What is Islamic fundamentalism and why has it become an important force in the politics and religion of Southwest Asia and North Africa?

Answer 1

This question has three parts:

What is Islamic Fundamentalism?

Islamic Fundamentalism is difficult to discuss as a general historical phenomenon because it is a heterodox philosophy. This means that there are numerous different beliefs that are only tangentially related to each other, but are all grouped under the same header. For example "flying animals" would be a group like this since bugs, birds, and bats are only tangentially related to one another. There are National Salafists, National Islamists, Transnational Salafists, International Islamists, there are apolitical Salafists, etc. All of these groups have different goals, aspirations, and intentions. The issue is not with the fundamentals of Islam but with the use of Islam as a roadmap to achieve certain political goals that are problematic. All of this variety comes out of the tragedy of the colonial experience in which the Medieval Islamic Society which never progressed naturally into the Modern Era was shattered and each group (including non-fundamentalist groups as well) is trying to pick up the shards and create something new that could work.

Probably, the most famous and important group of Islamic Fundamentalists are the International Islamists. Groups like Al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood are International Islamist organizations because their ideal is to create a unified international government based exclusively on Islamic Principles read in their way. The first modern Islamist was Sayyid Qutb (Oct. 9, 1906-August 29, 1966) who actively advocated for Islamic values to permeate government institutions. In his view Western values were corrupt and any government based on those values should be destroyed, especially in the Islamic World. He was executed for attempting to assassinate Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser after being a leading member of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1950s and 1960s.

Why Has Islamic Fundamentalism become an Important Political Force in Southwest Asia and North Africa?

Many of the cruel dictatorships that were in power from the 1960s-2011 were secular "republics" or secular absolute monarchies leaving a strong distaste in the Arab World for secular authority. The Islamists were the only group that consistently denounced the Secularists. Liberals, Socialists, and Nationalists (the three other major movements) would be less harsh or less frequent in their criticism. Therefore people began to side with the Islamists since they echoed the people's sentiments.

There is also the belief that religious leaders are by nature more pious or more pure than secular individuals and less interested in grabbing power. However, the Morsi regime in Egypt is helping to debunk that idea.

Why Has Islamic Fundamentalism become an Important Religious Movement in Southwest Asia and North Africa?

Sayyed Qutb was very clear about why he thought that Islamist principles were necessary. Some or all of these arguments have resonated with many Arabs in Southwest Asia or North Africa:

Modern Jahiliya: He saw the modern interplay between nation-states and empires as reminiscent of the Arabian Peninsula in the Jahiliya or Pre-Islamic Period. During this period, Arab tribes jockeyed for power and served only their self-interest. What stopped this fighting was when Mohammed successfully subdued Mecca in armed combat and was able to unite all of Arabia under Islamic principles. He expanded this view to the world.

Western Cultural Hedonism: He objected to Western Materialism and the Western obsession with sex and violence. He thought that this method of thinking and perceiving the world was incredibly hedonistic and did not give reverence to those things that were actually worth praising, such as love, devotion, and truth.

Diplomatic Intransigence: Western States were not willing to recognize the independence of Islamic States and even when they did, they left them in the hands of Secularists who would rule the countries as if they were Western Proxies, instead of being representative of the Islamic beliefs of its people. Therefore, violence would be necessary to reclaim power for Islam.

Islamic Virtue: Qutb held that Secularists were unbridled in their ability to inflict torture and damage upon their fellow humans. By injecting morality into the people through Islamic governance, problems like torture, civil strife, etc. could be removed.

Offensive Jihad: He believed that Islam had been under colonial occupation and now ran the risk of being destroyed. To prevent this and protect Islam, campaigns of violence and religious war needed to be used proactively against Westerners to cow them into accepting Islam as the correct and proper way to rule Islamic States and for the non-Muslims to accept the Islamist mentality. This to him was analogous to how the colonizers forced secularism on Islamic States, but since Islam was more virtuous, it would result in a more virtuous world.