The Role Religious Leaders in Combating Extremism

Religious extremism is a fundamental socio-cultural issue in Pakistan. The state and society must control the issue before it spreads across.

Saqlain Raza

The Role of Religious Leaders in Promoting Peace and Combating Extremism is generally considered an abstract motive and intellectually indoctrinated mindset. From a particular direction-based psychological buildup to a social construction mechanism, it is an aspect of perception problems and the buildup of false biases. 

Meanwhile, regardless of extremism, kinetics measures countering their intellectual gatekeeping play an important role in their combat. Using social and intellectual gatekeeping for social cohesion and mutual harmony, religious pundits can play an important role in building a plural society and countering the intellectual phobia of extremism. “Exceptional security discourse, Pakistan construct as an over homogenous national security state, single-handed de-facto Institutions led policies, participation in no win war as a buffer is a brief summary of Pakistan extremism penetrated thaw which proved a hydra-headed monster for Pakistan for all time.”

In a social construction phenomenon, the binary of narrative matters much. The same phenomena are applied to Quintessential, the social construction of extremism. Generally, extremism is an abstract motive totally dependent upon social construction and construction toward a particular mindset of biases. In an extremism warfare of narrative, the first and foremost thing that is done is the falsification of biases of their recruits. By keeping the narrative gatekeeping towards a particular motive, a stigma of intellectual inclination towards particular intellectual rigour is indoctrinated to specific acts of radicalism and extremism. 

Before the kinetic action of extremism, it was a war of perceptions, a war of narrative, and a war of ideological gatekeeping, which has been won in order to make an influential cult. Peeping into windows of the past to understand the factual context of extremism penetrated thaw in Pakistan, whose roots can be found since partitions. Since partition from being in charge of colonial legacy to latterly impeding colonial inertia, Pakistan policies, from a realistic lens, remained on the Principle of hostage Factor and peer pressure on their neighbours, particularly viewing Indian-centric factor. 

The ideological, led patterns of state governance and controversy as an ideological state between different ethnic, cultural, and religious factions remained another issue. Last but not least, USA-led capitalistic war theatre in Afghan land and Pakistan’s role as a buffer state remained a Major reason for the overproduction of non-state actors’ breeds and their extreme intellectual and physical kinetics measures. Since the USSR’s arrival in Afghanistan, the jihadi recruits and the Jihadi factor that was put to counter them played a bouncing back factor and factor affects spillover. Though, for Afghanistan, it emerged as a new normal of their fate in the form of turning de facto militants into de-jure gatekeepers, for Pakistan’s factional and militant organizations, it proved a much more confident as an intellectual likewise franchise for their hideout’s resurgence and resurgence of sleeper cells in the form of extremism. 

While analyzing the dynamics of Pakistan’s statecraft operational vehicle, the political conflict analogy remained slightly confused among state actors. Institutional monopoly remained a buzzword. The military complex, up to some extent, becomes a resultant product of extremist tendencies. From ground-level politics to politics of the policy-making process, civilians’ roles always remained weak and dictated at a second rate. The lack of consistency in policies and strategic depth led to the model of the garrison state eventually turning into a strategic enigma. The post-jihad environment poses a serious threat either on the basis of the non-state actor’s model of self-proclaimed Shariah imposition to the self-proclaimed Caliphate. Swat and Northwest frontier regions remained primarily under the cult of this act.

But, more recently, the U.S.’s withdrawal acted as a new normal of militancy and their resurgence over similar ground and factors of spillover effect. Meanwhile, deconstructing the dynamics of today’s technological warfare and warfare of cyberbullying extremist narrative construction becomes an easy task to infiltrate and indoctrinate the mindset of particular factions towards extremism. Narrative construction on false and radial grounds and their advertising over particular motives poses a major challenge to social cohesion and social plurality. To debunk the overall monopoly of cyber radicalism, only the made trajectory of narrative and their widespread spectrum can counter this monster. 

Religious pundits’ more and more social roles among their cults can counter extremism through teaching and preaching interfaith harmony. By using the mass communication industry, the role of religious pundits can be defined more clearly in narratives of social cohesion and plural diaries. While looking at Pakistan’s nine lives, much of the rationale seems clearly divided among colonial legacy, class war, and intersectional oppression and suppression on the basis of sectarian extremism. Previously, militant’s monopoly over violence remained a prima fascia of extremism and terrorism. As much of Pakistan’s domestic rationale revolves around the shrine’s culture, by using this space, a plural construct can also be made. Previously, the ideological council of Pakistan played a vital role in promoting harmony, but a more inclusive approach is needed for more and more interfaith harmony. Looking for religious pundits’ harmony built up in the age of non-state actors-led Islam and an Islam of revisionist rigour, the ijtihad and ijma are the only requisites and prerequisites to counter this. Consensusmade policies create a heterogeneous culture with respect to religion, Caste, Creed, culture and ethnicity, which can counter the amalgam of monoliths of the homogenous model of extremism. Construction of societal trends over logical reasoning and installing the cancel culture of extremism scepticism, this menace can be side-lined. 

While looking at Moeed Yousef’s thesis as a case study, the Moeed lens gave more pass to buck to our consistent nostalgia for state-led strategic policies. Consistent policies of rifts and no shift from rifts are only the major reasons for extremism. Garrison’s State-led, ready-made History, desired culture, and homogenous model of ruling and governance could have created this extremist discourse and terrorist mess. Elite monopoly and state construct on elite capture mainly radicalized the mindset on class structure factor and on ethnic foundations. While giving a solution to this menace, Yousef tells us pluralism as a part of governance due to the sharing of everyone’s intellectual spaces and gatekeeping, a shift from Geo politics to Geo economics and policies of win-win is the only viable option and clear solutions to eradicate the roots of extremism. Yousef also explains that previously, the Major cause of sectarian extremism in Pakistan remained the spillover effects of two neighbour-based similar factors. 

After the Iranian revolution, their similar factor remained a new normal for the particular sect, but compared to the Saudi Angel of Wahabi school of thought, acts as a peer competitor of that. Additionally, additionally, Garrison state favoured some religious factions that played a major role in extremism by using their power and exploiting the other factions. While concluding and viewing all scenarios of past, present and future trajectories, only collective culture, plural diaries, and responsible stakeholdership seem the viable solution to all this mess. From the prospects of a nation, Pakistan is more of a heterogeneous subject on the basis of culture, ethnicity and religion; only democratization and harmony-led preaching of culture, ethnicity, and religion seem the viable solution to eliminate the extremism rife from the lens of unity in diversity. 

From religious proxy war mechanisms and sectarianism only, ijtihad and ijma are the solutions to all rife. From a religious lens, the shrine’s culture is properly used as a sign of Peace. Institutions of mosques are also used as schools of plurality preaching. On domestic grounds, local committees of ulema and religious leaders can clearly counter the recruitment process of jihadi organizations. At the same time, viewing digital policy options, a specific portal on mass communication is installed for consensus-based teachings. At the end of the day, this gatekeeping of religious leadership can be clearly used for the perfection of Peace if intentions are fully implemented with due heart desire. The writer is a medical graduate and a consistent writer of public policy-related matters.

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