ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at the survival and consolidation of the Asads' authoritarian regime in Syria, paying particular attention to secular–religious interactions and dynamics in the country. It relies on post-Democracy/authoritarian resilience theoretical approaches in arguing that authoritarian regimes have a robust repertoire of responses and tools, and can adapt and transform their practices in times of crisis. The chapter also looks at the state's dynamic relations with secularism and Islamism in Syria to draw out aspects of the regime's transformative capacity, which are sometimes hidden in plain sight, as well as to consider their significance and the resulting outcomes. It adds nuance to this argument by showing that the halt to secular institutionalization was also due to the regime's fears of Syria's pro-democracy secular activists, concerns that drove the regime to placate the pious but also to silence Syria's secular political dissidents.
