Rethinking sovereignty beyond the Islamic state rhetoric: Bringing the people back in

Abstract

The Caliphate of Man is a study of the development of a particular political theology in modern Islamic thought that grounds a doctrinal commitment to a form of popular sovereignty in the Qurʾānic claim that God has created a “caliph” on earth. Andrew March argues that this vision of popular sovereignty is not merely a superficial apologetic move designed to refute claims that “Islam is not compatible with democracy,” but rather reflects a genuine intellectual revolution in modern Islamic thought. That reformulation involved not only reducing rulers to their proper status as agents...