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2003-2004
Conference:
“BEYOND
RADICAL ISLAM?”
The
2003-2004 conference,“Beyond Radical Islam?” was
held at Michigan State University on Friday, April 16 through
Sunday, April 18, 2004. The conference was organized by
the LeFrak Forum and Symposium on Science, Reason, and
Modern Democracy at Michigan State and the Ethics and Public
Policy Center of Washington, DC.
The
conference addressed questions such as the following: To
what extent and in what ways does radical Islam represent
a distortion of traditional or “true” Islam?
What are the resources within traditional Islam to resist
the arguments and appeal of radical Islam? Does there exist
or could there develop a liberal Islam? What would liberal
Islam look like and under what conditions would it thrive?
All
conference sessions were held in Kellogg Center. They were
free and open to the public.
Conference
Sessions: Friday, April 16:
Session
1, Part
1 Video
Session
1, Part
2 Video
Popular
Sovereignty and the Divine Sovereign
(9:30 am - noon), Lincoln Room
Are Islam and liberal democracy compatible? The democratic idea of popular
sovereignty poses a serious challenge to the Islamic idea that God has authority
over humans. And yet some liberal Muslim thinkers argue that popular sovereignty,
though no substitute for divine sovereignty, is not necessarily inconsistent
with Islamic teachings: popular sovereignty is an expression of God's sovereignty.
What specific sources within Islamic tradition support the development of an
Islamic idea of popular sovereignty? How can constitutional democracy be made
meaningful in Islamic terms and relevant to future of Islam?
Papers:
Nurcholish Madjid is a prominent Muslim intellectual, known for his innovative
opinions on social and political matters in Indonesia and other developing
Islamic nations. Dr. Madjid has served as Rector of the Paramadina Mulya
University (Jakarta) since 1998. In addition, he is a lecturer on the post-graduate
faculty at Syarif Hidayatullah University (Jakarta) and a senior researcher
at the Indonesian Institute of Sciences. He was previously a leader of
various student organizations.
Ahmed
al-Rahim is a founding member of the American Islamic Congress,
an organization formed after September 11 in the belief
that American Muslims should play a leading role in rejecting
Islamic extremism and promoting a democratic future in
the Muslim world. Mr. al-Rahim is also preceptor in Classical
Arabic Language and Literature at Harvard University, and
a doctoral candidate at Yale University, where he is completing
a dissertation on Islamic intellectual history during the
Mongol period. During 2002, he served as an advisor to
USAID on educational reform in Iraq. A frequent contributor
to television and radio programs on Islam and politics,
Mr. al-Rahims publications include an edited book, Before
and After Avicenna, and a number of articles in the Boston
Globe and The Wall Street Journal.
Response:
Mohammad Fadel is an attorney in New York City and frequent lecturer
on Islamic law. He was a founding member of Muslims Against Terrorism, now
Muslim Voices for Peace. Dr. Fadel has also been an instructor of Arabic at
the University of Virginia, Middlebury College, and Notre Dame University and
has published several papers on Islamic law.
Session
2, Part
1 Video
Session
2, Part
2 Video
Political
Islam
(2 - 4:30 pm), Lincoln Room
Islamic movements exhibit a wide variety of forms, political programs, and
identities. What are the major movements in the Middle East, South Asia, and
Southeast Asia, and how do they differ in their perceptions and diagnosis of
the problems facing Muslims today? What policies should Western governments
develop to address these Islamic movements? How can liberal and reformist movements
be identified and encouraged? What are the likely consequences of the wars
in Afghanistan and Iraq for the larger relationship between the Muslim world
and the West?
Paper:
Mohammed Ayoob is University Distinguished Professor of International Relations
at James Madison College, Michigan State University. Before joining Michigan
State University, he taught at Jawaharlal Nehru University in India and
the Australian National University. He has also held visiting appointments
at Princeton, Columbia, Oxford, Sydney, and Brown Universities and at Bilkent
University in Turkey. He is the author of The Third World Security Predicament:
State Making, Regional Conflict, and the International System, and has
published numerous scholarly articles in professional journals such as
World Politics, International Studies Quarterly, Global Governance, Asian
Survey, Orbis, Foreign Policy, International Affairs, International Journal,
Washington Quarterly, Middle East Policy.
Responses:
Hillel Fradkin is president of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, as well
as the director of its Islamic Studies and Jewish Studies programs. Before
joining the Ethics and Public Policy Center, he was the W.H. Brady, Jr.
Fellow in Politics, Religion and Culture at the American Enterprise Institute.
Prior to his work at AEI, Dr. Fradkin was a member of the Committee on
Social Thought at the University of Chicago, where he taught the history
of political and religious thought (Muslim, Christian and Jewish) as well
as other courses in political science. For the same period, he was vice
president of the Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation.
Husain
Haqqani is a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment
for International Peace in Washington, D.C. He is a syndicated
columnist for The Indian Express and The Nation (of India)
and serves as chairman of Communications Research Strategies,
a Pakistani consulting company. Mr. Haqqani's journalism
career includes work as East Asian correspondent for Arabia
- The Islamic World Review and Pakistan and Afghanistan
correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review. He is
a regular contributor to The Wall Street Journal, The New
York Times, The Boston Globe, and Arab News. He regularly
comments on Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Islamic politics
and extremism on BBC, CNN, NBC, and ABC. Mr. Haqqani has
also served as an advisor to Pakistani prime ministers
Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, Nawaz Sharif, and Benazir Bhutto.
From 1992 to 1993, he served as Pakistan's ambassador to
Sri Lanka.
Saturday,
April 17:
Session
3, Part
1 Video
Session
3, Part
2 Video
Islam
and Modernity
(9:30
am - noon), Big Ten Room C
Many Muslims, radicals and moderates alike, understand secular modern life
as a form of ignorance and disavowal of God. This view contributes to the anti-modernist
ideology of radical Islam and to the political and economic poverty that exists
throughout the Muslim world. What are the sources of this view? Does Islam
need to undergo a "Reformation" or "Enlightenment" similar
to that experienced by Christianity in the West? Is this a helpful way to conceptualize
the present conflict between Islam and modernity and to encourage the future
growth of liberal Islam?
Paper:
Abdou Filali-Ansary is director of the Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilisations,
Aga Khan University in London. He served from 1984 to 2001 as the founding
director of the King Abdul-Aziz Foundation for Islamic Studies and Human
Sciences in Casablanca, Morocco, having previously taught modern philosophy
in the Faculty of Letters in Rabat. Professor Filali-Ansary has contributed
widely to academic discourses on democratization and civil society in the
Middle East and in 1993, co-founded the bilingual Arabic and French journal
Prologues: revue maghrébine du livre . His work includes a translation
into French of Ali Abderraziq's landmark book, Islam and the Foundations
of Political Power, and an essay titled "Is Islam Hostile to Secularism?".
He serves on the advisory boards of numerous academic and cultural institutions,
and on the editorial board of the Journal of Democracy.
Responses:
Asma
Afsaruddin is associate professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies
at the University of Notre Dame. Her fields of specialization
are the religious and political thought of Islam, Qur'an
and hadith studies, and the intellectual history of Islam.
Professor Afsaruddin is the author of Excellence and Precedence:
Medieval Islamic Discourse on Legitimate Leadership and editor
of Hermeneutics and Honor: Negotiating Female "Public" Space
in Islamic/ate Societies. She was recently a visiting scholar
at the Centre of Islamic Studies at the School of Oriental
and African Studies, London, and is currently serving on
the board of directors of the Center for the Study of Islam
and Democracy (Washington, DC) and on the advisory board
of Karamah, a women's and human rights organization (Washington
DC).
Francis
Fukuyama is dean of faculty and the Bernard L. Schwartz
Professor of International Political Economy at the Paul
H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies of Johns
Hopkins University. He has previously taught at George
Mason University, was a scholar at the RAND Corporation,
and served on the Policy Planning Staff of the US Department
of State. Professor Fukuyama has written widely on democratization
and international political economy. He is the author of
many books and articles including The End of History and
the Last Man and Trust: The Social Virtues and the Creation
of Prosperity.
Session
4, Part
1 Video
Session
4, Part
2 Video
Islam
in the West
(2 - 4:30 pm), Big Ten Room C
Millions of Muslims live in relative prosperity and affluence in Western liberal
democracies. What civil associations have these communities established within
their respective homelands and with other religious groups? What policies have
Western governments adopted with respect to Muslim communities? What policies
should they adopt? Will future generations of Muslims in the West seek to embrace
or withdraw from Western life? Insofar as these communities have experienced
life in liberal democracies firsthand, how might they contribute to the development
of a liberal alternative to radical Islam around the world?
Paper:
Olivier Roy is research director of the humanities and social sciences at the
Centre National de la
Scientifique (Paris) and consultant with the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
He undertook several journeys in Afghanistan during the Mujahidin resistance
to the Soviet invasion of 1979 and then embarked on numerous trips to the ex-Soviet
Central Asian republics, notably Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. He served as special
representative of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe
(OSCE) in Tajikistan from 1993 to 1994 and headed the OSCE Mission to Tajikistan
in 1994. Dr. Roy is the author of numerous articles and books including Islam
and Resistance in Afghanistan; The Failure of Political Islam; The New Central
Asia: The Creation of Nations; and Vers un islam européen.
Responses:
Shaykh Kabbani is a Sufi scholar and chairman of the Islamic Supreme Council
of America, a Muslim civic organization that hosts conferences, engages
in inter-religious dialogue, and promotes traditional, moderate Islamic
views within US and foreign policymaking channels. In his effort to unite,
educate and serve Muslims, Shaykh Kabbani has also founded several national
organizations, including the Kamilat Muslim Women's Association. He holds
a degree in Shari'ah, and has also studied medicine in Louvain, Belgium,
and Islamic spirituality under two internationally renowned spiritual guides
of the worldwide Naqshbandi Sufi Order.
Peter
Skerry is professor of political science at Boston College
and senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. His research
focuses on social policy, racial and ethnic politics, and
immigration. He was formerly a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson
International Center for Scholars and a research fellow
at the American Enterprise Institute. He has also served
as legislative director for the late Senator Daniel Patrick
Moynihan. His writings on politics, racial and ethnic issues,
immigration and social policy have appeared in a variety
of scholarly and general interest publications, including
Society, Publius, The Journal of Policy History, The New
Republic, Slate, The Public Interest, The Wilson Quarterly,
and The National Review. He is the author of Mexican Americans:
The Ambivalent Minority. His current project is a study
of the social, cultural, and political integration of Muslims
and Arabs in the United States.
Sunday,
April 18:
Session
5, Part
1 Video
Session
5, Part
2 Video
Cultivating
a Liberal Islamic Ethos
(10 am -12:30 pm), Lincoln Room
What Islamic institutions would support a liberal democratic ethos in the Muslim
world? What habits and practices, modes of scriptural interpretation, and attitudes
are best suited for Muslims to embrace and engage more fully in the public
life of liberal democracies? What are the sources of citizenship, social and
economic entrepreneurship, and civility and tolerance within Islamic tradition?
How can the development of such practices and sentiments be encouraged and
supported? How might orthodox Muslim piety and modern life come to coexist
in Islamic thought and practice?
Paper:
Sohail Hashmi is associate professor of international relations at Mt. Holyoke
College. His doctoral work focused on contemporary Islamic discourse on
just war and peace. His teaching and research interests lie at the intersection
of Western and Islamic political and moral philosophy as they relate to
normative issues in comparative and international politics. Professor Hashmi
has published on such topics as sovereignty, humanitarian intervention,
international society, and the theory of jihad.
Responses:
Qamar-ul Huda is assistant professor of Islamic studies and comparative theology
at Boston College. He writes about medieval Islamic texts and mystical
Sufi treatises. A scholar of Islamic thought and history, he is the author
of Striving for Divine Union: Spiritual Exercises for Suhrawardî Sufis,
and is presently writing Sufi commentaries on the Qur'ân and on contemporary
issues of violence, religion, and Islamic moral philosophy. Professor Huda
is also editor of Sufi Illuminations,a journal dedicated to the study of
Islam and Sufism,and serves as advisor to the Archdiocese of Boston and
the Islamic Council of New England Christian-Muslim Dialogue.
Nathan
Tarcov is a professor in the Committee on Social Thought
and director of Olin Center for Inquiry into the Theory
and Practice of Democracy at the University of Chicago.
He has served on the Policy Planning Staff of the US Department
of State. He is the author of Locke's Education for Liberty
and of many articles on the origins, development, and nature
of liberalism. He is also editor of Locke’s Some
Thoughts Concerning Education and Meanings of Revolution.
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