This book confronts the key questions surrounding comparative secularism in historical perspective. The contributions critically consider the normative ideas and alternative political arrangements that govern religion’s relation to politics and to the public and private spheres.
Containing contributions by world-renowned scholars such as Michael Walzer, Asma Afsaruddin and Sudipta Kaviraj, this book recounts the arguments, debates, and disputations regarding secular arguments for accommodating religion. It does so in both critical and appreciative ways and describes some of the outcomes in actually existing institutions, policies, and practical arrangements. With the addition of many non-Western experiences and viewpoints on how secularism is theorized and lived, politically and historically and from Europe and Asia to Africa and the Americas, this volume is of great value political philosophers across the globe.
Author(s): Jonathan Laurence
Series: Philosophy and Politics - Critical Explorations, 23
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 174
City: Cham
Foreword
Contents
Chapter 1: Introduction
Works Cited
Part I: Secularism at Large
Chapter 2: Islam, Political Governance, and Secularism: Examining a Fraught Relationship
2.1 Theorizing About Politics and the State in the Modern Period
2.2 ‘Abd al-Raziq’s Views
2.3 A Critique of ‘Abd al-Raziq’s Views by Muhammad Bakhit al-Muti‘i
2.4 Analysis of ‘Abd al-Raziq’s and al-Muti‘i’s Views
2.5 Implications for Twenty-First Century Conversations on Religion and Politics
2.6 Debating Islam’s “Compatibility with Democracy”: The Fault-Lines of Civilization?
Works Cited
Chapter 3: Languages of Secularity
3.1 Two Stages of the Intellectual History of Secularity
3.2 The Originality of the Indian Debate
3.3 Democracy and Secularism
3.4 Peculiarities of the Indian Discourse
3.5 The Peculiarity of the Indian Use of ‘Communal’
3.6 Transformation of Hindu Nationalist Idiom
3.7 The Academic Debate about Secularism
Works Cited
Chapter 4: Islam and the State from a Shi’ite Perspective
4.1 The Age of the Presence of the Infallible
4.2 Waiting for the Governance of the Infallible Imam
4.3 Separation of Religious and Profane Affairs
4.4 General Guardianship of the Jurists
4.5 Constitutionalism
4.6 The Birth of Political Shi’ism in a Secular Context
4.6.1 Stage One. Qom’ Theory: Royal Constitutionalism with Fuqaha’s Monitoring
4.6.2 Second Stage, Najaf’s Theory: General Appointive Guardianship of Fuqaha
4.6.3 The Third Stage. Paris Theory: Islamic Republic with Jurist’s Monitoring
4.7 Islamic Republic and Afterward
4.7.1 Stage Four. Tehran’s Theory: Islamic Republic with Absolute Guardianship of Jurist-Ruler
4.8 Recent Theories
Works Cited
Part II: Secularism in Contexts
Chapter 5: Catholicism, Colonial Encounters and Secularism in Asia
Works Cited
Chapter 6: Secularism in the French Context
6.1 A Brief History of Revolution, Church, State, Colonialism, and Education
6.1.1 The Revolution, the Republic(s), and the Two Frances
6.1.2 Schooling the Republic
6.1.3 The Separation
6.1.4 Meanwhile, Colonialism
6.2 Theorizing Laïcité
6.2.1 Laïcité: Theorizing Secularism in the French Context
6.2.2 Theorizing Laïcité Today
6.2.3 Shifting Interpretations in the Contemporary Context
6.2.4 Theorizing Laïcité in the School Context Today
6.3 Laïcité in Practice
6.3.1 An Extended Affair with the Islamic Headscarf
6.3.2 Extracurricular Troubles with the Headscarf
6.3.3 Charte(s) de la Laïcité
6.4 Concluding Reflections
Works Cited
Chapter 7: The Absence of Secularism in Senegal
7.1 Islam in Senegal’s History – Laying Down the Foundations for Cohabitation
7.2 Islam in Senegal’s Politics Today – Belonging, Fitting, and Evolving
7.3 Islam in Senegal’s Gender Politics – Conflicts and Compromises
7.4 Conclusion
Works Cited
Chapter 8: Secularization in North Africa
8.1 Secularization Through Bureaucratization
8.2 Infrastructure, Education, Hierarchy
8.3 After Independence
8.4 The First Phase of Nation-State Islam (1950–1980)
8.5 Nation-State Islam, For Now
Works Cited
Chapter 9: Rethinking Secularism and State Policies Toward Religion: The United States, France, and Turkey
9.1 The United States: Stable Passive Secularism
9.1.1 The Muslim Minority
9.2 France: Stable Assertive Secularism
9.2.1 The Muslim-Minority
9.3 Turkey: Declining Assertive Secularism
9.3.1 Erdogan and Populist Islamism
9.4 Conclusion
Works Cited
Chapter 10: Secularism in US State and Society
