Shadi Hamid (born 1983) is an American author and political scientist, who is currently a columnist at the Washington Post. [1] From 2023 to 2024, he was a member of the Editorial Board of the Post. Previously, he was a longtime senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a contributing writer at the Atlantic. [2] He also holds the position of research professor of Islamic studies at Fuller Seminary. This appointment is the first time a Muslim scholar has been hired in the school's history. [3] He has been called a "prominent thinker on religion and politics" in the New York Times [4] and was named as one of "The world's top 50 thinkers" in 2019 by Prospect Magazine . [5] He is known for coining the phrase "Islamic exceptionalism" to describe Islam's resistance to secularization and outsized role in public life. The phrase has come under some criticism. [6] [7]
Hamid was born in Pennsylvania to a Egyptian family. [8] [9] A Marshall Scholar, [10] Hamid completed his doctoral degree in politics at Oxford University in 2010. His dissertation was titled Democrats without Democracy: the Unlikely Moderation of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and Jordan. [11] Hamid received his B.S. and M.A. from the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service. [12]
Hamid was a Hewlett Fellow at the Stanford University Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law and a Fulbright Fellow in Jordan, researching Islamist participation in the democratic process, and a research fellow at the American Center for Oriental Research in Amman, where he conducted research on the relationship between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Jordanian government. [12]
The Wisdom of Crowds podcast started in 2019, with Hamid as a co-host. [17] [18]
Islamic Exceptionalism: How the Struggle Over Islam is Reshaping the World was shortlisted for the 2017 Lionel Gelber Prize. [19] Temptations of Power: Islamists and Illiberal Democracy in a New Middle East was named a Foreign Affairs "Best Book of 2014." [20]
Islamism is a range of religious and political ideological movements that believe that Islam should influence political systems. Its proponents believe Islam is innately political, and that Islam as a political system is superior to communism, liberal democracy, capitalism, and other alternatives in achieving a just, successful society.
The Society of the Muslim Brothers, better known as the Muslim Brotherhood is a transnational Sunni Islamist organization founded in Egypt by Islamic scholar and schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna in 1928. Al-Banna's teachings spread far beyond Egypt, influencing today various Islamist movements from charitable organizations to political parties.
Political aspects of Islam are derived from the Quran, ḥadīth literature, and sunnah, the history of Islam, and elements of political movements outside Islam.
Islam is the dominant religion in Egypt, with approximately 90% of Egyptians identifying as Muslims. The majority of Egyptian Muslims are adherents of Sunni Islam, while a small minority adhere to Shia Islam. Since 1980, Islam has served as Egypt's state religion. Due to the lack of a religious census, owing to the alleged undercounting of non-Muslim minorities in Egyptian censuses, the actual percentage of Muslims is unknown; the percentage of Egyptian Christians, who are the second-largest religious group in the country, is estimated to be between 5% and 10% of the population.
There exist a number of perspectives on the relationship of Islam and democracy among Islamic political theorists, the general Muslim public, and Western authors.
The Istiqlal Party is a political party in Morocco. It is a conservative and monarchist party and a member of the Centrist Democrat International and International Democracy Union. Istiqlal headed a coalition government under Abbas El Fassi from 19 September 2007 to 29 November 2011. From 2013 to 2021, it was part of the opposition. Since 2021 it is part of a coalition government led by Aziz Akhannouch.
The Muslim Brotherhood is an Islamic organization that was founded in Ismailia, Egypt by Hassan al-Banna in March 1928 as an Islamist religious, political, and social movement. The group spread to other Muslim countries but has its largest, or one of its largest, organizations in Egypt, where for many years it has been the largest, best-organized, and most disciplined political opposition force, despite a succession of government crackdowns in 1948, 1954, 1965 after plots, or alleged plots, of assassination and overthrow were uncovered. Following the 2011 Revolution the group was legalized, and in April 2011 it launched a civic political party called the Freedom and Justice Party (Egypt) to contest elections, including the 2012 presidential election when its candidate Mohamed Morsi became Egypt's first democratically elected president. One year later, however, following massive demonstrations, Morsi was overthrown by the military and arrested. As of 2014, the organization has been declared a terrorist group by Russia, Egypt, UAE, Saudi Arabia and is once again suffering a severe crackdown.
Vali Reza Nasr is an Iranian-American academic and author, specializing in the Middle East and the Islamic world. He is Majid Khaddouri Professor of International Affairs and Middle East Studies at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Washington, D.C. He served as the eighth dean of the school from 2012 to 2019. Nasr is also a Non-Resident Fellow in South Asia at Atlantic Council and is described by The Economist as "a leading world authority on Shia Islam".
Ed Husain is a British author and a professor in the Walsh School of Foreign Service in Georgetown University. As a political advisor he has worked with leaders and governments across the world. Husain is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) focused on U.S. foreign policy towards the Middle East generally, and specifically at the intersection of Arab-Israeli relations after the Abraham Accords, the geopolitical interplay of Arab Gulf states, China-Muslim world dynamics, and Islamist terrorism. As a professor at the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, he teaches classes on global security, Arab-Israeli peace, and the shared intellectual roots of the West and Islam.
Fawaz A. Gerges is a Lebanese-American academic and author with expertise on the Middle East, U.S. foreign policy, international relations, social movements, and relations between the Islamic and Western worlds.
The Islamist uprising in Syria comprised a series of protests, assassinations, bombings, and armed revolts led by Sunni Islamists, mainly members of the Fighting Vanguard and, after 1979, the Muslim Brotherhood, from 1976 until 1982. The uprising aimed to establish an Islamic republic in Syria by overthrowing the neo-Ba'athist government, in what has been described by Ba'ath Party as a "long campaign of terror".
Islamic extremism in Egypt caused terrorism and controversy in the country in the 20th century and continues to be a main issue in the 21st century Egyptian society. Egypt has a long history of radical and extreme sects of Islam with roots dating back to around 660 CE. Islamic extremism opposes "democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs". These extreme beliefs led to radical actions across the Middle East. The main conflict between Islamic extremists and the government officials throughout history stems from two major issues: "the formation of the modern nation-state and the political and cultural debate over its ideological direction".
Nidaa Tounes is a big tent secularist political party in Tunisia. After being founded in 2012, the party won a plurality of seats in the October 2014 parliamentary election. The party's founding leader Beji Caid Essebsi was elected President of Tunisia in the 2014 presidential election.
Secular liberalism is a form of liberalism in which secularist principles and values, and sometimes non-religious ethics, are especially emphasised. It supports the separation of religion and state. Moreover, secular liberals are usually advocates of liberal democracy and the open society as models for organising stable and peaceful societies.
The Mirage is a book written by Jamal Sanad Al-Suwaidi, Director of the Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research in Abu Dhabi, UAE. This book, originally published in Arabic as “Al-Sarab”, is a review of the history, origin, evolution, practices and objectives of political Islam in Arab and Muslim societies. It also explains the danger of related political religious groups. Its title is a metaphor about the misleading religious solutions proposed by Islamist groups, to contemporary social problems.
Sheikh Abdul Munem Abu Zant was a Jordanian Muslim scholar and politician. He was member of the House of Representatives between 1989 and 1997 for the Islamic Action Front. He was an opponent of the Israel–Jordan peace treaty and a supporter of Hamas. Abu Zant frequently criticized the Western world and especially the United States and Israel. He was also critical of moderate Islamic regimes in the Middle East.
Sayida Ounissi is a Tunisian politician representing the party of Ennahdha. She currently serves as Secretary of State for Vocational Training.
Post-Islamism is a neologism in political science, the definition and applicability of which is disputed. Asef Bayat and Olivier Roy are among the main architects of the idea.
Secret Affairs: Britain's Collusion With Radical Islam is a 2010 non-fiction book written by the British historian and journalist Mark Curtis which explores the United Kingdom's relationship with radical Islamism.
The religio-political ideology of Islamism which has "arguably altered the Middle East more than any trend since the modern states gained independence", redefining "politics and even borders" (according to at least one observer, is active in many countries around the world.
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