Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
XX ISA World Congress of Sociology, Melbourne, Avustralya, 25 Haziran - 01 Temmuz 2023, ss.376, (Özet Bildiri)
in some countries where religion plays an important role as a crucial component of identity. This combination, however, can be very detrimental to social harmony especially in countries with great diversity, such as Malaysia. In Malaysia, there is are substantial ethnic and religious minorities, and ethnic identities are often conflated with religious identities. However, identity politics rooted in a fragmented society along ethnic and religious lines creates socio-political tensions and grievances that facilitate the mobilisation of social movements. Being ideologically a far-right Islamist movement in Malaysia, the Malaysia Muslim Solidarity Front (ISMA)’s ethno-religious ideology is rooted in the need for the ontological security of Malay Muslims. The movement creates its power struggle against rival Islamic movements and other civil society actors through a shift of common sense from the Ummah solidarity (Muslim Unity) toward Malay-Muslim solidarity ISMA’s main diagnosis frame is that Islam and Malays are under threat in Malaysia because of the non-Malay elements in the government or party politics In this respect, the movement integrates the religious and ethnic identity which materialised in their slogan “Malay consensus, Islam sovereign”. The movement’s efforts have political outcomes. ISMA influences popular consent through rallies and voter awareness programs aimed at affecting voting behaviours of Malay constituents in favour of their candidates. So far, ISMA has achieved increasing support to mobilise Malay-Muslim voters on a few occasions showing that the frames they invoked resonated among the Malay-Muslim population. Using the case of ISMA, I examine how an Islamic movement rationalises the use of ethnic identities in a religious ideology and combines religious and ethnic identities to influence its audience and gain political power. The empirical data have been collected using qualitative methods and analysed through the framing analysis.