The Awakening of Muslim Democracy: A Dialogue.

• Author: Ozkan, Muhammet Fatih
• Position: Book review

The Awakening of Muslim Democracy: A Dialogue

By Jocelyne Cesari

NY: Cambridge University Press, 2014, 423 pages, $34.99, ISBN: 978-1107044180.

The governmental experience of Islamic-oriented parties in Tunisia and Egypt drew attention to the trajectory of political Islam by the time of the Arab Spring. The main objective of the book under review is to examine the neglected aspect of the politicization of Islam in the light of the Arab Spring. In her preface to the book, the author, Jocelyne Cesari, explains that the book aims to analyze the political mechanisms which fueled the conversion of Islam into a modern religion.

The book consists of three main parts, and a general conclusion. Interestingly, there is no introduction, but two appendixes which comprise almost one quarter of the book. The first part, "The Making of Islam as a Modern Religion," is divided neatly into six chapters. In the first chapter, some criteria are defined for the understanding of the religion's hegemonic status in the process of its modernization and politicization. These are, the nationalization of a single religion's institutions, clerics, and places of worship; including only this religion's doctrine in the public school curriculum; legal discrimination against minorities and women; and legal restrictions on freedom of expression. The author elaborates these issues in the countries of the case study: Egypt, Iraq, Pakistan, Tunisia, and Turkey. Cesari's presuppositions could be critiqued here, for instance, the labelling of Turkey and Egypt as authoritarian regimes, although they have different backgrounds. The process of nation-state building and the development of Muslim polities within the Westphalian order are included in other chapter for all five countries. Their resistance against the West is analyzed inclusively, but a wrong causality is depicted among some events. For example, the establishment of modern Turkey is directly correlated with the Young Turks, and there is no reference to Turkey's War of Independence, which is one of the most significant events in Turkish history.

Chapter three, "Islam in the Constitution," examines the role of Islam in the constitutional texts of the countries in question. All of these countries' suspended constitutions, the constitution-making processes, the draft texts and the current constitutions are viewed descriptively within the context of their inclusion of Islamic principles. However, although the chapter is...