Dear Colleagues,

What constitutes ‘relevant’ and ‘apt’ Islamic knowledge and expert education of future Islamic authorities in Western Europe? The central and much debated point of departure of this Special Issue has a longer history in Western Europe. Various authors have shown how it was originally formulated already since the 1980s and 1990s in terms of integration (policy) (Birt 2006; Boender 2014; Loobuyck and Meier 2014; Sunier 2009). Since the attacks of 11 September 2001, however, and with renewed incentives after the attacks in Paris of January 2015, the focus shifted from integration in terms of social cohesion, to securitization of Islam and responsibilization of its authority figures in terms of social order, safety, and control (Birt 2006; Boender 2014; Schepelern Johansen 2008; Yazbeck Haddad and M.J. Balz 2008). The number of teaching programs in Islamic Studies at publicly funded universities in Western Europe increased rapidly in the last decade and a half (Morris et al. 2014). These programs primarily answered the need for ‘secularized’ education about Islam (e.g., considered suited for policy recommendations), rather than ‘confessional’ education into it (Buskens and Van Sandwijk 2017; Grimmit 1994).

Hence, in recent decades, higher education on Islam in Europe has predominantly taken place in two domains: in the publicly funded university context as Islamic Studies, and in the privately funded context of mosques, madrasas and teaching institutes, often with strong links to Muslim countries of origin. In the introduction to this Special Issue, we will reflect on this distinction in terms of the constructed dichotomy inherent to this problem-space (Scott 2004) of ‘outsiders’ secularism’ versus ‘insiders’ traditionalism’ (Asad 2003; Grimmit 1994; Said 1978).

In recent years, however, new answers have been formulated to this central question; new initiatives have been created—or are in the making—to train Islamic experts that prepare for professional and academic careers in Europe. Publicly funded universities have started to organize imam training and Islamic theology programs, notably in Germany and the Netherlands. New curricula are being developed that aspire to answer the needs of Muslim believers while also meeting university standards. Furthermore, private confessional Muslim institutes are now recruiting lecturers who also graduated from Western Islamic Studies university programs. New situations therefore appear, in which educational domains and trajectories are looking for various combinations, accommodating the needs and expectations of diverse groups of Muslim and non-Muslim stakeholders. In the introduction, we will suggest analyzing these in terms of the articulation of new educational assemblages (Delanda 2006; Hall 1986). Reaching out to diverse audiences with different expectations and backgrounds regarding what ‘apt’ teaching about Islam should be (Asad 1986), these programs and their educators enter into a next phase of Islam education in Europe, articulating previously unexplored potentialities.

This Special Issue focuses both theoretically and empirically on these new aspirations and initiatives, illustrating a space of negotiation for future potentialities. We will welcome single-country as well as comparative essays, either focusing on university or private initiatives, and this from a broad range of (inter)disciplinary perspectives (anthropology, political sciences, theology, sociology of religion, history, etc.).

Dr. Welmoet Boender
Dr. Mieke Groeninck
Guest Editors

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• Islamic Higher Education
• Islamic authority formation
• Islamic expert education
• problem-space
• assemblage theory
• secularism