Islam and the State

Workshop 1
Islam and the State in Lebanon
(in English)
While Morocco is a fairly homogeneous country, Lebanon is anything but that: it has dozens of religious, sectarian and ethnic minorities, ranging from Christians to Muslims, from Sunnis to Shiites and from Arabs to Armenians. While some of the political actors actively seek to accord a greater role for Islam on a state level (such as Hizbullah), others are staunchly against this or merely try to uphold the country’s fragile system of consociationalism. Is a tight relationship between Islam and the state even possible in such a divided country, with so many different religious minorities? If so, what Islam should that be? What fault lines can be discerned among the Lebanese on this question? To what extent are diasporic communities mobilised to support, cement or break down religious sectarianism in Lebanon? Is Islamic (or Islamist) opposition to the Lebanese state markedly different from that of other, more homogeneous countries in the region?

Keynote lecturers:

Roschanack Shaery-Yazdi (Associate Professor at the Department of History, University of Antwerp)

In this talk Roschanack Shaery-Yazdi will focus on the process of the politicization of the Shiite community in Lebanon since the late 1960s via the impact that various events such as the Lebanese civil war, the Iranian revolution, the Syrian military occupation in the postwar era, and finally the Syrian civil war has had on the empowerment of this once marginalized community. She zooms in particular on the changes in the image of Hizbullah since 1982 and the party’s increasing political power in the Lebanese arena. She will conclude by reflecting on how her own views on Hizbullah have shifted since the publication of her book Shiite Lebanon in 2008. 

Ward Vloeberghs (Senior Lecturer in Political Science, Erasmus University College Rotterdam)

Ward Vloeberghs explores some dynamics within the contemporary Sunni political landscape over the past few decades. Without systematically reviewing all actors and (sub-)currents, he intends to use the concept of sectarian entrepreneurs and a concrete illustration of it to analyse in what ways Islam can be constructed as an identity for political purposes in post-war Lebanon. He will then build upon this notion to argue that statecraft in Lebanon needs to be understood as an ongoing, continuously relational process to better grasp the past and present positionings of Muslim politicians in a what is often mislabelled as a failed or failing state.

Lunch break

Workshop 2
Islam and the State in Morocco
(in English)
Unlike many of the republics in the Middle East and North Africa, Morocco has long been a kingdom. Like several other kingdoms in the region (notably Jordan and Saudi Arabia), the Moroccan regime claims to have a special relationship with Islam through the heritage of the king as the “commander of the faithful” (amir al-mu’minin) and the specifically “Moroccan Islam” presented and spread by the state. What does this state-sponsored Islam entail and how did it come into existence? How and why does the state spread this type of Islam to other parts of the world, including Western Europe? How is this Islam received by Moroccans themselves? Is opposition on Islamic (or Islamist) grounds still possible in a state that claims the mantle of Islam for itself?

Keynote lecturers:

Sami Zemni (Professor in Political and Social Sciences, Ghent University)

State and religion in Morocco: Moroccan Islam between Monarchy, Tradition, and Islamism

Even though Islam has played for centuries an important legitimizing role of the authority of the Moroccan monarchy and acted as an important rallying factor for nationalist sentiments under colonisation, it is only after independence that the Moroccan monarchy consciously set out to “étatise” Islam thus creating an ‘official Islam’. In this presentation Sami Zemni retraces how this regulatory process took shape and what role did (and does) Islam play in the nation-building process. Furthermore, he will shed light on how the Monarchy, strong of its religious credentials, created, promoted and controlled religious and political institutions in order to legitimize its rule and policy choices. The creation of a specific Moroccan ‘orthodoxy’ was from its inception developed with different goals in mind. Legitimation of the royal dynasty was directly linked to a security-agenda (internal oppositions, and ‘foreign’ or international ‘threats’) as well as a policy of authoritarian modernization. While overall successful, this “Moroccan Islam” has also been challenged over time. From Islamists accepting the political order over Islamists rejecting the royal institution to Salafi and Jihadi groups, the Monarchy has deployed new religious policies to answer these challenges. In presenting the nature of these questions in a broader analytical perspective Zemni will be able to unearth Islam’s functional role in Morocco’s state- and nation-building and developmental process.

Nina ter Laan (Postdoctoral researcher, University of Cologne)

Promoting a “Moroccan Islam” through Sufi aesthetics and Jewish heritage 

Nina ter Laan will explore the country’s contemporary efforts to promote a ‘Moroccan Islam’ through aesthetic practices, both nationally and internationally. Rather than a conventional political science approach that focuses on policy instruments, she will examine how art forms and heritage are implicated in the production and contestation of a “Moroccan Islam”.

In particular, ter Laan will focus on the promotion of Sufism and the heritagization of Judaism, exploring how the recent promotion of these specific strands within Morocco’s religious landscape affects the country’s socio-political and religious dynamics and reshapes our understanding of Islam and the state in the Moroccan context.

She will also pay attention to the responses to these cultural and artistic initiatives from different sectors of society. The discussion aims to provide insights into Morocco’s approach to promoting a moderate and tolerant form of Islam and the implications of this strategy for the country’s political, religious, and cultural dynamics.

Coffee break

Public Lecture
Moroccan-Belgian and Moroccan-Dutch Minorities
(in Dutch)
Both Belgium and the Netherlands have had sizeable Moroccan communities for decades as a result of guestworker programmes, family reunification and migration. Although many of the initial Moroccan migrants to Belgium and the Netherlands were unskilled labourers, their descendants have found their way into the various layers and sectors of society. Given the fact that they are also divided between Arabic- and Berber-speaking sub-groups, this makes the Moroccan-Belgian and Moroccan-Dutch communities highly diverse ones. Yet one thing both communities have in common is that they are overwhelmingly Muslim and live in Muslim-minority countries. To what extent have these communities subconsciously inherited, implicitly incorporated or explicitly adopted ideas about Islam from Morocco? What does “Moroccan Islam” mean to Belgian and Dutch people of Moroccan descent? Have they been influenced by Islamic (or Islamist) opposition in Morocco itself? To what extent are they subjected to the Moroccan regime’s religious messaging? Does their position as minorities in Belgium and the Netherlands the way minorities in Lebanon cope with their positions?

Keynote lecturers:
Nadia Fadil (Associate Professor at the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology, KU Leuven)
Martijn de Koning (Associate Professor Department of Islam, Politics and Society, Radboud University Nijmegen)
Read the abstracts of the lectures in Dutch here.

Moderator:
Leni Franken (Center Pieter Gillis, University of Antwerp)