For more than four decades, political Islam was one of the Middle East’s most influential political ideas. The 1979 Iranian Revolution inspired Islamist movements across the region, while organisations such as Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, Tunisia’s Ennahda and Turkey’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) argued that Islam should provide the foundation for politics and government. Scholars including John L. Esposito, Gilles Kepel and Olivier Roy regarded the late twentieth century as the period in which political Islam emerged as one of the dominant ideological forces shaping Middle Eastern politics. When the Arab Spring erupted in 2011, many observers believed the region was entering an Islamist era through democratic elections. That expectation proved short-lived.
Today, although political Islam remains influential in countries such as Iran, Palestinian territories, Yemen and Turkey, it no longer dominates political debate across much of the Arab world. In its place has emerged a new political order centred on state nationalism, and stability.This transformation did not occur because religion became less important. Islam continues to occupy a central place in public life across the Middle East. What has changed is the appeal of Islamism as a political project.
More than three decades ago, the French political scientist Olivier Roy argued in The Failure of Political Islam that Islamist movements were often highly effective at mobilising supporters but struggled to provide a workable model for governing complex modern states. Political scientist Graham E. Fuller similarly observed that while Islamist movements possessed considerable ideological appeal, they faced the same structural constraints and governance challenges as secular governments. Following the Arab Spring, Roy revisited his earlier arguments, noting that although Islamist parties could succeed electorally, they frequently moderated or compromised their ideological ambitions, once confronted with the practical realities of governing, including prioritising coalition building and constitutional compromises.
The sociologist Asef Bayat described this broader evolution as “post-Islamism”. In Post-Islamism: The Changing Faces of Political Islam, he argued that many Muslims were not abandoning religion but were increasingly separating personal faith from political ideology. Bayat maintained that citizens continued to value religion while simultaneously demanding accountable government, economic opportunity, individual dignity and effective public services. His analysis echoes the earlier observations of John L. Esposito that the future of Muslim politics would depend increasingly on governance and institutional performance rather than ideological purity. In other words, growing numbers of citizens sought better government rather than an explicitly Islamic state.
Nowhere has this transition been more evident than in the Gulf monarchies. As political scientist F. Gregory Gause III argues, Gulf states increasingly derive their legitimacy from economic performance, competent administration and national identity rather than ideological mobilisation. Steffen Hertog similarly observes that ambitious programmes of economic diversification, bureaucratic reform and state-led development have become central instruments of political legitimacy. National flags, cultural heritage, global sporting events, tourism initiatives and large-scale development projects have become as significant to state legitimacy as religious symbolism.
This transformation, however, should not be mistaken for democratisation. Most Middle Eastern states remain highly centralised, with political power concentrated in the hands of the state. Independent civil society organisations continue to operate under legal restrictions, while labour unions enjoy no or far less autonomy than those in established democracies. As political scientist Eva Bellin argues, the resilience of authoritarian rule in the Middle East stems not only from ideology but also from the adaptability and institutional strength of the state. As a result, economic modernisation has progressed much faster than political liberalisation.
Political scientist Steven Heydemann anticipated this evolution nearly two decades ago. Writing about what he termed ‘authoritarian upgrading’, he argued that many Arab governments were adapting rather than collapsing. Instead of resisting globalisation, they embraced selective economic reform, technological innovation, administrative modernisation and carefully managed market liberalisation while preserving concentrated political authority. More recently, scholars such as Sean L. Yom have likewise argued that many Middle Eastern governments have reinforced state capacity without undertaking meaningful democratic reforms. These issues include minority rights, political pluralism and questions of equal citizenship as per Andrew F March. Together, these analyses help explain why many governments have become more economically ambitious and administratively effective without becoming substantially more democratic.
Demographic change has further reshaped regional politics. According to the United Nations and the World Bank, the Middle East remains one of the world’s youngest regions. Young people entering the labour market are generally more concerned with employment, affordable housing, inflation, education, entrepreneurship and social mobility than with ideological debates. Successive Arab Barometer surveys consistently show that corruption, economic hardship and poor public services rank among citizens’ greatest concerns across countries including Jordan, Iraq, Lebanon and Tunisia. Political scientist Marc Lynch has argued that the frustrations exposed during and after the Arab Spring were rooted less in ideological competition than in failures of governance, accountability and economic opportunity. Religion remains important, but effective government increasingly matters more than ideological identity. Across much of the region, demands for dignity have increasingly become demands for competent governance.
Political Islam, however, has by no means disappeared. Iran remains the region’s foremost Islamist state, although repeated waves of protest have exposed growing tensions between clerical authority and significant sections of society. Hamas continues to combine Palestinian nationalism with Islamist ideology, while Islamist movements retain influence in Yemen and Turkey. Shadi Hamid has argued that religion remains deeply embedded in the political identities of many Middle Eastern societies and is unlikely to disappear from public life, even where support for Islamist parties fluctuates. Moreover, recent Arab Barometer findings suggest that support for a greater public role for religion has increased in several countries following the instability of recent years, although attitudes continue to vary across the region. The story, therefore, is not one of the disappearance of political Islam but of its uneven evolution and complexity across different political and social contexts.
The Middle East is thus entering a new political era. The region is not replacing political Islam with liberal or pluralist democracy. Rather, it is replacing one principal source of political legitimacy with another. Across much of the Middle East, governments increasingly seek public support through economic growth, technological innovation, infrastructure development, state capacity and national development while retaining firm political control rather than embracing conventional democratic institutions. This shift reflects what Samuel P. Huntington once described as the enduring importance of political order and institutional effectiveness in societies undergoing rapid social and economic change.
As Olivier Roy anticipated decades ago and Asef Bayat later refined through the concept of post-Islamism, the central political question is no longer who governs in the name of religion, but who can deliver prosperity, stability and effective government. Whether this emerging model can satisfy the aspirations of one of the world’s youngest populations will shape the political trajectory of the Middle East for decades to come.
The writer serves as Editor-at-Large for Science Matters India and is a prolific author. Feedback at naveedqazi@live.com
