HENT DE VRIESlive with the skepticism concerning ‘‘other minds,’’ as Stanley Cavell might say? But it
should not be forgotten that the medium in question also gives rise to more disturbing
phenomena, such as mob ‘‘Internet hunting’’ and ‘‘Internet wars.’’^52
In his recentMarket Islam, Patrick Haenni claims that, since the second half of the
1990s, political Islam and radical jihadism are slowly but steadily being overcome by
strategies of engagement and accommodation centered less on the state (the nation, the
ummah), let alone on violence and terror, than on more subtle promises of economic
achievement. The ensuing ‘‘ ‘theology of prosperity’ announces a newMuslim pride, which
no longer passes through armed confrontation or affirmation of an ostentatious piety,
but via performance and competitiveness.’’^53 Haenni observes that a management- and
bourgeoislike individualistic culture of ‘‘free riders’’ of islamization, an emphasis on the
powers of ‘‘positive thinking,’’ is emerging, to be substituted for past disappointments
concerning the restitution of the Caliphate and the general introduction ofsharia—in
short, a ‘‘neo-liberal politicization of Islam,’’ which, ironically, resembles the agenda of
‘‘faith-based initiatives’’ and ‘‘compassionate conversation’’ of the American Republican
Party more than anything else.^54 No longer focused on acquiring power in the nation-
state and shunning the Jacobin (but also Marxist and Keynesian) models of intervention-
ist policies in state-sponsored socialist and welfare states, the new practice of ‘‘market
Islam’’ puts its money on reforming mores in ‘‘civil society.’’
This development goes hand in hand with tendencies in recent Islamic global invest-
ment and private banking in the Middle East and in Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia,
operating in compliance with the requirements ofsharia(which bans usury, the charging
of interest on loans, and all commercial transactions having to do with alcohol, tobacco,
and gambling), while attempting to provide competitive returns (such assukuk, or nonin-
terest rent on revenue). Since February 2006, the Singapore stock exchange lists a ‘‘Shariah
100 Index,’’ which covers Asian banking and trading indexes that comply with traditional
law.^55
Tracking the disillusionment of former Muslim Brotherhood militants, notably in
Egypt, both in conversation and on the Web site islamonline, Haenni sees an aspiration
to turn away from pyramidical hierarchies toward ‘‘operating in networks.’’^56 Its result
will be a ‘‘multipositioned’’ engagement, which no longer aspires to a global political
agenda for Islam but opts instead for a variety of managerial (antiglobalist, ecological,
feminist, cybercultural, etc.) local interventions, whose overall effect will be that of a ‘‘new
mental universe,’’ based upon ‘‘bricolage.’’^57 Again, this new agenda would seem to be
carried out by individuals rather than movements, brotherhoods, or small groups and
cells. They are typically well integrated, oriented toward self-realization, and weary of
great global causes. Its guiding concepts are that of a nonviolent ‘‘civil jihad’’ or even an
‘‘electronic jihad’’ (or ‘‘hacktivism,’’ also meaning, it should be added, taking out anti-
Islamist sites).^58
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