1,720,965 research outputs found
Fragile peace, violent extremism, and feminist solutions in Nepal
No full textThis chapter explores how the feminist conceptualization of oppressions and violence can help us better comprehend and analyse fragile peace and think about better solutions to the possibility of violent extremism in Nepal. After the peaceful settlement of the Maoist insurgency in Nepal (1996–2006), the Nepalese government has claimed the peace process as completed and Nepal ushering towards growth and prosperity. This chapter shows that the premature proclamation of ‘post-war’ peace is problematic. Many causes of the Maoist insurgency in Nepal have not been completely addressed. The ‘post-war’ peace in Nepal remains fragile as beset by many continuing challenges like poverty and inequalities, unequal distribution of power and resources, and natural hazard-related disasters while the democratic restructuring of the state remains an unfinished project. Similarly, the voices of the marginalized population under multiple oppressions are unheard and their needs remain unaddressed. Moreover, emerging crises like climate change and natural hazard-elated disasters have added further vulnerabilities. Thus, the chapter argues that the combination of all these factors can create a perfect incubating environment for the recurrence of violent extremism. Feminist theorizations of oppression and violence in the concepts of ‘matrices of domination’ and ‘continua of violence’ can better understand and analyse multiple and intersecting forms of oppression and violence in Nepal.</p
Islam and politics in Bangladesh: the followers of Ummah
No full textMubashar Hasan, an young academic from Bangladesh who was kidnapped and later released after 44 days in November 2017 (21), delivers a nuanced, refined, and well researched book on the growing nexus between Islam and politics in contemporary Bangladesh. He does so by employing socio-political and historical approaches, an area of knowledge which has so far attracted inadequate scholarly attention, be it at home or abroad. For the analysis and conceptualisation of the book, the author relies mainly on the Islamic concept of ummah, which is further reinforced by another Islamic ideal, 'Muslim brotherhood'. This ideology of ummah is for Muslims as powerful as Western liberalism (204) because it addresses a broader Muslim community beyond national boundaries and time periods. In this respect, it competes with the dominant value system of western societies. This book thus clearly demonstrates that the underlying spirit of political ummah undermines the spirit of liberal democracy and secularism. It can thereby also foster interfaith intolerance and conservative religiosity, and concurrently welcoming religious fundamentalism (2)
Understanding Islamist Militancy in Bangladesh
No full textChallenges from Islamist militants have been an integral part of Bangladesh's political landscape since the 1980s. Islamist militancy has passed through different phases of silent and active forms, drawing inspiration from conflicts in Libya, Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. A vast literature has dealt with Islamist militancy in Bangladesh, but very few works have shed light on who the Bangladeshi Islamist militants are and how they radicalize youths, whom they target for their secret mission of killings, and finally why youths choose to be radicalized, especially with the arrival of Islamic State and Al Qaeda in Bangladesh in 2013. The author conducted nearly 50 in-depth interviews with experts in Bangladesh and reviewed newspaper reports to answer these questions. This paper argues that middle-class youths with urban and secular backgrounds are increasingly being radicalized through cyber space, and diverse groups of people are targeted to carry out killings owing to their perceived ideological divergence. The idea of an apocalyptic Caliphate, a feeling of victimization, a disillusionment with the state and society, and personal distresses are all found to act as catalysts for Islamist radicalization in Bangladesh
The Diverse Roles of Bangladesh's Diaspora Communities in Jihadism
No full textDiaspora radicalisation has increasingly become a source of major concern for home and host countries, especially with technology facilitating easier communication with the global village. The popular perception used to be that expatriates were less vulnerable to radicalisation, but this paper argues that in reality the scenario is completely different. Using a desk-based literature review and interviews in Dhaka, and focusing on the Bangladeshi diaspora, the findings of the study show that members of the diaspora communities have increasingly been targeted, or indeed target other members, for radicalisation. Radical expatriates have not only recruited new members online and raised funds to support terrorism, they have also provided charismatic leadership, thereby directing extremist groups from the front
Jama'at-e-Islami and Trust Building in Bangladesh
No full textBangladesh is the third-largest Muslim country in the world where Islamic ideals inherently influence people's thought and actions. One of the Islamist political parties that has been trying to influence the Bangladeshi population is the Jama'at-e-Islami (JeI). The JeI is one of the oldest and largest Islamist political parties in the country and has continuously exerted its influence on the social ethos and state policy. JeI's unconditional support for Islamization and a society based on Sharia law undoubtedly attracts some sections of the Bangladeshi population. Apart from promoting an Islamist totalitarian ideology, it also maintains a requirement of religious purification for choosing its party members" a strategy that has earned a reputation as a party with robust intraparty discipline. To enhance its trust-based relationships with its members (at both the horizontal and vertical levels), JeI helps its members through various means, including the provision of financial support, social welfare programs, and charity activities. Although the targeted population are their members, these schemes have had an impact, however minimal, on the Bangladeshi population to redress its anti-independence stance in 1971, on the failure to send an apology message for what JeI did in 1971, and on the worldwide failure of political Islam
Islam Beyond Borders: The Umma in World Politics. By James Piscatori and Amin Saikal (Review)
No full textProfessor James Piscatori and Professor Amin Saikal are the established names in the field of political Islam. Piscatori and Saikal offer a nuanced, sophisticated, and well-researched argument to show that the Islamic concept of umma (a community of all Muslims) continues to influence a popular symbolic appeal of Muslim unity and an exclusive Muslim identity, although umma fails to provide a monolithic idea as a concrete project for all Muslims. Consequently, this has become a powerful "tool for a variety of social and political actors" (p. 160) to advance their (Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Islamic State) local authoritarian and global imperialistic agenda. The authors argue this based on three case studies of major actors, such as Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Islamic State, and diverse theological interpretations of the umma. To the authors, the concept of umma is much contested among even Muslims and non-Muslims. While western imperialists find it a threat to their interests, Muslims differ in their interpretations of the concept, from national to transnational to radical internationalism
Covid-19 and the Clash of Narratives: From Cold War to End of Time (1989-2023)
Get PDFThis paper discusses the impact of Covid-19 on Islamist narratives of end time scenarios that predict the annihilation of a corrupted world and its ultimate replacement by a world order based exclusively on Islam. It does this against the backdrop of Islam’s antagonistic relationship with the West, particularly from the ending of the Cold War in the early 1990s to the present day, a relationship conducted within the shadow of the US’s attempts to establish a new world order based exclusively on its own values and interests. In the light of the contrary predictions of Francis Fukuyama that the resulting Pax Americana will bring a century of peace and S. P. Huntington a century of conflict, the paper goes on to examine the vastly different world views of the United States on the one hand and Al Qaeda and Islamic State on the other and how they envisage the future unfolding. What the paper shows is that the advent of Covid-19 has served not only to convince traditional Islamic Scholars that Al Mahama, the great battle at the end of time, is well on the way and may even have started, but also to make Muslims in the streets more receptive to such a doomsday message
Islamist Militancy in Bangladesh: An Examination of Its Cause and Likely Trajectory (2009-2019) - Dataset
No full textResearcher conducted semi-structured in-depth elite interviews. All interviews can be found here in three forms such as audio recordings, transcriptions, and translations. They have been quoted pseudonymously and put in sequential manner
Religious Extremism and Terrorist Recruitment: The Case of Al Qaeda in Bangladesh
No full textOn 12 June 2018, Bangladesh, the third-largest Muslim majority country of the world, once again figured in the headlines of the international media because of the killing of the secular writer and publisher, Shahzahan Bachchu
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