institutions which perform important social serv-
ices (health care, shelter provision, education, and
the like) and to participate peacefully in electoral
politics.
On the political continuum of Islamism the dif-
ferences in methods veer from the moderate to
the extreme. At one end, the moderates believe in
gradual Islamic education and awareness raising
amongst peoples; active, legal, and peaceful politi-
cal participation; condemnation of violence as a
means to achieving an end; and the importance of
actively participating in the social sector (through
donations of various forms of resources – personal,
financial, or other – to education, health care, wel-
fare services, and so forth). The moderates tend to
believe in political participation, democratization,
and respect for human rights as principles and stan-
dards which are advocated by Islam itself, and will
seek to create alliances across the political spectrum.
At the opposite end of the continuum are the rad-
icals, or extremists, many of whom condone the use
of violence as a legitimate means to the sanctified
objective of spreading the word of God. Most rad-
icals eschew existing political arenas as fundamen-
tally corrupt and opt out of participation, or at
worst decide to wage war against the political
regime and the society. Some radicals also believe
in contributing to social work, but very often such
contributions are made available only to a limited
circle of partisans.
Some Islamists, therefore, have undertaken to bear
arms in a struggle specifically tailored to wreak
mass havoc and destruction in order to bring about
a more religious (and in their eyes, just) political
order, or to consolidate an existing one – such as
the Taliban in Afghanistan, and modern day al-
Qà≠ida (al-Qaeda). Although they are a minority
amongst Islamists, and certainly on the wider polit-
ical spectrum, such extremists are also heard the
most and known the best. Partly because many rad-
icals initially tended to embrace a moderate version
of political conviction, and later (due to a variety of
reasons) veered toward a more radical stance, and
because all Islamists ultimately champion the im-
plementation of Sharì≠a, secular politicians tend to
be deeply suspicious of the democratic credentials
of Islamists. This is despite the fact that many
Islamists assert democratic values of consultation,
consensus, and justice.
Women are active members of all these groups:
fundamentalists, Islamists, and religious extrem-
ists. When the first Islamic political party in the
twentieth century – the Ikhwàn al-Muslimìn
(Muslim Brotherhood) of Egypt – was nearly anni-
hilated by the then president and Arab nationalist
mashriq, egypt, and north africa 607leader Gamal Abdel Nasser, it was single-handedly
kept alive – despite great odds – by one woman,
Zaynab al-Ghazàlì. Al-Ghazàlìwas instrumental in
maintaining the infrastructure, and even the ethos
of the movement, and eventually went on to be-
come a strong proponent of women’s activism
within Islamist movements around the Arab and
Muslim world.
From India to the United States, women are
actively recruiting other women (and men) into
fundamentalist movements. As spokespersons for
the ideology, as the motors of organizations, and
often as ideologues of the need to make women
focus on their primary responsibility as mothers
and wives, women play an important role in
recruiting and mobilizing others within these
movements.
As for religious extremists, research into mem-
bers of Egyptian Jihad and Lebanese Hizballah has
shown that there were women, fully and diversely
veiled, who were prominent not only during the
executive meetings of the movements, but also in
undertaking activities which could – and in some
cases, did – imperil their lives. Whether discussing
strategies of confronting state repression, or carry-
ing arms from one location to another, highly edu-
cated and eloquent women were often crucial
actors and partners within such extremist move-
ments. In other words, not only are women not
absent from religious extremism, but they can be
critical to the success of such movements.
Secular women activists in the Arab world claim
such participation to be “false consciousness.”
Unable to fathom why women would be part of
movements which limit women’s public roles, secu-
lar women activists often regard their female coun-
terparts in Islamist and extremist movements as
being either brainwashed or downright unintelli-
gent. Islamist women activists – and to a large
extent the women members of extremist move-
ments – in turn, see their secular counterparts in
much the same terms: indoctrinated by Western
values and agents of corruption. It might be said
that no movement is as polarized as the women’s
movement between the religious and more secular
activists.
What must be borne in mind, however, is that the
women members of Islamist movements differ
widely in and amongst themselves, more so perhaps
than their sisters in extremist religious organizations.
Indeed, some women Islamists see their engage-
ment within such movements as an empowering
reality, and apply this discourse to argue for women’s
equity and the religious imperative behind women’s
social, economic, and political advancement in