Islam and Political Violence

Shahram Akbarzadeh is a Senior Lecturer in Global Politics at Monash University. He is Director of the Centre for Muslim Minorities and Islam Policy Studies (CMMIPS). He is the author of 'Uzbekistan and the United States: Islamism, Authoritarianism and Washington's Security Agenda'. Fethi Mansouri is Associate Professor in Middle Eastern Studies at Deakin University. He is the Project Group chair of the Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation and the founding Convenor of the Refugee Studies Group. He is co-author of 'Lives in Limbo' and the editor of 'Australia and the Middle East' (I.B.Tauris 2006).

"'Judiciously blending theoretical discussions with the analysis of manifestations of Islamic sentiment in important parts of the world, this book offers a wealth of instructive material for both specialist and general readers.'-Professor William Maley, Director, Asia-Pacific College of Diplomacy, Australian National University, Canberra 'This is a timely and significant volume. Produced by two of Australia's leading Muslim intellectuals...it provides fresh insight not just on jihadi Islamist terrorism itself but also on our reaction to it, laying bare some of the central complexities and moral quandaries of our troubled times. In their probing essays James Piscatori, Bryan Turner, Riaz Hassan, Greg Fealy and other leading scholars of Muslim society explore the drivers of jihadi Islamism in contemporary Muslim societies, including in Indonesia and the rest of Muslim Asia, and the Islamophobic fears and dark anxieties that this threat has unleashed in western societies. There are no easy answers in this field, but knowledge and insight of the kind presented here is essential to finding a way forward.'-Dr Greg Barton, Associate Professor, Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies (APCSS), USA"