Islam as Social Movement

Abstract

The chapter identifies five common features of modern Islamic social movements: 1) They tend to begin as mutual aid societies rather than as clearly defined political entities; 2) they offer themselves up as ways for society at large to organize itself outside the state; 3) they signify the increasing politicization of society itself; 4) they are only partially oriented to capturing state power; and 5) they tend to transform when they capture the state or become part of it. The jihadist movements are treated as a sub-case of Islamic mobilization, and the chapter considers five theses concerned specifically with jihadism: 1) jihadism as generic radicalism camouflaged in religious language; 2) jihadism as fusion of two previously distinct theaters (local wars and global youth culture); 3) jihadism as Islamized traces of former, secular regimes; 4) jihadism as nihilism borne out of a sense of impasse; and 5) jihadism as critical mimicry of government ideology.