This project is designed to identify patterns of politicization of religion across countries and traditions. It combines a conceptual history of religion with an analysis of modern political institutions and contexts.
An initial phase of the project, which culminated in the book What is Political Islam? (2018), built on scholarship that considers both the nation-building processes in postcolonial Muslim countries and the reformation of Islamic thinking that accompanied it as codependent factors in the development of political Islam. Further research has expanded these initial findings to the politicization of other religious traditions in various national and international contexts, with case studies from China, India, Russia, Turkey, and Syria.
It also explores the intersection between religion, nationalism and populism across the North/South divide.
The results of that research are discussed in a special luncheon series held at the Berkley Center.
Each session focus on one of the case study included in the project.