The Challenge of Dawa: Political Islam as Ideology and Movement, and How to Counter It

The Hoover Institution hosted "The Challenge of Dawa: Political Islam as Ideology and Movement, and How to Counter It" on Wednesday, March 22, 2017 from 5:00pm - 7:00pm EST.  

Since 9/11, the dominant Western response to radical Islam has been to focus only on “terror” and “violent extremism,” but in focusing only on acts of violence, we have ignored the ideology that justifies and encourages those acts. The goal of Islamist ideological indoctrination--dawa--is to establish an unfree society ruled by strict Sharia law. U.S. foreign and domestic policy must oppose and systematically tackle this ideology, not just its violent manifestations.

Hoover Institution Research Fellow Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Hudson Institute Distinguished Fellow Christopher DeMuth discussed Ayaan's new report on specific policies that Congress and the administration must implement to dismantle the infrastructure of dawa in the United States and to counter the spread of political Islam.