therearenonetheless
some parallels,by contrast,to the communalcountries,since both Islamic and
Christianmovementsgreatlystressthreatsto conservativepositionson such issues as genderrelations,the family, and sexual mores. Both also centrallydemonize seculargovernmentsand their growing power.
While Muslim movements have often had leaders who were formerly nationalistsor Marxistsbut saw in Islam a more potentinstrumentof change, the
U.S. ChristianRight arose out of literalistand conservativeProtestantChristianity.This extended its intereststo politics at first in orderto achieve what
were consideredreligious goals, particularlyto reversecourtdecisions regarding abortion,prayerin the schools, and the teachingof evolution.
Both the United States and the Muslim world have experiencedboth gradualist-compromising and radical-uncompromisingreligiopolitics. In recent
years most U.S. religiopoliticshas concentratedon a policy of gradualchange,
stressingelectoralvictories in local races and chippingaway at laws and regulations governingschool prayer,creationism,andabortion,41thoughthe Christian Right's effort to control the RepublicanPartyshows its continuedaim of
seeking nationalpower.Gradualistand local tactics were epitomizedby Ralph
Reed, the first and now former executive directorof the ChristianCoalition,
who retainsan influence,but are opposedby some in the ChristianRight. Such
local andelectoraltactics are less possible in severalundemocraticstatesin the
Muslim world, where the only hope of controlmay seem to be throughrevolutions or acts of violence. When electoral politics are possible, Islamist movements often have a broaderbase of appealthan does the U.S. ChristianRight,
as seen in Turkeyor pre-1992Algeria,Muslim Brotherhoodallianceswith sec41 MatthewC. Moen, The
Transformationof the ChristianRight (Tuscaloosa:Universityof AlabamaPress, 1992); idem., "TheFourthWave of the EvangelicalTide: Religious Conservativesin
the Aftermathof the 1994 Elections,"Contention,5:1 (Fall 1995), 19-40; SaraDiamond,Roads
to Dominion: Right-WingMovementsand Political Power in the United States (New York:The
GuilfordPress, 1995), partsII and III.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
717
ular parties in Egypt, Islamist strength in Jordanianelections, or strongthough unsuccessful-attempts to be recognized as an electoral party against
governmentopposition in Tunisia.42
Religiopolitics in the United States and the Muslim world are similar in
stressingreligion and conservativebehaviorratherthanterritorialgoals and in
wantingto replace seculargovernments;but they differ in points of origin and
in the groupsto which they appeal.They both have a centralemphasison policies that affect women and the family, see contemporarymores as contraryto
religion and morality,and call for a returnto an idealized past with patriarchal
family structuresand limits on women's controlof theirbodies and activity in
the public sphere.43
The decentralizeddemocraticpolitics of the United States make it possible
for the ChristianRightto act throughmanydifferentorganizationsandin many
diverse ways, includingsupportingcandidatesand propagandaat all levels and
pushingfor a varietyof nationaland local laws to chip away at abortion,favor
Christianityin the schools, block many rights for homosexuals, and so forth.
The very political natureof today's ChristianRight, includingdirectentryinto
various forms of partisanand non-partisanpolitics, differentiatesthem from
most of those who called themselves fundamentalistearly in the twentiethcentury.The achievementof political goals, includingthe political enforcementof
ideological goals, now takes priorityfor most of the ChristianRight.
COMMONALITIES AND DIVERGENCES IN NRP MOVEMENTS
The argumentthus far has three main distinctive features.First, it provides a
list of socioeconomic, political, and culturalfactors in religiopolitics. Second,
it gives a definition of New Religious Politics, not based only on scriptural
monotheism,which accountsboth for primarilycommunalmovementsand for
those based more on religiosity.Third,it sees religiosity and communalism,as
defined, as two key factors demarcatingthe areas where New Religious Politics are to be found and notes differencesin movementswith these two bases.
Despite major differences among religiopolitical movements, it is striking
42 .Roy Mottahedeh,"TheIslamic Movement:The Case for DemocraticInclusion,"Contention
4:3 (Spring 1995), 107-27; Nazih N. Ayubi, "Rethinkingthe Public/PrivateDichotomy: Radical
Islam and Civil Society in The Middle East,"Contention4:3 (Spring 1995), 79-105. On Tunisia,
see the relevantchaptersin Ruedy, Islam and Secularism in North Africa; and Nikki R. Keddie,
"TheIslamist Movement in Tunisia,"TheMaghrebReview,1:1(1986), 26-39, which includes interviews with Islamist leaders.
43 On religiopolitics and gender, see ValentineM. Moghadam, ModernizingWomen:Gender
and Social Change in the Middle East (Boulder:Lynne Reiner, 1993); ValentineM. Moghadam,
ed., IdentityPolitics and Women(Boulder:Westview, 1994); MargaretLambertsBendroth,Fundamentalismand Gender:1875 to the Present(New Haven:Yale UniversityPress, 1994); Hawley,
Fundamentalismand Gender;MahnazAfkhami, Faith and Freedom: Women'sHumanRights in
the Muslim World(Syracuse:SyracuseUniversityPress, 1995); ParvinPaidar,Womenand the Political Process in Twentieth-Century
Iran (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversityPress, 1995); Fariba
Adelkhah,La revolutionsous le voile (Paris:Editions Karthala,1991).
718
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
how many of them developed rapidly beginning in the late 1970s. Relevant
events include IndiraGandhi'sEmergencyRule in 1973-75, which gave impetus to Sikh and Hindu politics and to Muslim movements in Kashmir;the
Iranian 1979 revolution and its influence; the Soviet 1979 invasion of
Afghanistanand the Islamist-ledresponse;Zia al-Haqq'sfavoringof Islamist
laws andgroupsin Pakistan;andin the United States,the foundingof JerryFalwell's MoralMajority,in 1979.44
Among the reasons for this simultaneityis the intensificationof socioeconomic discontent and dislocation: Few parts of the world have been exempt
from rapidandunequalsocioeconomic change,thoughmoreequal income distributionsor social safety nets in EastAsia and Europeand some recentfavorable economic changes have helped defuse opposition.In some countries,specific causes have stimulatedthe emergenceof strongNRP movements,such as
anti-imperialismin the Global Southor relationswith Israelin the MiddleEast.
On the other hand, it is more difficult to determinethe extent to which other
factors-such as challenges to patriarchyby women andtheirallies-have assisted in the emergenceof NRP movements.Since they are found in both NRP
andnon-NRPcountries,it is obvious thatthese factorscannotalone accountfor
the NRP.One factorthatseems strongerin countrieswith NRPmovementsthan
in those withoutthem is the disillusionmentwith recent seculargovernmental
policies, whetherthey are called socialist, welfare state, free market,or something else. Discontentwith socioeconomic policies, which often accompanies
opposition to perceived governmenthostility toward religion, is felt among
many Hindus,Muslims, Christians,and Jews.45
Also in recent decades, communistand socialist movementshave lost their
internationalbacking and much of their appeal.In the Muslim world and elsewhere,not only do fundamentalistsoften come fromthe same background(student and professional)that used to producecommunists;but a numberof exleftist intellectualshave become prominentin New Religious Politics.
Religiosity andcommunalismarehistoricallydevelopingandchangingphenomena.They have variedover time but have been on the rise in many partsof
the world, though not without setbacks,in recent decades.As with many factors thatcan be called causes, they are also both the effects of othercauses and
the consequence of a dialectical interpenetrationof many operativefactors of
cause and effect. Communalismor religiosity are also involved in areaswhere
religiopolitics are only partial, as in the ethnoreligious struggles in exYugoslavia,CentralAsia, Ireland,andMuslimAfrica, or religiopoliticaltrends
in LatinAmerica.
44 Regardingthe UnitedStates,SaraDiamond,Roads to Dominion,ch. 7, stressesthe late 1970s
as the years the ChristianRight became organizedopenly and on a massive scale, with an emphasis on issues concerninggender and the family.
45 The importanceof secularcentralizinggovernmentsin encouragingreactivereligiopoliticsis
noted in Said Amir Arjomand,"Unityand Diversity in Islamic Fundamentalism,"Martyand Appleby, eds., FundamentalismsComprehended,179-98.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
719
In attemptingto answer the question why some countries have more religiopolitics than others,we could startwith why only the United States, among
either countriesof advancedindustrializationor of Christianmajorities,has a
majorNRP movement, even though many of the others may have constituent
elements expressed in movements such as ChristianDemocracy,Catholic Integrism,LiberationTheology, or non-politicalfundamentalism.46
The most convincing reply as to why the United States has more fundamentalism than any other Christian-majoritycountryis that such a Christianreligiopolitics seems possible only with the multidenominationalsituationthere,
andespecially its far higherlevels (shown in numerouspolls) of belief in God,
in the literal truthof the Bible, and in such things as special creation,than in
any otherindustrializedcountrywith a Christianmajority.To cite only a few of
manypoll data,72 percentof Americanshave saidthe Bible is the Wordof God,
with 39 percentindicatingit should be taken literally and 44 percentprofessing that they believe God createdthe world "in prettymuch its presentform"
withinthe past 10,000 years.47Of the largenumbersof people attendingchurch,
many belong to evangelical denominationsthatbelieve in the inerrancyof the
rise
Bible. This lattergrouphas provided,ever since the late-nineteenth-century
of religious modernismand Darwinism, a large base for fundamentalismthat
does not exist elsewhere. In Europe,belief in God, the Bible, and basic Christian doctrines is far less widespread.48There is today no basis in Europe in
widespreadreligious belief for mass oppositionto Darwin,abortion,birthcontrol, or any of the otherpoints thatU.S. fundamentalistssee in the Bible.
We do not have good religious poll data for developing countries, and in
many of them one could not poll people about their beliefs; but there is little
doubt about the strengthof belief in Islam and the importanceof scripturein
the contemporaryMuslim world. In Israel, althoughthe founders were secularists,and secularismcontinuesto be strong,therehas been an increasingpush,
strengthenedby the heavy immigrationof morereligiousOrientalJews, to have
Jewishreligiousidentificationbe a strongerpartof Israel'sidentity.As in South
Asia, strong communal identity centering on a religious traditioncan in part
play a role similarto thatplayed by belief.
In the Muslim world, althoughsome of the socioeconomic and anti-secular
46 On
early U.S. fundamentalism,see Nancy Ammerman,"NorthAmericanProtestantFundamentalism,"in Marty and Appleby, FundamentalismsObserved, 1-65; Norman F. Fumiss, The
FundamentalistControversy(New Haven:YaleUniversityPress, 1954);GeorgeM. Marsden,Fundamentalism and American Culture (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980); and Ernest R.
Sandeen, TheRoots of Fundamentalism(Chicago:Universityof Chicago Press, 1970). An illuminatingcomparativestudy is MartinRiesebrodt,Pious Passion: TheEmergenceof ModernFundamentalismin the United States and Iran, Don Reneau, trans. (Berkeley: University of California
Press, 1993), one of the few workswith adequateanalysisof the genderandpatriarchycomponents.
47 George Gallup,Jr.,Public Opinion 1982 (Wilmington,Del: ScholarlyResources, 1983), cited in Ammerman,"NorthAmericanProtestantFundamentalism,"2. For a broaddata-basedsurvey
of Americanreligion and churchmembership,see Kosmin and Lachman,One Nation under God.
48 One Nation under God, 8-9.
720
NIKKI R. KEDDIE
backgroundfor fundamentalismis similarto thatelsewhere,manyof the groups
affected have been differentfrom those in the United States. Islamist movements did not arise so much from defendersof literalistorthodoxyas fromprofessionals, intellectuals,and studentswho might in earlierdecadeshave turned
to nationalism,socialism, or communism.Disillusionmentwith the failure of
Nasser, the symbol of nationalism,to defeat Israel or solve internalproblems
and with the failures of socialism and capitalismhelped turnpeople towarda
search for an idealized Islamic past as the embodimentof a more distinctive
identitythanthatofferedby nationalismor Marxism.It became fashionableto
thinkthatIslamic solutionscould meet moder problems,especially when governmentswere seen as too secular,too pro-Western,and too compromisingin
dealing with Israel.49
Despite these differencesin background,in most countrieswith strongNRP
movements, we may point to a few key governmentalsecular measuresthat
helpedarousemassreligiopoliticsin thepastquartercentury.Inthe UnitedStates,
measuresthatwere greetedwith unqualifiedenthusiasmby liberalswere equally despisedby biblicalliteralists.Among these were the proposedEqualRights
Amendmentandsome key SupremeCourtmeasures,especiallythe outlawingof
prayerin the public schools in 1962 and the grantingof abortionrightsin 1973.
These were partof a growing trendafterthe 1930s to give the SupremeCourt
power over the states.Althoughthe notion of the separationof churchand state
is an ideal going backmorethantwo centuries,the SupremeCourtmade several
key decisionsin the 1960s thatbroadenedthe meaningof the Bill of Rights and
appliedit in the states.FundamentalistChristiansbelieve thatthe Bible forbids
abortion(thoughthe texts they cite seem irrelevantto others)andthatoutlawing
school prayeris an abomination.Most objectto the teachingof evolution,andin
the postwarperiodthey inventedwhatthey called creationscience in an attempt
to includethe biblicalaccountof creationin the official curriculumof the public
schools. They have had considerablesuccess, obtainingde facto limits on the
teachingof evolution as a partof their continuingefforts in many partsof the
country.Especiallyin many partsof the South, prayerin the school continues
even thoughthe SupremeCourthas long outlawedit. The SupremeCourtis a
very visible aspectof the strengtheningof the centralgovernment,and its nonrepresentativenaturemakesit an easy targetfor populistattack.50
49 Olivier Roy, TheFailure of Political Islam, CarolVolk, trans.(Cambridge:HarvardUniversity Press, 1994), 4, notes that "fromCairo to Tehran,the crowds that in the 1950s demonstrated
underthe red or nationalflag now marchbeneaththe green banner. . .The continuityis apparent
not only in these targetsbut also in the participants:the same individualswho followed Nasser or
Marxin the 1960s are Islamiststoday."
50 Regardingthe UnitedStates,includingthe SupremeCourt,see OneNation underGod;Robert
S. Alley, ed., TheSupremeCourton Churchand State (New York:OxfordUniversityPress, 1988);
LeonardLevy, The EstablishmentClause (New York:Macmillan, 1986); Ralph Reed, Politically
Incorrect(Dallas:WordPublishing, 1994); idem.,Active Faith (New York:The Free Press, 1996);
GaryWills, Under God: Religion and AmericanPolitics (New York:Simon and Schuster,1990);
and LaurenceH. Tribe,Abortion:The Clash of Absolutes(New York:W.W.Norton,1990).
THE NEW
RELIGIOUS
POLITICS
721
In Muslim countriesresentmentagainstgovernmenthas centeredon a variety of measuresthat alteredtraditionallaw and mores generallyconsideredIslamic. A common featurein Muslim, and also in many non-Muslim,countries
has been the use of increasedcentralgovernmentpower in ways consideredinimical to religion and tradition.Islamic institutionsand ulama had controlled
most education, courts, and social services, all areas crucial to modernizing
states;and frictionas the statetook these over was inevitable.Traditionalways
of dealing with gender, the family, and social mores came increasinglyto be
seen as Islamic. Newer ways are viewed as not being Islamic. These include
growinggovernmentcontrolof educationandlaw, andespecially legal reforms
regardingthe family and the role of women.51India also saw variousforms of
secularizationand actions that favoredMuslims and other minorities,plus the
reservationof educationaland job positions for the lower castes. Significant
bothin Indiaandthe Muslimworldwas the interferencewith moresin the name
of modernization.In the Muslim World,concern centeredon reformsin family law, state encouragementof a presence of women-usually unveiled-in
jobs and schools, and both governmentaland private flouting of traditional
modes of dress and behavior.52
The considerablepost-colonial failure of governmentalsolutions to socioeconomic andculturalproblemshas broughta growingalienationbetweenpeople andtheirgovernments.In the Muslimworld,governmentshave often found
it difficultto suppressIslamistmovementsbecause of theirdecentralizedorganization,use of mosques and religious networks,and theirincreasingpopularity resultingfrom theirprovision of social services, especially to the poor.
A featurespecial to the Muslim world is the presence of Israel.To Muslim
andmanythird-worldeyes, Israelis a colonial implant.The Israelisenteredunder the protectionof western governments.For a while, it seemed not unreasonable to thinkthe Israeliscould be ejected by force, much as the Frenchhad
been in Algeria, as the last stage in a movementagainstthe westernoccupation
of Muslim lands. Only after several militarydefeats did many Muslims come
to believe they could not reversethe dynamicsfavoringthe continuedpresence
of Israel.Not believing this arethe Islamists,whose refusalto accepta statethat
has takenover land formerlycontrolledand populatedby Muslims has created
an impetus for religiopolitics among Muslims.
Anotherphenomenoncharacteristicof, thoughnot exclusive to, severalMuslim countries and South Asia, is what I have called the phenomenonof "two
cultures,"which could also be called culturaldualism.Althoughculturetoday
51 See the articleson Muslimcountriesin Contention,4:3 (Spring 1995); andthe articlesby AndreaB. Rugh,ShahlaHaeri,andMajidTehranianin Fundamentalismsand Societyandby Ann ElizabethMayer in Fundamentalismsand the State.
52 On the interactionbetween state secularismand fundamentalismsee Nikki R. Keddie, "Secularismand the State:TowardsClarityand Global Comparison,"New LeftReview,no. 226 (1997),
21-48.
722
NIKKI
R. KEDDIE
is most often tied to ethnic groups,there are otherforms of differentiationthat
areequally significant.In Iranbefore 1979, the MiddleEast,andSouthAsia we
find, broadly,two groups.One groupof people has had a westernizedor modernized, often secular,education,culturalmores and aspirations,and ways of
dress and behavior.Anothergroup has followed culturalways consideredtraditional. (The word "traditional,"however misleading, signals a practicethat
prominentlyincludes local pre-modernelements.) In the two-culturephenomenon, the size of the gap betweenthe two sides is particularlystriking.The modernized culture includes western forms of dress and consumption,heavy dependence on westernculturalsources, and command(often everydayuse) of a
westernlanguageas a mode of discourse.Its followers tend to be secular,cosmopolitan,andorientedto Westernideas. Most in this cultureoften regardthose
practicingthe ways of the traditionalcultureas backward,superstitious,fanatical, irrational,andso forth.Those in the traditionalculturefollow formsof gender relationsthat are closer to those of pre-moderntimes, such as those typically separatingthe sexes socially, giving men much control of sisters and
wives, insisting on strict limits on sexual relationsfor women.53Though this
two-culturedivision was named first (with apologies to C.P.Snow)to address
situationsin Islamic countries,much of it exists in SouthAsia, and a variation
exists in the United States. There, fundamentalistChristiansare offended by
contemporarymores and look on their practionersas harmfulsinners, while
secularistssee fundamentalistsas irrational,benighted,and so forth.
These two-culturedivisions preceded,andhave provideda fertilegroundfor,
the rise of New Religious Politics. Those who followed traditionalways often
resentedthe modem mode, especially if, as in the Global South, they saw it as
being tied to westernersthey disliked. The existence of a large bloc of people
who had never modernizedprovidedthe popularbase for more educated and
ideological fundamentalists.The latteroften came from rural,small-town, or
urbantraditionalbackgrounds.They felt tornbetween Westernand traditional
ways, so they looked favorablyon movementsthatencouragedboth technology and traditionalismand gave them a mass following. Educated men and
women who opt for a "traditional,"fundamentalist,and populistidentityoften
find a mass base largerand moreenthusiasticthanthey could have found in the
modernsector.
Anotherfeaturereligiopoliticshave in common is theirhostility towardthe
growing power of secularcentralizedstates. The relationshipbetween fundamentalismandthe statehas rarelybeen given the weight it deserves.54In Egypt
chargeswere raisedagainstNasser's socialism, which centralizedthe economy
and increasedcontrols over the ulama and the highest Muslim university,as
53 H. E. Chehabi, forthcomingbook manuscripton culturaland social dualism in twentiethcenturyIran.
54 See Deniz Kandiyoti,"Women,Islam, and the State:A ComparativeApproach,"in JuanR.I.
Cole, ed., ComparingMuslim Societies (Ann Arbor:University of Michigan Press, Comparative
Studies in Society and History book series, 1992), 237-60.
THE NEW RELIGIOUS POLITICS
723
well as against Sadat's and Mubarak'sopen-doorcapitalism and their foreign
policy. In the pre-revolutionaryIran of the Shah, religious objections were
raised to many measures,including land reform,votes for women, and cooperation with the United States and Israel. Post-colonial states often interfere
with all aspects of life more than did colonizers, who were wary about interferingwith personalandfamily arrangements.The Islamistreactionin the Middle East was largely directedagainst state actions perceived as tyrannicaland
anti-Islamic.In India, Israel, and the United States, state interferencein social
questionsalso grew in the postwarperiodand was a sourceof resentmentfrom
conservatives,whetherfundamentalistor not.
Scholars of fundamentalismmore often stress changes in society and the
economy which introducenew strains,income gaps, and dislocations.Some of
these changes have underminedthe belief in the progressivenatureof modern
social processes, causing feelings of alienationand a need to search for community.For some, these feelings and needs have been answeredby religiopolitics; while others,especially in countrieswhere religiosity and communalism
are weak, have turnedto nationalismor othertypes of identitypolitics.
Anotherreason for the spreadof religiopoliticshas been the force of example: Just as revolutionspreadin the nineteenthcenturyand after 1917, so religiopolitics has gained wider supportpartlythroughexample.The early Egyptian Muslim Brethrenstimulatedinterestin similar groups elsewhere, and the
IranianRevolutioninspiredboth Shi'i and Sunni religiopolitics.The spreadof
religiopolitics in the Arabworld afterIsrael's 1967 defeat of Egypt was in part
based on a strengthattributedto Israelby its identificationwith religion. Such
imitationof anotherreligious group is also found in the developmentof religiopolitics in the various communitiesof South Asia, which was in parta reactionto priorHindunationalism.And phenomenalike the anti-abortionmovement in Englanddrawheavily on the U.S. example.
Hence, commonalitiesin the causes and policies of New Religious Politics
are notable and explicable; and differences can also be explained. This essay
has not exhaustedall the points on which religiopoliticsarecomparable,andin
stressingthese points it has had to deal lightly with the specifics of each movement. Individualmovementsor specific featuressuch as militancyor different
gender attitudesand practiceshave received much publisheddiscussion elsewhere.55The great variety in tactics and ideology and changes over time are
materialfor other works, while the stress here has been mainly on comparable
features.On the specifics of each movement, a large literaturenow exists and
shows no signs of abating.Here, I have tried ratherto stress overall analytic
points thatmay tell us somethingnew aboutthis novel phenomenon.
55 On
gendersee note 36. On militancy,aside from generalworks cited above, see HenryMunson, Jr.,"IntolerableTolerance:WesternAcademiaand Islamic Fundamentalism,"Contention,5:3
(Spring 1966), 126; Beth Baron,"TolerableIntolerance?Silence on Attackson Womenby Fundamentalist,"in ibid., 119-26. See also Martyand Appleby,Fundamentalismsand the State, Part3,
"Remakingthe WorldthroughMilitancy,"chaptersby David C. Rapoport,Ehud Sprinzak,Olivier
Roy, Nikki R. Keddie and FarahMonian,MartinKramer,Faye Ginsburg,and StanleyJ. Tambiah.