Islam And Muslims In Europe

Exploring the woefully neglected reality of Islam as a major cultural and relgious facet of American and European politics and societies, Cesari examines how Muslims in the West are challenging the notion of an inevitable clash or confrontation. With nearly twelve million Muslims living in the larger countries of Western Europe and almost six million in America, the challenges of integrating newcomers within different countries, and the place of Islam in democratic and secular context in the post 9/11 context, have become more pertinent. Comparing the interaction of Muslims with their new countries, this book addresses the implications of increased Islamic visability, violent clashes, beneficial cooperation, and questions within the Muslim community about their role and the role of Islam in democratic states. Pursuing a holistic approach to Muslims as a new minority within western democracy, Cesari provides important insights.

This volume embodies an up-to-date and sensitive set of studies exploring the ongoing negotiation of European Muslim identities in Europe. The book argues there has been hitherto a three-fold response on the part of Muslims in Europe (some of whom are now third generation Europeans) - integrationism, isolationism, and escapism. Today the latter two responses are giving way, it is argued, to an active shaping of Muslim European identities. The central issue remains: what degree of freedom and what potential for cultural and religious diversity can minorities have in an outwardly secular and plural European society?

This book addresses some of the fundamental issues borne of the several million strong Muslim presence in Europe in our times. Based on a thorough study of Islamic sources, it seeks to answer basic questions about a European Muslim’s social, political, cultural and legal life as a practising Muslim while living together in multi-faith, pluralistic European nation states.

The articles in this volume deal with the role of Christianity in the definition of European identity. Europeans often identify advanced civilizations with secularity. But religion is very much alive in other fast developing countries of the world. In Europe, nevertheless, the organized churches very much wanted to stress the Christian character of European identity, and this engendered a lively protest focusing on the perceived threat to the secular European tradition. Also, Europe is facing its greatest cultural challenge in the demand of Turkey to be admitted as a member, and in the demand of many Muslims in Europe, often citizens of the countries in which they live, to be recognized in their difference and at the same time integrated in the European national and supranational institutions.

The main subject of this book concerns the Muslim immigrants in Europe. It includes the entire history of Islam vis-a-vis Europe since the 7th century, prescribing useful do's and don'ts for current European policymakers.Europeans have developed negative predispositions toward Muslims, sometimes even distinctly perceiving them as foes. The British greatly value the recollection of their glorious erstwhile empire, thus, when it broke-up, they enabled former subjects of the Crown to settle in the UK, as if to build a miniature duplicate of their empire within Britain's borders. Hence, the British did not perceive former colonies' Muslim immigrants as foes, unlike continental Europeans, but as British subjects.Generally, Europeans intend to fill the individual Muslim immigrant's needs as a citizen, according to the liberal approach. The expectation, however, is that Muslims, as a group, would become culturally integrated within the absorbing society. That approach bewilders the European Muslims. Many Muslim immigrants experience discrimination in Europe. The continental European approach toward Muslims, stemming from prejudice and fear, made some immigrants aggressive.The main divergence between European society and Muslim immigrants is due, foremost, to certain collective memories of the native Europeans. That insight is elucidated by comparing European and American societies. The American, found in a country built by immigrants tends to adapt to a variety of new immigrants, Muslims included. Conversely, European society is fundamentally incapable of truly incorporating immigrant culture and practices, which it perceives as a threat, especially concerning Islam.It is, therefore, the Europeans who hold the key to alter the destructive dynamics, not the Muslims.Muslims and Arabs within their countries suffer the frustration of remembering their Golden Age when the Europeans were deeply mired in the Middle Ages. Nowadays, the Arabs and Muslims have not been able to lift themselves back to their former state. That frustration may be compared to the German frustration in the 1920s being split up into distinct German states - the consequence of which was the mass destruction of the European Jewish population. The splitting of the Germans, while suffering from lack of one uniting national myth, had brought on the adoption of a German race theory - which Adolf Hitler offered to the Germans - and had led to the Holocaust. Frustration may turn people rather aggressive, and Iran or some Arabs (like the members of ISIS) aided by Muslims in Europe might end up using weapons of mass destruction against Europe. The case of ISIS is therefore elaborated upon, in detail, in this book. The successful integration of the Muslims in Europe may help somewhat; indeed, this book aims to promote such an accomplishment.The French approach is uniquely rather rigid towards Muslim immigrants, as a group and individually. Hence, there is no mental confusion among Muslims there and a significant portion of the Muslims in France see themselves as French - better integrated than other Muslims in Europe.The best policy the Continental Europeans may adopt is the French approach.

The twelve million Muslims living in western and eastern (non-CIS) Europe are confronted with the combined, localised effects of xenophobia, nationalism, an historical stigma attached to Islam and a contemporary fear of the 'global Islamic threat'. In resistance, a variety of Muslim groups throughout Europe have developed a 'politics of religion and community' calling for equal treatment of Muslim minorities in the public sphere. This volume provides insights into these groups and activities, their histories, ideologies, organizations and modes of representation.

Drawing upon extensive fieldwork and suggesting novel ways of approaching the phenomenon of European Islam and the continent's Muslim communities, Islam in Europe examines how European Muslims construct notions or identity, agency and belonging, how they negotiate and redefine the notions of religion, tradition, authority and cultural authenticity.