Fundamentalism in the Modern World

41

English translation © 2003 by M.E. Sharpe, Inc., from the Russian text © 2002by “Polis” [Politicheskie issledovaniia]. “Fundamentalizm v prostranstvesovremennogo mira,” Polis, 2002, no. 1, pp. 66–77.

Irina Vladimirovna Kudriashova is an assistant professor in the Departmentof Comparative Politics, Moscow State Institute of International Relations(MGIMO); she holds a candidate’s degree in political science.

The quotation from Melvin Lasky is retranslated from the Russian.—Ed.

Russian Social Science Review, vol. 44, no. 3, May–June 2003, pp. 41–62.© 2003 M.E. Sharpe, Inc. All rights reserved.ISSN 1061–1428/2003 $9.50 + 0.00.

IRINA V. KUDRIASHOVA

Fundamentalism in theModern World

In history, all clocks run forward.—Melvin Lasky, Utopia and Revolution

The return of the religious factor to politics in the form of funda-mentalism is a theme that is particularly relevant today, in policydecisions as in scholarly discussions and literature. The problemsare especially acute and alarming when fundamentalism (to bemore precise, its militarized extremist wing) causes suffering anddeath. Then this phenomenon is identified in the public mind withterrorism, medieval obscurantism, and fanaticism.

The word “fundamentalism” was first used in the United Statesto characterize certain Christian evangelical groups (primarilyCalvinists, Presbyterians, and Baptists) in the second half of thenineteenth century. Later it was applied to anti-Darwinists during“the [Scopes] monkey trial” of the 1920s. [See, for example,Sagadeev, 1993, p. 57; and Miloslavskii, 1999, pp. 9–10.] In1909–15 several issues of a bulletin entitled The Fundamentals

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were published, which “reinforced” the name. Only later was theterm used by Western scholars in studying Islam, Judaism, andother religions. In the process it was often interpreted very broadlyto mean a return to the origins of religious and civilizational unityand as the derivation of religious and political principles from aneternally sacred text. Nowadays fundamentalism is used to de-scribe the theoretical and practical activity of numerous political–religious movements and organizations (Islamic, Judaic, Protestant,Catholic, Orthodox Christian, Hindu, and Buddhist), which areactive in Southeastern and Central Asia, in Northern Africa, in theNear East, in Europe, and in the United States—in a word, almosteverywhere. The extent of the process and nations’ involvement init make fundamentalism not only an influential factor in but also asubject [sub’’ekt] of politics.

It is interesting to note that the controversy regarding the defi-nition of fundamentalism has a more than linguistic significance.Various terms—fundamentalism, religious revival, Puritanism,renaissance, integrism [extreme traditionalism—Ed.], revivalism,religious radicalism, millenarianism, and others—highlight vari-ous aspects of the phenomenon. For example, the first type of fun-damentalism—the “original” Protestant type—regarded the Bibleas an embodiment of original purity and a guide to “this world”activity; that is, it signified a return to the roots, to the foundation.“Integrism” (from the French intégrité—integrity, wholeness, im-plying purity and honesty) emphasizes communal unity and con-tinuity based on religious and moral values, whereas “revivalism”(from the English “to revive,” meaning to restore or to renew)emphasizes the recurrent nature of the phenomenon. Later, West-ern scholars applied these concepts to Islam, but the secularizedlanguages of the West and Western historical parallels cannot pro-vide appropriate analogies for the realities of the non-Westernworld. In Arabic, the phenomenon is most frequently defined asfollows: al-baas al-islami (Islamic revival); as-sakhwah al-islamiyyah (Islamic awakening); ihya ad-din (a revival of religion);and al-usuliyyah al-islamiyyah (Islamic fundamentalism). The lastterm (derived from usul ad-din, which literally means “fundamentals

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of a religion” [Ar-Raid 1964: 155]) seems to be the most precise.It implies adherence to the doctrines of faith, to the original prin-ciples of the Islamic polity (umma), and to the fundamental tenetsgoverning the legitimacy of power (sharia). I note here that, asunderstood at present, the formula emphasizes the political dimen-sions rather than the religious aspect of fundamentalism. The con-cept of salafiyyah (denoting those who advocate a return to the“origins” of Islam, to the norms of life and institutions of the “righ-teous ancestors” (as-salaf) [see Sagadeev, 1987, p. 11]) is used ina similar sense. As for the term “Islamism,” which is sometimesconfused with Islam as a whole, some scholars apply it not somuch to the sphere of social thought as to the sphere of politicalaction [see Malashenko, 1997].

The increasingly strong embrace of religious–civilizational unityas a source of self-identification and new group loyalties is one ofthe most important global tendencies in social development at theend of the twentieth and the beginning of the twenty-first century.In its developed form fundamentalism is a product of the present,although the tendency to reconstruct a “golden age” characterizedthe axis civilizations during earlier periods as well. A distinctivefeature of modern fundamentalism is the conviction that politicsis primary, even if it is directed by a total religious worldview.Fundamentalism achieves its highest development where there isbelief that the heavenly can be realized in the mundane—that is,that salvation can be achieved both in this world and in the next(which dramatically increases the amount of attention directed atreforming existing sociopolitical institutions)—where the relativesignificance of the doctrine is high, and where no one social insti-tution or group holds a monopoly on access to the sacred. The lastis connected primarily with the existence of a sacred book, opento all believers and the ultimate source of authority (as in Chris-tianity, Islam, and Judaism). On the whole, fundamentalist trendscan be subdivided into two types: (a) those based on the Abrahamicreligions of the Book; and (b) the nationalistic “derivatives” ofHinduism and Buddhism, which do not have a distinct set of sa-cred canons.


Regardless of all the diversity among fundamentalist movements,primarily the result of differences in ontological concepts, a pro-found similarity can be observed among individual versions in thesignificance given to politics and to historical experience: all thesevariants aim to affirm the religious authenticity of the modernworld. But why is the return to religious ideology taking placenow? Does this reflect the eternal conflict of religion, philosophy,and science, or does it represent something more significant? Whatunderlies the phenomenon? Is it a mixture of mystical impulseswith claims to rationality or a force capable of pushing humanityinto a specific new set of circumstances that are not yet visible?

The disintegration of the socialist system at the end of the twen-tieth century resulted, among other things, in the destruction ofthe ideological opposition of “liberalism—socialism.” Without thisopposition, a significant part of humanity found itself in a situa-tion of painful spiritual uncertainty, with no hope for a triumph ofjustice in the “wonderful, beautiful faraway world.” During theage of globalization, the world has become a “smaller,” more openplace. But it turned out that not everybody could enter this newworld on equal terms: altruism is inherently not a characteristic ofmodernity. The gaps in economic development and the aggressivepenetration of [Western] mass culture have practically deprivedperipheral countries of the opportunity to overcome the culturaland political divide and to preserve their civilizational foundations. Ahuge amount of socio-psychological energy has been released thatcannot be channeled through models of rational adaptation to anenvironment characterized by unequal partnership. This crucialpoint has sharpened demands to search for different criteria and tochange ideological and value precepts at the elite and mass levels.In the countries of the center the appeal to overcome disunity andindividualism and the call to spiritualize life in the “too rational”world by returning to traditional family values, love of one’s moth-erland, and God have acquired special importance.

Having identified the most general causes governing the devel-opment of fundamentalism, I focus on specific factors that deter-mine the rise and specific nature of its various versions.


The specific nature of Islamic fundamentalism is determinedby the very tight links between Islam and the political and socialorganization, as well as the solidarity, of the Muslim community.Its rise was caused by the crisis of nationalism as an ideology ofliberation and by the mobilization stimulated by “ineffective” revolu-tionary development programs and was aggravated by extreme socialstratification. It was also based on the failure of borrowed ideologies,the declining legitimacy of the authorities, the use of religiousmotives and symbols as auxiliary elements in the contest among thepolitical elite, and the foreign activity of Muslim organizations.

The rise of Judaic fundamentalism was furthered by the follow-ing factors: the tightening of the criteria for membership in thenational community (thus, a person who is considered Jewish inaccordance with Israel’s state law may not be considered Jewishin terms of religious law); the need to preserve the historic conti-nuity of the Jewish community and the definition of Israel itself(in conjunction with the biblical Eretz Yisrael); and the restartingof the Middle East peace process after the Camp David Accords.According to A.B. Volkov, contemporary Judaic fundamentalistssee the doctrine of the Chosen People and the Almighty’s gift ofthe land of Palestine to Jews for eternity as “the basis of their wholeideological and political program” [Volkov, 1999, p. 24]. At the sametime, modern-day Israel provides an especially vivid example of thevariable nature of fundamentalist thinking: thus, the ultranationalistorganization Gush Emunim (The Bloc of the Faithful), which imple-ments intensive settlement of land in the areas bordering on Jordan(the historical territory of Judea and Samaria), and the anti-ZionistHaredim coexist in the country [see Eizenshtadt, 1994, p. 37].

Protestant fundamentalism is based on Puritan and conserva-tive traditions going back to the eighteenth century (the recogni-tion of the absolute truth of Holy Scripture and the acceptance ofthe Bible as historical fact) and on its view of the American stateas a “new Israel” on which the salvation of other nations depends.Protestant fundamentalism is widespread in the United States[Haynes, 1995, p. 23], where millions of its followers advocatethe original Christian values. It also includes groups practicing


radical anti-Semitism, such as Christian Identity. Such groups be-lieve that the world is divided into “Adam’s descendants”—whitepeople, or “genuine Israelites”—and “Satan’s children”—Jews andother “impure” people [see Tuvinov, 2001].

Catholic fundamentalism is rooted in the ideological traditionsof the counterrevolutionary criticism of the world that emergedafter 1789. The most important tenets of Catholic conservatismagainst modernization, liberalism, and socialism were formulatedat the beginning of the twentieth century by Pope Pius X. Beforethe Second Vatican Council (1962), integrism (this is the term thatFrench scholars most frequently use to denote this type of funda-mentalism) remained an antimodernist tendency within the Churchsupported by the Papal Curia and the episcopacy in Italy, Spain,and especially Latin America. Today it can be defined as a theo-logical and political movement that regards the liturgical reformsand the theological quest of the Roman Catholic Church as hereti-cal (it interprets ecumenism as syncretism) and considers itselfthe only true voice of religious doctrine. The most influentialintegrist organizations include the Society of St. Pius X, foundedby Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre of France (1905–1993) in 1970.1

To this category of fundamentalists, the ideal Catholic state wouldbe the “social reign of Christ,” in which church law would becomestate law, although the state would be governed by representativesof the secular power with the support and counsel of the Churchand would be based on nationalism, the principle “of mutual util-ity,” the solidarity of corporate groups, and the charity system [seeCamus, 1990, pp. 67–68]. This explains the influence of the groupOpus Dei (“God’s Work”) on the policies of such dictators asFranco, Salazar, Peron, Stroessner, and Pinochet.

The “new right” movement in the United States, which has beengrowing since the end of the 1970s, unites Protestant and JewishOrthodox believers and Catholic integrists. The three largest organi-zations—Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority, Robert Grant’s ChristianVoice, and Ed MacAteer’s [National] Religious Round Table—were created in 1979, in time for the [1980] presidential election.Their manifesto was based on Falwell’s famous theses, the most


important of which is the recognition that it is America’s destinyto create a nation “to the glory of God” [Cerillo and Dempster,1989, pp. 109–12, 139–43]. The above-mentioned organizationsrely on television preachers efficiently using the mass media tomobilize believers against the spread of “the anti-Christian reli-gion of secular humanism” in sociopolitical life.

Finally, the sources of Orthodox Christian fundamentalism liein the tendency to make absolutes out of certain historical, cultural,and political traditions—for example, monarchism, communitar-ianism (sobornost’ ), and spontaneous collectivism. Russian Or-thodox Christian fundamentalism is characterized by attempts toimprove the status of the Russian nation and strengthen Russianstatehood; by radical anticommunist sentiment; and by disapprovalof steps to normalize relations between the Western and the East-ern churches. In Russia, too, several types of fundamentalism co-exist: some (including the Christian Patriotic Union [Khristianskiipatrioticheskii soiuz] and the Russian National Assembly [Russkiinatsional’nyi sobor]) emphasize the Orthodox Christian interpreta-tion of Russian nationalism (that is, [the link between] Russian state-hood and Orthodox Christian spirituality), whereas others focuson the struggle to purify Orthodox Christianity as a religion. Forexample, documents of the Christian Revival Union list its most im-portant goals as the following: “the exposure of secret lawlessness—the practices of fanatical cults based on ritual murder . . . ; the exposureof the world Talmudic plot against Russia, especially plots for theritual murder of God’s anointed sovereign and his family; prepara-tion of the Christian world for the war against the coming Antichrist;and measures to restore a powerful Orthodox Christian tsardom simi-lar to that of Ivan the Terrible” [Verkhovskii et al., 1999, p. 105].

Hinduism and Buddhism offer many fewer opportunities for therise of fundamentalist movements. This can be explained primarilyby the lack of a rigid system of sacred norms, which does not allowsuch norms to be perceived as sociopolitical goals; by the empha-sis placed on perfection of the self and the “optional” interest inpolitics; and by the lack of an organized clergy. Political and eco-nomic activity in this world has limited significance to Hindus


and Buddhists. The influence of religion on political life is alsorestrained by the pressure of ritual ascriptive networks and of thecaste organization (in Hinduism) as the only or the principal formsof social bonding2 [Eizenshtadt, 1999, p. 212]. This is why thesetypes of fundamentalism (and similar variants) are manifested pri-marily in the form of cultural exclusivity and nationalism. Thus,during the civil war in Sri Lanka, Buddhism became the banner ofthe Singhalese chauvinists in their fight against the Tamil Hindus.In India, the World Hindu Council, which regards its main goal asthe organization of various Hindu cults for the purpose of uniting theHindu community, is energetic; at the beginning of the 1990s itspun off as its youth wing the extremist group Bajrang Dal (TheDetachment of the Strong), which acts aggressively in regard toother denominations, as manifested in the “reconversion” of In-dian Christians and Muslims to Hinduism and in the destructionof churches and mosques [see Glushkova, 2000].

Despite all the differences between individual types of funda-mentalism, all fundamentalists share certain common features.These features include a sense of being the “only righteous menleft,” adherence to traditional (usually minority) interpretations ofsacred texts and values,3 membership in a special ideological com-munity that relies on a language unique to the initiated (a specialvocabulary that strengthens the identity of the group). Often suchgroups set themselves up in opposition to the ruling ethical systemand include members and supporters of peripheral elites. The over-whelming majority of those who join fundamentalist movements aremen (women are co-opted as “preservers of the domestic hearth”).

The timing of the rise of fundamentalist movements is deter-mined by the pace of modernization in a given country and/or re-gion: hence, in the United States it occurred at the beginning ofthe century, in Israel in the period after the establishment of state-hood, and in Muslim countries at the end of the 1970s.

* * *

The most influential of these groups in the modern world is Is-lamic fundamentalism, as the voice of hopes and interests of large


social groups and strata (here we have in mind legal fundamentalism;the nature of political extremism is somewhat different). This can beexplained in part by demographic trends: at present there are 1.18billion Muslims on our planet; their number has grown from 13 per-cent to 19.5 percent [of the world’s population] in the last hundredyears. The roots of this type of fundamentalism lie in Islamic doc-trine itself, in the sacralization of the legal foundations of the rela-tively egalitarian early Muslim community with its ideal of socialjustice. Islam was and still is a faith, but in addition to, outside of,and often above it there have been political, social-hierarchical,family and ethnic, and economic trends (mixed with religion andconnected to it by hundreds of ties). In this sense, Islam has beenundergoing a permanent revolution since shortly after Muhammad’sdeath—under Caliph Osman, who was accused of unjust acts. “Theearly fundamentalism” of the Umayyad decline was connected withthe name of ‘Umar ibn ‘Abd-al ‘Aziz (Caliph ‘Umar II, d. 720), whoinitiated government reform in accordance with Islamic principlesand came to be known as the first “renewer” (mudjaddid) of Islam. Itwas also linked to the broad movement of 750, the wave of whichswept the Abbasids into power [Dal’v, 1985, pp. 169–70 and 195–211]. In fact, the whole history of the medieval Muslim worldabounds with similar examples [see Fil’shtinskii, 1999].

The fall of the Ottoman Empire in the eighteenth century (thedestruction of the military–feudal system, civil strife, mercilessdespotism, corruption, and dissoluteness) led to growing indepen-dence in provinces where movements developed against “TurkifiedIslam.” These movements were headed by charismatic leaderspreaching the idea of salvation through purification of the religion—‘Abd al-Wahh ÷a\b in Arabia, [Sidi] Muhammad ibn ‘Ali as-San÷us˜in the eastern part of the Sahara Desert, and Muhammad Ahmadibn [as-Sayyid] ‘Abd All ÷ah (al-Mahd˜) in Sudan. All these move-ments were developing within the parallel contexts of an internalIslamic dialogue and a confrontation with the West and sharedcertain conceptual and practical features:

—the view that it was necessary to return to true Islam as amonotheistic religion (tawhid) and therefore to purify Islam of


pagan customs and foreign “additions.” Hence, these groups wereopenly hostile to innovations and to “vestiges,” especially to thecult of saints, magical rituals, and unions with infidels;

—advocacy of independent judgments on theological and legalissues (ijtihad)—that is, the formation of an intellectual traditionthat would make possible the rational interpretation of the generalpostulates and polysemantic statements of the Koran and Sunna,as well as a creative search for answers (in the spirit of Islam) tothe new demands of real life; such a position is incompatible with theblind worship of the authority (taklid) of any specific theologicalor legal school;

—the requirement of hijra (resettlement) away from lands con-trolled by infidels and pagans, which was the first step to declar-ing a jihad; at that the world was divided into two antagonisticgeographic camps: the domain of unbelief (Dar al-Kufr) and thedomain of Islam (Dar al-Islam); and

—the belief in one leader, perceived either as a “renewer” ofthe religion—that is, as an imam—or as the expected messiah(mahdi). Whereas in early Sunni fundamentalism, belief in themessiah could waver after the defeat or failure of contenders, inShiism this idea was limited by citizenship and genealogy: thus,the tragic death of Caliph Ali Hussain’s younger son in the Battleof Karbala (680) was interpreted in the context of a fight betweenabsolute justice and evil. When the line of the Shiite imams wascut short, the state acquired a temporal legitimacy in the eyes oftheir successors until the rights of the Prophet’s descendants couldbe restored through the return of the bearer of the divine sub-stance—the last, twelfth imam who had “disappeared.” The tradi-tional Shiite elite has never shared the Sunni viewpoint on electingcaliphs by community agreement; instead, it believes only in “ab-solute agents.”

Representatives of the radical wing of Sunni “early fundamen-talism” (the most outstanding among them were ibn Hanbal, ibnHazm, ibn Taym˜yah, and ‘Abd al-Wahh ÷ab) created the prototypeof active Islamic political behavior. The following features shouldbe regarded as the main parameters of this model: militancy and


jihad in protecting Islam; the combination of the fundamentalistidea with an active political position; the willingness to challengereligious and political power and to make sacrifices in the name ofIslam. For their part, the reformers (Jamal ad-Din al-Afgh ÷ani,Muhammad ‘Abduh, ‘Abd ar-Rahman al-Kawakibi, and others)prepared Muslim minds to perceive Islam’s sociopolitical dyna-mism and strengthened their faith in its capacity to overcome itstemporary decline and to resist foreign domination.

Thus, the emergence of modern Islamic fundamentalism wascaused by a combination of several historical, ideological, andcultural factors, although the erosion of traditions and the emergenceof new expectations connected with independence and national-ism served as a catalyst. The key tenets of Sunni fundamentalistdoctrine were developed in the 1950s–60s by an Egyptian, SyedKutb (1906–1966), who relied on certain theoretical principlesformulated by a Pakistani, Abul A’la al-Maududi (1903–1979).Since the second half of the 1970s a massive penetration of funda-mentalist ideas into collective political practice has begun, and themost important goal of the Islamic ideal’s adherents has become notsaving Muslims from stagnation, but rather restoring Islam as thebasis of national identity. Below I (briefly) outline the conceptualfield of the “classic works” on Islamic fundamentalism.

Its ideal is the “golden age” of Islam embracing the period be-tween Muhammad’s prophetic mission and the rule of the fourrighteous caliphs. In the Mecca period the basic doctrinal principles—monotheism, the power and the sacred nature of Allah—were af-firmed, while in the Medina period a set of political, socioeconomic,military, and spiritual instructions were developed. Over time, dif-ferent periods arose in the history of the Muslim states, includingsome characterized by immoral acts, but responsibility for suchacts is borne not by Islam as a whole but by individual Muslimswho deviated from the path of righteousness [see Kutb, 1981a,vol. 1, pp. 533–44].

Islam plays the role of world beacon because it is the last and mostauthentic divine message (Muhammad is the “seal of prophets”).Some have argued that the emergence of Islam stripped Judaism


and Christianity of their meaning, turning them into a collectionof obsolete, and therefore invalid, beliefs and rituals (for example,the dogma of the Holy Trinity raises doubts concerning the one-ness of God), especially since both Judaism and Christianity lackdistinct norms of sociopolitical life [Kutb, 1981a, vol. 2, pp. 924–25]. “The age ruled by the white man ended when the white man’scivilization achieved its short-term goals” [Kutb, 1993, p. 50].

Since Islamic societies have again fallen into a state of reli-gious ignorance (jahiliyyah),4 and general moral decline robs allachievements of Western philosophical and scholarly thought ofmeaning (that is, ignorance also characterizes modern Europeancivilization), the goal is proclaimed of restoring Islam within theframework of a newly organized community—that of a Muslimnation [Kutb, 1981b, pp. 5–8].

The principle of Allah’s absolute power (hakimiyyah) is under-stood to require the restoration of the unified Islamic system, sincethe universe is governed by a single law that connects all its partsin a harmonious and orderly sequence [Kutb, 1980, pp. 85–90];legal and political popular sovereignty is naturally denied.

In the Islamic fundamentalist interpretation, the thesis of thejust government means that an Islamic state should rely not onpopular sovereignty by rather on sacred law—Sharia (the “theo-logical democracy” of al-Maududi and Kutb’s “system of mutualconsultations”). Developing his model of an ideal Islamic state,al-Maududi accepted the principle of universal suffrage as the foun-dation for introducing modern political procedures. At the sametime, according to al-Maududi, executive power can be given onlyto a male leader (emir) who must do as Allah orders. A councilhelps him implement his governing functions and is elected byadult men and women who have already accepted the “fundamen-tals of the Constitution.” Since an Islamic state is primarily anideological unity, only those who are faithful to its doctrinal prin-ciples are considered to be “first-class” citizens. The rest of the popu-lation, as long as they stay “loyal and obedient,” are given certainrights as second-class citizens [Maududi, 1983, pp. 16–65].

Economic justice proceeds from the assumption that the com-


munity (and undoubtedly Allah as well) owns all material and fi-nancial resources. The community members simply make use ofthese resources in line with their labor contribution. Although pri-vate property earned through individual labor, profit, and free com-petition are recognized as essential features of the Islamic economicsystem, they are regulated according to what serves the well-be-ing of the community as a whole. Monopolies and usury are banned,while the zakat (a tax in favor of needy Muslims), combined withgovernment policy, is designed to prevent acute social stratification.

Moral perfection is one key to overcoming the state of igno-rance. The lives of the Prophet and his close followers must be amoral beacon for believers. A major part of Islamic upbringingdepends on the family. which acts as a micro-model of society.Kutb emphasizes that Islam pays more attention to the family thanto other institutions: the whole Islamic social system is an extendedfamily system linked to the sacred order and established in accor-dance with human instincts and needs. Kutb is also trying to pro-vide rational grounds for the division of labor between men andwomen based on their physical, intellectual, and emotional traits(a woman is to function as wife and mother, and a man as indis-putable authority, guarantor of material welfare, and active par-ticipant in political life; they enter the marriage voluntarily as equalpartners) [Kutb, 1981a, vol. 1, pp. 234–41].

The cause of Islam requires the creation of an elite vanguard—‘usba mu’mina (the union of believers)—which is capable of re-vealing the true doctrinal essence and of destroying modern-day“idols.” Since Muslims occupy first place when it comes to mas-tering Islamic doctrine and methods, they can accomplish thathonorable task better than anybody else. At the same time, theycan give others what they need and restore their own identity inthe process [Kutb, 1981b, pp. 8–13].

Jihad is understood as neither a holy war to convert infidels noran instrument of self-defense used by a community of believers. Adeclaration of jihad implies that an individual has joined a newcommunity (the world of faith), which rejects all laws of the worldoutside that faith. It also indicates a revolutionary struggle for the


revival of Islam, including a wide range of actions: from articlesin the mass media and charitable donations to the use of force[Kutb, 1981a, vol. 4, p. 2101–2].

Fundamentalist Sunni Islam was developed by Hassan al-Turabiin Sudan, Issam al-Attar in Syria, Abbasi al-Madani in Algeria,Rashid al-Gannushi in Tunisia, Erbakan in Turkey, Mustafa as-Sibai in Egypt, and others. Some of them were familiar with Marx-ism and Western philosophy in addition to Islam. For example,al-Gannushi called attention to the necessity of creating (underPresident [Habib] Bourguiba’s one-party regime in Tunisia) massmobilization centers in mosques, of fighting for the rights of work-ers and women, and of eliminating contradictions between secularlaw and the Sharia. He understood jihad as nonviolent sociopoliticalactivities [see Gannushi, 1984]. As-Sibai supported “Islamic so-cialism”; he advocated the “natural rights” of each Muslim anddefended the right to property based on zakat and irs (the Islamicright to inherit) and nationalization [see Bagdadi, 1998]. Muammaral-Qaddafi incorporated many fundamentalist elements in his GreenBook.

The special characteristics of Shiite fundamentalism can beexplained by the Shiite religious system (the doctrine of a “secretimam,” unconditional predetermination, etc.) and by its clericalorganization, which is more expressive and more independent ofgovernment power than the Sunni clergy (“the social-corporativeclass” of the ulema) [see Doroshenko, 1998]. The Iraqi ayatollahand theoretician Muhammad Bakir al-Sadr defined the Islamicsystem as an organic combination of the earthly and heavenlyworlds, attainable if the ideal sociopolitical organization revealedto humanity by Allah can be realized. It is superior to other sys-tems because it ensures spirituality and morality, takes into ac-count the interests of both individuals and society, and supports abalance between them through conformity to the “moral criterion”(service to Allah). The Iraqi scholar singled out two key functionsof an Islamic state: to bring up each individual in accordance with the“Islamic ideological principle”; and to monitor various “outside” ten-dencies, allowing no deviations [al-Sadr, 1989, pp. 29–34].


Al-Sadr also developed a draft constitution for an Islamic re-public in which he defended the principle of marjiyyah [the su-preme religious authority—Ed.].5 Interpreting the righteousmarjiyyah as a legal (juridical) expression of Islam, al-Sadr be-lieves that the supreme religious leader is a deputy or representa-tive of the “secret imam” and therefore should be the head of thegovernment and the commander in chief, with the right to deter-mine the legality of constitutional provisions from the standpointof Sharia, to decide whether laws passed by the nationally electedlegislative assembly are constitutional, to approve candidates forthe position of head of the executive branch, and to appoint thesupreme court, the appeals council, and the council of a hundredtheologians, mullahs, and religious intellectuals that would imple-ment supreme guidance.

The interpretation of marjiyyah as a covenant between Allahand the imams implies that the man elected to that position mustbe a model leader—righteous, devoted to the idea of an Islamicstate, and capable of governing and interpreting Islam [al-Sadr,1978, pp. 18–35]. In fact, [Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruhollah]Khomeini’s doctrine is a development of this principle and a theo-retical substantiation of what is called vilaiyat al-fakikh in Arabic(in Farsi it is velaiyat-e fakikh) [transliterated from Cyrillic—Ed.]—that is, “guidelines of a legal specialist.” According to Khomeini,the Koran and Sunna contain all the laws and directives a manneeds to achieve happiness and to perfect his state, and experts inSharia can best implement these laws and directives [see Khomeini,1993]. In essence, the recognition that political leadership is ex-clusively the business of the clergy means a break with the Shiitetheological tradition.

* * *

In my opinion, the most important task is to separate what thefundamentalists have achieved or are trying to achieve from whattheir theoretical and practical activities mean for the rest of theworld. As a rule, more attention is paid to the former question. The


essence of the latter can be formulated as follows: are autonomousreligious values compatible with the modern construction of thematerial world?

From the moment a nation emerges in the political arena, poli-tics becomes a characteristic and unifying activity of its citizens(even if it also juxtaposes them based on their group affiliation).From then on, they are united by a collective goal, which impliesmovement beyond their former frame of existence and transitionto a community. Here we can discern an analogy with religion,which in the etymological sense is unifying. Affiliation with a re-ligion and affiliation with a political trend are alike in one respect:self-determination always rests not on scientific criteria but onfaith. In the case of religion, this is because religion is a revela-tion; where the choice involves a political position, the choice in-volves faith because whatever rational motives lie behind it, ideallyit requires taking into account an endless multiplicity of factors. Apolitical choice involves choosing a hypothesis, especially sincepolitics is oriented toward the future and requires the engagementof an individual’s entire personality—mind and emotions. Evenwhen views are progressive, many people express their convic-tions in an irrational way (suffice it to recall the key words of theFrench Revolution—liberty, equality, and fraternity). Also, the firsttype of modern ideology was, according to Karl Mannheim, theorgiastic community of the Anabaptists. So maybe the religiousrevival of the twentieth century has a powerful secular compo-nent, or maybe it is covering up a secular movement with reli-gious discourse and rituals and forms of collective behavior.

As I have tried to show, fundamentalism is not simply a supportof any existing tradition. It is an ideological construct and a politi-cal platform consciously opposed to certain contemporary devel-opment processes. It is both a product of modernization and areaction to the ever-growing significance of criteria that are nei-ther religious nor spiritual. Its theoreticians sift tradition throughthe sieve of authenticity based on their views of the ideal and sub-stantiate their position with direct use of a sacred text (it is noaccident that S. Kutb’s main work is a six-volume commentary on


the Koran). In so doing, they set up an arbitrary hierarchy govern-ing the religion’s aspects or symbols and introducing innovations(for example, “theological democracy” and the “guidelines of alegal specialist”).

Thus, the antimodern charge of fundamentalism is character-ized by quite modern features. These include a strong predisposi-tion to develop not only a distinct individual worldview but also atotalitarian ideology with elements of rationality, a conviction ofthe primacy of politics in which the transformation of central po-litical institutions is regarded as a supreme goal, and a readiness touse the technological and organizational achievements of civiliza-tion. This, above all, differentiates modern religious fundamental-ism from its predecessors. Fundamentalism overcomes thecontradiction between religion and ideology by combining rev-elation (faith) with sense and expediency (reason).

Of course, talk about the secular nature of spiritual matters doesnot apply to Islamic fundamentalism (the most influential funda-mentalist ideological trend and movement). Within this type offundamentalism, the ability to receive divine inspiration and guid-ance is not destroyed, nor does it have a cultural and political pro-gram promoting liberation from theological thinking. Its adherentsthink that liberation from Sharia or from the Sharia mentality isnot possible for a Muslim and that an Islamic state and society canemerge only when the sacred law is followed absolutely. But arethe state and the ideas of statehood diminished in countries wherefundamentalism is especially successful (that is, in countries whereit leaves the opposition and joins the active polity)? I try to showthat they are not.

The age of the great empires (Ottoman, Safavid, Mongol) wasextended in the Islamic world from the sixteenth to the beginningof the twentieth centuries. During that period problems involvingthe coexistence of various trends and political loyalty within Is-lam were solved in different ways depending on the specific po-litical situation. When a nation-state was formed, the newinterpretation of Islam came to be perceived as a lack of politicalloyalty, while official Islam was turned into a powerful means to


defend the nation-state. Sunni fundamentalists responded to thisby accusing both the ruling elite and the official clergy of corrup-tion. The Shiite forces opposed to the shah declared that he did notguarantee the right of the clergy to represent Islam and had there-fore lost his legitimacy. In both cases, the borrowing of religiousresources strengthened opposition to the government. The para-dox is that the fundamentalists themselves could succeed only byusing the modern government apparatus to achieve their goals.The Shiite mullahs who came to power in Iran in 1979 were fun-damentalists and modernists at the same time. The example ofIran, as an indirect manifestation of fundamentalist consciousnessin political discourse, shows its capacity for theoretical reflection,development, and mastery of new types of political interaction atthe national and world levels. Economic and financial changesnaturally play a certain role here, as does mastery of modern com-munications and technologies (for example, the nuclear project inBushehr), which change behavior by supplying new motivations.In this respect, the position of Iran’s president, MuhammadKhatami, whose legitimacy relies not only on religious authoritybut also on his popular election (he received over 80 percent of thevotes during the 2001 elections), is of particular interest. Khatamiadvocates a constructive dialogue, without turning “the onlyProcrustean model of freedom in the modern world” into an abso-lute, in support of the multipolar world (all people have the rightto participate in activities that will shape the world of the thirdmillennium) and in support of greater openness in Islamic society(“Islam has never considered the policy of isolationism to be sen-sible and has always been ready to encounter opposing views”).By the way, the “dialogue among civilizations” is an old sloganfrom the shah’s “white revolution,” but as expressed by Iran’s cur-rent president it undoubtedly acquires a reformist ring. Stating thatall civilizations are transient, Khatami speaks of the need to de-velop theology and reach a different level of understanding in or-der to meet the demands of the revolution and solve the practicaltasks of the day. He also recognizes that legal activity by the oppo-sition is legitimate; that is, his idea of dialogue implies not only an


“extended” dialogue—with the world at large—but also an internaldialogue—within Iranian society [Khatami, 2001, pp. 64, 117, 121–24, 128]. A new Islamic civilization cannot be built without creat-ing an “Islamic civil society” in every Muslim country, and thisshould include the positive achievements of Western civil society.While the genotype of the latter is polis, the former goes back toMedina in the Prophet’s lifetime, “to the beginning of life in ac-cordance with Allah’s time.” In such a society dictatorship, eventhat of the majority, is not possible, and human rights are respected;its members are entitled to determine their own fate, to control thegovernance of the country and to hold the government account-able. These rights should be enjoyed by non-Muslims as well. Thisview envisages the functioning of various parties and groups andthe development of civil institutions—naturally, within the frame-work of the accepted religious system [Khatami, 2001, pp. 34–37]. In January 2001, 103 political parties and groups wereregistered in Iran, about 10 of which had a tangible political pres-ence; in essence, these are factions and groups within the familiar“conservative–reformer” dichotomy [Vagin, 2001, pp. 109–10].In the 1990s fundamentalists held power in Sudan as well (whichmade al-Turabi reconsider some of his views in order to strengthenthe unity and stability of the state). In addition, they also partici-pate (at different levels) in the political systems of Yemen andLebanon. Meanwhile, the Taliban, which controlled 90 percent ofAfghanistan, can be characterized (in contrast to GulbuddinHekmatiar’s fundamentalist mujaheddin) as a traditionalist move-ment advocating patriarchal norms of social organization and be-havior but having vague political views, including on how to govern[see Umnov, 2001]. In Israel the probability of the Gush Emunimbloc’s further rise depends on its readiness to compromise withthe government-oriented ideology of the major political parties.In this way, by organizing themselves and by organizing others inpower, not only do fundamentalist movements acquire a strongpolitical weapon “to restructure” the world, but they also becomeintegrated into the very system they oppose.

The fundamentalist idea plays an ambivalent role. Especially in


its radical form, this idea contains both constructive and destruc-tive aspects. Fundamentalists often do not distinguish between thepersonal and the social, between the individual and the commu-nity, and between the rational and the irrational, but they can con-trast these elements in such a way that the individual and the privatedo not disappear completely, so that politics preserves a certainautonomy with regard to the religious sphere (or the religious spherewith regard to the political one). They often control the nature ofthe discourse or activity in the public sphere, and in the processthey can develop reformist tendencies or even modernize (which,as noted above, usually happens in response to a new national areaof responsibility). The results of implementing what at first seemedto be utopian projects significantly differ from the ideal. More-over, the greater a project’s scope and the longer its practical life,the more obvious are such deviations; if a project survives, it iscapable of evolution. Therefore, it is legitimate to regard legal fun-damentalism as one element in national development.

The fundamentalist model is more than a utopia, because it ob-jectively influences the search for a rational path of developmentand the creation of normative models for humanity’s future. It ispossible to realize the scale of this function of fundamentalistmodels only within the framework of a different worldview, inwhich the world is perceived not as a multitude of objects andcontradictions between them but rather as an integral system. Tointerpret various political spaces and traditional and transient so-cieties correctly, one clearly needs a broader application of cat-egories of political consciousness and political culture and anintroduction into political analysis of concepts of justice and equal-ity, which, according to Immanuel Wallerstein, determine the vec-tor of human development. Talking about the existence of the nextworld does not mean only that in addition to earthly life there isanother world as well. It means to evaluate life by applying notonly everyday criteria (status or wealth) but also the criteria ofeternal life. The fundamentalist idea is also, however, no less im-portant as a utopia. It gives life a different existential meaning andhelps us understand the interests and problems of the type of mind


it represents while linking it to a different chronotope.Pure, abstract fundamentalism is unlikely to win a political vic-

tory in the long term: either it will be replaced or it will change.But fundamentalism can succeed even if it is defeated in the po-litical sphere. In the postindustrial area it is capable of challeng-ing modernism on the basis of its spiritual mandate, which reflectsthe tendency to revive an authentic moral and cultural legacy andwithout which it is not possible to move forward. If one is to makea contribution to a new vision of the world, it is probably neces-sary to find oneself first.

Notes

1. Considering all other cults (even monotheistic ones) satanic, Lefebvrepredicted the death of Catholicism if Islam triumphed and preached the renewalof empire and colonization.

2. This circumstance gave rise to attempts to use Hinduism as an ideologicalcomponent of national development.

3. Thus, in Iran, even after the Islamists came to power, they still perceivedthemselves as a minority with regard to the sinful world.

4. By the way, Kutb’s follower and brother Muhammad interpreted that con-cept in a particular moral and intellectual sense, interpreting it as “a psychologi-cal state of denying Allah’s guidance” [Kutb, 1964, p. 11].

5. The term is derived from marja’ at-taklid—“a source of emulation” (thehighest rank of Shiite mujaheddin).

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Selected by Nils WessellTranslated by Larisa Galperin

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Fundamentalism in the Modern World