Disambiguating the Idea of Public Sphere and Secularism in the Middle East

Abstract

This chapter critically examines the idea of modern public sphere in the Middle East in connection with the idea of secularism. It argues that any understanding of the public sphere requires the unpacking of its different layers and that we encounter theoretical and practical problems to connect secularism with the process of modernisation in the Middle East. I will argue that the public sphere, as such, in this region is likely to be less robust and more prone to fracture. Likewise, any understanding of the project of secularism in the Middle East depends, to a large extent, on disentangling secularism as a political principle that is conceivable through the state’s political institutions from secularisation that is pertinent to society and its realisation requires certain political values to exist, which makes it less realistic in the current domineering political systems in the region.