Promoting the Everyday: Pro-Sharia Advocacy and Public Relations in Ontario, Canada’s “Sharia Debate”

Religions

关键词: “Sharia Debate”;    faith-based arbitration;    representation;    orthodoxy;    advocacy;    public relations;    Muslims;    Ontario;    Canada;   

DOI  :  10.3390/rel4030423

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

Why, in the midst of public debates related to religion, are unrepresentative orthodox perspectives often positioned as illustrative of a religious tradition? How can more representative voices be encouraged? Political theorist Anne Phillips (2007) suggests that facilitating multi-voiced individual engagements effectively dismantles the monopolies of the most conservative that tend to privilege maleness. In this paper, with reference to the 2003–2005 faith-based arbitration debate in Ontario, Canada, I show how, in practice, Phillips’ approach is unwieldy and does not work well in a sound-bite-necessitating culture. Instead, I argue that the “Sharia Debate” served as a catalyst for mainstream conservative Muslim groups in Ontario to develop public relations apparatuses that better facilitate the perspectives of everyday religious conservatives in the public sphere.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2013 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.