Monday, December 23, 2013

Book Publication Announcement

Political Islam in the Age of Democratization, my book with Farid Senzai published five days ago.

We have used democratization theory to try and make sense of the evolution of Islamism in the Middle East and South Asia since the beginning of the 1990s. Our thesis is that democracy in the Muslim world will take root but it will be different from what we have in the west given that Muslim democracies (to varying degrees) will allow for religion to have some (as yet undefined) role in public affairs. That said, there will be countries that may not democratize given that more radical forms of Islamism are dominant there. We offer two separate 3-tiered typologies that classify different Islamist movements. The first is based on how different Islamist groups seek to establish their envisioned 'Islamic' polity and the second one is based on the different attitudes that exist among Islamists towards democracy. In addition, we offer a spectrum that identifies the various types of Islamists and secularists with regards to their views of the role of religion in politics. We then apply this framework on five case studies: Muslim Brotherhood, Salafists, Taliban, al-Qaeda, Iran, Arab Shia (Hezbollah and Iraqi Shia parties), and Turkey's ruling AK Party.

It can be ordered through the publisher or Amazon. 

http://us.macmillan.com/politicalislamintheageofdemocratization/KamranBokhari 
http://www.amazon.com/Political-Islam-Democratization-Middle-Today/dp/1137008040