About “Experiences of Political Islamic in the Corridors of the Modern State” project

Mr. Maher also pointed out that there are a number of dichotomies within which Islamic movements move, dichotomies that must be recognized while analyzing and studying these movements and their experiences in governance. Among these dichotomies is “social and political” dichotomy, as most Islamic movements in the twentieth century began as social and preaching, and then later they moved to political action so it collided with problems related to its preaching or political identity, the dichotomy of deep awareness of social problems versus superficial awareness of them, as well as the dichotomy of serious solutions and mechanisms to overcome these problems versus sparkling slogans that postpone solutions and policies to an unknown time, and the dichotomy of tyranny and secularism and the priority of confrontation  is it to tyranny or secularism? He stressed that the Islamic movement throughout its history preferred to confront secularism and postpone the confrontation of tyranny, while it was necessary to confront both sides because most of the tyranny the Islamic world faces is basically secular tyranny.

 Dr. Abdul Aziz Kamel talked about the necessity of having a “standard model” based on the provisions and purposes of Islamic law (Shari’aa) in order to use it as a lens for evaluating the different experiences that claim to adhere to the Islamic reference and are called political Islam. This model has two aspects, practical and theoretical. The practical aspect is represented in the experience of the first Islamic state during the era of the Prophethood. It is a model that has risen and continued, and how close the other experiences are from it is what determines their success or failure throughout Islamic history. As for the theoretical model that needs contemporaneity, modernization, and alignment with reality is what has been termed the “Islamic project.” Islamic experiences, without exception, did not have an integrated theoretical Islamic project or a complete conception of state administration, rather, they only sought power for various reasons, and when they were able to do so, they were unable to deal with reality in an integrated manner on the various levels political, economic, strategic, military, and other levels.

Dr. Abdul Aziz also emphasized the importance of enumerating the commonalities among the different “Islamic” experiences as an important entry point for building this standard model. Among the most important of these commonalities is the issue of the absence of the project, as we mentioned before, the issue of the international position on the experience of political Islam, which often results in its short duration and not allowing it enough time to reach a stage of maturity during which it can make influential civilized contributions and the issue of using these experiences for the benefit of the various international powers, with or without the knowledge of the Islamists; In many cases, these forces use Islamic movements as a “stick” which they use to strike and then they break it later.

With regard to the issue of using the experiences for the benefit of the major international powers, Dr. Sherif suggested using the idea of “manipulability” of the various Islamic movements as a theoretical approach to assessing the performance of these movements and their experiences in governance according to the proposed standard model, as it is imagined that many Islamic movements and currents act according to their will and independent ideas, while in fact it acts according to the will of the dominant international powers, and this is what we discover after an in-depth analysis of its performance and policies in light of the surrounding international and regional context.

Dr. Nadia Mustafa stressed that such a standard model of political Islam should not aim to unify everyone’s perception of the Islamic rule and so on. Rigid stereotypes should be avoided, and we should have multiple and different perceptions, even if they are based on a single reference. This diversity and variety should be welcomed and accepted. In this context, she emphasized that the different “Islamic” experiences vary according to the multiplicity of scientific and intellectual schools in which these experiences arise, according to the surrounding environment; The nature of religious schools in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan differs from their counterparts in Turkey and differs from their counterparts in the Arabian Peninsula, just as the schools of the Arab East differ from the schools of the Arab West and so on. Therefore, the nature of religious schools, which vary according to the multiplicity of countries and the diversity of cultures, is considered one of the most important indicators for evaluating experiences and one of the most important entrances for understanding their performance correctly.

Confirming what Dr. “Nadia” said, Dr. “Abdul Aziz” referred to the doctrinal and jurisprudential dispute between Taliban movement according to its affiliation with the Deobandi school, which adopts the Maturidi school of thought in doctrine and the Hanafi school in jurisprudence, and the Arab mujahideen who belong to the Salafi school as most of them belong to the Arabian Peninsula and are influenced by the call of Sheikh Muhammad bin Abdul Wahhab. Perhaps one of the most important features of the impact of this doctrinal and jurisprudential dispute on political and dynamic options is the insistence of Mullah Omar ,the leader of Taliban movement, until the last moment on demanding a seat for Afghanistan in the United Nations and his endeavor to build balanced external relations and break the international isolation that was imposed on his rule. Many jihadists, who refuse to recognize international legitimacy and to follow normal political paths within the framework of the existing international system, criticized this.

Hence, Dr. Abdul Aziz emphasized the importance of researchers in the social sciences possessing sufficient religious culture that qualifies them to understand such interactions regarding the experiences of different Islamic currents and their intellectual perspectives. The researcher without this culture is unable to understand the attitude of these currents or to put them in their correct context without an adequate understanding of the religious terminology and the principles of jurisprudential sciences; so this results in distorted analyzes that have nothing to do with reality.

Dr. Sherif pointed to another variable regarding the intellectual formation of Taliban movement and its difference from other political Islam movements. Where the movement arose and flourished in the shadow of the state and with its support, it did not deviate from the national framework that carried the same concepts of the modern state like the rule of law and so on. Therefore, it seems that there is some effect of this “statist” emergence of Taliban movement on its ideas, especially with regard to the reinterpretation of concepts common to Political Islam movements such as the concept of “Hijrah” (immigration) and the concept of “Al-Talia’ah” (vanguard ) and so on, and perhaps they do not have a big problem in being “absorbed” within the recognized international frameworks, which is one of the reasons for their acceptance of negotiation and the practice of politics in a non-radical way until now.

On the other hand, Dr. Nadia objected to considering Afghanistan a modern nation-state in the conventional sense, and expressed her disagreement with Dr. “Sherif” concerning the emergence of Taliban movement within the national framework and that this had some effect on the intellectual formation of the movement. Mr. “Medhat Maher” confirmed that the main orientation in the foreign policy of Taliban movement was a confrontational orientation that relied mainly on force, not on the practice of political Islam within the framework of international legitimacy In addition to Taliban responsibility of the consequences of al-Qaeda practices due to the great harmony between the two organizations and Taliban insistence on maintaining the correlation with al-Qaeda. Nevertheless, Dr. “Maher” did not deny the existence of latent willingness of Taliban movement to negotiate and practice politics rationally, citing what Dr. Nasr Farid Wasel and Dr. Yusuf al-Qaradawi mentioned after their return from visiting Afghanistan and their meeting with the leaders of Taliban movement; They called on the international community to be patient with the movement and affirmed its readiness for negotiation and understanding given that its leaders enjoy a degree of intellectual balance, unlike other jihadist currents. They also stressed that the confrontational orientation of their policies stems mainly from the international prejudice against it.

Dr. “Muhammad Wafiq Zain al-Abidin” indicated that the beginning of Taliban experience was not like its end, that indicators of maturity appeared over time in its performance and its political and social perceptions, and that if it had had the opportunity, it would have been able to present a significantly different model from what the experience ended with during its short rule. Dr. “Sherif Abdul Rahman” confirmed this by saying that most of the experiences that were overthrown were not overthrown because they failed, but because they could have succeeded.

Concerning the Saudi model, Dr. “Nadia Mustafa” said that its early stages lead us to think about the research problem that was raised at the beginning of the discussion, represented in the relationship between the preaching and the political, or between political and military power and the religious and preaching current, and which one should take over the other and use it to serve its goals and interests. The emergence of the Kingdom through a Saudi Wahhabi alliance and the developments of this alliance so far have important indications of the nature of the relationship between the preaching and the political in the various reformist and revolutionary movements. Where it is proven to us that the most rational model is the one in which the preaching is liberated from the grip of the state and has its own societal authority that is capable of enabling society to interact by itself and to monitor the scholars, not for the preaching to be absorbed in the state’s apparatus and institutions.

In this context, Mr. “Medhat Maher” referred to the sharp criticism that Ibn Khaldun leveled at the callers who wanted to establish states for their calls through revolutions, stressing that they are only good at agitating the public and the mob and involving them in dangerous confrontations that destroy countries and peoples.

Dr. Sherif Abdul Rahman also referred to Dr. Azmi Bishara’s statement that secularism is not the separation of religion from the state, but the subjugation of religion to state. This means that the process of liberating religion from the state and its institutions is considered a process against secularization, and that the process of subjugating religion to state, even in the name of supporting religion and applying it in the beginning, often leads to a kind of secularization in which religion is not ruling the state, but the state is a spokesman for religion and monopolizing it.

Dr. “Nadia” also added that the Saudi model prompts us to think about the position of the major international powers concerning Islam and the various Islamic projects, and destroys the myth that the West has no other concern than fighting Islam and preventing the establishment of Islamic forms of the state in the modern world. Rather, it proves that the West may accept Islamic projects and even support them as long as they do not represent a civil, political or military threat to it and as long as it can use them in a way that serves the stability of the Western domination system over the world. Rather, the matter goes beyond that, as these Western-supported models defend themselves in the face of any other Islamic model that seeks to gain confidence and present more open and democratic Islamic models similar to the Turkish model, and this was evident in the position of the Saudi model regarding the emerging models of political Islam in Egypt and countries of the Arab Spring.

Dr. Abdul Aziz Kamel referred to the problem of “overthrow the model,” stressing that when the major powers seek to thwart a particular Islamic model, before they overthrow it by physical force, they seek to distort and overthrow it as a “model” that is followed and that gains supporters outside its geographical borders. As is the case with the Saudi model, whose mission may have ended internationally, and the various regional and international powers are currently seeking to overthrow it and replace it with other models. For this reason, the matter came to the Saudi ruling family itself fighting this model or some of its manifestations as a prelude to its complete replacement, as Dr. Abdulaziz believes there are attempts in the stage after thwarting the Arab Spring to revive what might be called “political quietism,” which is an alternative political Islam model that is being revived regionally and internationally. It seems that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia will have a hand in reviving it. One of the most prominent features of this model was the failed coup attempt in Turkey, which It would have opened a wide door for “political quietism” in the Islamic world.

Mr. “Medhat Maher,” in the context of his talk about the crises of the “Wahhabism,” indicated that all the calls of modern political Islam that have a specific founder suffer from a serious problem in the understanding of the followers of this founder of the religion as they believe that the founder has answered all religious, civilized and political questions. Their ideas – and then their movements – are confined to the framework of this founder’s ideas and sayings without sufficient care to criticize, renew and build on them. Wahhabi Salafism fell into this matter when it answered civilizational and political questions with the religious sayings of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab.

Likewise, both Mr. “Maher” and Dr. “Nadia” emphasized that the problem of effectiveness is considered one of the most important problems posed by the Saudi model. It is a model that has lasted for many years, and yet it did not make a significant civilizational contribution at the level of “building the human being”, serving the sciences and providing a model for the active Muslim country that is independent politically and economically. And that it did not set out to build a “state” as much as it set out to build a “family property.” Moreover, the Saudi family’s eye in building its property was on the outside more than on the inside, and this matter had a significant negative impact on the effectiveness of the experience and its civilizational contribution. So that it can be considered a distinguished model for providing adequate answers to the question, “How do you build an Islamic model steeped in dependency?”

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On the second day, Dr. “Ahmed Tohamy” referred to a new issue, which is that most, if not all, national liberation movements in the Islamic world were launched from Islamic backgrounds, even if they adopted different references after that. He cited Fath movement which was influenced by the Muslim Brotherhood in its early days, as well as The Free Officers’ Movement in Egypt, which the Muslim Brotherhood had a great influence on before it turned against them afterwards.

Dr. “Tohamy” believed that the “Islamic” experience in Turkey is distinguished from all other experiences in terms of the nature of its origins, since Necmettin Erbakan was not a religious figure like other founders of Islamic movements in the Islamic world. Rather, he was a technocratic man whose movement was mainly based on his developmental and traditional partisan concerns while adhering to the conservative Islamic character he gained from the Sufi schools, especially the Naqshbandi school, which are the only source of religious education for the Turkish people in general, and perhaps this explains to us the success of the experience in development aspects and issues related to the policies of the country’s administration.

In this context, Dr. “Muhammad Wafik” wondered about how the Turkish Islamic Movement could employ the Sufi culture prevailing in it. What can be said is that the Islamic movement in Turkey emerged from the existing pattern of popular religiosity and did not oppose it or present a religious pattern of its own, as what other Islamic movements did in most countries of the Islamic world, which facilitated the process of integrating the masses into this movement and not to turn it into a source of disturbances and unrest in the religious field.

Dr. “Tohamy” added that there is an important geographical dimension in the relation between Turkey and Egypt that many do not pay attention to, which is that Turkey represents Egypt’s northern border in the eastern Mediterranean region, and that if cooperation takes place between the two countries, perhaps we can say that the Mediterranean will turn into an Islamic lake as the Red Sea was once an Arabian lake.

Ms.”Shaima Bahaa El-Din” added, “The Turkish experience is also distinguished by its great interest in local developmental and political work which led to honing its members’ skills especially youth who later led the Justice and Development Party and brought about a comprehensive renaissance transformation in Turkey. This draws attention to the importance of honing youth’s skills at administration and public policy-making levels that qualifies them to be real statesmen instead of being just community leaders or preachers and speakers capable of agitating the public as it is the situation with most members of Islamist currents in the Arab world.

Regarding Turkey’s transition to the presidential regime and concerns that tyranny may continue in Turkey, Counselor “Mohamed Nagy Derbala” stressed that the presidential regime in third world countries is the cause of corruption and political tyranny, and that he constantly struggled when he was a member in the Constituent Assembly of the 2012 Constitution in Egypt to approve the parliamentary regime, which was hindered by the military council’s agreement with the major political powers – led by the Muslim Brotherhood – on the presidential regime. Moreover, other parties did not understand the parliamentary regime’s idea to end up entrenching the central power in Egyptians according to the so-called “Asiatic mode of production” or “Eastern tyranny” resulting from the Nile agricultural life in Egypt.

Concerning Hamas’s experiment as one of the “Islamic” rule’s experiments based on the use of force, Dr. Tohamy pointed to an important issue related to the extent of societal presence and support for the armed movement inside the territory it controls. Although Hamas has stronger support in the West Bank than in the Gaza Strip given the results of the 2006 parliamentary elections, the sensitivity of the West Bank and Jerusalem to Israel led it to suppress Hamas in the West Bank and support Fatah’s authority for this purpose unlike the Gaza Strip, which is less important to Israel. Therefore, we may pay attention to the nature of the geographic areas controlled by Islamists given the interests of various international and regional powers.

In the same context, Dr. Tohamy pointed to a major problem raised by Hamas’s experience in governing the Gaza Strip. It is the problem of full application of Islamic Sharia’s provisions by the armed forces that control a certain geographical area. Interpretations and visions of different movements on provisions of Sharia and how to apply them in society and state as well as their practices in this regard are different. According to this difference, opposing international forces on the one hand and other Salafi and religious forces on the other hand take different positions. Experiments that adopt broader concepts of Sharia’s application– as in the case of Hamas, which did not apply the provisions for example in the Gaza Strip – receive severe criticism and attack from Salafi currents that have tried to launch military strikes against Hamas from inside the Strip more than once. In return, application of sharia’s provisions in a more clear and challenging way calls for international intervention, media attack, and loss of influence in international civil society such as Taliban’s experiment. Intellectual and ideological control of such problems is perhaps a major research question that requires efforts of many thinkers to answer.

Such movements also need to redefine themselves and clarify whether they are resistance movements with an armed militant plan aimed primarily at ending occupation or political movements with a militant developmental plan aimed primarily at gaining power. This clarification helps to better assess and understand these movements’ practices and their results unlike their ambiguous positions on this duality.

Commenting on this, Counselor “Mohammed Naji Derbala” pointed to another problem related to the nature of experiments of “Islamic” rule or political Islam which were established by armed groups coming under a fierce war, as is the case with the Taliban and Hamas. We cannot describe these experiments as pure “governance” experiments in the sense of forming a “state” by transforming the political and social forces possessed by these movements into a ruling elite in a normal state. They are rather only experiments of managing people’s lives that tend to be temporary and wait for consequences of ongoing wars. He stressed that this problem is a turning point in understanding these movements’ experiments and practices in power and interpreting their policies.

Dr. Tohamy also raised the problem of the legitimate rooting of political positions, and wondered about the necessity of this rooting, which gives sanctity to some positions that change according to the political action’s nature. This shows a sharp contrast when these positions change according to the different political environment and calls for a new legitimate rooting that raises accusations against the movement regarding the political employment of religion and others. This showed in the legal aura that surrounded Hamas’ position on boycotting the 1996 elections under the Oslo Accords in comparison to the movement’s participation in the 2006 elections while the same agreement continued. This is due to the different political environment in 2006 that allowed Hamas and Islamists to legitimately participate in governance compared to what was the case in 1996. So, what is the need for legitimate rooting of the political position? If there is a need, what should be the features of this rooting and what are its limits?

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On the third day, the discussion of Ennahda Party’s experiment in Tunisia sparked discussion about the nature of similarity between the Egyptian and Tunisian cases at all political and social levels given that both countries’ historical development since colonization, conditions of liberation, and political and social movements’ transformation within both countries were similar. Dr. “Muhammad Wafiq” wondered about the relationship between this similarity and the anthropological dimensions and psychological composition of the two peoples and its role in the similarity of historical developments in both countries. In this context, Dr. “Ahmed Tohami” pointed out that the agreement between the two peoples in terms of homogeneity and absence of many tribal or sectarian conflicts except for Christians’ high percentage in Egypt than in Tunisia in addition to similarity in the existence of the historically extended central state in both Egypt and Tunisia, influenced the relationship between the Islamic movement in both Egypt and Tunisia, affected the relationship between Egypt and Tunisia’s Islamic movement. The latter witnessed internal clashes within the Islamic movement between a current that suggests sticking to the Egyptian Brotherhood pattern influenced by Said Qoutb in particular, and another current that seeks to create a Tunisian or Moroccan model that follows the ideas of Malik Ben Nabi. Mr. “Medhat Maher” added that the current affected by Malik bin Nabi is also influenced by the Egyptian scholars of Al-Azhar especially Sheikh Mohammed al-Ghazali and Dr. Youssef Al-Qaradawi so the Egyptian influence in the Tunisian Islamic movement is unbroken.

In the context of the mutual influence between the two Islamic movements in Egypt and Tunisia, Mr. “Medhat” stressed that Tunisians after the Arab Spring deliberately lagged a step behind Egypt and waited for how events would turn out in it to make their decisions. This shows in Ghannouchi commencing reconciliation with the secularist current on the fifteenth of August 2013, i.e., one day after Rab’a dispersal in Egypt, in addition to Ennahda movement being distinguished by strong and effective rules in decision-making which made leaderships consider them and prepare for withdrawal in case of failure. Ennahda was also distinguished by the “art of making political alliance” in which Egyptian Islamists failed in addition to making concessions at the right times to defuse anger in times of turmoil, which Egyptian Islamists did not do.

Mr. Medhat also referred to what distinguishes Moroccan political thinking from Levantine thinking in the issue of the relationship between Arabism and Islam. Arabic nationalism implies sticking to Islam in comparison to Moroccan nationalists who unlike most Arab nationalists call for a nationalism without Islam. The crisis of the relationship between Arabism and Islam only shows in the East.

Bosnia and Herzegovina’s model during Alija Izetbegović’s reign formulated a new question of “Islamism of the state” which varies from one context to another and from one experiment to another. In Mr. Medhat Maher’s opinion, Begović’s main call was to achieve Bosnia’s independence as an independent nation state. A call that was apparently national, but deep down it introduced Islamism as concept that includes questions of maintaining existence and giving space for identity renewal considering the civilizational collapse’s state and existence in a European non-Muslim environment.

Accordingly, Dr. “Muhammad Wafiq” stressed the need to separate Begović’s ideas from his experiment in state administration. His practices in administration cannot be attributed to his Islamic thoughts that he expressed in his books. As reality imposed on him a realistic political project that differs from the thesis that he talked about in his writings especially the Islamic Declaration Book. He also referred to an important aspect raised by Begović’s experiment about the Bosnian army’s formation in the international dimension, where Begović was able to integrate and contain the Arab mujahideen within the Bosnia’s military system which gave it great strength and courage in resistance.

Mr. Medhat Maher believes that Begović proceeds in his practices out of his very distinctive thinking that he expressed in his unique book “Islam between East and West”. This is the thinking that enables Muslims to live under conditions of empowerment in which Islam is everything as well as enabling them to live their Islam to the full under conditions of very severe disempowerment. Begović’s presentation of the Islamic creed and values helps non-Muslims accept them and Muslims to feel the beauty of Islam. His ideas were of such absorptive power that enabled him to cope with his reality extremely and skillfully. As he was able to turn the values shared between him and others into disciplined indicators through which a realistic political and social project can be achieved. He then referred to the importance of Dr. Saif El-Din AbdulFattah’s book: “An Introduction to Values” as a significant introduction to studying values, how to activate them, and their importance in reconceptualizing common work between different ones.

On the fourth day, the Iranian model raised another problem about the issue of “unity with description” as Dr. “Sharif Abdul Rahman” referred to those experiments that show and consider themselves to be “Islamic” and not just based on the Islamic reference or seeking to activate the values of Islam in the management of public affairs, but to consider itself the “only” achiever of the “Islamic” description, and even be a demolition pickaxe for other projects and experiments that raise the Islamic flag. The “Islamic” Republic of Iran was the main cause of collapse of the “Islamic” Taliban experiment by allying with the United States called “the Great Satan” by the former. This contradiction is a research question that needs to be considered. Dr. Sharif stresses that the apparent disputes between Iran and both Israel and the United States are not enough to say that Iran presents a structural opposition to the international regime dominated by the West.  At the same time, it cannot be said that they are all show to hide secret manipulation and cooperation behind. It is more correct to look at these disputes according to the different degrees of disagreement, the depth of these disputes, and how major or minor they are.

Dr. Sharif stressed that the Iranian experiment, just like the Saudi one, started abroad. And that abroad in which it started is the same that allows it to continue until now. But whenever abroad wants to overthrow it, it will just do so. This is the case with all the experiments of Islamic rule that abroad succeeds in overthrowing whenever it decides that such experiment is at odds with its interests.

One of the attending researchers commented on this presentation that some experiments show in an international context that supports or employs them then they witness over time a state of strength and consolidation that is difficult to dislodge even if their existence somehow threatens Western interests. The Turkish experiment is an example of that. Dr. “Sharif” stressed that the major powers held the reins of the psychology of peoples so they can move or calm them using media according to their interests. However, he stressed that we should not believe that these great powers have the absolute power since the universe is ultimately subject to unchanging norms.

Dr. Sharif added that the Iranian experiment raises the problem of “epic and politics”. Epic is that historical grievance on which its makers rely in calling for an independent political entity for them. It is the same grievance relied on by Israel when it comes to the “Holocaust” and Iran when it comes to to the martyrdom of Al-Husayn peace be upon him and the historical persecution of Shia. The problem with this pattern is that no compensation can satisfy such epic makers. They always feel that their tragedies are greater than any compensation they may receive, thus they always ask for more until they swallow whoever against them.

Eng. Hassan Al-Rashidi pointed to the issue of change in the collective view of most Arab countries’ peoples to the Iranian experiment. At first, only Salafis were against it and unsupportive of its declared confrontation with Israel mainly for ideological reasons. But then large sectors of Islamic currents and others looked at the Iranian role in the region as a negative role after the sectarian dimension in its policies clearly appeared towards the Syrian revolution and its shameful roles in Iraq, Yemen, etc. This is an issue that makes us think of regional policy model of the “Islamic” governance model and the impact of such policy on the experiment as a “model” considered in several Arab and Islamic communities.

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On the fifth day, the talk about the experiment of Ansar al-Din in Mali and its focus on the Tuareg tribes and their Berber language drew attention to the “cultural and anthropological dimensions” of the governance experiments that adopted the Islamic approach. Dr. “Houriya Mustafa” pointed out the need to pay attention to these dimensions and considering them one of the gateways to considering the various experiments of “Islamic” governance. Many of these experiments are intrinsically linked to ethnic, tribal and cultural issues perhaps more than their ideological links. The Tuareg in Mali, for example, speak and stick to the Berber language to entrench the cultural barriers between them and other ethnic regions and formations.

In this context, one of the attending researchers referred to the colonization’s role in sowing the seeds of these cultural crises within independent countries. The major colonial powers, while competing for control over the largest amount of Africa’s resources, did not consider the issue of ethnic and cultural harmony when dividing colonized lands. Different cultural and ethnic formations gathered under the umbrella of “national” countries consisting of a land, peoples, and a government recognized by the international community without considering the great cultural and ethnic differences within these countries’ border that would make their stability, independence, and advancement impossible.

Talking about the Somali Islamic courts’ experiment, attention was drawn to the issue of customary community interactions that are independent of the state and its importance in building new experiments of governance especially in cases of governments’ collapse and the countries’ fall into chaos. Dr. “Houriya” said that the Somali Islamic courts represented a state of return to martial law between Somali tribes after collapse of Siad Barre regime. This return, which began at limited local tribal levels, was the nucleus for building a new system of government that includes all regions of Somalia that fell into chaos.

Accordingly, Dr. “Mohamed Wafiq” referred to a rule that can be concluded from discussions of many experiments. The rule implies that the growing social role of certain organizational groups or intellectual networks often leads them to exercise a direct political role according to their growing social effeciency. This rule clearly shows in the Islamic courts’ experiment in Somalia which was initiated by Sharia students in cooperation with Somali tribes and their customary regimes.

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On the sixth day, the talk about the Sudanese experiment raised the issue of the Sudanese peoples’ religion factor and its role in bringing Islamists to power and settling in it. On the one hand, one of the attending researchers believed that the Sudanese peoples are deeply religious and that this has a major role in providing a popular and societal backer that supports Islamists during their endeavors to reach and influence power. On the other hand, Dr. “Houriya Mustafa” said that it should not be easy to call the different peoples “religious” and that such a statement should be scientifically measured by specific standards and these standards vary from one place to another and from one ideology to another. For example, it is common in Egypt and other countries that a religious one sticks to the Islamic dress whether it is hijab or niqab for women or jilbab and beard for men. However, these looks are not found in Sudan except in a small group. Most Sudanese women wear the “Sudanese dress” which is not considered, according to the previous view, a sufficient standard for religiosity. The dominant feature of Sudanese religiosity is Sufism which is less concerned with outward issues than with spiritual aspects.

In this context, Dr. “Muhammad Wafiq” pointed to a big problem into which many Islamic currents that rely on the “religiosity” of peoples to ensure support for their political positions and visions run, stressing that this view is extremely misleading. He also pointed that religious norms and patterns vary from one country to another. Turkey’s religiosity differs greatly from the Arab Levant’s Sufi one which may be similar to the Sudanese one.

Dr. “Wafiq” concluded by noting that many of the currents that adopted the Islamic approach in its various forms have succeeded in reaching power differently whether through experiments of electoral partisan experiments, integrated countries and kingdoms, or armed rebel movements. However, most of them failed in “institutional performance” at the level of policies for managing public affairs at its various political, social, economic, military, etc. Since the fall of the Ottoman Caliphate, all these different experiments could not offer an “Islamic” model of governance and management of public affairs.