Secularization in the Muslim World: Relationship Between Government Performance and Religiosity

Abstract

Why Are There More Atheists in the Muslim World? For many years, Muslim countries were outside the secularization trend experienced in different parts of the world. This situation seems to have changed in recent years. Surveys in many Muslim countries show that Muslim societies are rapidly moving away from religion, trust in religious leaders and Islamist parties is declining, and fewer people want religion to have an impact on politics. Yet, it seems that none of the explanations provided by secularization literature, such as revised modernization theory or religious markets theory, can help us adequately understand the decline in religiosity in Muslim countries. I claim that there could be a relationship between people's well-being and religiosity and argue that governments' declining economic performance can explain the recent developments taking place in Muslim countries. Various authors have already shown that politics can influence religion just as religion and religiosity influence politics. With this study, I tried to provide details about conditions under which politics can affect religion and religiosity in Muslim countries. Considering that religion affects every part of Muslims' lives, results from this study may give us an idea about the future of politics in the Muslim world.

Keywords

• Secularization
• Modernization
• Islamist Parties
• Religiosity
• Secularism.

Müslüman Dünyasında Sekülerleşme: Hükümet Performansı ve Dindarlık Arasındaki İlişki

Öz

Müslüman Dünyasında Neden Daha Fazla Ateist Var? Müslüman ülkeler uzun yıllar dünyanın farklı yerlerinde yaşanan sekulerlesme eğiliminin dışında kaldı. Bu durum son yıllarda değişmiş gibi görünüyor. Pek çok Müslüman ülkede yapılan araştırmalar, Müslüman toplumların hızla dinden uzaklaştığını, dini liderlere ve İslamcı partilere olan güvenin azaldığını ve dinin siyaset üzerinde etkili olmasını isteyen insan sayısının azaldığını gösteriyor. Ancak görünen o ki, revize edilmiş modernleşme teorisi veya dini piyasalar teorisi gibi sekülerleşme literatürünün sunduğu açıklamaların hiçbiri, Müslüman ülkelerde dindarlığın azalmasını yeterince anlamamıza yardımcı olamıyor. İnsanların refahı ile dindarlık arasında bir ilişki olabileceğini iddia ediyorum ve hükümetlerin düşen ekonomik performansının Müslüman ülkelerde yaşanan son gelişmeleri açıklayabileceğini savunuyorum. Çeşitli yazarlar, tıpkı din ve dindarlığın siyaseti etkilemesi gibi, siyasetin de dini etkileyebileceğini zaten göstermişlerdir. Bu çalışmayla Müslüman ülkelerde siyasetin hangi koşullar altında din ve dindarlığı etkileyebileceğine dair detaylar vermeye çalıştım. Dinin Müslümanların hayatının her alanını etkilediği göz önüne alındığında, bu çalışmadan elde edilecek sonuçlar bize İslam dünyasında siyasetin geleceği hakkında fikir verebilir.

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Sekülerleşme
• Modernleşme
• İslamcı Partiler
• Dindarlık
• Laiklik

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