Religious Politics and Secular States
Egypt, India, and the United States
- 326 pages
- 12 hours of reading
The United States, Egypt, and India were known as ideal models of secular modernity during the 1950s and 1960s. By the 1980s and 1990s, conservative Islamists challenged the Egyptian government, Hindu nationalism rose in India, and the Christian right emerged in the United States to dominate the Republican Party and large segments of public discourse. The author discusses this using a precise theoretical framework that emphasizes the interaction between religion and politics, demonstrating that three closely related factors have led to the current situation and ignited a new era of right-wing religious populism within the three countries.