ABSTRACT
In the previous chapter we focused on a particular type of ‘‘deterritor-
ialized’’ radical Islamic politics-certain groups whose goals and methods
are not tied to any one country, but which seek to effect revolutionary
change in multiple countries simultaneously, or in some cases to recover
historical models of Muslim polity such as the caliphate. In recent years,
and particularly in the aftermath of the attacks in the United States on
September 11, 2001, the very notion of ‘‘transnational Islam’’ has tended to
be associated with radical and militant agendas of this sort. In actual fact, the violent approach of groups such as Al-Qaeda represents but a very small
percentage of Muslim transnational social and political activity. Transna-
tional Islamic radicalism needs to be situated within a much broader ecol-
ogy of global networking and transborder religious activism in the Muslim
world. This chapter will survey the full range of contemporary Muslim
transnationalism and will help the reader to better understand how and
where various strands of local and global Muslim politics fit together. We
begin with a brief historical overview of Muslim transnationalism that will permit us to appreciate how the movement of peoples and ideas across
borders and territories has been an intrinsic part of Islamic history. We then
move on to sketch a typology of various kinds of transnational actors and
activities in the Muslim world and to explain the interplay between them.
These include various governmental and nongovernmental organizations
(NGOs), scholarly and educational associations, Sufi and pietistic networks,
and a variety of diaspora and migrant communities. Several of these are
then singled out for closer examination in terms of their significance for contemporary Muslim politics. The chapter ends with an exploration of
several analytic themes that arise from our survey of Muslim transnation-
alism. To what extent does globalization make it possible today to speak in
terms of a new umma? What is the nature of transnational Islam in terms of
its tendency toward radical or moderate politics? Are we seeing a decline in
the ability of the state to organize and control religious activism in Muslim
majority countries? Is it possible to speak in terms of a distinctly Muslim
approach to globalization? These are some of the questions the concluding section will hope to answer.
