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In recent years, the intellectual tide has moved strongly against the kind of secular thinking that characterized Gellner's work. Whether couched in terms of postcolonialism, multiculturalism, genealogy, global understanding, political theology, or the revival of normative, metaphysical and openly religious perspectives, today's postsecular and even anti-secular mood in social theory seems to consign Gellner's project to the dustbin of history: a stern but doomed attempt to shore up western liberal rationalism. Under some revisionary lights, it has even become pointless to distinguish flexible secular thinking which still retains some firm 'bottom lines' from what is routinely portrayed as rampant ideological secularism. Unconvinced by key assumptions and motivations on this terrain, I reactivate Gellner's essential concerns and propositions around secularity and secularism, feeding these into the current debates. Whilst Gellner's stringent, unrivalled exposure of intellectual cant continues to be hugely valuable, and his sense of the utter historicity of social life and thought indispensable, Gellner's critical positivism could not, by his own admission, produce a coherent cultural politics.

They describe the role of Iranian civil society in the process of transition to democracy in Iran and offer insight about the enduring legacy of previous social and political movementsstarting with the Constitutional Revolution of . ; 1st (Edition) ; Published version

Tharun Venkat explores the root causes of modern-day conflicts in India over political-religious questions and the role of the consititutional principle of secularism.

The 'Indian' lives in a land of diverse traditions and his­- tories. The 'we' as a collective, inclusive of multiple identities, both regional and religious, is one that, rooted in the particular, celebrates plurality. Indian secularism is the ideal tool to allow for integration, and poses a challenge to fundamentalism. However, there are divisive forces that bring to fore the question of the possibility of a diverse people co-existing in free, respectful spaces. It shakes our foundations and leaves citizens questioning the future and the validity of ideals they believed they practiced as a nation. This paper shall explore an Indian worldview of secularism in plurality and the threats that are posed to it. An Indian worldview of secularism in plurality, in the final analysis depends on the defini­- tion that its citizens, as participatory agents, give to itself.

The following is intended to suggest a fairly simple contention concerning a number of interconnected propositions made in connection with the debates on modernity and secularism. None of these propositions is particularly novel, nor is this the first time that they have been put forward. Yet the issues raised have remained with us and become all the more pressing; I can see that points that were made, against the flow, more than two decades ago, now stand out more cogently than ever, and are being revisited, rediscovered or simply discovered by many. The simple contention I wish to start with concerns Islamism, often brought out emblematically when secularism and modernity are discussed. Like other self-consciously retrogressive identitarian motifs, ideas, sensibilities, moods and inflections of politics that sustain differentialist culturalism and are sustained by it conceptually, Islamism has come to gain very considerable political and social traction over the past quarter of a century. This had until recently reached the extent that it, as a perceptual grid of social and cultural purchase relating to societies and countries that many associate with Islam, has become hegemonic in public discussions about society and politics and, until recently, hegemonic without serious challenge. It has also been crucial for triggering the latest round of antisecular discussions and polemics. The following discussion will proceed in three stages. First, an overall characterisation of anti-secular polemics and motifs in their broader discursive and other contexts and motifs will be offered, with special attention to writings characterised as post-colonialist. Next will be offered a discussion of some keywords that come up in this context and which indicate the conceptual profile in question. The essay will then move on to discuss two specific methods of using history in arguments against secularism. Finally, the essay will concentrate on post-colonialist discussions of Islam and secularism, exemplified in a particular case.:1 Sentiment, Pathos, Rhetoric.4 2 Moods and Keywords.11 3 Actually Existing Secularism and the Challenge of Fate.21 4 One Genealogy of Post-colonialist Eminence.38 5 Bibliography.51

What is sometimes talked about as the 'post-secular' or a 'crisis of secularism' is, in Western Europe, quite crucially to do with the reality of multiculturalism. By which I mean not just the fact of new ethno-religious diversity but the presence of a multiculturalist approach to this diversity, namely: the idea that equality must be extended from uniformity of treatment to include respect for difference; recognition of public/private interdependence rather than dichotomized as in classical liberalism; the public recognition and institutional accommodation of minorities; the reversal of marginalisation and a remaking of national citizenship so that all can have a sense of belonging to it. I think that equality requires that this ethno-cultural multiculturalism should be extended to include state-religion connexions in Western Europe, which I characterise as 'moderate secularism', based on the idea that political authority should not be subordinated to religious authority yet religion can be a public good which the state should assist in realising or utilising. I discuss here three multiculturalist approaches that contend this multiculturalising of moderate secularism is not the way forward. One excludes religious groups and secularism from the scope of multiculturalism (Kymlicka); another largely limits itself to opposing the 'othering' of groups such as Jews and Muslims (Jansen); and the third argues that moderate secularism is the problem not the solution (Bhargava).

In apologetic work below author compares the ideal types of secular ideology (being understood as superstition) and religious one (as faith in God), showing a competitive and conflictual nature of their interaction. The article demonstrates ideological and moral bankruptcy of secular worldview, his apophatic, negative pathos of pseudo freedom from one's duties and relations, and, as a result, from the meaning and true value of human life.The purpose of this document is to criticize the theology of political correctness, i.e. attempts to soften the adherence to Biblical principles of moral evaluation of the atheistic way of life, as well to criticize the false spirituality of New Age movement that would return a civilized consumer to the pagan deification of human instincts.Separation of Church and State, bought with the lives of thousands of Protestants, is one of the major achievements of Modern time. Solving the problem of moral degradation of society lies not in the reduction of the space of freedom like it was in the medieval Catholic Europe, but in the following moral precepts of the Gospel by the Church, not the short-term political order, albeit with a religious tinge, and the continued execution of the Great Commission.

In apologetic work below author compares the ideal types of secular ideology (being understood as superstition) and religious one (as faith in God), showing a competitive and conflictual nature of their interaction. The article demonstrates ideological and moral bankruptcy of secular worldview, his apophatic, negative pathos of pseudo freedom from one's duties and relations, and, as a result, from the meaning and true value of human life.The purpose of this document is to criticize the theology of political correctness, i.e. attempts to soften the adherence to Biblical principles of moral evaluation of the atheistic way of life, as well to criticize the false spirituality of New Age movement that would return a civilized consumer to the pagan deification of human instincts.Separation of Church and State, bought with the lives of thousands of Protestants, is one of the major achievements of Modern time. Solving the problem of moral degradation of society lies not in the reduction of the space of freedom like it was in the medieval Catholic Europe, but in the following moral precepts of the Gospel by the Church, not the short-term political order, albeit with a religious tinge, and the continued execution of the Great Commission.

The following is intended to suggest a fairly simple contention concerning a number of interconnected propositions made in connection with the debates on modernity and secularism. None of these propositions is particularly novel, nor is this the first time that they have been put forward. Yet the issues raised have remained with us and become all the more pressing; I can see that points that were made, against the flow, more than two decades ago, now stand out more cogently than ever, and are being revisited, rediscovered or simply discovered by many. The simple contention I wish to start with concerns Islamism, often brought out emblematically when secularism and modernity are discussed. Like other self-consciously retrogressive identitarian motifs, ideas, sensibilities, moods and inflections of politics that sustain differentialist culturalism and are sustained by it conceptually, Islamism has come to gain very considerable political and social traction over the past quarter of a century.

In the progress of modernization and Westernization, secularization has been reported in various areas such as politics, among individuals and even religions themselves. Theorizing and explaining such situations, scholars have argued that religious things should be excluded from the public sphere. However, a trend to doubt such secularization theory has recently appeared, which regards society as a "post-secularized" place. This article explores to what extent that the view of "post-secularization" can be adopted to the actual society by focusing on politics in Turkey as one of the examples of "post-secularized" society. While Turkey is known as a country which had experienced a severe secularization in the 1920s by Ataturk, when it comes to the recent political situation, the impacts of Islam cannot be ignored. This article explores the relation between the recent Turkish politics and the "post-secularization" theory, also comparing it with the leading democratic theory argued by Habermas (2008).

The concepts of secularism and religious freedom were significant for the public and leaders both before and after the independence. Among leaders, there were many who belonged to the Indian National Congress (INC), such as Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, B. R. Ambedkar, but also staunch supporters of "Hindu Rashtra": M. S. Golwalkar, Veer Savarkar, and many others. In 1928, the right to freedom of conscience, profession and practice of religion was explicitly included in the Nehru Report in order to prevent a community dominate over another. In its original meaning, secularism denotes anti-theism, but not atheism. It was a philosophical an ethical movement, negatively religious, which introduced science, technology and rationalism in the society and generated the basis of a modern secular state. During this process, it had to oppose and struggle against the clergy and vested forces of society. Therefore, the fundamentalist communal onslaughts are not secularism and secularization. During the struggle for freedom and thereafter, the Indian leaders made secularism the mantra of the nation, though each of them expressed apprehensive views in different manners, representing the aspirations of different social strata. Especially Gandhi and Nehru preferred to keep India secular in the sense that if the Indian state will have no religion, the people will be free to follow any religion of their birth or adoption. Secularism in India meant equal respect for all religions and cultures and non-interference of religion in government affairs. This paper aims to go through the different shades of Indian secularism, as found in the Constitution and the public opinion as well. The transitional phase of socio-political phenomenon and diversities in society have made the situation complex and challenging in this fast-changing global scenario of which India is an essential part.

Pakistan was created in 1947 by leaders of the Muslim minority of the British Raj in order to give them a separate state. Islam was defined by its founder, Jinnah, in the frame of his "two-nation theory," as an identity marker (cultural and territorial). His ideology, therefore, contributed to an original form of secularization, a form that is not taken into account by Charles Taylor in his theory of secularization - that the present text intends to test and supplement. This trajectory of secularization went on a par with a certain form of secularism which, this time, complies with Taylor's definition. As a result, the first two Constitutions of Pakistan did not define Islam as an official religion and recognized important rights to the minorities. However, Jinnah's approach was not shared by the Ulema and the fundamentalist leaders, who were in favor of an islamization policy. The pressures they exerted on the political system made an impact in the 1970s, when Z.A. Bhutto was instrumentalizing Islam. Zia's islamization policy made an even bigger impact on the education system, the judicial system and the fiscal system, at the expense of the minority rights. But Zia pursued a strategy of statization of Islam that had been initiated by Jinnah and Ayub Khan on behalf of different ideologies, which is one more illustration of the existence of an additional form of secularization that has been neglected by Taylor.

Pakistan was created in 1947 by leaders of the Muslim minority of the British Raj in order to give them a separate state. Islam was defined by its founder, Jinnah, in the frame of his "two-nation theory," as an identity marker (cultural and territorial). His ideology, therefore, contributed to an original form of secularization, a form that is not taken into account by Charles Taylor in his theory of secularization - that the present text intends to test and supplement. This trajectory of secularization went on a par with a certain form of secularism which, this time, complies with Taylor's definition. As a result, the first two Constitutions of Pakistan did not define Islam as an official religion and recognized important rights to the minorities. However, Jinnah's approach was not shared by the Ulema and the fundamentalist leaders, who were in favor of an islamization policy. The pressures they exerted on the political system made an impact in the 1970s, when Z.A. Bhutto was instrumentalizing Islam. Zia's islamization policy made an even bigger impact on the education system, the judicial system and the fiscal system, at the expense of the minority rights. But Zia pursued a strategy of statization of Islam that had been initiated by Jinnah and Ayub Khan on behalf of different ideologies, which is one more illustration of the existence of an additional form of secularization that has been neglected by Taylor.

In this paper I analyze Cecile Laborde's conception of justificatory secularism. Laborde points out that in her formulation and defense of the conception of justificatory secularism, she follows Rawls' conception of political liberalism to a certain extent. For that reason, I first provide a sketch of Rawls' conception of political liberalism. Then I focus on justificatory secularism, trying to show to what extent it displays similarities with the conception of political liberalism, but also how it differs. I am interested in whether justificatory secularism represents a better alternative to the conception of political liberalism or whether these two conceptions should be considered complementary.

In recent debates on the constitutional status of 'secularism' we can discern three positions. The first tries to overcome the absence of 'secularism' in most liberal-democratic constitutions by developing a more robust theory of constitutional secularism. The second develops theories of 'alternative secularisms'. The third, defended in this article, argues that we should drop secularism as a 'cacophonous' concept from our constitutional and legal language and replace it by liberal-democratic constitutionalism. I develop an analytical taxonomy of twelve different meanings of 'secularism' based on a comparative study of Turkish and Indian Supreme Court cases on secularism, and demonstrate that they are incompatible with each other and with the hard core of liberal-democratic constitutions. Next, I criticize the respective rulings in the Turkish and Indian context. Particularly in 'militant democracies', the appeal to a principle of 'secularism' turns out to be inimical to the liberal and to the democratic 'constitutional essentials'. I end with some normative recommendations on the role of constitutional review and judicial activism.