Across the Muslim World, Islamism is Going out of VogueImran Said
21 Jan 2022
Though the Taliban has once again taken power in Afghanistan, they have come back at a rather inopportune time. Across the Muslim world, many seem to be souring on Islamists, defined as those who derive legitimacy from Islam and advocate for modern states to be governed along Islamic precepts, both economically and judicially. Over the last few years, Islamist governments have fallen out of power across the Middle East and Africa, haemorrhaged support in Turkey, and failed to make headway in Southeast Asia.
Islamism was once seen as an unstoppable force throughout most of the Muslim world, its proponents representing the most organized and influential voices in opposition to the often corrupt and incompetent secular leadership of Muslim countries. In more authoritarian states, mosques regularly served as one of the few “safe spaces” for citizens to vent their disenchantment about the state of society, ensuring the institutions of Islam a prominent place in the larger anti-statist opposition. Many Islamist groups further amass popular support by filling the gap left behind by woefully inadequate welfare systems and, in turn, providing their own social services, including schools and hospitals.
The issue is that once Islamists manage to get themselves into power, they frequently prove incapable of delivering on their promises. Islamist governments have often been, at best, incompetent and out-of-touch (as has been the case in the Arab world) and at worst, economically disastrous (as has been the case in Turkey and Sudan). In the more consolidated democracies of Malaysia and Indonesia, Islamist movements are fractious and riven by internal divisions and overly ambitious leaders. The Taliban may be back, but it would be a mistake to overstate the power of Islamist movements around the world.
Islamists' Woeful Governance in the Middle East and North AfricaThe failure of Islamists to bring about change and effective governance was brought vividly to the fore with the fall of the moderate Islamist party Ennahda in Tunisia on July 25th, 2021, after Tunisian President Kais Saied invoked emergency powers to fire the prime minister and suspend parliament (in which Ennahda had been the largest party). The fall of the Islamist government was largely supported by the public. Just a day prior to Saied’s suspension of parliament, the country had been gripped by anti-government protests demanding the dissolution of parliament, with groups in the cities of Kairouan and Sousse storming local Ennahda offices and tearing down banners. In the city of Tozeur, a party headquarters was set ablaze.
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Source:
https://quillette.com/2022/01/21/in-the-muslim-world-islamism-is-going-out-of-vogue/
