Understanding Salafism [electronic resource] / by Mohamed-Ali Adraoui.

Chapter 1: Understanding Salafism: A Few Introductory Remarks -- Chapter 2: Defining Salafism: What is at Stake? -- Chapter 3: Salafism: A Brief History -- Chapter 4: The Basics of the Salafist Ethic -- Chapter 5: The Globalization of Salafism -- Chapter 6: The Fragmentation and Crisis of Salafism: The Saudi Turn and the Rise of New Ideological Contenders -- Chapter 7: Salafism and Modernity: Beyond Politics -- Chapter 8: Understanding Past and Today Jihadism -- Chapter 9: Salafism in Context: Understanding the Issue of Ideological and Social Permeability, and the Value Placed on Quietism, Political Participation and Violence -- Chapter 10: By Way of Conclusion: Salafism as a Vector. A Container more than a Content? Beyond the Essentialization of a Fundamentalism.

This book addresses the issue of one of the most visible and debated currents in contemporary radical Islam. It sheds light on the history, the fundamental principles, and the political and religious translations of Salafism and explains current events involving Salafist actors in an objective and dispassionate manner. The author explains with precision the different contemporary Salafist mobilizations by illustrating them with specific cases while shedding light on the main debates related to this mode of understanding of the Muslim religion, such as its potential role in triggering certain forms of violence, the way to compare it to other fundamentalist versions in other religions, or the way to describe, in terms of social sciences, the main concepts and discourses that can be observed in this current of Islam today. Mohamed-Ali Adraoui is Research Fellow and Lecturer in International Relations at Sciences Po Paris, France.