Laure Guirguis

Copts and the Security State

Violence, Coercion, and Sectarianism in Contemporary Egypt

• Broschiertes Buch

Produktbeschreibung

Laure Guirguis is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Orient-Institut, Max Weber Foundation in Beirut.

Produktdetails

• Stanford Studies in Middle Eastern and Islamic Societies and Cultures
• Verlag: Stanford University Press
• Seitenzahl: 256
• Erscheinungstermin: 30. November 2016
• Englisch
• Abmessung: 229mm x 151mm x 17mm
• Gewicht: 376g
• ISBN-13: 9781503600782
• ISBN-10: 1503600785
• Artikelnr.: 45009950

Autorenporträt

Laure Guirguis is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Orient-Institut, Max Weber Foundation in Beirut.

Inhaltsangabe

Contents and Abstracts
1Institutionalized Violence and the Identity-State
chapter abstract
Although sectarianism depends on a juridical and political order partly
inherited from the Ottoman Empire, this legacy does not explain its
contemporary specificities. Sectarianism has endured to the extent that the
modern state has consolidated it, while profoundly modifying it. In other
words, the state is the principal agent enforcing sectarianism.
2Purity as an Embodiment of Security?
chapter abstract
This chapter deals with the formation of national and community imaginaires
from the nineteenth century to the present day. During the
nineteenth-century nation- and state-building processes, religion became an
identity marker defining both nation and state in opposition to the
occupying powers, which were considered as Christian. By the same token,
group-representations - Egyptian nationalist, Coptic, or Islamist -became
embedded in this logic of exclusion that governs the definition of the self
and the other, and that mobilizes fear.
3The Coptic Church as Space of Resistance and Ally of the Regime
chapter abstract
This chapter offers an analysis of the infra-community dynamics that have
bolstered sectarianism. It shows how the transformation of the Church under
Shenuda III and the contemporary politicization of the minority phenomenon
were determined reciprocally, and how they also both depended on the
relationship between the Church and the regimes.
4Intracommunitarian Dynamics and Tensions
chapter abstract
This chapter sheds light on various dynamics in the community scene, from
clerical rivalries to youth dissent to new kinds of religiosity and
opposition to the Patriarch. Indeed, since the 2000s the clerical
hierarchy's unconditional support for the regime has been the subject of
ever-increasing criticism from Coptic youth and reformers.
5Sectarianism, Authoritarianism, and the Dynamics of Fear
chapter abstract
This chapter continues an analysis of the interconnection between identity
and authoritarian logics. Instead of focusing on the distinction between
authoritarian and democratic regimes and the alleged transition to
democracy, the chapter relies on the Foucauldian notion of governmentality.
This concept allows us to further an analysis of the exercise of social,
political, and symbolic power in contemporary societies and to combine the
analysis of micro- and macro-powers. This chapter shows how the controlled
pluralization of the Egyptian political scene has strengthened
sectarianism, though not without several changes, and it pays special
attention to Muslim Brotherhood attitudes toward Copts.
6Contesting Sectarianism
chapter abstract
The sixth chapter presents the Coptic strategies of resistance to
state-imposed processes of minoritization. In return, it shows how the
regime and the Coptic Church have integrated or neutralized critics.
Finally, it interrogates the impact of advocacy activisms on social
changes, while slightly shifting the terms of debate on the role of "civil
society:" if the world is now in a phase of "de-democratization" how then
should we reassess the impact of advocacy activisms and of the January 25
revolution on social and political change?
Conclusion: 2011-2015: Subversion and the Restoration of Identity Logic
chapter abstract
This chapter outlines the dynamics of the January 25 revolution and shows
how the counter revolutionary governments of former President Muhammad
Morsi and current President Abd al-Fattah al-Sisi have reactivated
sectarian discourses. While the January 25 revolution constitutes the most
radical attempt to break the vicious circle of violence and sectarianism,
revolutionary practices had not yet invented a coherent system of meaning
that would replace the old one. And, the ongoing counter-revolution has
established a new regime of fear.