The Resurgence of Jihad & The Specter of Religious Populism

Global modernity has transformed the nature of religious belief and the practice of religion. One crucial change has been the resurgence of publicly active religious populism. However, policymakers and social scientists, burdened with a secularist bias, have failed to grasp the full nature of this phenomenon. A more complete understanding of contemporary religious populism can be attained by examining their distinctive narrative forms—that is, the way that they describe their worldview and fundamental goals. This article focuses on of one of the most extreme forms of religious populism: the global jihad.1 A cursory examination of this single case suggests that despite strong rhetorical similarities between the most prominent forms of religious populism, both at home and abroad, crucial differences persist in their political effects.