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  • Introduction:Secularism and Islamism: Iran and Beyond
  • Saeed Rahnema (bio) and Haideh Moghissi (bio)

The rise of Islamic fundamentalisms, the establishment of Islamic states, and the atrocities committed by state and nonstate actors in a growing number of Muslim-majority countries have generated a great deal of scholarly and political debate about secularism and Islam and the question of the separation of religion and state. After decades of modernization experiments, the first Islamic state in modern times was produced in Iran, and following more than three decades of life under strict religious rules based on an obscurantist version of Shi'i Islam, that country is now the site of a most vibrant popular protest against the religious state. Iran is now facing yet another round of serious political uncertainty and crisis, and despite decades of orchestrated ideological indoctrination and religious propaganda, the calls for secularism and the separation of religion and state are stronger than ever.

The example of Iran has special significance because it has inspired or has directly assisted the rise of Islamist movements of different kinds in other Muslim-majority countries. And yet, all evidence points to the possibility that the first country that produced an Islamic state in modern times might also be the first in the region to liberate itself from the grips of a religious state. The failures of the Islamic Republic of Iran in almost every social and political domain have far-reaching consequences and lessons for the region. The case of Iran clearly shows that neither secularist dictatorial regimes nor authoritarian religious states can resolve the complex problems of these societies. The only solution would be the establishment of a secular democratic state accountable to the people which guarantees social and political rights and freedoms.

An important outcome of Iran's experience is that its secular political forces, the Left in particular, are rethinking their earlier understandings of politics. A major part of the Iranian Left—the main players in the 1979 revolution who were defeated, discredited, and brutally suppressed by the religious state—infatuated by anti-imperialist illusions of the new regime compromised its secular principles, while another section, consumed by its antireligion and radical populism, adopted strategies that expedited its own political and physical elimination. Some of the old perspectives still prevail, but new ones have emerged, an encouraging sign that the secular liberal, left, and reformist religious forces have learned from their past mistakes. Learning about and unlearning the assumed meaning of secularism, distinguishing between nonreligiosity and antireligiosity, showing more tolerance for differing views, [End Page 1] reconsidering old dogmas and engaging in debate about contemporary theories of secularism are the hallmark of the new left perspectives. Criticism and self-criticism about the hazards of compromising strategies vis-à-vis Islamism have also begun to take root. The new Muslim reformers, for their part, unlike their predecessors who focused mostly on attacking the secular Left and supported a religious state, now openly reject any idea of a religious state and favor collaboration among all secular forces for establishing a democratic state.

The essays in this collection, the outcome of a conference on the subject held at York University, Toronto, in May 2009, examine and analyze some of these and other complex issues concerning secularism and Islamism in Iran and beyond. The first group of articles deals with broader conceptual questions. Susan E. Babbitt calls for "epistemic humility" in dealing with both religion and the rational philosophy of secularism. She questions the cogency of taking reason as the only motor of human progress. In rethinking the concept of secularism as understood in Muslim-majority societies, and in opposition to both secular authoritarianism of the state and religious fundamentalism within the civil society, Ramin Jahanbegloo favors the Indian concept of secularism, which is based on tolerance, constitutional equality, and protection of different religious communities. Hassan Yusefi-Eshkevari, a defrocked cleric, rejects the religious state's claims of "divine legitimacy" and its pledge for "full implementation of the Sharia." He contends that the faithful cannot live only as faithful citizens, for they will have more freedom to be who they want to be under a secular state. Reza Alijani, a lay religious intellectual...

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