Suchergebnisse

The emergence of the new states of Africa into world politics not only influenced the traditional balance of power in the international system, but also created a response among the older African states to restore the equilibrium of order maintained on the continent and fill the vacuum created by the departure of the colonial powers without clashing with the new nationalist movements. Henceforth, the search for influence had to take an ideological overtone. The activities of Egypt in Africa are a reflection of this. Since the mid-fifties, her African policy has aimed at creating a sense of community, cultural loyalty, and political integration. An attempt was made to reinforce the existing culture created by Islam and to transform it into what Pye and Verba call 'political culture'.1 Thus, Egypt turned gradually toward the employment of religion on the African continent as an instrument of its foreign policy.

Title first published in 2003. In this insightful book, the authors explore Turkey's role within a globalizing world and, as a new century unfolds, examine a nation at the crossroads of both time and space within the international political order. Chapters consider Turkey's policy history, its prospects and policy issues and discuss them with positive alternatives outlined for Turkish policy-makers and the academics who examine them.

From the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, in New York to the Madrid and London bombings of 2004 and 2005, the presence of Muslim communities in the West has generated security issues and major political concern. Governments, the media, and the general public have raised questions regarding potential links between Western Muslims, radical islam and terrorism. This speculation has given rise to popular myths concerning the Islamic world and led to a host of illiberal measures such as illegal warranting, denial of habeas corpus, "black prisons", and extreme torture throughout the democratic world. Islam in the Eyes of the West challenges the authenticity of these myths and examines the ways in which they have been used to provide an ideological cover for the "war on terror" and the subsequent Iraq War. It argues that they are not only unfounded and hollow, but have also served a dangerous purpose, namely war-mongering and the empowerment of the national-security state. It.

Since the Anglo-American invasion in 2003, Iraqi politics and society have been interpreted through the lens of sectarian division and strife. Iraq under occupation has been beset by sectarian violence; however, contrary to standard belief, this sectarian violence has no significant
precedent in Iraqi history, the politicized sectarianism that now dominates Iraq is argued to be the intended result of a deliberate Anglo-American occupation policy that has had at its foundation, the goal to carve Iraq into sectarian enclaves and to engineer a weak, pliable, state. The purpose
of this article is thus two-fold: first, this article delineates social folkloric forms of sectarianism in Iraq from the militarized sectarianism that now constitutes Iraqi political culture. This, centred on folk practices, is argued to have been mitigated through a long process of state-building
and social secularization. Today's political sectarianism, as reflected in militia activity and religious chauvinism, is presented in terms of Anglo-American occupation strategy, including: the empowering of sectarian militia parties which had no natural constituency in Iraq; the stripping
and destruction of Iraq's national symbols; and the imposition of an American-written constitution drained of any national content that only reinforced sectarian division in Iraq. Second, against this backdrop of politicized sectarianism, outposts of genuine Iraqi nationalism are considered,
with a particular focus on the populist Sadrist current. This current, an Iraqi national force informed by Islamic notions, represents an uneven but nevertheless genuine resistance movement, who might portend the emergence of further national movements in occupied Iraq.