ABSTRACT
This chapter aims to demonstrate the potential synergies between Islam and liberalism, two allegedly contradictory, even oxymoronic, concepts in a strange soil, post-Soviet Central Asia. It is argued that the negative predisposition of Central Asian peoples towards liberalism should not be seen as a paradigmatic rejection of core liberal values. The chapter introduces the reader to a series of factors which develop the idea of a synergy between Islam and liberalism in Central Asia. This includes the secular and modernist legacy of the Soviet period; the rationalistic premise of the historically dominant Hanafite-Maturidite school in Central Asia; the growing critical disposition of youth in Central Asia towards a de-modern Islamic tradition; and the theological and intellectual legacy of Jadidism. The chapter argues that overall it is not impossible from the ‘epistemological point of view’ of the rationalistic Hanafite-Maturidite school of Islam, to reconcile the Islamic revival and the development of liberalism in Central Asia.
