Dissent has a great article about European Islam -- after reading an unhealthy amount of conversative literature on the topic, author Johann Hari concludes the supposed "clash of civilizations" between the East and West is nonsense. There is radical Islam, and its currently prevailing over moderate muslims -- but Hari points to an little-discussed trend as a source of hope:

"On the streets and in the mosques outside, jihadi young men distributing 'death to democracy' leaflets subtly clash with young Muslim feminists who want an open, liberal Islam. Kaffiyas and headscarves contrast with makeup and wonderbras in a bewildering Islamic cacophony. [...] Here is an authentic Islamic Reformation on the streets of Europe. Here is the development of a strain of Islam fiercely committed to democratic values. Yet those who suggest that the birth of every new European Muslim is a problem—another tick from the time-bomb—treat [Fadela Armana, a leader of the Muslim Feminist movement] as akin to Osama. This mind-set is (at best) a distraction from the real fight: across the continent, groups of Muslim women are rebelling in the same way against the literalist, quasi-fascist interpretation of the Koran popularized by the mullahs. Tired of being its first victims, they are creating their own liberal lived Islams as an alternative. And if this rebellion is completed, European jihadism will be left literally unable to reproduce itself."

The people of "the West" have tried for years to combat radicalized Islam -- first we ignored it, then we bombed it. We even tried to hand the problem off to Vatican City -- if the pope is a source of moral clarity to Christians, he probably has credibility with muslims, right? -- but maybe the answer to fundamentalist Islam has been in our backyard the whole time. It seems like the formation of a homegrown, moderate muslim reform movement is the event most likely to take the steam out of fundamentalist Islam -- just as the organized labor movement undercut communism in Africa during the Cold War, feminist Islam can offer an alternative to Muslim youth somewhere between the evils of an authoritarian reading of the Koran and an unequivocal acceptance of western society.

When I was at the Academic Freedom Conference last month, Rick Santorum made a comment about how conservatives should engage feminists on Islam's treatment of women. While I disagreed almost entirely with the rest of his speech -- his basic policy prescription: we should say "Islamic Facsicm" as many times as humanly possible -- I do think international feminism has a role to play in reforming Islam. What's ironic, however, is that the same conservatives who have spent their entire political careers fighting "Feminazis" now need their help in their crusade against radical Islam.