‘democratic constraint’ influences what these movements actually say (1994: 197).
Yet Armstrong cites an American fundamentalist who praises the early puritans for
opposing democracy, and she refers to American fundamentalists who see democracy
as a modern heresy to be abolished, and look towards the reorganisation of society
along biblical lines (2001: 273, 361). Moreover, as will be seen in Wilcox’s (1996)
analysis of the religious right, fundamentalist Christianity can also be militantly
exclusivist and extol violence. Naturally, different fundamentalist movements are
affected by their particular environment (the degree of poverty, unemployment and
authoritarianism), and this accounts for their differential severity and harshness.
Nevertheless, the link between fundamentalism and the dislike for democracy
applies generally, and explains the propensity by fundamentalists for violence. Thus,
the public and private violence of men against women – a gender fundamentalism- involves a refusal to communicate in situations in which patriarchal conditions
are under challenge. There is no question of men imagining what it is like to be a
woman, for differences are absolutised, and used to justify the domination over the
‘other’. Likewise, with the violence of what Giddens calls exclusionary ethnic groups
(1994: 48), fundamentalisms of various kinds can act to sharpen up pre-existing
ethnic or cultural differences. Whenever fundamentalism takes hold, degenerate
spirals of communication threaten where one antipathy feeds on another antipathy,
and hate is heaped upon hate (Giddens, 1994: 243, 245).
Violence, as we have argued elsewhere, involves a radical absence of common
interest, so that the target of violence is seen as an enemy rather than a fellow
human being. Active trust established through an acceptance of difference is the
enemy of fundamentalism. By difference, Giddens means the opposite of what we
have called ‘division’. Dialogic democracy involves a recognition that everyone is
different and this difference is a positive and unifying attribute (Giddens, 1994:
129). In a post-traditional age, he argues, nationalism stands close to aggressive
fundamentalisms, embraced by neo-fascist groups as well as by other sorts of
movements or collectivities (1994: 132). The point about fundamentalism, as it is
conceptualised here, is that it is new so that, as Giddens points out, neo-fascism is
not fascism in its original form – it is a species of fundamentalism steeped with the
potential for violence (Giddens, 1994: 251).
386 Part 3 Contemporary ideologies
- Fundamentalism is a concept rather than a label and it relates not simply to religion but to any
ideology. - Although fundamentalism takes the form of a return to fundamentals, in fact fundamentalists are
highly selective and innovative with regard to sacred texts. - Fundamentalism is a product of modernity and makes use of modern technology, although it
also rails against modernist ideas. - Fundamentalism espouses the use of violence to settle conflicts of interest, and is profoundly
anti-democratic.
Four facts about fundamentalism