C L O S E R

Liveleak.com: Welcome to Taliban-istan

Posted on November 21st, 2007 by .
Categories: Misc. News.

In the heart of Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, FRANCE 24’s Claire Billet meets “Abu Tayeb,” a Taliban special brigade commander.

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How to Look at Homegrown Terror – TIME

Posted on November 21st, 2007 by .
Categories: International Terrorism, ISIM/RU Research, Religious and Political Radicalization, Religious Movements.

How to Look at Homegrown Terror – TIME

How to Look at Homegrown Terror
By Amanda Ripley

The most sophisticated government analysis of the homegrown terrorism threat to be made public in the United States came out this week, and it didn’t come from Washington — not from the FBI, the Director of National Intelligence or the Department of Homeland Security. It came from the New York City Police Department, and with any luck, its release will spur the federal government ostensibly leading the war on terror to show more faith in the general public’s ability to digest serious intelligence.

The report, entitled “Radicalization in the West: The Homegrown Threat,” makes several important and underappreciated points.

— There is no useful profile to predict who will become radicalized. Most would-be terrorists are “unremarkable men” living “unremarkable lives.” They don’t have criminal histories, and they don’t always gather at mosques.

— They do, however, follow remarkably similar behavior patterns. Participants in 11 anti-Western terrorism plots analyzed in the report all went through four stages on the path from unremarkable to violent: Pre-radicalization, Self-identification, Indoctrination and Jihadization.

The report isn’t perfect. The phrase “Jihadization” is problematic, and has already alienated some of the Muslim-American leaders who should be included in this conversation. Nor is it all new. Some of these points have been made before by respected counterterrorism scholars. But the fact that it came from a government organization, not a think tank, and that it struggles mightily not to dumb down its content, makes it exceptional.

“It’s remarkable to me that one of the first public reports on radicalization to get it right came from a police department,” says Chris Heffelfinger, a counterterrorism expert with the Combating Terrorism Center at the U.S. Military Academy, West Point. “Our preconception is that it should come from the top, from the White House, [but] I don’t think the CIA or any other analytic agency has better stuff than this.”

The authors, Mitchell D. Silber and Arvin Bhatt, of the NYPD’s intelligence division, spent months traveling the world and systematically analyzing the facts: who has participated in foiled and realized plots against the West? Where did they meet? What motivated them? And how did they go from being regular people, often citizens of Western nations, to radical violent extremists?

“This was a triumph of sensible men working very, very hard to get a good understanding of how this process works and determined, despite the risks, to get it out into the public,” says Brian Jenkins, a veteran counterterrorism expert at the RAND Corporation who was also a consultant on the report.

The NYPD has, since 9/11, built up one of the most impressive intelligence organizations in the world. The Department has officers based in the U.K., Israel and Europe, among other places. It also has hundreds of linguists who speak Farsi, Arabic and Urdu. Its intelligence division is led by David Cohen, who spent 35 years at the CIA.

In the past, the NYPD has been criticized for not sharing its intelligence widely, and it could have easily kept this report private and still reached its primary audience of law-enforcement officials. But it chose not to. “The NYPD knew it was going to draw some flak, as anything pertaining to domestic intelligence does and should. But we’d rather have the public debate, as noisy and rude as it may be, than have frightened acquiescence,” Jenkins says. “Too much of the message to the American people has been a message of fear, without explanation. In order to really get this, we have to educate, engage and enlist the citizens.”

Of course, doing that has its own dangers, and once the Department made its findings public — after a road show in Washington to the powers that be — it quickly became clear why this kind of thing doesn’t happen as often as it should. First, the broadcast media mischaracterized the report. Certain TV news shows defaulted to their usual “be afraid, be very afraid” script and claimed the report described two dozen active sleeper cells in the U.S. In fact, it did no such thing. If you read the 90-page report, you will see that it is a retrospective analysis of past plots, conducted with meticulous attention to detail. It is not the vague warnings of imminent doom we have heard from the federal government in the past. But the local CBS affiliate in New York City described it as “chilling,” perhaps out of habit.

At the press conference announcing the findings, NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly and his counterterrorism team started out visibly proud of their report. But questions from the media forced Kelly to keep stressing the basics. Reporters wanted to know how many cells Kelly was watching in the New York area, and how frightened we should be. “That’s not what this is about,” he said.

By afternoon, American-Muslim organizations had issued press releases criticizing the report. The Council on American-Islamic Relations said it cast suspicion on all U.S. Muslims, even though the report repeatedly stresses that there is no obvious way to profile would-be terrorists. The Muslim Public Affairs council says the report contradicts the findings of the federal National Intelligence Estimate declassified last month. But that’s an oversimplification. The National Intelligence Estimate did put more emphasis on the threat of al-Qaeda, but both reports stressed the danger of radical, self-generating cells. The federal Estimate is put together by people whose focus is overseas, says Frank Cilluffo at the Homeland Security Policy Institute at George Washington University. The feds will never be as well-positioned as NYPD to understand the homegrown threat. “Ultimately, state and local authorities know their communities best.”

Perhaps one of the best things the report will do is create competitive pressure, Cilluffo suggests, spurring the feds and other police departments to greater feats of transparency and nuance. Historically, at the FBI and the Department of Justice in particular, intelligence is meant to be kept close, and the public is not to be trusted. Hopefully, the public and the NYPD will, eventually, prove them wrong.

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Protected: nu.nl/algemeen | Nationaal onderzoek naar salafisme

Posted on November 21st, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Misc. News.

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Protected: nu.nl/algemeen | Nationaal onderzoek naar salafisme

Posted on November 21st, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Misc. News.

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Divisions in Muslim Brotherhood – World – theage.com.au

Posted on November 21st, 2007 by .
Categories: Religious Movements.

Divisions in Muslim Brotherhood – World – theage.com.au

Muslim Brotherhood members and internet bloggers Sondos Asem Shalabi, 21, and Abdulrahman Mansour, 21, in a cafe in Cairo.
David Wroe
November 17, 2007

THE lowly shoe is considered a degrading weapon in Egypt. To be beaten with a shoe adds insult to injury.

So when Mohamed Mahdi Akef, the Supreme Guide of the Muslim Brotherhood, the banned Islamist group whose members have frequent encounters with the police, threatened critics with his shoes last year, it was seen as a classic example of an intemperate leader’s inability to control his language.

Under Mr Akef’s leadership, the Muslim Brotherhood, considered the world’s largest, oldest and most influential Islamist organisation, is in crisis in its home country. Analysts in Egypt say it is struggling to define its political goals amid divisions at the top and a lack of fresh, charismatic leadership.

At the same time, a new generation of brothers and sisters are gaining prominence through Egypt’s ubiquitous political tool, internet blogging, and are starting, sometimes gently, to criticise their leaders.

Differences within the 79-year-old organisation emerged last month when it released a draft of its first political platform, which advocated banning women and Coptic Christians, who make up a 10th of Egypt’s population, from becoming president. The draft also raised the spectre of an Iran-style religious council.

Before the final version of the platform is released, Mr Akef, 79, indicated in two interviews with The Age that he would not bow on the question of women and Copts. “It is the Muslim Brotherhood’s opinion that a woman cannot be president,” he said.

“How can a Christian president protect the religion of Islam?”

Mr Akef also railed against globalisation, which he sees as naked US ambition, and slammed Western democracy as subservient to whims of the masses, without moral absolutes.

Banned since 1954, the brotherhood shocked the ruling National Democratic Party and Western observers in 2005 by winning a fifth of the seats in the Egyptian Parliament through independent proxies.

Pragmatist brothers are pushing to create a more mainstream political party. But Khalil al-Anani, an expert on political Islam, who has written a book on the brotherhood and is deputy editor of a government-funded political journal, said most brothers did not really understand democratic values such as pluralism and the protection of minorities.

“It’s very complicated for a religious organisation to transfer to a political party,” he said. “Most of them don’t believe in the value of equality.” He said the organisation was in crisis, with deep divisions in the wake of the poor public reaction to its draft platform.

One moderate on the brotherhood’s 15-member executive, Abdel Monem Abou el-Fotouh, told The Age: “I believe it is the right of any citizen to be president, whatever their sex … whatever their religion.”

Brotherhood members played down the divisions but Hesham Kassem, founder of the respected independent newspaper al-Masry al-Youm, said: “I don’t remember ever seeing so many schisms and differences between the dinosaurs and the innovators.”

As well as having influential branches around the world, the brotherhood is Egypt’s strongest opposition to President Hosni Mubarak, who has ruled this country of 80 million people as an effective autocrat since 1981 and is a key ally of the US. The Government initiates periodic crackdowns, the most recent of which has seen 40 members facing military courts, sparking human rights protests. Most leaders have been jailed repeatedly, in Mr Akef’s case for a total of 23 years. Estimates of the brotherhood’s Egyptian membership range from 100,000 to 400,000.

Doubts linger over how it would behave in power. Young brothers become defensive when quizzed on the specifics of Islamic democracy.

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Protected: Rector maakt eind aan 'missiewerk' – Binnenland – Telegraaf.nl [24 uur actueel, ook mobiel] [binnenland]

Posted on November 17th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: ISIM/RU Research, Young Muslims.

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Protected: Rector maakt eind aan ‘missiewerk’ – Binnenland – Telegraaf.nl [24 uur actueel, ook mobiel] [binnenland]

Posted on November 17th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: ISIM/RU Research, Young Muslims.

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Interview: Paul Sniderman | Higher | EducationGuardian.co.uk

Posted on November 16th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Important Publications, Multiculti Issues.

Interview: Paul Sniderman | Higher | EducationGuardian.co.uk
Paul Sniderman: Identity crisis
Paul Sniderman: Identity crisis

Multiculturalism may seem a liberal policy, but it reinforces prejudices, a visiting expert tells John Crace

Tuesday July 3, 2007
The Guardian

The best ideas often have the most unpromising beginnings. Towards the tail end of the 1990s, Paul Sniderman had just finished presenting his findings on immigrant minorities from eastern Europe and Africa to a conference in Italy, when a delegate stood up to ask him a question. “He was only about four sentences in, when I realised there was a huge gap in my research and that I didn’t have a clue what the answer was,” he says.

The question that left him speechless was this: if, as Sniderman claimed, people didn’t distinguish between minorities in their prejudices – those that were systematically hostile to one were likely to be systematically hostile to another – how did he reconcile this with the fact that there were clearly hierarchies of minorities?

Later that afternoon, at a different seminar, the same person asked him another question that was almost as tricky. Again, Sniderman, professor of public policy at Stanford University in California, had no hiding place. “I couldn’t escape the fact that I had clearly made a big mistake,” he says. Many academics might have adopted a policy of damage limitation, before sloping off to lick their wounds in private. Sniderman did something rather different. He invited his conference nemesis – a Dutchman called Louk Hagendoorn – to collaborate on a research project to find out the answers he didn’t have.

This turned out to be the best decision Sniderman ever made. He and Hagendoorn embarked on a study of Muslim minorities in the Netherlands. “We were very lucky,” he says, “because we began our research before anyone was aware there was a problem, before 9/11, and well before the murders of the Dutch film-maker Theo Van Gogh and the gay rightwing politician Pim Fortuyn. This meant there was a purity to our work that wouldn’t have been there if we had been merely reacting to events. We were getting a snapshot of a society before it could be distorted by outside events.”

According to their research – just published in a book, When Ways of Life Collide – deep divisions between locals and Muslim immigrants existed much earlier than anyone had previously suspected in the tolerant, democratic Netherlands. (more…)

1 comment.

Interview: Paul Sniderman | Higher | EducationGuardian.co.uk

Posted on November 16th, 2007 by .
Categories: Important Publications, Multiculti Issues.

Interview: Paul Sniderman | Higher | EducationGuardian.co.uk
Paul Sniderman: Identity crisis
Paul Sniderman: Identity crisis

Multiculturalism may seem a liberal policy, but it reinforces prejudices, a visiting expert tells John Crace

Tuesday July 3, 2007
The Guardian

The best ideas often have the most unpromising beginnings. Towards the tail end of the 1990s, Paul Sniderman had just finished presenting his findings on immigrant minorities from eastern Europe and Africa to a conference in Italy, when a delegate stood up to ask him a question. “He was only about four sentences in, when I realised there was a huge gap in my research and that I didn’t have a clue what the answer was,” he says.

The question that left him speechless was this: if, as Sniderman claimed, people didn’t distinguish between minorities in their prejudices – those that were systematically hostile to one were likely to be systematically hostile to another – how did he reconcile this with the fact that there were clearly hierarchies of minorities?

Later that afternoon, at a different seminar, the same person asked him another question that was almost as tricky. Again, Sniderman, professor of public policy at Stanford University in California, had no hiding place. “I couldn’t escape the fact that I had clearly made a big mistake,” he says. Many academics might have adopted a policy of damage limitation, before sloping off to lick their wounds in private. Sniderman did something rather different. He invited his conference nemesis – a Dutchman called Louk Hagendoorn – to collaborate on a research project to find out the answers he didn’t have.

This turned out to be the best decision Sniderman ever made. He and Hagendoorn embarked on a study of Muslim minorities in the Netherlands. “We were very lucky,” he says, “because we began our research before anyone was aware there was a problem, before 9/11, and well before the murders of the Dutch film-maker Theo Van Gogh and the gay rightwing politician Pim Fortuyn. This meant there was a purity to our work that wouldn’t have been there if we had been merely reacting to events. We were getting a snapshot of a society before it could be distorted by outside events.”

According to their research – just published in a book, When Ways of Life Collide – deep divisions between locals and Muslim immigrants existed much earlier than anyone had previously suspected in the tolerant, democratic Netherlands. (more…)

1 comment.

SCP-publicatie "Discriminatiemonitor niet-westerse allochtonen op de arbeidsmarkt 2007"

Posted on November 16th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

SCP-publicatie “Discriminatiemonitor niet-westerse allochtonen op de arbeidsmarkt 2007”

Niet-westerse allochtonen nemen ten opzichte van autochtonen een ongunstige positie in op de arbeidsmarkt. Zij hebben een grotere kans op werkloosheid en zijn vaker afhankelijk van tijdelijk werk. In hoeverre speelt discriminatie hierbij een rol? Wordt allochtone groepen structureel vaker een (vaste) baan geweigerd? In hoeverre ervaren niet-westerse allochtonen dat zij worden gediscrimineerd bij sollicitaties of in contacten met collega’s en welke gevolgen heeft dit voor het arbeidsmarktgedrag? Op basis van literatuuronderzoek, informatie uit bevolkingsenquêtes en surveys, oordelen van de Commissie Gelijke Behandeling, inventarisatie van klachten bij Anti-discriminatiebureaus en gesprekken met verschillende groepen niet-westerse allochtonen zelf is getracht de aard en omvang van arbeidsdiscriminatie in Nederland in kaart te brengen.

De discriminatiemonitor is uitgevoerd op verzoek van het ministerie van Sociale Zaken en Werkgelegenheid. Het rapport is gezamenlijk geschreven door het Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau en Art.1.

Samenvatting (persbericht): (more…)

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SCP-publicatie “Discriminatiemonitor niet-westerse allochtonen op de arbeidsmarkt 2007”

Posted on November 16th, 2007 by .
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

SCP-publicatie “Discriminatiemonitor niet-westerse allochtonen op de arbeidsmarkt 2007”

Niet-westerse allochtonen nemen ten opzichte van autochtonen een ongunstige positie in op de arbeidsmarkt. Zij hebben een grotere kans op werkloosheid en zijn vaker afhankelijk van tijdelijk werk. In hoeverre speelt discriminatie hierbij een rol? Wordt allochtone groepen structureel vaker een (vaste) baan geweigerd? In hoeverre ervaren niet-westerse allochtonen dat zij worden gediscrimineerd bij sollicitaties of in contacten met collega’s en welke gevolgen heeft dit voor het arbeidsmarktgedrag? Op basis van literatuuronderzoek, informatie uit bevolkingsenquêtes en surveys, oordelen van de Commissie Gelijke Behandeling, inventarisatie van klachten bij Anti-discriminatiebureaus en gesprekken met verschillende groepen niet-westerse allochtonen zelf is getracht de aard en omvang van arbeidsdiscriminatie in Nederland in kaart te brengen.

De discriminatiemonitor is uitgevoerd op verzoek van het ministerie van Sociale Zaken en Werkgelegenheid. Het rapport is gezamenlijk geschreven door het Sociaal en Cultureel Planbureau en Art.1.

Samenvatting (persbericht): (more…)

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SCP-publicatie "Jaarrapport Integratie 2007"

Posted on November 16th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

SCP-publicatie “Jaarrapport Integratie 2007”
Het Jaarrapport Integratie 2007 beschrijft aan de hand van uiteenlopende indicatoren de integratie van niet-westerse allochtonen in Nederland. De aandacht gaat uit naar onder meer de situatie van allochtone leerlingen in het onderwijs, de positie op de arbeids- en woningmarkt, de vertegenwoordiging in de criminaliteit, de sociaal-culturele integratie en de betekenis van religie.
Het beeld van de integratie van niet-westerse allochtonen is divers: sommige groepen kenmerken zich door een forse sociaal-economische achterstand en een aanzienlijke sociaal-culturele afstand. Tegelijkertijd blijkt dat de diversiteit tussen en binnen groepen zeer groot is en dat in het onderwijs en op de arbeids- en woningmarkt duidelijk positieve ontwikkelingen gaande zijn.

Uitgebreide samenvatting (Persbericht): (more…)

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SCP-publicatie “Jaarrapport Integratie 2007”

Posted on November 16th, 2007 by .
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

SCP-publicatie “Jaarrapport Integratie 2007”
Het Jaarrapport Integratie 2007 beschrijft aan de hand van uiteenlopende indicatoren de integratie van niet-westerse allochtonen in Nederland. De aandacht gaat uit naar onder meer de situatie van allochtone leerlingen in het onderwijs, de positie op de arbeids- en woningmarkt, de vertegenwoordiging in de criminaliteit, de sociaal-culturele integratie en de betekenis van religie.
Het beeld van de integratie van niet-westerse allochtonen is divers: sommige groepen kenmerken zich door een forse sociaal-economische achterstand en een aanzienlijke sociaal-culturele afstand. Tegelijkertijd blijkt dat de diversiteit tussen en binnen groepen zeer groot is en dat in het onderwijs en op de arbeids- en woningmarkt duidelijk positieve ontwikkelingen gaande zijn.

Uitgebreide samenvatting (Persbericht): (more…)

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Protected: de Volkskrant – Binnenland – Zwaardere eisen tegen Hofstadgroep

Posted on November 15th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: International Terrorism, Murder on theo Van Gogh and related issues, Religious and Political Radicalization, Young Muslims.

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Protected: Allochtone leerlingen experts in identiteitsvorming – Massimiliano Spotti

Posted on November 14th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Important Publications.

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Imam in Nederland – Welmoet Boender

Posted on November 14th, 2007 by .
Categories: Important Publications, Research International.

De vraag naar de rol die de imam speelt in moskeeën in de Nederlandse seculiere, niet-islamitische samenleving wordt al zo’n dertig jaar gesteld. De kernvragen in dit beschrijvend-exploratieve onderzoek zijn dan ook: Welke rol speelt de imam in de moskeegemeenschap volgens circulerende opvattingen uit het Nederlandse publieke debat over imams? Hoe zien imams en praktiserende gelovigen de rol van de imam in de moskeegemeenschap? Welke zijn de voornaamste overeenkomsten en verschillen in deze rolopvattingen?

De eerste vraag wordt onderzocht door het externe perspectief van het publieke debat over imams tussen 1993 en 2004 te beschrijven. Spraakmakende debatten rond publieke uitspraken zoals van imam El-Moumni en imam Haselhoef worden geanalyseerd

De tweede vraag wordt empirisch beschreven vanuit het interne perspectief van de imam en praktiserende gelovigen in twee moskeegemeenschappen en een islamitische studentenvereniging. Hoe is het om imam te zijn in Nederland? Wat zeggen zij in hun preken en lessen? In de studie zijn onder meer elf Turkse preken vertaald in de appendix opgenomen. Welke interactie en communicatie is er tussen hoogopgeleide jonge mannen en vrouwen die in Nederland zijn opgegroeid en de imam? Wanneer en met welke vragen gaan zij bij de imam te rade? Welk gezag kennen zij hem toe?

De studie geeft antwoord op vragen als: Wordt in het publieke debat zijn invloed uiteindelijk niet overschat? En: Blijft de rol van vrouwelijke religieuze leiders niet te veel buiten beeld door de focus op de imam in de lokale moskee? De indicatieve uitkomsten van de vergelijking tussen het externe en het interne perspectief worden gebruikt om het voortdurende ‘imam debat’ te verhelderen.

Uitgegeven bij Bert Bakker.

Interview NRC Handelsblad door Sheila Kamerman: De imam legt de ‘technische’ regels uit. (more…)

1 comment.

Poetic (in)justice?

Posted on November 10th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: International Terrorism, ISIM/RU Research, Public Islam, Religious and Political Radicalization, Youth culture (as a practice).

Poetic Justice is a literary device which virtue or the good is ultimately rewarded and/or vice punished and is related to Aristotle’s Poetics. According to Aristotle poetry is superior to history in that it shows what should or must happen, rather than merely what does occur. Poetic justice is also used to describe how a work should inspire proper moral behavior in its audience by illustrating the triumph of good over evil.

In 2006 I received an email with a .pdf file that contained an article called Raising Mujahideen Children from a Moroccan-Dutch Muslim woman. Around the same time the article was posted on a Dutch webforum Marokko.nl by someone else which triggered a small discussion. The piece was originally written by Umm Musab al-Gharib; a nickname that I came across several times. Umm Musab al-Gharib aka LyricalTerrorist aka Bint al Shaheed aka Stranger awaiting Martyrdom posted several messages on different websites, mostly poems. Many of those were send to me by the woman I mentioned earlier.

Busy with other things I did not gave it much thought until I read an article at the BBC website about Samina Malik: (more…)

5 comments.

Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam: Tariq Ramadan argues for an intensive debate on citizenship and identity

Posted on November 10th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Misc. News, Public Islam.

Erasmus Universiteit Rotterdam: Tariq Ramadan argues for an intensive debate on citizenship and identity

Ramadan is visiting Professor in Identity and Citizenship at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Yesterday, Tariq Ramadan has held his inaugural lecture at the Erasmus University Rotterdam: Citizenship and Identity: old terminology and new challenges’.. In this lecture he argues for an intensive debate on citizenship and identity.

The European societies are facing new and very complex challenges. The presence of millions of new citizens mainly with a Muslim background is perceived as a potential threat: what about our roots, our legacy, our identity and our future? What do they want? To adapt themselves, to integrate or to silently colonised the European countries? Far from being driven by some negative perceptions, mistrust and fears, it is necessary to come back to a deep, rational and reasonable debate, argues Ramadan. This is where the academic can – and must – help to shape the debate with in-depth, more rationality but also with no compromise as to the essential principles or overwhelming optimism.

According to Ramadan we need a clear and realistic approach: to be able to achieve that, it is important to return to the old concepts – such as citizenship and national identity – and to try to study their past and current meanings (or uses) in order to try to draw the outlines of renewed understandings while setting a clear framework related to the conditions of citizenship. This is the first step helping us to talk about the commonalities and, from there, to tackle the issues of identities, diversity and multiculturalism. Between the worst case scenarios and the idealistic projections, what approach can we propose from an academic viewpoint tacking into account what has already been said while trying to open new channels and to propose creative ways to deal with these issues.

Prof.dr. Tariq Ramadan is Visiting Professor in Identity and Citizenship at Erasmus University Rotterdam, with effect from 1 January 2007. Prof. dr Ramadan will hold the post at least for a period of two years. The chair is shared by the Faculty of Social Sciences and the Faculty of History and Arts of Erasmus University Rotterdam, and was created for four years on the initiative of Rotterdam city council.

Prof. dr Tariq Ramadan (45) is a philosopher and theologist. He is particularly well known for his work in philosophy and Islamic studies, where he has made a special study of the recent growth of Islamic communities in Europe. Prof. dr Ramadan is a strong advocate of full participation by Muslims in European society and is known for his critical stance towards Muslims and non-Muslims alike. His message that Muslims can and must be good, fully-participating European citizens has made him one of the leading voices of contemporary Islam and an example to many young people wrestling with questions of identity and citizenship.

The new Visiting Professor is a Swiss citizen with an Egyptian background. He took a doctorate from the University of Genève in 1998. Between 1997 and 2004, he was attached to the Department of Philosophy at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. Dr Ramadan holds numerous academic posts, including that of Visiting Fellow at St Anthony’s College, Oxford, which he has held since 2005.

You can read the summary of his lecture (in English and published in the NRC Handelsblad) here:

(more…)

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Social Science Research Council: The Immanent Frame

Posted on November 10th, 2007 by .
Categories: Blogosphere.

The Social Science Research Council has announced the launch of The Immanent Frame, a new SSRC blog on secularism, religion, and the public sphere.

The blog is opening with a series of posts on Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age, including recent contributions from Robert Bellah, Wendy Brown, Jose Casanova, Elizabeth Shakman Hurd, and Colin Jager. Robert Bellah has called A Secular Age “one of the most important books to be written in my lifetime,” and there will be more to come on Taylor’s major work in the weeks ahead, with posts by Rajeev Bhargava, Akeel Bilgrami, Hent de Vries, Amy Hollywood, Tomoko Masuzawa, Joan Scott, and others. Meanwhile, Charles Taylor himself has just made his own contribution to the already ongoing conversations.

Later this fall The Immanent Frame will host a series of posts responding to Mark Lilla’s The Stillborn God: Religion, Politics, and the Modern West. And there will be posts on a variety of other topics too—from pluralism and the “post-secular” to international relations theory, religious freedom, and the future of shari’a.

This new SSRC blog will draw on, and is closely linked to, the Council’s expanding work on religion and the public sphere.

1 comment.

Protected: L1 – Radicalisering in Roermond?

Posted on November 9th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Religious and Political Radicalization.

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Boosmakertjes

Posted on November 7th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

Boosmakertjes: pakkende termen of zelfs hele berichten die gegarandeerd felle reacties losmaken onder lezers. Voorbeelden te over: gebruiken termen als landverraad, wijs op blunders bij justitie, vermeld dat mensen iets moeten betalen (dat ze eerder als voorschot hebben gehad op basis van eigen berekeningen) enzovoorts. Iedere krant of omroep kent het principe wel. Met name de Telegraaf is er goed (sterker nog ik heb de term van hun journalisten, ere wie ere toekomt).

Kampioen hierin is toch wel Geenstijl.nl en hun spin off Nieuwnieuws.nl. De boosmakertjes hier hebben onder andere vaak betrekking op Marokkanen. Kijk bijvoorbeeld even naar het volgende persbericht van het onderzoek van Jan Dirk de Jong: (more…)

11 comments.

Allochtonenweblog stopt er (voorlopig) mee

Posted on November 7th, 2007 by .
Categories: Misc. News.

Op Allochtonenweblog valt te lezen dat Ewoud Butter (voorlopig) stopt met zijn uit de hand gelopen hobby om dagelijks berichten te plaatsen die iets te maken hadden met de integratie van etnische minderheden in Nederland. Gaandeweg is het weblog uitgegroeid tot één van de belangrijkste online verzamelingen van berichtgeving over de multiculturele samenleving. Regelmatig zijn berichten op Allochtonenweblog voor mij aanleiding geweest om ze ook hier te posten of er een commentaar over te schrijven. Allochtonenweblog was vaak wat saai en degelijk en dat was wel een verademing in een samenleving die van de ene in de andere hype valt.

De persoonlijke weblog van Ewoud Butter gaat wel door: http://ewoudbutter.web-log.nl.
Ook daar vindt u stukken over integratie, maar ook andere zaken zoals  informatie over zijn roman Isa die begin 2008 zal verschijnen.

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Universiteit Utrecht – Willem Pompe Instituut: ‘DUBBEL DE KLOS – slachtofferschap van criminaliteit onder etnische minderheden’

Posted on November 7th, 2007 by .
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

Universiteit Utrecht Rechtsgeleerdheid – Willem Pompe Instituut: strafrecht en criminologie

‘DUBBEL DE KLOS – slachtofferschap van criminaliteit onder etnische minderheden’
Maandag 26 november 2007 – van 12.00 tot 17.00 uur

De maatschappelijke discussie over criminaliteit wordt in Nederland overheerst door bezorgdheid over allochtonen als daders van criminaliteit. De problemen zijn reëel genoeg, maar zijn er onder etnische minderheden dan geen slachtoffers van criminaliteit?

Op maandag 26 november 2007 wordt het boek ‘Dubbel de klos’ geschreven onder redactie van Dirk J. Korf en Frank Bovenkerk (beiden verbonden aan het Willem Pompe Instituut voor Strafrechtswetenschappen van de Universiteit Utrecht) gepresenteerd aan de minister van Justitie, Prof.mr. Ernst Hirsch Ballin. Er zal tijdens dit symposium gesproken en gedebatteerd worden door gezaghebbende vertegenwoordigers van de politiek, politie, slachtofferhulp, minderheden en wetenschap.

Uit het boek blijkt zonneklaar: jazeker, allochtonen worden slachtoffer van criminaliteit! En dan niet uitsluitend van stereotiepe delicten als eerwraak, vrouwenbesnijdenis of liquidaties in het criminele circuit. Net als autochtone Nederlanders worden zij bestolen, bedreigd, beroofd en mishandeld. Dat blijkt uit verhalen van Marokkaanse, Turkse, Surinaamse en Antilliaanse bewoners en ondernemers. En ook uit cijfers van slachtofferenquêtes en de politie. Veel misdaad is blind voor de etnische achtergrond van slachtoffers. Maar soms kiezen daders juist allochtone slachtoffers, bijvoorbeeld omdat zij niet zo gauw aangifte bij de politie zullen doen.

Graag nodigen wij u uit om van 12.00 uur tot 17.00 uur aanwezig te zijn bij het symposium dat gehouden wordt in Ottone, Kromme Nieuwegracht 62 te Utrecht.

U kunt zich inschrijven via onderstaande link. Een week voorafgaand aan het symposium ontvangt u per post de uitnodiging. U kunt zich aanmelden tot vrijdag 16 november a.s.

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Protected: 'Onbedoelde discriminatie in jeugdrecht' – telegraaf.nl [Binnenland]

Posted on November 7th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

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Protected: ‘Onbedoelde discriminatie in jeugdrecht’ – telegraaf.nl [Binnenland]

Posted on November 7th, 2007 by martijn.
Categories: Multiculti Issues.

Enter your password to view comments.

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