This column is co-written with Dyala Hamzah.

"What many Muslims forget is that positive social solutions are offered by societies, and change cannot come about unless these ideas are realised through debate and social interaction. What is required here is a collective effort at the level of the masses including people from all walks of life. (But) the problem we face is that there are still some elites who claim that they alone have the right to interpret Islam. They do not trust the intellect of the common man... Unless there is a serious attempt to sit down and negotiate and work together, positive changes in society will not take place."

Interview with Prof Muhammad Khalid Masud, We no longer communicate, we just go to war, (2002)

Since the publication of Olivier Roy's The Failure of Political Islam (1994) (1), both activist-Islamists and scholars of the phenomenon of political religion have wondered aloud about the future trajectory of Islamism. Some, such as Bobby Sayyid (2) have argued that political Islam will retain its relevance as long as it remains as the only alternative counter-hegemonic force to stand against the advances of globalisation. Others, including this writer (Noor, 2004) have argued that political Islam may yet succeed if it manages to addresses universal concerns that exceed the Muslim ummah.(3)