What is ‘Sectarianism’?

Abstract

This chapter interrogates the term ‘sectarianism’ and its problematic use in the field. It surveys over 200 Arabic and English language works to illustrate the term’s opacity, its shape-shifting fluidity, its negativity and the contradictory ways in which it is understood and used. The chapter identifies six broad understandings of ‘sectarianism’ in the literature: 1) ‘sectarianism’ as a catch-all for all that is related to sectarian identity; 2) as a catch-all for all that is related to inter-sect antagonisms; 3) as a term for various forms of sect-centricity, benign or otherwise; 4) as the sect-based equivalent of racism; 5) as the intersection of sectarian identity and politics; 6) as a multi-layered concept requiring typologies of various forms of ‘sectarianisms’. The chapter demonstrates why none of these approaches are sufficient. Moreover, combined with the term’s negativity, policy relevance and political utility, ‘sectarianism’ goes beyond mere incoherence and becomes analytically distortive, politically dangerous and socially divisive. The chapter thus argues for the term’s abandonment and presents an alternate lexical framework for addressing the subject. Absent the convoluted term ‘sectarianism’, the study of sectarian dynamics can proceed more fruitfully by taking sectarian identity, rather than an ill-defined ‘sectarianism’, as its starting point.