This course is designed to prepare students to effectively engage with Islam, the Muslim community, and the Muslim world, through an exploration of Islam and Muslim encounters with Democracy, through the exploration of three central questions:
The first central question asks whether Islam is compatible with Democracy? While certainly not a new inquiry, this question stems from the fact that the political character of the overwhelming majority of Muslim countries in the age of Democracy have vacillated between religious fundamentalism on the one hand and secular authoritarianism on the other. We explore this central question more closely in this section of the course and interrogate why this may or may not be true. What are the underlying factors that may or may not have contributed to the religious or secular state formation in the Muslim world? Is this feature of modern Muslim governance integral to Muslim statecraft in the modern era, or is the current model of modern Muslim governance merely positioned on a normal political trajectory eventually leading to
Democracy formation? Are Muslim societies seemingly inherently resistant to democratization and efforts towards more open government? And what role has American foreign policy played in the success or failure of democracy development in the Muslim world?
The second question addresses the plausibility of an Islamic state as a Democracy. The original “state” in Madina was a city-state formed by consensus from the community and enshrined in a constitutional document, one of the first in history. The features of this original paradigmatic (some would say oxymoronic) “Islamic state” were incredibly democratic and provide the foundational principles for Islamic governance, some of which have been viewed as problematic to implement as a modern state. Major themes of discussion for this portion of the course include questions surrounding the separation of church and state in Islam; the defining of governance in Islam and its relation to political Islam; the role of public freedoms in relation to individual liberties, and whether secularism or Democracy constitutes a more accurate form of Islamic governance for Muslim states today?
The final question of this course asks whether and how Muslims can live as inclusive citizens of a liberal democracy. This portion of this course will be devoted to social and cultural challenges related to Islam and the age of Democracy. Two paradigms of Muslim citizenship in America and the West will be explored. In doing so, this course asks, what are the ways in which sectarianism and division may be overcome? How are differences navigated in Islam in the public sphere? What, if any, is the role of pluralism in Islam, and what role does it play in countering extremism and religiously motivated violence?
Also offered by the Divinity School as HDS 3059.