As the Ottoman Empire crumbled, the Middle East and Balkans became the site of contestation and cooperation between the traditional forces of religion and the emergent machine of the sovereign state. Yet such strategic interaction rarely yielded a decisive victory for either the secular state or for religion. By tracing how state-builders engaged religious institutions, elites, and attachments, this book problematizes the divergent religion-state power configurations that have developed. There are two central arguments. First, states carved out more sovereign space in places like Greece and Turkey, where religious elites were integral to early centralizing reform processes. Second, region-wide structural constraints on the types of linkages that states were able to build with religion have generated long-term repercussions. Fatefully, both state policies that seek to facilitate equality through the recognition of religious difference and state policies that seek to eradicate such difference have contributed to failures of liberal democratic consolidation.

Using historical process tracing, this book examines state interaction with religious elites, institutions, and attachments in Egypt, Greece, and Turkey.

About the Author
Kristin Fabbe is an assistant professor in the Business, Government, and International Economy Unit at Harvard Business School. Dr Fabbe is also faculty affiliate at the Middle East Initiative at the John F. Kennedy School of Government's Belfer Center, the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies, and the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program.

Reviews
'Kristin Fabbe has written a highly engaging study of the historical relationship between religion and state-building in the Middle East and Balkans ... Fabbe's study should appeal to historians and political and other social scientists interested in state-building, secularization, and nationalism.' Mark Biondich, Journal of Church and State



Book Information
ISBN 9781108409452
Author Kristin Fabbe
Format Paperback
Page Count 310
Imprint Cambridge University Press
Publisher Cambridge University Press
Weight(grams) 460g
Dimensions(mm) 227mm * 152mm * 17mm