What is Agonism?

Agonism, a word only two letters from antagonism, but worlds apart in the world of political theory. Agonism is, in fact, one of my favorite political theories. Thinkers such as Chantal Mouffe and William Connolly are usually counted as "belonging" to this perspectives, although it should be said that they vary from each other in quite distinct ways.

"The world is a place of conflict." That could be a good starting point. Agonistic political theory is in many ways a respons to liberal theory, that is driven towards consensus. But there are many problems with consensus, nobel as the thought may be - in fact, more problems than with conflict, paradoxically enough.

Chantal Mouffe's take on agonism comes from the place of seeing conflicting perspectives as something natural. Conflict in other words is not necessarily negative. What is negative, Mouffe argues, is when conflict takes on a form that threatens the function of the political. Put differently: We need not always agree, in fact, we are bound not to agree with one another at some point. The question then is; how do we meet each other in a way where our different perspectives can be acknowledged as legitimate claims and interests, and discuss them publicly - even if the debate may become ever so heated at times?

Mouffe argues that the political should be about one thing: turning antagonistic (illegitimate) enemies into agonistic (legitimate) adversaries. The problem built into most liberal thought is that politics should strive for an ever increasing amount of consensus. The agonists however argue that the only way of achieving such a goal is to remove claims that are too disharmonious from the debate all together. And once this process is started it takes an ever narrowing turn - the longing for consensus is effectively removing the opportunity of opposition, bit by bit, until there all opposing thoughts and claims have been made labelled "illegit" and therefor can be ignored.

If the political model adapted is (as it is today) to refuse to give legitimacy to a number of claims - instead of seing them as legitimate (in a political sense) no matter how objectionable they are - this is effectively removing the political from politics, as it removes the demos (the people's built-in patchwork of desires, claims and aspirations) from democracy (from the processes of legislation and public debate).

William Connolly has given some thought to how this may be achieved. What Connolly proposes rests on the same notion, in terms of acknowledging that other people have the right to be heard and not be ignored or forced out of the political. Connolly's aspiration is to recognize the possibility of associating yourself with different "minorities" in different questions; a model that goes against the old "one party fits all"-model. In stead, it is possible to see someone with a similar view on - let's say - drug policy and form an alliance with them on that issue, whilst allying yourself with a completely different group of people in the debate over animal rights, or public healthcare.

The main point with this, is that this identification with multiple groups acknowledges one person's different identities. No person is forced to identify solely as a christian, muslim, carpenter, stuntman, lesbian, convervative or any other identity-label. Further more it creates and interdependence between these groups that makes society more open for various forms of opposition, as this is required when all people are tangled into an oppositional/minority group on at least a few questions close to the heart.

This is of course a brief and slightly crude crash course in agnostic political theory, but it is one discourse that has massively influenced me - not just on a political level but also more generally, in seeing that conflict is not something necessary, and not a defeat. Instead conflict is something that we should try to channel into proper dialog and proper politics, because if we don't: that's when the real problems start.

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Further reading: I suggest the clear and short chapters by Mouffe and Connolly respectively, in Hent de Vries & Lawrence Sullivan (ed:s). (2006). Political Theologies: Public Religions in a Post Secular World. New York: Fordham University Press.

This is also a great anthology for anyone who wants to compare their perspective to others, such as the Pope's, or Jürgen Habermas for instance...

Is it obvious? (Valenta)

Markha G Valenta sets out, in her arcticle How to Recognize a Muslim When You See One: Western Secularism and the Politics of Conversion, stating something that ought to be fairly obvious, as she critizes the cultural war/clash of civilizations-thesis:

"The West and Islam encompas histories too varied, too porous, too centrifugal to be coherent powers ... That isn't to say that we might not yet create them, or that they might not clash. But for the moment it is precisely the mythic nature of the battle that makes it so appealing to the fantasies of our politicians and lesser commentators, while it is only a minor drama relative to the so much more grand drama of invention that is taking place" (Valenta 2006:444f).

(Her whole introduction is in fact really well written.) What the article is dealing with here is the "clash" that is percieved in what can really more accurately be described as an value-irritation (I've borrowed this from Åke Sander's Swedish phrase värdeirritation which he suggests fits better in most cases, as rather than things being real threats to ones value system, it's more often than not merely an irritation of said system). Valenta goes on to show how the responses to The (muslim women's) Veil (as almost a kind of religio-political dark matter) have much in common with the myth of "the white man's burden", in its charge to enlighten and enrich the lives of the brute natives that me must protect from the dangers outside (in the world) and inside (themselves).

She also points out that this is not a one-project idea: "liberals and revolutionaries as well as expansionists shared the conviction that tribal peoples lacking territorial structures must succumb to modern states ... Something there was that must have loved a wall" (Valenta 2006:447). Valenta then goes on to display how various frontiers are raised and deemed necessary, both those of social status and class, gender, ethnicity, church/state etc. This, she calls the double logic of the modern territoriality: "the simultaneous necessity to saturate and to separate, to centralize and to expand, to fortify against the alien and make coherent the own - nation, home self" (Valenta 2006:447). What happens in territoralization is that the area defined gets all the more interconnected, integrated, and lets various forces and services (labour, transport, information etc) flow, but also included in the territorial package are such feats as police/military (some institution with the possibility of acting out legitimate violence). In order to make such an arrangement work, it has traditionally been argued that unity is called for in order to make such a territory work. But not only that, the territory as such is circled in the first instance by such an idea of (the possibility of) unity.

She also takes up capitalism as an interesting example of a universal dynamic. Capitalism only produces more capitalism (just like territorialization produces more territorialization). Possibly - and possibly sadly - capitalism as a universalizing agent may be more apt to function as it is probably in place, than the ethics proposed by Valenta. This is because Valenta suggests a respons to our mode of being, which makes a break with our colonial burdened past, and aims for something less ethnocentric-made-universalistic. Her suggestion is a mode of being and acting where we are to a larger extent prepared to utilize various forms of self sacrifice. It can be argued, however, that such a principle has a firm basis in a Christian legacy, depending on God's self sacrifice in the form of Jesus. This example may be both interesting and constructive to expand on, but nevertheless it does probably not amount to a less ethnocentric point of view, than the one Valenta has problems with. Possibly if we understand Christianity in a wider ("non-West") perspective, but then we also have the problem of accounting for Liberation Theology for instance, which has brought about decidedly positive and people-empowering change in South America, but at the same time rests upon a refusal of endless self sacrifice, rather than invoking it. In the end, it is probably mainly for the colonial powers that this perspective can be said to be a reasonable invokation - where one of our heritages (colonialism/the white man's burden) is countered by another (self sacrificial Christianity).

best

Jonatan

Quotations from:

Valenta, Markha G. (2006). How to Recognize a Muslim When You See One: Western Secularism and the Politics of Conversion. In: de Vries, Hent & Sullivan, Lawrence, E. Political Theologies: Public Religions in a Post-Secular World. pp: 444-474. New York: Fordham University Press.

Talal Asad and Laïcité

"It is often pointed out by defenders that laïcité does not require citizens of the Republic to be identical. On the contrary, it encourages them to develop their individuality. The flowering of individuality that laïcité encourages, however, is founded on positivism and humanism" (Asad 2006:519).

The secular state ought to be secular, because secular means neutral, seem to be the argument. On the contrary, Asad argues - and I would agree - that specific modes of being is encourages, whilst others are seen as problematic or illegitimate. The problematic nature is often located as or within religion, especially when that religion is not Judeo-Christian (as much talk revolves around these - oh so elusive - Judeo-Christian values, upon which Europe in general seem to be built), but are connected to other ethnic groups. Asad sums up himself by saying that "differences in class, gender, religion, and ethnic origin do not constitute a community of shared values" (Asad 2006:525). This suggests, that even if we do away with components 3 and 4, we would at the very least be "left with" having to deal with "the problem" of class and gender-significance. Furthermore, class, gender, religion and ethnicity generates other modes or being or identifying with people, than what is contained within the nation state. Asad points to Esther Benbassa who have made this point by asserting that

"precisely because secularism is a state doctrine, devised for the purpose of dealing with state unity, it does not fit well with a world of multiple belongings and porous boundaries, nor can it acknowledge the fact that people identify emotionally with victims in the past and with victims in other countries as 'their own'" (Asad 2006:511).

The nation-state today is therefor left with a scramble for unifying doctrines. That of laïcité is a French mode that is working out less and less everyday for France. In Sweden we have seen unsympathetic attempts to the same end in the past, both when religion was supposed to have this unifying effect, but also the "nordic race" was the posterboy for such an attempt (and Uppsala's racebiological institute got a soon-to-be-infamous sister institute in Germany). The main question is off course: Do we need to find one mode of unity to hold the nation together, that also requires us to all be the same?

I would propose, in line with William Connolly, that it is instead possible to find ways of relating to different groups within the population on different topics. This way, everyone is "in a minority position" in some aspects of their lives (as we may see eye to eye with the majority of the population, in the majority of topics - but in some cases we diverge and sympathize with an "outsider" perspective), which also stresses the way we treat all minorities as legitimate and equal. The way other people "disturbs" a part of our ideas/faiths/beliefs about the world, is a means to be reminded that we are not "finished" or completed persons, but an always ongoing constructing and deconstructing of our own identity/identities. Instead of getting all annoyed with the fact that other people beg to differ we should also allow ourselves to differ - on as many or as few points as we want to - AND to differ to different people. It's not always necessary to agree with your favorite party, it's not always necessary to agree with your spouse, your children, your parents, your neighbours, your colleagues etc. We may slip in and out of these identities in ways, where nothing is acted upon in the way that for instance laïcité proposes; that we ought to first and formost belong to France (or Sweden or whatever country we're citizens of). The fact that we don't always feel the urge to honor such an allegiance doesn't mean that we can't enjoy being French, Swedish or whatever. It just means that sometimes we also feel the urge to honor other aspect of (our) humanity.

best

Jonatan

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Asad, Talal. (2006). Trying to Understand French Secularism. In: de Vries, Hent & Sullivan, Lawrence, E (ed:s). Political Theologies: Public Religions in a Post-Secular World. pp 494-526. New York: Fordham University Press.

Commentary

"[O]n a serious note i thought all along that this is where you're heading... to me it's utterly obvious that our whole culture and politics in sweden are built upon super christian values. perhaps even more than other scandinavien countries... with our state protecting us from bad things bad like alcohol and other stuff. Or is that really a christian thing? Is it more of a socialist/communist thing? And in all it's atheism wasn't communism/socialism built on super christian values that jesus himself would've been proud of?What is religion? What is politics? Should it matter these days anyway? The only possible answer: P O L I G I O N. (now is it a strike of genius or just an easy way out???) "

Well, there are a few things here that I may off course clarify. But I will at the same time try to take the easy way out of the messy connections in here... :)

First and foremost, we have the question of what is build on what. As I've said earlier the birth of science is the outcome of (let's just briefly and abstractly call it) Christian theology's critical reflection on the world (as atheist philosopher Richard Rorty holds true). To further this example political ideas that has arised in the last few centuries in Europe, does off course not emerge out of nothing. They emerge out of culture and context (and like religion, needs to be reinterpreted in order to fit into new culture and contexts when we want to apply them). Here a distinction can be made between whether i.e. communism is strictly or loose built on Christianity. To claim that Christian ideals that saturates culture to a relatively high extend has nothing to do with communism would be to disregard its historical/cultural context. However, strictly speaking communism is focused to a larger extent on materialism than Christianity generally does.

The Christianity we have in Sweden today is in its turn inspired by communism, in a turn to legitimize a bigger focus on materialism. Here we have a perfect example of syncretism; christianity inspires communism inspires christianity. However, to say that they are the same would hide more than it explains. However, both have part in each other, and it is thus legitimate to take both traditions values or truth claims at the same face value.

The project of separating private from public is a discourse that has recieved massive criticism from various directions. However, the main and best formulated criticism comes, in my view, from feminism. Private-Public was a divide that served to relegate another distinction - woman-man - into different spheres, where man would be involved in the decision making and ruling of state (one forgets that even prominent liberalists as Rosseau held this view of women not fit for the public domain). Then off course, what went on in private was a different matter. This was not unproblematic, however, as the result often was that there was no governance over private affairs, such as men's violence towards women going unpunished (a fine tradition we've managed to keep alive since Roman days where pater familias had the right to do whatever he wished to anyone beneath his roof - he could kill his wife for all he cared without punishment).

So tying together this crash course in feminism with what I've said above: it is important to remember that relegating religion to the private - as politics is the subject proper of the public realm - is every bit as problematic, as it just continues down this troubled path. Besides rendering claims made from within religious traditions illegitimate (visavi state/public discourse), it also leaves religion in the private "secret" sphere where less light is shed on it, and it can be left to develop its more sinister sides by itself. Rather than the alternative of religious claims being fully scrutinized in the public eye, as they are legitimate parts of public discourse.

So, easy way out? Rather I believe that all matters of faith (and I think I've clearly demonstrated in previous articles how politics is all about matters of faith) should be set on par, as a starting point, and then see how they do compared to each other, in a collective open democratic discourse.

Shoot yourself in the foot, why don't you...

This is a transcript of Israel's forgein ministers' speach on the Israeli attack on Ship to Gaza:

"The armada of hate and violence in support of Hamas terror organization, was an outrageous and premeditated provocation. The organizers are well known for their ties to global Jihad, Al-Qaeda and Hamas. The have a history of arms smuggling and deadly terror. Onboard the ships we found weapons, prepared in advance and used against our forces. The organizers' intent was violent. Their method was violent. And the results were unfortunately violent."

Well, if you're seriously saying that some of, for instance, Sweden's leading politicians, most beloved authors and most ackowledged scholars are in fact nothing but terrorists, then you are right. Or more likely, chances are that people about to be stormed by professional elite soldiers with apparently little regards for human lives, scrambled to defend themselves. Nothing, and I mean nothing, gives Israel the right (regardless of the ships' nature) to board ships on International Waters, which was clearly the case. The fact is that the ships' were filled with medical supplies, concrete, prefabricated houses and schools, clean water and other supplies to improve the Palestinians quality of life (which is by all means extremely poor in the current situation). This takes away all justification for Israel's actions.

Israel now finds itself in a position where they've probably made more enemies in a day, than they've made in the ten previous years. Because of the credentials of the people arrested (you arrested members of parliament for heavens sake!), you have utterly lost your chance at credibility; all retoric means are futile in comparison.

I must also add that it is important not to discuss the "history of the Jews" and anti-Semitism connected with this. For starters Israel does not comprise all jews, nor do they speak for all jews/semites. To deepen this point, many of the Swedes arrested were in fact part of the group jews for israeli/palestinian peace. This point also illustrates that this attack must be viewed as a hanous crime on international waters, and has nothing to do with any overarching semitism/anti-semitism discourse. This was Israel attacking jews, swedes, norwegians, turks, palestinians and numerous other citizens of the world.

And especially seeing that this aid-mission is framed as supporting terrorism by the Israeli foreign minister, has certainly made a Palestine-supported out of me.

Religious Sciences & Theology / Empirical Research & Political Ideology (3/3)

So, after having discussed Philosophy of Science, and the involvement of pre-empirical presuppositions in Science and later politics, I would now like to expand on the third part of my proposal of studying religion and politics as a joint field - as if they are the same - and what implications this would have.

But for those of you who haven't read the first two parts, here are the links so you can catch up.

PART ONE: What Guides Science

PART TWO: What Religion Has In Common With Politics

Now, once you've caught up on the previous reading material, let's get started. :)

When I say that politics is based on pre-empirical notions of what it is to be human, and how we ought to live, this doesn't mean that politics doesn't deal with science at all. On the contrary, the state comission surveys and expert research in various field all the time. In Sweden these are called Statens Offentliga Utredningar (SOU) and are ways in which the state collects data in order to make a more informed decision. But (as reader of the first part will know) the question here is off course: how does one decide what research to comission in the first place? As I've argued previously what guides science in this case can be summed up as finding out how we can best implement our ideology in the current society.

There may be research on the table that may be discussed, but what it says will always be weighed against what the political party is trying to achieve; i.e. (taking a purely hypothetical example) getting grades from an early age in schools seem to encourage students to work harder but also apply more stress - now, how do we as social democrats approach this empirical evidence, in order to make society more equal, and generally more educated? Or taking a more sinister turn, the case may be that social democrats comissioned the reserach, and are only interested in early grades effect on education - and not in the least on how it affect students' stress levels; then this may not even be a parameter measured in the survey!

So what about religion? In Sweden, academic theology is not to be confessional. This means, that it is set on par with religious sciences in general, where the question of truthclaims within religion, is not judged (how can it, empirically?), but instead what is studied is part of (for example) Christianity: its history, sociology, psychology och religion, dogma and systematic theology, etc. More then seldom I've come across (both in litterature and verbally) people claiming that when religious science gets too interested or attached to a subject matter, it becomes poor religious science, which to many scholars equals theology. The distinction here is one where some scholars try to claim that they are utterly objective, but is that really possible? Again, lets remember what I wrote in the first part about all this - that what questions science engages in rests upon an idea of what things are worthwhile spending time on in life, in the first place. If we were to take scholars argument of total objectiveness this means that they really have no interest in the subject at all - because you cannot be both objective and attached to a question at the same time. If you are utterly objective, it wouldn't matter to you, whether you were researching the field of Islamology, Cancer, or how to produce a seedless watermelon.

What I'm trying to say here is not that science is worth less, because people don't deliver on the strictest form of objectivity. On the contrary, I think it's imperative for science to be guided by passions, ideas about how to make things (society, life, stuff in general) better, and last but not least; morals. A science without morals is a science that can lend its expertise to anything; You want me to build an atombomb? - Pay me, and I'll do it! I don't care who you use it on, I'm just a scientist, and the science of making an atombomb has nothing to do with then using the finished product! It is not that science hasn't operated this way some times, but the point is that it shouldn't. Especially, science can't extricate itself from being complicit in the things it has been an instrumental part in producing, and the results of such a production. The same goes for the production of information really. If a survey states that all members of group x hate group y, then this will have an impact on society. Group x may be looked upon with disgust and group y may all of a sudden recieve police protection, or new laws may be passed to support or supress one or the other... You get my point.

As you may have gathered by now, my general argument points to the likeness or correspondance between politics and religion. In politics we can separate ideology from SOU's - although SOU's are always guided by the morals and ideas in ideology. Similarily, theology and religious science have the same connection. Although, if it's not theology (with its morals and ideas) guiding religious science, there is always something else - and here is where it gets really interesting!

Above I wrote that Swedish academic theology and religious studies are non-confessional. So what are they guided by? The answer is politics. Every year there are new directives from the state, regarding how science should be done and taught. And when its not leaning directly on the curriculum - such as: all courses in religion/theology are "miljömärkta" at University of Gothenburg and must discuss ecological questions. (You can really se how this is helpful for a course in the History of Early Christianity, can't you?!) - it's governed by what institutions gets funding. For instance, more than once in my academic career, there has been no new doctorate studies-position offered. This means that no one can recieve a higher education than a masters level in all of Gothenburg that year - on any topic relating to religion! Instead, money are directed towards other disciplines; technology of different sorts tends to be hugely favored over humanities in general. This is for sure a way in which ideology guides science, and not only the science it comissions but ALL science in a community.

My focus is not to moan at humanities being overlooked as an academic discipline. However, my suggestion of leveling the playing field of political ideology and religion, based on accepting that both categories deal in the "currency" of what life is about, what it is to be human, and what society we want to create. I believe that this would create a discourse (societal and academic) where we accept that science never leave the arena of poligion (the name I suggested for the field), but are always guided by it - and that this is as it should be. The implication is also that different perspectives from religions and ideologies can be discussed, mixed, sometimes discarded and sometimes accepted.

This is also a way of saying that the Swedish (for instance) historic legacy is not one of suchandsuch. It is a "poligious" syncretism where Roman jurisprudence, protestantism, socialism, marxism, liberalism, feminism, and other poligions have been instrumental guiding principles that are by now so intertwined that it is often hard to separate what is what anymore. This, I believe, is also a positive thing, because it sheds light on the fact that Sweden has more than one "culture" informing it. This, most likely, is a perspective where it is less intimidating to let new/other actors on to the stage; such as biologism, islam(ism), confusianism (given Chinas rising influence in the world) etc... It makes us more open to realize that these "systems" are not entities trying to replace the "totality" of Swedish culture, but merely to challenge things, in the instances where we have given certain cultural feats priority over others without realizing it or why (such as politics over religion). In short, the perspective of poligion makes for a less frightening world, with a more generous measure of equality.

Best

Jonatan

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You can also read slightly shorter text by me on twitter.com/jonatanbackelie :)

I'm gonna be ambitious (Van Der Veer)

Yes. I've decided I'm gonna be ambitious and write a few rows regarding the people I'm reading (and reading about, as many academic texts are written as replies to earlier texts and thinkers). I've been intending to do this for a long time, but have always ended up not doing it, because I need to write some kind of introduction. Now, I will instead risk that the reader may not get everything (or in worst case, anything), but then again, something may be interesting or thought provoking even so.

First off is PETER VAN DER VEER's article "Pim Fortuyn, Theo van Gogh, and the Politics of Tolerance in the Netherlands" (in de Vries, Hent & Sullivan, Lawrence, E. (ed:s). (2006). Political Theologies: Public Religions in a Post-Secular World. New York: Fordham University Press.) commented on in connection to Aaron Hughes book Situating Islam (sorry don't have the details at hand).

When Van Der Veer writes about Fortuyn he describes him as the classical populist. One of the reasons is that "he followed a very common trajectory from the radical left to neo-conservative" (Van Der Veer 2006:530). This is one of the first things I grew wary of in the article. The argument of postulating someone as a populist because they've found sympathetic feats in both the left and right camp, can suggest that someone indeed has a hard time making their mind up regarding what they believe in. It can however also suggest that the understanding of left and right as arch enemies is not always the best way to view the whole of politics.

Fortuyn was radically sceptic towards immigrants, and especially muslims whom he considered "backwards". Normally this is an argument that is percieved as far from the left. However, in Sweden, the work immigration came to a halt because of the union movement (a movement siutated to the left, due to its connection of the working class) in Sweden. Furthermore, even though the left and right in Sweden (which is not the left and right that is described in the article, but again there are probably likenesses) have different policies on immigration as a whole - the idea that politics is something that should remain separated from religion and religious claims is an overarching idea that Swedish politicians seem to have bought wholesale. Also, there are plenty of examples of irreligious sentiments to the left in politics, especially in the left's history. Marxism, for instance, has never been known for its generous attitude towards religious people. It's more been one of: sure, be religious, but the reasonable thing in the end is off course to become fully attached to the idea of strict materialism and thereby embrace atheism.

So, back to Fortuyn. Another interesting feat that separates him from most usual "right wing"-men, is the fact that he was gay. And not in a subdued closet type way; he used it as a means of breathing flamboyant life into what he described as dull dutch politics. The "purple" coalition that ruled the Netherlands at the time was also consensus-based in their mode of politics, and didn't care much for bringin passions into the political realm. Chantal Mouffe has rightly pointed out in her "On the political" and also in her contribution in the same book (de Vries & Sullivan) that these passions are crucial in order for the political to function properly. So that someone moved away from the dulled consensus and brought in both a flamboyant alternative lifestyle AND passion, have to count for something more than being described as just your "usual populist".

So what does it mean that Fortuyn was gay? For one, his sexual identity enabled him to compare a progressive sexual politics against (elements in) the Islamic traditions (which he no doubt bundled together as The Islamic Tradition). He then went on to offer the classical easy sollution of "the immigrants are the problem, if we can just get rid of them and their backwardness everything will be fine" (although this everything is typically never defined, because as you start picking it apart it always becomes evident how little bearing on society its minority groups have in many cases). So yes, Fortuyn gave in to easy - too easy - sollutions (meaning no sollution at all in praxis). This, however does not make all his criticism null and void.

In Sweden this year there was quite a debacle around Sveriges Unga Muslimer/Sweden's Young Muslims' (SUM) annual youth conference (the one I attended for my field work in 2009). The reason was that SUM had invited Abdullah Hakim Quick - a speaker that had previously made antigay remarks. RFSL (NGO protecting gay rights) opted for a cancellation of SUM's state funding and in the end SUM choose to withdraw their invitation to said speaker (although they maintained that he was never intended to speak on that topic to start with). Even though SUM withdrew the invitation to Hakim Quick, my fieldwork showed that many of the young muslim were opposed to the idea of allowing gay couples to marry. This is interesting, since this is one minority group who want their rights to be protected, at the same time as members of the group feel hesitant to extend rights to another minority community.

Furthermore, the sentiments expressed in my survey shows that although voting for parties on the left, these young muslims also expressed some conservative sentiments, regarding questions of family and morality. This is another interesting example of how the left-right dicotomy is not functional in order to understand the voters. If we were to apply Van Der Veer's terminology; are these muslims then also "populists"? They have sympathy with questions both to the left and right, but only for the left (and green) parties in Sweden. How do we understand that, from Van Der Veer's proposed perspective? Aaron Hughes proposes that it is not the place of the scholar to be a "cheerleader" of religion. When we do feel the need for it, we need to be able to "do science" in a critical way, where we feel that routing for, or being apologetic, or criticizing a certain mode of religious behavior is not a stance we need to take a priori. Instead we must allow ourselves to get to grips with both problematic and encouraging ways in which religion (and its different parts) operate.

We may for instance acknowledge that even Fortuyn - populist or no - may have points in his argument. My point with this argument is that he poses one interesting question within his argument (which on the whole, however, faulters in my eyes). This question also cuts through the division of politics into left and right, but at the same time proposes that we need to take passions (as Mouffe propose) into politics, in order for them to function. The interesting question, that remains to be answered then, is off course what passions? I for one argue for the legitimacy of religious passions, making their way into the political, not to dominate the discourse, but to be one of the many parts of people's lives which also needs to be reflected in representative politics. Anything less than full representation of (the) people, fails to be a representation.

The trouble with defining religion

As promised I carry on my mini-series of blog posts, which will present my view on religion and politics - something that may be of interest in the running up to the Swedish election, but also hopefully interesting in general.

This part is regarding the trouble of defining religion. Now, you may think that I'm kidding, right? - I mean, everyone knows what is and what isn't religion. This may at first seem like a straight forward deal that can be discussed in a matter-of-factly fashion, and if someone doesn't can't define religion then it must just be some scholars who are trying to stir up debate over nothing, in order to stay employed by their academic institutions. However, I would argue that the problem of defining what counts as religion runs deeper. I will give a short background, and then connect these to William Cavanaugh's argument in the book The Myth of Religious Violence.

One common way to deal with definitions of religion is to order them into the sections substancial and functional. The substancial mode of defining religion deals in what people believe, feel and think on the inside. Religion is then anything that evokes this special "spiritual" feeling, or makes you reflect, pray or worship in a heartfelt personal way. But in order for a substantial definition to deal specifically with religion the said beliefs must be directed towards something transcendent - a god or something of that magnitude. However, there are a great many things that are usually referred to as religion that doesn't comply with this seemingly straightforward (and very Swedish) take on religion. The classic example - because it happens to be one of the "world religions" is Theravada Buddhism. Even though Mahayana Buddhists generally view Buddha as divine or transcendent (at the very least in comparison to the rest of us humans) and therefor offer prayer to Buddha, the Theravadan branch is more "atheist" if the expression can be allowed. This is probably also part of why Buddhism was for a long time not judged as a religion in Sweden, but a philosophy.

Next, we have the functional definitions of religion. These define religion by modes of acting. Yes, there may be something systematic that referes to some wise being (even though we must include non-transcendent beings such as Buddha), but more importantly religion is about performance. Church, synagogue and mosque attendance for example - and what people do within these spiritual spaces: religions is that which have some sort of ritualistic(ish) behavior attached to it and that gets people to engage with their surrounding community in a certain way. Problem is here, that instead of being too narrow a definition - this is instead too wide, as there is no way to exclude other doctrines who bears heavily on how people lead their lives - such as political ideologies. The usual argument goes: why isn't Marxism counted as a religion with the help of such a definition?

The answer is, unfortunately, unhelpful. The respons such as that in William Cavanaugh's book, is that this renders the definitions of religion useless. But I think Cavanaugh is getting ahead of himself. How does Cavanaugh arrive at his conclusion about the usefulness of the definitions? The answer is that he beforehand has selected a number of religions (the world religions at the very least) that must be fitted into the definition. And when we find something else, like a political ideology, which fits the perspectives we've choosen - we fault the perspective instead of applying the tools at hand for the study of that which we've circled as being religion. I will return to this shortly, but first I will make a short excursion which is not unimportant in terms of the use of religion "as a theoretic tool".

There is another argument in Cavanaugh's book that deserves both attention and merit, which is his historical argument around the construction of religions in the plural. In early Christian writing - such as Augustine - religione ment the true worship of Christ. And other modes of worshipping other gods (which the ancient world was ripe with) was not deemed another religione. The concept of religions was in fact constructed at a much later stage in order to compare the Christian belief to the believes of people who were soon about to be colonized and conquered around the world by Europeans. In the first order religious comparison was applied so that the European expedition could claim: "These people have no such thing as a religion" only to impose their own ways of believing and acting out faith in a proper manner by force. Once the people had been conquered the Europeans incidentally discovered that they locals did indeed have some sort of belief system in place. Handy then, that the Europeans could apply a comparative perspective where we could argue for the superiority of the Christian religion above the local variant - something that gave missionaries the legitimacy they needed.

The next shift came about in the era of Enlightenment. Before this, the faith of the ruler was to be the faith of the ruled (subject). The outcome of the various struggles in at the time where nation-states started to form, was a mode of being where religion was not part of the measures used to control the people. It turned into a division where the church would be the benevolent caretaker of souls, but the nation-state would require the lethal allegiance of the people. In short, the rise of the nation-state produced a shift in what people were willing to kill or die for. Before, it was the church, now it was the nation. Bare in mind also, that the nation-state wasn't always ruled by the people in this era (more often than not it wasn't), and especially not by any women inhabiting the nation.

So where does this deeply problematic history of religions AND problems of definitions lead us? I want to return to the argument above where I felt that Cavanaugh goes awry. I would argue that this history and its host of problem is told in Cavanaugh's The Myth of Religious Violence gives us reason to think of the construction of various "secular" political ideologies are playing into exactly the same register as religions do.

What political ideology effectively does is point to something that it percieves as the good life (and society). This goes for religions as well. Furthermore, political ideologies does not back this up by empirical proof: "Look, here is the perfect marxist/socialdemocratic/marketliberalistic country" and then everyone jumps on the bandwagon. The goal is a utopian goal, an idea or ideal - something to strive towards. This, again, goes for religion as well. The intertwined history of the two - religion and politics - should also make it clear that the transfer of power between them has not produced a clear cut Robin Hood type of power-to-the-people effect, from evil to lesser evil. One of Cavanaugh's points is that in any type of violence - religious or no - there are always a host of components at play who are greatly important; ideological/religious, cultural, socio-economical etc. To extrapolate the "religious" ingredient and to say what this consists of, clearly separated from the other disciplines, is in his view not possible.

For me, this is another way of displaying that religion is not separable from ideological utopian societies and modes of being. Furthermore, religion is not to be excluded from debates about the good in life because of its especially violent or irrational elements, as Cavanaugh succesfully shows that no such elements can be extrapolated. But as I've said I disagree with Cavanaugh on one point: the point where functional definitions of religion is rendered useless by their entanglement with political ideologies. Instead, we should compare these to each other on their shared merits and acknowledge their messy intertwine-ment (is that a word?). We might just want to call it something else. If politics and religion is inseparable, we may want create a new field instead of moving everything from one of them into the other field (thus creating unnecessary confusion). My suggestion is that we call this new field poligion.

Sincerely and theologically yours

Jonatan

Abstract: Young muslims and political left and right in Sweden

I've been working with it over the past year, and finally the time has come to publish it, my exam paper on young muslims' perspective on Swedish politics. The paper is written in Swedish, but will probably be included in a reworked version in a book later this year - in English. I will off course keep you posted. Meanwhile, here is my English abstract.

To what extent do young Muslims relate to the left-right-scale in Swedish politics?: A case study from SUM’s youth conference of 2009.

English Abstract

In Sweden there seem to be a growing concern about young people’s waning involvement in party politics. Another group that is sometimes described as uninvolved in politics is immigrants, living in worn down suburbs with low employment and education levels. In expressing sentiments like those above, it seems that “guilt” is shifted onto young people or immigrants. This essay explores another possibility, namely the hypothesis that the historical divide between a political left versus right may make little sense to parts of the population. If this holds true, it means that young people, immigrants and other people alike may in fact be willing to engage in politics if there was a party who catered for their full range of opinions.

Based on a survey conducted during SUM’s (Sweden’s Young Muslims) annual conference 2009, this paper touches on relevant research on Islam and politics in order to analyze the survey results. The paper also undertakes a critical analysis of one of the theories that argue for keeping left and right as a primary divide in party politics.

The intention was for the data to touch on groups both “young” and to some extent “im-migrant”, but even though the respondents can accurately be described as young, the image painted above regarding immigrants does not hold true for the respondents. Instead they live in big and small cities, and in city centres as well as in both wealthier and poorer suburbs. Moreover, the education level is high, and interest in party politics is anything but marginal.

The survey shows that the respondents agree with sentiments and proposals made both by parties positioned to the left and to the right. Interestingly enough however, the support for the parties positioned to the left (S, V and MP) is strong, and the support for the parties on the right (M, KD, FP and C) is minimal. The tendency of expressing opinions both “left” and “right”, but almost exclusively supporting left-oriented parties largely holds true for the majority of the respondents, and is an important finding from the undertaken survey. There is no party who caters for the whole range of opinions expressed by the respondents. This however, does not seem to hinder the respondents from expressing confidence for the parties positioned to the left. The findings supports the conclusion that left versus right is not necessarily a good primary divide in party politics for the respondents. Conducting the same or similar surveys on other parts of the population would enable a comparison to find out how wide spread or limited this phenomenon may be.

Download as PDF (the paper is in Swedish)

Summary

Every year, everyone and everything racks up a host of best of the year passed and so forth. I instead want to reflect on what I've done this year.

Parenting.

If 2008 was the first trembleing year of parenthood, where both of us read up on methods for this and sollutions to that (kind of like your child was a problem), this year has been smoother sailing. In 2008 some good books were read and placed in the bookcase, this year they've stayed there. A kid means infinite discoveries, and rediscovering, reassessing and understanding things quite differently. It's an exhausting but exhillarating ride.

Music.

Although plans were more extensive I released the I Need a Bassline single together with Waveplant. There's been some other music works in the wings, but I'm waiting for the proper possibilities for this music, rather than just throwing it out there on a wim.

Theology and religious studies.

After reading a load of fantastic books during the last few years, and thereafter having to sum them up in essays - always with a rigorous limit on the maximum number of pages allowed - I've finally been let loose to produce serious academic text. My fieldwork how young muslims view the political left-right-scale in Sweden is finished, and will be published as a pdf (as all exam works are) at the beginning of next year. But more excitingly it will also be made into an article in a book about religion and politics! More about this when it happens.

Wine.

I've found a little collector's streak in me. Although my alcohol consumption is modest, I've managed to try a number of good new wines, and more importantly; understand why I find these wines good. I've gained some knowledge about a few grapes and what characterize them. My main focus has been Pinot Noir, Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc. Chardonnay is wonderful because it generates such an array of wines. I really like American and South African ones that are heavy in oak and butter notes, and I'm also very keen on the crispness of a good Chablis (which is always done on Chardonnay). Even though I've so far been much of a new world-guy I'm very very keen on the french region of Sancerre. And I've learned, as with Chablis, that Sancerre wines are always made from the same grape, which in Sancerre's case is Sauvignon Blanc.

Bread.

To my great delight we had our kitchen re-done this summer. New appliances, and among them a new oven. And so I've started to make bread with a great deal of help from my good friend Manitoba Cream who is always present in my baking. I've also got a lot of inspiration from the blog Pain De Martin (in Swedish). As a rookie baker I've come a long way in a short time. As I'm writing this for instance, my home-made leaven Ciabatta (that has taken me three days to make) are in the oven.

Earlier, I've had some gatherings at home where we ate bread and cheese and drank some exciting wine. This year the wine pairing has gotten more informed and exciting and the bread on which the cheese is places - has been a home-made success!

So, not listing anything as the best or the most exciting, these are things that I've been excited about in 2009. It's probably no stretch to imagine that 2010 may look similar, although it will hopefully involve more music not only being made but also being released.

Best wishes for the futuristic year of 2010!

Jonatan