The Meaning of the Concept in This Book
This book sees Islamism as based on a literal and uncritical reading of history and text, and as using religious memory and values to justify power and violence. It is not presented as an extension of an authentic Islam, but rather as the product of an ideological and political transformation in modern contexts.
Its Place in the Book’s Argument
The concept appears within an argument that links the decline of critique to religion’s transformation into a tool of political legitimation. Islamism here is therefore connected to the justification of politics in the name of religion, and to a critique of activist Islam when it shifts responsibility onto others and selectively reshapes history.
How It Works Within the Atlas
The concept appears in the atlas as a point of convergence among several threads: religions are used as political justification, fundamentalism grows when critique weakens, and sacred violence takes shape when discourses of the enemy, jihad, and al-Qaeda intersect with contemporary appropriations detached from their original context. In this sense, the concept does not operate alone, but within a network that explains how religious reading moves from understanding to ideological instrumentalization.