ABSTRACT
The modern era of Islamic history may be divided into FOUR PERIODS. The precise point at which one period ends and another begins is debatable. It might, therefore, be better to think of them as four overlapping phases. Nevertheless, the following scheme, although undoubtedly oversimplified, has the advantage that it is relatively easy to remember. The first period, 1699–1798, was a century of decline and reform. The decline of the three great Muslim empires arguably began several decades before this. Nevertheless, I have taken 1699 as the symbolic beginning because in that year, as a result of the Treaty of Karlowitz, the Ottoman Empire lost extensive territories for the first time. The second period, 1798–1922, was characterised by European domination. European domination of the Muslim heartland began with Napoleon's expedition to Egypt in 1798, and reached its greatest geographical extent when the League of Nations (the forerunner of the United Nations) gave France and Britain mandates to rule the newly-created Arab states in 1920. The third period, 1922–1962, was one of decolonialisation and the origins of Islamism. Because Egypt gained limited independence in 1922, I have taken that date as marking the beginning of the period. The following year saw the birth of the Republic of Turkey, the first modern Muslim nation state, which rose from the ashes of the dismembered Ottoman empire. However, most Muslim countries gained their independence much later, the majority of them between 1945 and 1960. Although the dominant ideology during this period was nationalism, some Muslims founded religio-political parties with a view to establishing a truly Islamic state. This type of politicised Islam is often misleadingly called ‘Islamic fundamentalism’. The more technical term for it is ‘Islamism’. The fourth period, 1962 to the present, has been characterised by Islamic resurgence. It began in 1962, with the founding of the Meccan-based World Muslim League, an international organisation geared to propagating the faith. Islamic revival did not, however, gain momentum until the late sixties, by which time many Muslims had become disillusioned with nationalism and other western ideologies. A watershed was reached in 1979 when Ayatollah Khomeini led an Islamic revolution in Iran.
