The late twentieth century has seen an unprecedented rise in alternative Islamic discourses. As the Muslim world continues to grapple with the processes of secularisation and globalisation in the twenty-first century, questions of representation and authority remain at the centre of these contemporary debates. Spokespersons for a growing Islamic piety movement and new collective expressions of Muslim practice and activism have appeared throughout the Muslim world. Coloured by local, national, and regional contexts, they share certain commonalities, such as a claim to interpretative authority. Intellectuals, developing new hermeneutical methods to reassess the Islamic heritage, are doing the same. Meanwhile, representatives of 'Establishment Islam' perceive these disputes and demands as a threat to their position. This book argues that the centre of gravity for alternative Islamic discourses will continue to shift from the Arabic-speaking 'heartland' towards the geographical peripheries of the Muslim world and expatriate Muslims in North America and Europe. This process has consequences for the question of authority among Muslims.

The emerging alternative Islamic discourses indicate a move away from recognized and (self-) acclaimed spokespersons. This diffusion of voices leads to a dispersal of authority, challenging binary oppositions and dichotomies of orthodoxy vs. heterodoxy, great vs. little tradition, state vs. civil religion, and calling into question hierarchical structures. In view of recent seismic shifts in the political constellation of the Middle East, the trends discussed in this book hold important clues for the possible direction of future developments in that part of the Muslim world.