Suchergebnisse

In his book, The Taliban Phenomenon, Kamal Matinuddin does not offer a central thesis regarding Afghan politics or the Taliban movement. Rather, he discusses a number of important questions pertaining to the Taliban movement. Since the rise of the Taliban, their identity has been disputed. The opponents of the Taliban claim that many members of the movement are natives of Pakistan. In contrast, the supporters of the Taliban assert that they are ethnic Afghans. Matinuddin's discussion of the origins of the Taliban addresses this controversy. According to Matinuddin, during the 1980s a large number of Islamic seminaries (d―in―i mad―aris) were established in Pakistan. The government of Pakistan and oil-rich Arab states paid for most of the expenses of these institutions. In 1997, about 220,000 students were enrolled in these seminaries. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, a large number of young Afghan refugees registered in these institutions. When the Taliban movement began, not only Afghan students (Taliban) of these seminaries joined the movement, but Pakistani Taliban from these institutions also joined their Afghan colleagues in their efforts to take control of Afghanistan. Thus, according to Matinuddin, the Taliban movement is an Afghan phenomenon, but occasionally Pakistani Taliban help their Afghan colleagues in the battlefield. However, Pakistani Taliban do not take orders from the government of Pakistan.

As the author sees it, the conflict in Afghanistan is extremely complex. Involving numerous Afghan components and intense regional rivalries it had a very salient Cold War dimension during the 1980s. Focusing on the interactions of Iranian, Pakistani, and Saudi interests, the author examines the interaction of the interests of regional powers and their impact on the resolution of the Afghan conflict. (DÜI-Sen)

Islamic fundamentalism has either declined or stagnated since the mid-1980s. This is evident in the declining electoral strength of many fundamentalist political parties; in the ability of the authoritarian nationalist regimes to suppress the fundamentalist challengers; in the declining popularity of the Islamic regime in Iran; in the continuing rise of modernity in the Islamic world; and, in the attitude surveys of Muslim students. The decline of Islamic fundamentalism is related to three factors: first, fundamentalism offers a peculiar conception of Islam which is not shared by most Muslims; second, fundamentalism's rejection of certain elements of modernity is quite unpopular; and, third, as a socio-political alternative, fundamentalism is both incomplete and incoherent.