Throughout the twentieth century, Muslim religious authorities have been confronted with the task of addressing the relationship between Islam and secularism. Reacting against the controversial ideas of 'Ali 'Abd al-Raziq, early Muslim writings on the subject of secularism focused upon establishing its undesirability and religious impermissibility. Nevertheless, over the past three decades, these discourses have acquired a new dimension. In particular, religious authorities have begun to approach the concept of secularism itself (al-'almaniyya) as an object of analytic interest, critically investigating its basic presuppositions. At the forefront of these efforts have been the religious scholars Safar al-Hawali and Yusuf al-Qaradawi. Western researchers have only recently begun to examine how al-Hawali and al-Qaradawi theorize secularism. Moreover, as yet, no attempt has been made to compare and contrast their ideas. My presentation will help fill this gap by systematically outlining each figure’s views and explaining how they relate to one another. In describing the views of al-Hawali and al-Qaradawi I will focus on their treatment of three questions: (1) How does secularism conceptualize religion? (2) What relationship does secularism posit between religious belief and lived behavior? (3) How does secularism conceptualize freedom of religion? I will show that both al-Hawali and al-Qaradawi challenge conventional secular assumptions on all three points by arguing that legal transactions are an essential element of Muslim religious practice. In doing so, they seek to establish that, contrary to what is claimed by secular liberalism, Muslims can only truly practice their religion in a state which applies Islamic law. On the other hand, despite areas of overlap between al-Hawali and al-Qaradawi, there are significant differences as well. Most importantly, al-Hawali’s analysis is tightly intertwined with Salafist theological postulates inspired by the thought of Ibn Taymiyya. These postulates associate life under a secular regime with apostasy through the absence of religious belief. Such invests al-Hawali’s critique with a more radical character than that of al-Qaradawi. To describe each scholar’s views, I will rely on his original Arabic writings. For al-Hawali, I will use (1) al-'Almaniyya and (2) Zahira al-Irja' fi al-Fikr al-Islami. For al-Qaradawi, I will use (1) al-Islam wa al-'Almaniyya and (2) al-Tatarruf al-'Almani fi Muwajaha al-Islam. In conclusion, my presentation will provide an account of the different ways in which two leading religious scholars have sought to challenge conventional understandings of secularism, thereby setting forth an alternative perspective on religion and politics in contemporary Muslim societies.

Title: Limited Expressions: Intellectuals and Security in Mubarak’s Egypt Abstract The paper investigates the relationship between the state and Egyptian intellectuals under the Mubarak regime. Since 1952, the state had tried to control intellectuals through the regulatory roles of the ministries of information and culture. The three decades between 1981 and 2011 witnessed fluctuating levels of political openness and de-liberalization. Notwithstanding Mubarak’s authoritarian practices, his regime adopted a discriminating policy towards intellectuals’ dissent. Whereas some writers were awarded some liberty to criticize publicly the regime, others were harassed by the security sector. The paper examines this variation in the ruling elite’s position, exploring which forms of opposition were permitted while others were not tolerated, and why. I argue that two factors impacted the regime’s decision to tolerate dissent: intellectuals’ capacity to mobilize and their views with regards to Islamism. The paper shows how the regime’s evaluation of intellectuals’ roles was often tied to its security concerns. In the early years of Mubarak’s rule when regional security was a major concern to the regime, intellectuals were granted higher levels of freedom and encouraged to communicate with fellow Arab intellectuals to help normalize Egypt-Arab relations. When domestic security threats became of a higher concern for the regime by the mid-1990s, intellectuals’ liberties were closely tied to their position vis-à-vis Islamists’ activism and their ability to mobilize. Dissent from intellectuals with more secular views and who were disconnected from protest movements was tolerated by the regime. The research follows the comparative historical approach to examine the development of the state-intellectuals relationship. It relies on extensive archival research of government-owned and independent newspapers covering the Mubarak era. The research also builds on months of field work in Egypt where a number of journalists, historians and writers have been interviewed.

A number of scholars have addressed the great difficulty of defining “Salafism” but few have examined the instability of the term in a particular historical moment, or the efforts of various stakeholders, Salafis included, to reclaim ‘Salafism’ in any depth. Instead, scholars often focus on Salafism’s emergence as an ideology, its incompatibility with modernity, and the piety, practices, and sometimes-violent tendencies of its adherents. The result is a series of narratives that silence Salafis, privilege the longue durée, gravitate toward doctrine, and (over-)emphasize jihad. The dearth of academic scholarship exploring Salafism in modern Egypt is particularly striking. This paper seeks to address this void, which, as will be demonstrated, is further compounded by the writings of those who explore Salafism through a series of reductive classifications incapable of reflecting the complexity of present-day Egyptian politics. The research presented herein is based on Arabic newspaper articles, television broadcasts, YouTube videos, pamphlets distributed in Tahrir Square, and one year of fieldwork in downtown Cairo (2010-2011). The objectives of my analysis are two-fold. First, I seek to understand the processes and conditions under which ‘the Salafis’ were produced in Egyptian mass media in the months following the ousting of Hosni Mubarak. I pay particular attention to the resistance and responses of Salafis to their portrayals as vanguards and villains. I address both the construction and receptions of these representations in order to observe the instability of ‘Salafism’ in a particular historical moment, as well as the efforts of some Salafis to reclaim and re-define their doctrine in front of the Egyptian masses. Secondly, I contest the idea of ‘the Salafis’ as a monolithic entity. I maintain that the tendency of commentators to frame Salafis as a unified movement of like-minded organizations presents a number of shortcomings. After accounting for the weaknesses of movement-based analysis, wherein Egyptian Salafis are compared to, and confused with, Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, I address the complex dynamics at play between, as well as within, Salafi schools and currents, such as the “Salafi Call” (al-Da`wa al-Salafiyya) in Alexandria. Ultimately, I reveal a more complex religious landscape wherein multiple Salafisms compete to define “correct Salafism” in contemporary Egypt.