ABSTRACT
Islam can provide a framework in which new transnational social options for individuals and collectives grow. As a result of migration, religion can play a more important role in Europe than is allowed for by sociological modernisation theory or theories of functional differentiation. This is connected with the meaning that Islam has acquired for Muslim immigrants. In particular, new transnational dynamics that arise as a consequence of migration equip people with social options that present additional or alternative 'biographical' prospects in terms of the relationship between the individual and national welfare states in France and Germany. In this sense, Islam becomes relevant for its organisational potential and not just as some kind of 'traditionalist' or 'anti-modernist' reaction to settlement in western Europe.
