Fundamentalist World: The New Dark Age of Dogma

by Stuart Sim

Whether it's religious, political, imperialist, nationalist or even market fundamentalism, believe we live in an increasingly fundamentalist world.

Genres: Politics, History

256 pages, Paperback

First published January 10, 2001

Reviews

[Elliott Bignell · Rating 3 out of 5]

On this second reading, I find myself according only a middling rating. While very readable, and to be praised for its recognition of fundamentalism as a wider phenomenon than merely religious, I found the text a little passionless and the content not really challenging any obvious preconceptions.

Sim is quite right, in my opinion, in identifying a general trend towards what I would call "entrenchment" in various world-views. In some instances there is nothing new in this. Christianity, in particular, has been prone to cast differences of opinion over the most abstruse and abstract concepts as representing The Truth, and those who fail to agree as Antichrist, right back to the Arian controversy. Judaism has also had this tendency - see my last review on Josephus, for instance. That's monotheism for you. The current ascendancy of fundamentalist thinking across much of the Muslim world, however, is historically anomalous, and it's not just restricted to theistic religions. We are seeing violent Hindu and Buddhist nationalism, we have seen murderous fundamentalisms in socialist regimes in the last century, and we see a now-tottering market fundamentalism in economics. The USA has just elected a fascist - at the time of writing the electoral college has not voted and the President-Elect lost the popular vote, but it looks bad - while fascist groups are in the ascendant from the UK to Russia.

Part of this can probably be blamed on the echo-chamber effect of modern media, which Sim addresses but which has only intensified since. The author seems to be quite right in identifying a "fundamentalist world" rather than any "fundamentalist fringe", as it's everywhere right now. All the same, perhaps such an important and worrying trend could have used more forceful and passionate writing.

Sim is an academic and cannot really be blamed for this. Indeed, as academics many of us should probably be digging our foxholes. Praise Aristotle and pass the ammunition...

[Malcolm · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fundamentalism and libertarianism are locked in an unavoidable conflict that none of us - Al Qaeda, the Christian right, Islam or capitalism can avoid. This is the grim conclusion of Stuart Sim in his important contemporary non-fiction book, Fundamentalist World: The New Dark Age of Dogma.

He sees fundamentalist groups as each having somewhat different emphasis and goals. However, both religious and economic fundamentalists also have much in common such as their propensity for rigid dogma and single-mindedness. He includes eco-fundamentalism in that group as well citing the eco-terrorist destruction of a Vale Colorado Ski resort as one example of how strident, and dangerous even that group is prepared to be.

The intent of the Christian right in the USA and the Islamic fundamentalist movement in the third world and elsewhere, are even more ominous given the single-mindedness of “correctness” and “truth” each presume to possess. Are we going to have a military and economic collision with Islam? Particularly radical Islam with the bomb – think about it people.

This is an important book, arguments are well made and detailed yet straightforward. The overall style is quite readable. This is probably the best Political Science book I have read for some time. Given what this planet is currently facing, or shall shortly do so, I recommend you check this one out.
Malcolm Watts BA MSW 2006
Malcolm Watts is a novelist, writer, photographer and reviewer. Visit his website www.authorsden.com/malcolmwatts

[Imran Rasid]

The book mentioned few important points on what really constituted the fundamentalist movement in the modern era. I like the fact the he move beyond the narrow categorical relationship that often put religion and fundamentalism into one box yet i think he had loosely used the term "fundamentalism" and often confused it with anti-postmodernist views. Still,a good read.

My favourite part of the book were when he discussed the "market fundamentalism" that operates within our global economy and the last two chapters on Nationalist Fundamentalism and the overall trend of the fundamentalist movement.

[Nathaniel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Almost interesting in places, but ultimately the key word is "almost". The book is well-organized, but the writing is extremely stiff, and the content pretty pedestrian - there's not much in this book that a well-educated person up on current events didn't already know when it was written in 2005. Sim "connects the dots" in a way that might be interesting if he weren't such a phenomenally dull and superficial writer, but as it is, this book isn't worth bothering with 10+ years later.