Islam and Democratization in Asia By Shiping Hua

There are two reasons why religion and politics are intertwined. ⁶ The first is the increasing use of complex discourses for the purpose of legitimization. Today all politicians seem to follow the Machiavellian dictum—it is not important to be just, it is important to be seen to be just—and therefore politicians and political parties and regimes produce discourses to legitimize their goals and strategies. It is in the production of these discourses that religion either underpins political logic or camouflages politic motivations, depending upon the cultural context.

The second, and perhaps the most important, reason why religion will always play a role in crucial issues is the important role that religion plays in identity formation. All important political issues eventually affect individual and collective identity and in the process trigger religious sentiments. As long as religion plays a role in people's identities, it will play a role in politics. The contemporary European experience of and obsession with secularism is a tiny departure from the course of human history. Moreover, European distaste for religion in politics does not derive from religion sui generis, but from its experience with a particular manifestation of religion—the Catholic Church.

On the contrary, Islam for Muslims and for many non-Muslim chroniclers has contributed to the development of pluralism, religious tolerance, and communal harmony. The golden age of Andalus and the period of the Mughal Empire in India are two widely cited examples of how Islam is potentially capable of providing the infrastructure for a society where pluralism and tolerance triumph. Even the discourse of the “war on terror” acknowledges that liberal Islam, with its emphasis on enlightenment, peace, and tolerance, is the antidote to the rise of terrorism and sectarian violence in some Muslim societies today. ⁷

Thus, concluding that (a) secularism as a necessary condition for good governance is a Eurocentric myth and (b) that Islam has historically demonstrated its capability to underpin social harmony and pluralism, I shall now make the case for the Islamic state. Most contemporary Islamists argue that an Islamic state is necessary to provide Muslims with the mechanism necessary for social engineering and moral and cultural reform. They envision the Islamic state as a political unit that will