ABSTRACT
In each society one finds competing persons, groups, and classes that already hold effective power or are struggling to gain it. It is these rival interests that decide the form, the character, and the magnitude of the “Islamic ingredient” in power. The Libyan colonel has openly challenged the foundations of the fiqh and the hadith, the two pillars on which ‘Ulama’ power has been based historically. Dualist models may be divided into two categories: one in which Islam is paired with the nation, and a second in which Islam is paired with the tribe, and the second, of whom Saudi Arabia is the best example, has traditionally proven most resistant to shocks and to socio-political unrest. Making an abstraction of the decisive impact that domination has had on Muslim societies, these idea-mongers point to the structural incapacity of these societies to adopt a democratic model and found a nation-state.
