A Fundamental Fear Eurocentrism and the Emergence of Islamism

The fear and anxiety aroused by Islamism is not a myth, nor is it simply a consequence of terrorism or fundamentalism.

Writing in 1997, before 9/11, before the austerity that has bred a new generation of far right groups across Europe and the US, Bobby Sayyid warned of a spectre haunting western civilization. This ground breaking book is both an analysis of the conditions that have made 'Islamic fundamentalism' possible and a provocative account of the ways in which Muslim identities have, in the west, come to play an increasingly political role over the last two decades. It shows that the spectre of Islamism is more than just a continuation of political and cultural decolonization; it is the returned repressed proof that the western world order is just another civilization among many.

In wake of multiple crises, this is an essential, intricate and challenging story about why individuals chose to kill and be killed in the name of a faith that History had seemingly forgotten.

Professor S. Sayyid is the inaugural Director of the International Centre for Muslim and Non-Muslim Understanding, at the University of South Australia. His numerous publications explore culture and politics and the effects of the postcolonial condition on so-called 'mainstream' socio-political processes and structures. His previous edition of A Fundamental Fear was shortlisted for the British Sociological Association's Philip Abrams Prize and has been banned by the Malaysian government. Professor Sayyid is a member of the Academic Forum of the United Nations 4th Conference on Lesser Developed Countries and has been a keynote speaker at many major international institutions and universities.

Foreword
Preface to the Critique. Influence. Change. Edition
Preface to the Second Edition
Prologue: The Return of the Repressed
1. Framin' Fundamentalism
2. Thinking Islamism, (re)thinking Islamism
3. Kemalism and Politicization of Islam
4. Islam, Modernity and the West
5. Islamism and the Limits of the Invisible Empire
Epilogue: Islamism/Eurocentrism
Bibliography
Index