Vroom, H.M.

DSpace at VU

European Ideas Network & Centre for European Studies  February 9, 2011 
 
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WHAT POLICIES TOWARDS ISLAM? 
 
If we think about Islam today, we think about Cairo, Tripoli, Yemen, and we realise how decisive 
present developments are for the future of the world and the EU.  Our esteemed chair, Wilfried 
Martens, has addressed those developments. From my own experiences in meetings with 
Muslim leaders and Islam Conferences in Morocco and Cairo, I would stress that there is much 
more openness in leading Islamic circles than the media reports—I should say: than what we 
remember from the media. I have heard about the freedom of conversion—no use of force in 
religion!—greater gender equality, democratic developments from leading Muslims all over the 
world as well as in leading circles in Rabat and Cairo. I would like to add two remarks:  
1. First, one, if not the most important factor, in policy on Islam in Islamic states is the fear 
of radicalisation. This is one reason why Islamic states are so interested in the 
developments of Islam in Europe—they do not want radical imams in Europe to produce 
unrest that could be transported to their countries.  
On the one hand, this interest stimulates interest in the development of a sound, healthy 
Islam in the European Union. On the other hand, they think that the state should develop 
a policy in relation to Islam: not everything goes; religion has to be the subject of 
reflection. 
2. Democracy depends on social conditions such as education, the quality of the media, 
social security for people who cannot help themselves, and a high level of social 
cohesion. This implies, I think, that Muslims in the EU can assist in these developments 
by developing Islamic universal ethics and the idea of the dignity of each human being 
into an Islamic theory of democracy. However, the implementation of this is not that 
easy. 
Islam in Europe  
We speak about Islam in Europe; it is not correct to speak about Islam as a monolithic entity. Just 
as the inheritance of Confucian social structures varies in Korea, China, and Japan, so Islam has 
several different groups, widely varying developments, backward and modern situations 
(Karachi, Jakarta, and Istanbul). Muslims in the EU also have widely varying statuses: fourth- or 
even fifth-generation Muslims in Paris and London, guest workers in Berlin, Dusseldorf, Lille, 
Antwerp, Malmö, and Rotterdam, refugees in all countries from different cultures. There is not 
only one Islam in Europe, and a European Islam still needs to develop. That is in the common 
interest of young Muslims, foreign Islamic states, and European governments. Therefore, this 
ideal is a possibility but it requires that we—politicians, scholars, and educators—work together 
and facilitate this needy development.   
In this presentation, I would like to stress four points: diversity, education, social cohesion, and 
the equal treatment of different traditions. 
1. The Acceptance of Difference 
First, two quotes—I will just quote them: 
European Ideas Network & Centre for European Studies  February 9, 2011 
 
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“In ... we are accepted as Moroccans but not as Muslims.” The speaker here is someone who 
had fought for independence, was later sent into exile, and had just returned in 1995 to 
Morocco. This comment was made at a conference in a program on European-Arab Dialogue. 
“In this country I have to leave my religion at home to be accepted.” The speaker here is an 
African from Nigeria or Ghana during a conference of the European Society for Intercultural 
Theology and Interreligious Studies, Birmingham, 2007. The full quote: “In this country I 
have to leave my religion at home to be accepted. But if I have to leave my religion at home, I 
cannot come because my religion, that’s me.” 
This may be difficult to accept from a laic point of view, but it is nevertheless how the large 
majority of the world’s population think and live. “Europe, the Exception”―that is the title one 
scholar (Grace Davie) chose for her sociological book on religion in different parts of the world.  
There is more to say about this matter, but this much is true: Muslims are Muslims first; that is 
their identity, and one cannot leave one’s home and enter the public sphere without one’s 
identity. Therefore, Muslims have to be accepted as Muslims in the state and by the state. Even a 
state that privatises religion 100% has to compromise. Moreover, it is clear they do: cemeteries, 
law on slaughtering animals, rules for clothing and buildings, and subsidies for sociocultural 
work.  Every government deals with Muslims as Muslims. I would say: Be transparent. Bring it 
out into the open! 
2.  Islamic Education 
To develop a contextualized Islam, Muslims need education. To fight islamophobia (and prevent 
hate language and discrimination) all schools should teach religious studies—which will also 
include secular worldview traditions. For Muslims, that has to be information about Islam. An 
example: our Qur’an and tafsir expert held public lectures in the university; afterwards, one 
Muslim young person said “Thank you!” and added: “I really did not know that we believe in 
God; I thought we believe in Mohammed.” It is because the level of knowledge of real Islam is so 
low that people are open to more radical forms of Salafism.  
Information is needed, but religious studies is not enough. The speaker should have the 
authority to develop the Islamic tradition. A non-Muslim scholar can say to Muslims—as I have 
heard somebody say, “You may think so, but in other parts of the world are Muslims who think 
otherwise.” I could say: “Our fiqh scholar stresses that it is the intentions of Islamic laws that are 
decisive; he is an acknowledged authority, and I think that he is right.” Muslims have to develop 
their tradition themselves.  This implies that knowledgeable Muslims should teach Muslim 
children and students.  
In turn, this also requires that institutions of higher education be involved in the training of 
Islamic teachers of Islam and imams. Muslim ethics and laws have to be applied to new 
circumstances. Islamic theology has a field of studies concerned with new ethical questions: fiqh 
al-waqi’. In the more secular parts of Europe Muslims have to be able to explain their religion 
and develop their religion in exchange with others. This requires tough theology, but theology 
does not develop in private institutions but needs an academic environment: a university setting 
in which Muslims—and,  with all due respect,  not islamologists—study their own tradition and 
dialogue with people from other areas of expertise and other worldview traditions. I like 
religious studies, but it is not enough. Universities should study and teach theologies and train 
European Ideas Network & Centre for European Studies  February 9, 2011 
 
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leaders of humanists, Buddhists, Hindus, Islam, churches: not in isolation but authentically in 
their tradition and in dialogue with one another. 
3. Social Cohesion, Diversity, and Fundamental Values 
The reason for establishing institutions for various traditions is twofold. First, we have to grant 
freedom for diversity in worldviews, not only individually but also as groups. Worldviews are 
about one’s values and ideals, both for oneself and for society at large.  To live according to one’s 
own (secular or religious) beliefs, one needs some structures: channels to deepen one’s insight 
(like zendos, Freemasons’ houses, mosques, synagogues, or churches; documentaries on 
different worldview traditions; publications; we also need groups and other people to advise us 
on how to live and to support us in difficult circumstances. Value traditions have 
infrastructures—in very different ways. Thinking about diversity and human rights on freedom 
of religion/worldview, assembly, and conscience, we cannot just say: government, it’s none of 
your business!—as they say on the other side of the Atlantic. 
Second, however, our lives are intertwined in our modern and complex societies. Only 
together can we reach high standards of living. Only when most people feel at home in 
society, we can feel safe. We need police officers who are honest and just—but these values 
are bound up with our cultures, as we see that in many countries these virtues are needed but 
are not present. If there is one thing that is personal, it is virtue. However, we depend on 
virtues. We depend on the willingness to cooperate, to listen to one another, to answer 
questions, and sometimes to give way to others and to help one another. Rules are not enough: 
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? Who will guard the guards?—as the question was put to 
Socrates. Wisdom and honesty are not learned by rules. Therefore, the state is empty-handed 
in relation to the social cohesion on which our societies rest. Governments can facilitate 
others to do the job. The ground for policy in relation to worldview organisations and media 
coverage of worldview traditions in documentaries, arts, etc. is that people have to live and 
work together in one society. In the end we are not only responsible for ourselves and the 
people we like, but for all. 
I do not think that the state is able to inspire people to help others and find meaning in their 
lives. Therefore, governments have to facilitate institutions that do help people to live 
meaningful lives in our midst—and for Muslims. On the one hand, the modern state has to 
grant freedom and give way to diversity; on the other hand, the modern state has to stimulate 
social cohesion and cooperation. 
Therefore, the state should work together with Muslim organisations for three reasons:  
• to help them become members of the EU states in their own right  
• for social cohesion  
• and for the security reasons I mentioned earlier. 
In this way, the state has the obligation to defend and propagate the fundamental values of the 
modern social and just state. In the research paper you will find a section on the realistic but 
troublesome issue of Leitkultur, identité française, etc.: the search for common values—that 
are not innate by birth but the results of historical processes. 
European Ideas Network & Centre for European Studies  February 9, 2011 
 
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The solution for (secular/religious) worldview diversity is dialogue, and not privatisation. 
Therefore, religious education should be part of the normal educational system. Neutral 
religious studies are helpful but enough.  
4. Equal Treatment of Unequal Traditions 
This implies a different solution for equal treatment from privatisation of religion and a laic 
public domain. It requires equal treatment. However, the various traditions have different 
structures. The laws of EU states presuppose the structures of Christian churches. The 
churches have rules; most apply canonical or church law. Law acknowledges these old 
organisations with their rules and representatives, but other religious traditions have 
completely different structures. In the research paper, I describe how the French, German and 
Dutch governments have dealt with this problem. All three have taken the initiative in coming 
to an Islamic umbrella organisation. Of course, also France collaborates with Christian and 
Islamic organisations. In Germany, culture (and religion) is Landeshoheit (the responsibility 
of the federal states); nevertheless, the national government started an Islam Konferenz—and 
I would say: rightly so. The Dutch government has a double policy, one side of which is 
laicism, and the other of collaboration. In 2004 the Minister of Integration at the time urged 
the mosques to form an umbrella organisation. However, this organisation is more or less a 
lame duck. Let me tell you why, and in the background we can see the recent resistance 
movements in Tunisia and Egypt. 
The Egyptian (former?) Minister of Religion (Professor Mahmoud Zarzouk) is a sincere 
defender of collaboration between Islam and Christianity. He studied in Munich and speaks 
fluent German. He organises dialogue meetings with Islam scholars and people from abroad. 
His office is responsible for Islam. I think the Egyptian and the Moroccan government 
officials would not find it a good idea for every local mosque community to choose its own 
imam. Therefore, the offices of the ministers of religious affairs appoint 30-50,000 imams. 
That is not freedom of religion, of course. But freedom of religion presupposes a degree self-
criticism within the church or mosque, and a public domain in which people can ask critical 
questions too. That is lacking. Maybe they should have done more to build more and better 
schools and to form such a public domain, but my point is that Islamic education in North 
Africa is very traditional: students learn a great deal by rote, are not acquainted with plurality, 
and therefore not forced to be truly self-conscious as Islamic leaders. The Islamic University 
in Cairo is probably the most international university in the world, but it is mono-religious. 
Guest workers from North Africa and Turkey are often simple but honest people. The Turkish 
people had it easy. The official Turkish agency for religion sends and pays imams; the 
Turkish communities in Western Europe have to pay increasingly for their own mosques. 
Other Turks used the freedom of religion to organise themselves: Milli Görüs and the 
Suleymanis. They are forbidden in Turkey—although the Turkish policy is moving on. 
However, in the EU these Turkish Islamic organisations are allowed to be active. Turkish 
Islamic organisations usually are well-organised. I do not know if official Turkish Islam fully 
trusts what they do. In Western Europe the official national organisations are rather 
independent from Turkey, but important decisions have to be made in Ankara—which also 
provides sermons that can or ought to be used in Holland now with summaries in Dutch. 
The other Muslims, North African, Iraqi or Pakistani, organised their mosques themselves 
without a minister of religious affairs. The boards of the local mosques appoint the imams 
themselves—sometimes imams who were not given a place in Morocco but are welcome to 
European Ideas Network & Centre for European Studies  February 9, 2011 
 
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help in Western Europe. The Chambers of Commerce list these umbrella organisations, but in 
the end, they lack anything that resembles canonical law. The solution is the most modern 
model of organisation: the network. And this is the instrument: the mobile phone. If one asks 
what the equivalent of church law the answer would be, it is the mobile phone. That sounds 
funnier than it is. What do politicians do if they want to legislate something? How are 
majorities found in parliament? By networking—with one’s mobile phone, having a meal 
together during the breaks, maybe an iftar or other meal. I just want to say: Muslims are 
human. 
The serious point is that our governments find it difficult to collaborate with Muslims 
organisations with a few loose rules for representation. My advice is: do it nevertheless. 
The equal treatment of diverse organisations is not equal for those organisations that do not fit 
in the system of another. Equal treatment has to respect diversity and find solutions that 
respect the history and the nature of those other traditions. My advice is: work towards the 
ideal of making sure Muslims receive a high-quality education, of finding imams who are at 
home in Western society and are authentically Muslim. If that happens, then Islam will not be 
a Fremdkörper in Europe anymore and we can learn from each other, and I think that Western 
Muslims will stimulate collaboration with colleagues in Islamic countries. From our 
perspective, that could help the development of democracies elsewhere. Such contacts are 
very interesting, as we have experienced with our Centre of Islamic Theology in Amsterdam 
in a conference on medical ethics with the Medical Faculty and colleagues from Cairo 
(November 2010). We have much more in common than people think. Colleagues from Cairo 
wanted to have another conference on principles of democracy, gender, and economic ethics. 
Politicians can talk about such subjects as well. From our perspective, we will talk about 
human dignity (and what it means), democracy (and what it means practically), equality (and 
what it implies)―and why should we not speak about banking, economy, individual 
autonomy, etc.? We cannot dictate what other people should believe, but we can talk and 
study and sometimes we even learn from the other—that is not fully impossible, isn’t it? 
My advice is: take Muslims seriously as Muslims, and talk, ask, answer, and accept different 
traditions in their own right. If necessary, ask critical questions. Whoever does not ask and 
listen cannot learn. 
 
Hendrik M. Vroom 
Coordinator Centre for Islamic Theology 
Prof. Em Philosophy of Religion 
VU University Amsterdam 


What policies towards Islam?

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What policies towards Islam?

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