Pan-Islamic Connections

Transnational Networks Between South Asia and the Gulf

Jaffrelot Christophe, Louer Laurence

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South Asia is today the region inhabited by the largest number of Muslims – roughly 500 million. In the course of its Islamisation process, which began in the eighth century, it developed a distinct Indo-Islamic civilisation that culminated in the Mughal Empire. While paying lip service to the power centres of Islam in the Gulf, including Mecca and Medina, this civilisation has cultivated its own variety of Islam, based on Sufism.

Over the last fifty years, pan-Islamic ties have intensified between these two regions. Gathering together some of the best specialists on the subject, this volume explores these ideological, educational and spiritual networks, which have gained momentum due to political strategies, migration flows and increased communications.

At stake are both the resilience of the civilisation that imbued South Asia with a specific identity, and the relations between Sunnis and Shias in a region where Saudi Arabia and Iran are fighting a cultural proxy war, as evident in the foreign ramifications of sectarianism in Pakistan.

About the Author

Dr Christophe Jaffrelot is Research Director at CNRS and teaches South Asian politics and history at Sciences Po (Paris). From 2000-2008, he was Director of CERI at Sciences Po. Arguably one of the world's most respected writers on Indian society and politics, his publications include "The Hindu Nationalist Movement and Indian Politics, 1925 to the 1990s", "India's Silent Revolution: The Rise of the Lower Castes in North India", and "Dr Ambedkar and Untouchability: Analysing and Fighting Caste", all of which are published by Hurst.

Laurence Louer is Research Fellow at CERI/SciencesPo in Paris. She has served as a permanent consultant for the Policy Planning Department of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs (CAP ) since 2004 and as co-editor-in-chief of Critique Internationale since 2006. Her research focuses on the politics of identity and ethnicity in the Middle East.

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