I don't think there is, or can be, any consensus on what Islamism is, any more than there is consensus on what socialism, nationalism, and liberalism are. Or rather there is much less consensus about the former than the latter, for Islamism, unlike socialism, nationalism, and liberalism, is usually not a term of self identification, but a term of attribution. It is a term promiscuously attributed to a wide variety of groups, only some of whom seek to impose their particular interpretations of Islam by armed struggle, let alone on an international scale.
Conversely, not all parties and states that incorporate sharia into law are commonly called Islamist in political discourse here, though it's not clear why they shouldn't be. Most Middle Eastern countries, including states that are usually labeled secular, "acknowledge Islamic law in their constitutions by making Islam the official religion of the country or by stating that sharia is a source -- or the source -- of the nation's laws" and "incorporate some traditional sharia into their legal codes, especially in the area of personal-status law, which governs marriage, divorce, and inheritance" (Sharon Otterman, "Islam: Governing Under Sharia," 14 March 2005, <http://www.cfr.org/publication/8034/>).
In short, the way the label has been used tends to obscure the matter more than clarifies it, though I have been using it, and am still using it in this posting, myself for lack of a better term.
Not all groups that are called Islamist should be defended, and as a matter of fact I have said so many times here. But it is advisable for liberals and leftists in the West to come to terms with some of the groups that are called Islamist, such as Hamas, Hizballah, the government of Iran, etc., as entities that have legitimate rights and interests, till such time as their respective constituencies establish different leaderships than them. That is so because the cornerstone of current imperial policy is to precisely deny them the right to legitimacy and existence even.
> You may, as with Philby, like the
> people they lead, but I don't think you'd want to wake up like Philby
> to the realisation that you don't like the leaders after all!
That is certainly true. However, while I may express my opinion as to the leadership of people in other countries (and I often do), I don't necessarily expect it to be adopted by them (and, more likely than not, it won't be). That's in the end up to them.
> I suggest you try and follow some of the events in countries like
> Indonesia or Malaysia to get a better sense of what contemporary
> islamism is. It's not pretty.
<snip>
> OK, it doesn't help for some western power to then come along
> to lecture about freedom of religion and all that; but it also
> doesn't help if some leftists come along to lecture about
> the anti-imperialist character of the islamists.
I have never said that all Islamists have an anti-imperialist character. Only some do. The same goes for socialism and secular nationalism.
> > "Struggle against Pan-Islamism!" is not always
> > everywhere the right position
>
> That's a stupid slogan. But, yes, combating such matters as recounted
> above is, I think, right. But the who and how are difficult issues,
> very much subject to the exigencies of time and place, and we do need
> a way of wrapping our heads around a multi-cultural practice that has
> regard to both individual and collective rights.
The topic at hand is Islamism, but the difficulty of reconciling individual and collective has been an enduring problem, perhaps as old as politics, and certainly a well-recognized one in the history of socialism and secular nationalism.
> > so-called New Atheists among others is precisely the "militantly
> > anti-religion stance" that, if adopted by leftists, would make it
>
> Isn't this tilting at windmills? Although if the militantly religious
> go around trying to impose their positions on others, then shouldn't
> they be opposed?
Within the country where I live, yes, I certainly oppose them. But exactly how? That depends a lot on the intra- and international balance of forces and other factors.
For instance, in Iran, Islamic feminists' war of position within the framework of the Islamic Republic has made things better for women than the Mojahedin's full-frontal attack (including armed struggle) against it.
Beyond the country of my residence, I'm much less sanguine about the prospect of what is often called human rights activism on a transnational scale than most liberals and leftists today, whether or not the matter concerns religion in any way. That is especially the case because I live in the USA.
> > So would have the Soviet government if Malaka had ended
> > up in the USSR
> > at a wrong time, judging by what it did to Muslim national communists
> > (see below) and others who fell out of orthodoxy (which was easy to
> > do, as orthodoxy kept changing).
>
> This is beginning to clutch at straws. The USSR was not a model of
> respect for rights. You might as well say that one could also get
> detained and tortured in the USA. So what?
Seen objectively in terms of their respective casualties, the collective records of liberalism, socialism, secular nationalism, etc. are not prettier than that of Islamism. As far as I can see, though, selective indignation is the norm rather than an exception among liberals and leftists, as well as among the power elites, just as it is among Islamists in particular and Muslims in general. A better way to go would be for each school of thought to be especially critical of suffering imposed in its name.
Also, some secular liberals and leftists are quick to blame imperialism and other causes external to themselves for the rise of Islamism. In many countries, especially those like Pakistan, that is certainly one of the main causes for it. But at the same time another reason is that they themselves have lost old political visions, programs, and strategies and have yet to find new ones that can appeal to people in large numbers. Below is an impressionistic sketch of the problem in Pakistan:
<http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/akhtar080707.html> Fallout at the Frontline by Aasim Sajjad Akhtar
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
There is another major explanation for what appears to be the rapid Islamization of political discourse in the Muslim world. From the Maghreb to Indonesia, there has been for many years a consistently growing gap between the sensibilities of people and the political alignments of anti-people states. As pointed out already, the latter are mostly clients of the empire and rely for their survival on Washington. Once upon a time, the sensibilities of Muslim peoples were represented by the Nassers, Ahmed Ben Bellas, Sukarnos, and Bhuttos of the Muslim world. The personality cults that revolved around such figures were problematic as were many other aspects of their politics. Nonetheless, the populists that prevailed in the Muslim countries until 1970s had a finger on the pulse of their people. Since the rise of political Islamism, secular elite groups have grown alienated from working people, both in terms of lifestyle and in terms of their worldview. Whereas once upon a time the intelligentsia of the Muslim world was a part of progressive political movements, it is now cut off from real class struggle. The growing mistrust amongst working people for what are easily dismissed as "Westernized" elements in society has also been a major factor in the rise of the right.
Shockingly, a large number of "liberals" argued in favor of the American invasion of Afghanistan following the September 11 attacks under the pretext that this was the only way to be rid of the forces of religious obscurantism. Needless to say, the optimism surrounding the American invasion has dissipated, but the fact remains that the alienated elite in Muslim countries such as Pakistan do not offer a coherent solution to the nexus of military-religious right-imperialism because it is obsessed with the spectre of "Talibanisation" and is unwilling to put the politics of Islamism in the proper perspective. That having been said, the ahistorical manner in which the corporate media and Western governments have portrayed the right as being the preeminent political and social force in the Muslim world -- including Pakistan -- is criminal. Islamist politics -- both its more militant and mainstream versions -- must be understood as a product of real history and the need of Muslim states and imperialism. It still does not enjoy a widespread popular social base, and will not in years to come either, if only because it too, like the alienated liberal intelligentsia, does not offer a coherent alternative to neo-liberal imperialism.
At the same time, however, it is essential to recognize that the role of Islam in societies such as Pakistan is real. It cannot and should not be marginalized. The right cannot be opposed by invoking a brand of politics -- in the name of secularism -- that dismisses religion altogether. This is a sure route to isolation. Progressive forces in Pakistan -- and the rest of the Muslim world -- will regain the influence they once enjoyed only if they are able to acknowledge the Muslim sensibilities of the people and offer a coherent alternative to the status quo. -- Yoshie