A Sultan in Brussels? European Hopes and Fears of Bosnian Muslims
A Sultan in Brussels? European Hopes and Fears of Bosnian Muslims

Summary/Abstract: Abstract: Bosnian Muslims position themselves as European Muslims whose tradition embodies multicultural values. Seeing their future security and prosperity in European integration, they are concerned over Europe's image of Islam. Some have voiced ambi-tions for contributing to a "Euro-Islam." Important assets in this regard are their experi-ence with orderly institutionalization and representation of Islam, indigenous Islamic higher education, and a relaxed Islamic lifestyle adapted to European secular societies. However, Bosnian Islam is not easily packaged for export to heterogeneous Muslim con-texts in western Europe. As a new Islamic fringe makes itself at home in Bosnia, the question is also "which Bosnian Islam." Even within the mainstream influenced by Is-lamic modernism, the embrace of "European" rights and liberties is tempered by fears of moral decline, and by disillusionment with European responses to ethnic cleansing, the "war on terrorism," and the headscarf affair.

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