The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State (Comparative Studies in Religion and Society): Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State

Comparative Studies in Religion and Society

by Mark Juergensmeyer

Will the religious confrontations with secular authorities around the world lead to a new Cold War? Mark Juergensmeyer paints a provocative picture of the new religious revolutionaries altering the political landscape in the Middle East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe. Impassioned Muslim leaders in Egypt, Palestine, and Algeria, political rabbis in Israel, militant Sikhs in India, and triumphant Catholic clergy in Eastern Europe are all players in Juergensmeyer's study of the explosive growth of religious movements that decisively reject Western ideas of secular nationalism.

Juergensmeyer revises our notions of religious revolutions. Instead of viewing religious nationalists as wild-eyed, anti-American fanatics, he reveals them as modern activists pursuing a legitimate form of politics. He explores the positive role religion can play in the political life of modern nations, even while acknowledging some religious nationalists' proclivity to violence and disregard of Western notions of human rights. Finally, he situates the growth of religious nationalism in the context of the political malaise of the modern West. Noting that the synthesis of traditional religion and secular nationalism yields a religious version of the modern nation-state, Juergensmeyer claims that such a political entity could conceivably embrace democratic values and human rights.

Genres: Politics, India, Political Science, Grad School

306 pages, Paperback

First published April 10, 1993

About the author

Mark Juergensmeyer is a professor of sociology and global studies, affiliate professor of religious studies, and the Kundan Kaur Kapany professor of global and Sikh Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He was the founding director of the Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies, and is a pioneer in the field of global studies, focusing on global religion, religious violence, conflict resolution and South Asian religion and politics. He has published more than three hundred articles and twenty books, including the revised and expanded fourth edition of Terror in the Mind of God (University of California Press, 2017).

Reviews

[Alexander Kennedy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is about the confrontation between secular nationalism and religious nationalism. While not the main thesis of the work, one of the most important points that I think Juergensmeyer makes is that the real divide might be between individualism vs communitarianism. Should society seek to protect the rights of individuals or the morality of the community? Secularists side with individualism while religious nationalists prioritize the community. He also hits on the fact that secular nationalism and religious nationalism are two forms of providing order. As Marvin and Ingle showed in Blood Sacrifice and the Nation, a secular nation can have a civil religion, thus the conflict can be seen as a religious war between patriotic nationalists and religious nationalists. The highest authority is the authority to kill. The battle is over that authority. Is it permissible to kill for God or nation? This is why many Westerners regard religious terrorists as such a threat. Killing in the name of God threatens the authority of the secular nation-state. Another key theme is that religious nationalism asserts the uniqueness of a culture in the face of a dehumanizing universal secularism or previously communism. The fall of the USSR and the perceived failure or Western style secular governments have left many countries feeling disillusioned.
One issue I had with the book was the incongruity Juergensemeyer exhibits in this book and his later work Terror in the Mind of God. In Terror in the Mind of God he asserted "These creations of terror are not done to achieve a strategic goal but to make a symbolic statement" (125). In the New Cold War he stats, "Because the activities are sanctioned by religion, they are not just random acts of terror but are strategic political actions: they break the state's monopoly on morally sanctioned killing" (170). In Terror in the Mind of God he seems to view strategy as a traditional military objective like taking over a piece of land or disrupting a supply line. However, this misrepresents the nature of the war. The war isn't about land: its about the moral authority to commit acts of violence. While terrorist acts certainly strike symbolic targets, they also make a profound statement about what makes violence legitimate.

[Maurice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Marc Juergensmayer introduced us to the term Religious Nationalists, as opposed to secular nationalists, tidying up the muddled naming process of fundamentalists, orthodoxs, Salafis and the like. He then guides us through the world of the upcoming religious nationalist movements since the seventies and eighties and shows us 9/11 was not an isolated event. Fortunately he shows there is still hope at the end of the tunnel. See my blog at http://mauricehertog.web-log.nl for more insights learned from him.

[Patty Chang · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good theory attributing the rise of religious nationalism as a backlash to post WWII secular nationalism

[Lyn]

Poking through slowly

[aldo zirsov · Rating 3 out of 5]

Edisi bahasa Indonesia, Menentang Negara Sekular; Kebangkitan Global Nasionalisme Religius, Penerbit Mizan, Cetakan I, Mei 1998, Bandung.
(hasil hunting di JaCC)