The political Islamist movement has changed over the last 15 years. Through much of the 1980s and 1990s, Islamic fundamentalists had revolutionary aims. They sought the violent overthrow of Western-allied regimes to have them replaced with Islamic states. This desire for Islamic states and not Western-style democracies was at the core of their message. Often transnational in their objectives, they spoke in global terms. But it turned out that the appeal of this ideology was limited. People in Algeria, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and countless other places rejected it; in fact, they grudgingly accepted the dictatorships they lived under rather than support violent extremism. In this sense, political Islam did fail.
But over time, many of the Islamists recognized this reality and began changing their program. They came to realize that shorn of violent overthrow, revolution and social chaos, their ideas could actually gain considerable popular support. So they reinvented themselves, emphasizing not revolutionary overthrow but peaceful change, not transnational ideology but national reform. They were still protesting the dictators, but now they organized demonstrations in favor of democracy and honest politics.
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