Formulation of the claim
Islam, in the course of its modern history, is subjected to colonial domination and political dependency.
Explanation
Arkoun understands this fact as the reason for distinguishing the trajectory of modern Islam from those of Judaism and Christianity. The relationship to modernity here is not a quiet internal transition, but one of external pressure and dependency that affected the shaping of the historical experience itself.
This means that speaking of Islam in this context is not limited to its religious or intellectual structure, but also includes its position within unequal political conditions. Colonial domination therefore becomes an element that explains a kind of rupture or stumbling in the course of transformation.
Its place in the book’s argument
This atom falls within Arkoun’s attempt to read the history of modern Islam outside the assumptions that make it seem isolated from major global transformations. It aligns with the book’s theses that highlight the effect of political dependency in reshaping the Islamic field, and it shows that critique for him is inseparable from analyzing the historical conditions that surrounded this field.
Limits of the claim
This atom should not be taken as a sweeping judgment on Islam as a whole, nor as a single explanation for every aspect of its modern transformation. Nor does it reduce the Islamic experience to the colonial factor alone; rather, it points to one of its prominent historical determinants.