Ray Takeyh's "Islamism: R.I.P." (Spring 2001) argues, rightly, that Islamism (or fundamentalist Islam) must fail because of its inherent weaknesses. But he errs in thinking that moment is upon us.
Takeyh skews his analysis by choosing three countries (Algeria, Egypt, Iran) and almost randomly declaring them the "bookends" of the Muslim world, then showing how Islamism is in retreat in all three. Had he chosen three other, no less important countries - say, Morocco, Pakistan and Indonesia - and called them "bookends", he could have made a convincing case for the continued rise of Islamism.
More broadly, the author (in the footsteps of Olivier Roy's 1992 study, L'Echec de L'Islam politique, which he surprisingly does not mention as his intellectual precursor) ignores the fact that Islamism remains on the ascendant from Afghanistan to Atlanta. Whether one's measure be lives lost or political assertiveness, far from having failed, the Islamist movement is more vibrant and bellicose than ever before.
Do I need to remind Takeyh how the Morocco Islamist movement has challenged the government's legitimacy? That Nigeria is going through an acute national crisis because of the sudden decision of some states to apply Shari'a law? That Islamists have prosecuted a religious war in Sudan that has caused the most horrific humanitarian crisis in the world today? That a Muslim vigilante group in Cape Town, South Africa, has set off about one bomb per month over the past three years? That the explosion of the U.S.S. Cole in Aden reflects the surge of Islamism in Yemen? That Hamas is steadily gaining strength vis-à-vis the Palestine Liberation Organization? That the main opposition to the already fervently Islamic Saudi regime is a Taliban-like movement? That the growth of jihad movements in Pakistan has led to a wave of terrorism around the world? That Islamists in the Philippines are engaged in an active attempt to break up the country? That their counterparts in Indonesia have created violent crises in such regions as Timor, Aceh and the Moluccas? That France in late 2000 witnessed the largest wave of anti-Semitic violence since World War II, all carried out by Islamists? That virtually every American Muslim organization invited to the White House to celebrate the Islamic holidays is Islamist?
The list goes on and on. Only a selective vision and willful disregard of the facts can lead an analyst to look around today and declare that "the failure of political Islam" is upon us. This failure will come in good time, as Takeyh suggests, but it has not yet happened.
Daniel Pipes
Middle East Quarterly
Takeyh responded to this and two other letters: "After reading the critical responses, I am even more assured in my judgment that the moment of militant Islam has now pass."
