European Shiism

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European Shiism? Counterpoints from Shiites' organization in Britain and

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Article

European Shiism?Counterpoints fromShiites’ organizationin Britain and theNetherlands*

Matthijs van den BosBirkbeck College, London, UK

Abstract

European Shiism is a neglected area in studies of European Islam, which raises the

question of to what extent Shiism in Europe represents a particular realm of organiza-

tion and a particular religiosity. Shiism’s striking transnational features, and general

findings on European Islam, suggest prolific border-crossing and cross-ethnic organiza-

tion among Shiites in Europe. Exploring British and Dutch cases, however, leaves little

room for the notion of a specific European Shiite realm. When focusing on the ethnic-

national background of board members of Shiite organizations and on their formal

organizational interlocks, ethnically articulate identities come to the fore, particular

mixes of which take shape within sub-European frameworks of states. The last section

explores sociopolitical implications of Shiites’ organizational life in Europe, as seen

through the Dutch and British samples. A contrast is drawn between the relative scar-

city of Shiite organization, which delimits the role of Shiism as a political actor in Europe,

and recent indications of civic engagement.

Keywords

European Islam, Shiism, transnational networks, The Netherlands, Britain

Mainstream (Twelver) Shiism, more than Sunnism, often appears to be inherentlytransnational, because of the wide geographical distribution of its core symbols.1

Clerical cross-border movements back and forth take place between Iranian and

Ethnicities

12(5) 556–580

! The Author(s) 2011

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DOI: 10.1177/1468796811432687

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*Dedicated to the memory of Nico Kielstra

Corresponding author:

Matthijs van den Bos, Department of Politics, Birkbeck College, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HX, UK

Email: [email protected]



Iraqi seminaries (hawzas), the system of religious Sources of Emulation (marja‘iyat)is analogically dispersed and Shiite minority constituencies in Sunni-majority coun-tries practice ‘emulation’ (taqlid) of them beyond the border. One also finds tellingproofs of transnationalism on the level of popular piety in multi-centred practicesof regional pilgrimage (for example, to Damascus, Medina, Karbala or Mashhad)or in topical aspects of Shiite religiosity.2

However, it is equally striking that modern scholarship typically researchesShiism in the context of nations (Cole, 2002: 1) while neglecting its transnational-ism (Shaery-Eisenlohr, 2003).3 Another feature of modern scholarship on Shiism isa spatial focus that naturally lingers on Shiite heartlands but tends to overlook thewest, and Europe in particular, despite the fact that ‘[c]ities such asToronto . . .Washington, D.C., and London now have sizable Shia communitiesin their midst’ (Nasr, 2007: 79).4 These facts define this paper’s larger question ofShiites’ organization in European countries and the extent to which, withinEurope, it is transnational.

The articulation of that question derives from studies of Islam in Europe (or thewest) and the question that often motivates them: does Islam in Europe evolve intoparticular European forms, or a ‘European Islam’? The application of that ques-tion to Shiism is long overdue given that studies of Islam in Europe, with very fewexceptions, have addressed their topic as if Islam equals Sunnism. Shiite EuropeanIslam, or ‘European Shiism’, will be assessed in this article by the extent to whichShiites’ identities and relations are transethnic and transnational, rather than byother criteria that are often used but are more elusive and harder to measure, suchas ‘individualization’ (see Peter, 2006: 105–118; Tezcan, 2003: 237–261).Transnational and transethnic dimensions involve physical and social geographicaltranslations of the word ‘European’, referring respectively to phenomena occurringacross borders in European space and to phenomena that are particular to theirEuropean environment.

A statement of the transnational dimension figures, for example, in Allievi’sclaim that ‘[t]he umma is in many ways an imagined community, but it exists inthe facts [in Europe] . . .The mobilisation of resources, men, discourses and rhetoricclearly shows the depth of [its] links’ (Allievi, 2003: 23; cf. Salih, 2004: 1006). Thesignificance of such ties emerges from studies involving particular pan-Europeanorganizations, among which are the Forum of European Muslim Youth andStudent Organizations (FEMYSO), founded in 1995; the Muslim Council ofCooperation in Europe (CMSE), founded in 1996 (Massignon, 2007); and theEuropean Council for Fatwas and Research, founded in 1997 (Shadid and vanKoningsveld, 2002).

One finds the transethnic dimension of European Islam described by Allievi andNielsen (2003), for instance, in their observation of ‘a very active process of con-structing Muslim/Islamic networks held together by shared ideas and responses tothe European environment, rather than common ethnic or national identity’(Allievi and Nielsen, 2003: vii; see Salih, 2004: 1000). In a slightly more assertivestatement, Cesari observes that: [t]he existence in certain European countries of a

van den Bos 557



third or even a fourth generation of Muslims means that versions of Islam detachedfrom the ethnic and national identifications of the first generations (cultural refer-ences, language, behaviour, interactions with non-Muslims, etc.) are already wellestablished (Cesari, 2007: 56).

Thus, ‘there now exists a French Islam, an English Islam . . . etc.’ (Cesari, 2007:56; see Cesari, 2003: 257). These detached Islamic identifications often imply areorientation not only towards Muslim (post-)migrants’ European surroundings,but also to what is deemed ‘the pure religion’. Transethnic Shiite organizations,therefore, are characterized by stronger religious than ethnic orientations, whichare also conceivable in but may not define ethnically articulated Shiiteorganizations.5

In the absence of quantification, the above citations on European Islam none-theless suggest an important tendency, which seemed to be corroborated in manyinterviews and conversations that I conducted with representatives of Shiite orga-nizations. Their self-representations often downplayed or denied ethnic, national(and sectarian) identity. The analysis of Shiites’ organizations in Europe willaddress that claim, then, by exploring the degree to which Shiites’ identities andrelations are transnational and transethnic.

Overview

The section below on ‘Studying European Shiism’ argues for the relevance ofexploring Shiism on the level of transnational social interaction, and outlines fur-ther methodological considerations for this study. Two subsequent sections situateShiism in Europe, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, historically, andpresent findings on Shiite organization in the latter two countries as sample datafor European Shiite Islam at large.

The choice of sample countries is arbitrary, in the sense that the cited scholars ofEuropean Islam often presume the processes studied here to be cross-European, atleast within the western European realm; however, further research expandingthe sample will naturally provide stronger bases for claims regarding EuropeanShiism.

Landscapes of European Shiism are charted here through two complementaryexplorations of organization data. First, the focus is on 10 major Shiite organiza-tions in Britain and 10 major Shiite organizations in the Netherlands – a dual-country sample of European Shiism that will allow insight into its most powerfulformal ties and identities. Second, I will focus on the bulk of the Shiite organiza-tions, which yield a qualitatively different kind of information – not necessarilyreflecting power relations as much as the larger sociological reality of Shiism’sEuropean organization, both in terms of its (trans)ethnic identities and (trans)na-tional board-member overlaps, or interlocks. In addition, the larger sample allowsfor comparisons with ethnic organization within Europe, for which Dutch–Moroccan and Dutch–Turkish cases will be considered.

558 Ethnicities 12(5)



The data collection in each exploration comprises three categories: numbers andidentities of organizations; numbers and identities of board-member interlocks;and the nature of ‘peak organizations’ or organizational umbrellas.6 The firstentails an ethnic and cross-ethnic7 breakdown of Shiite organizations in each coun-try; the second treats ‘compactness’ of the two Shiite landscapes as seen throughtheir densities and degrees of fragmentation; and the third explores the extent towhich peak organizations bridge ethnic differences between (trans)national Shiitecommunities.

The conclusion evaluates the outcomes in light of preliminary findings on Shiitereligious ideology in Europe and the prospects of European Shiism in civil society.

Studying European Shiism

The question of European Islam is often addressed at the level of religious practice,values, identity and thought (see, for example, Cesari, 2003), but seldom exploredalong the lines of transnational social interaction. Furthermore, a limited numberof studies address European Islamic institutions (for example, Salih, 2004; Shadidand van Koningsveld, 2002), but these have not substituted the need for ‘a moreresolutely supra-individual perspective’ that goes beyond the focus on muftis,imams, preachers and intellectuals in the study of religious authority inEuropean Muslim communities (Peter, 2006: 111). The transnational focus pursuedhere thus addresses a significant lacuna in the study of European Islam, enhancingits conceptualization on the level of social organization.8

The Shiite organizations have been tagged for ethnic-national identity by takinginto account board members’ or their parents’ countries of origin, or the commu-nities that they catered for.9 This approach is sometimes taken to task for conflat-ing ethnicity with nationality, descent or citizenship (see, for example, Constantet al., 2009: 274), but evidence highlights ‘country of origin’ as a key principle oforganization in the context of European Islam. Much has been written about thepurported fluidity of immigrant/Muslim identities . . .but ‘[w]hile identities are mal-leable [and] despite the theorized fluidity, Muslims’ organizing behavior is stronglyaffected by their country of origin/descent and ties to homeland ethnicities (Warnerand Wenner, 2006: 473).

In France, for instance, ‘[a]s in Germany, Muslims are divided by nationalityor ethnicity; since Islam in the various countries of immigrant origin is differ-ent, country-specific Islamic organizations have emerged’ (Warner and Wenner,2006: 468).

To address the specific question of the degree to which European Shiism exists,it has been useful to borrow methodologically from research into ethnic organiza-tion designed to map ethnic civil society (for example, Van Heelsum, 2002, 2005).The method used to establish degrees of ethnic organization has been to seek outoverlapping board memberships. It needs to be stressed that this method concernsformal organization only, and the findings do not reflect directly on the measure ofinformal association.

van den Bos 559



Informal contacts are likely to be significant in cementing ties among EuropeanShiites. Orators and religious performers (rowze khv �ans) travelling between reli-gious centres across European borders illustrate the process.10 In terms of organi-zations, the importance of informal ties is indicated, for instance, by the existenceof ‘European Ahl-e Beyt’, which is not registered in either Britain or theNetherlands, but which nevertheless connects two prominent – and registered –Shiite organizations, the Islamic Centre of England (ICEL) in Britain and theStichting Sji’itische Islamitische Raad in Nederland (SIR) in the Netherlands,through their respective representatives Hojjatolesl�am ‘Abdolhoseyn Mo‘ezi andSheykh Israfil Demirtekin.11 Another example indicates how informal relationsmay signal cross-ethnic connections between prominent Shiite organizations thatwould remain invisible if one relied only on formal board information. Board-member data are unavailable for the Islamic College for Advanced Studies(ICAS), which is predominantly Iranian, as to its directors and instructors (onwhom data are available). But one ICAS director is also a board member of theMuhammadi Trust – which, in terms of board members, is predominantly aPakistani institution.

While important, ‘[i]nformal organizations [also] pose a problem [ . . . ] By theirvery nature they are difficult to track down and leave few traces in archives’(Schrover and Vermeulen, 2005: 825). There are also positive reasons for focusingon formal organization, however. First, the threshold of formal organization is low(see Warner and Wenner, 2006: 472),12 and Shiite religious life soon attains ameasure of institutionalization (the use of a mosque, the registration of a charity,the publication of a magazine and so on) that leaves formal trails. Often, thesetrails include board membership, through which organizational interlocks may beexamined. Second, the public presence of formal organizations allows them to becharted with more precision, and the problem of sampling from a hidden popula-tion is thus diminished (see Fennema, 2004: 440–441). Third, the focus on formalorganizations allows comparison with a body of scholarship on ethnic organiza-tion, social capital and civil society in Europe.

Data on Shiite organizations in the Netherlands and Britain were collectedirregularly, mainly from October 2007 to January 2008, and in August 2008.13

The data cannot be presumed to be comprehensive in the absence of central reg-isters for religious organizations in either country, and given that the landscape ofShiism is constantly evolving. However, the record is very likely to represent formalShiite organization fairly in each country at the time of the search, because thedatabase includes all active institutions that were listed by main umbrella organi-zations and online Muslim directories, and the survey targeted a wide variety ofsources.

The British data were collected through keyword searches on Google, onlinedirectories such as the Muslim Directory and the Ahlulbayt Directory, the CharityRegister and the Company Register. In several cases, the organizations were con-tacted in order to ascertain ethnic backgrounds. The Dutch data were collected




through umbrella organizations, minority organizations, the Minorities Yearbook(Jaarboek minderheden) and similar guides, Google searches, the online Companyregister (Bedrijvengids) and the Chamber of Commerce (Kamer van Koophandel).14

Shiism in Europe, Britain and the Netherlands

The Twelver Shiite presence in Europe ‘goes back to the 19th century when a groupof South Asian individuals . . . came to Britain to study’ (see Ansari, 2004: 31;Shubbar, 2006). Shiite landmark establishments of the twentieth century includethe Imam Ali Mosque in Hamburg, which originated from a building societyestablished in 1953 by a local community of Iranian traders (Hesse-Lehmannand Spellman, 2004: 145) in consultation with their religious leader, the marja‘al-taqlid Borujerdi (see http://de.izhamburg.com/Ueber-das-Zentrum/Baugeschichte), and several organizations in Britain. The Muslim Arab YouthOrganization for Great Britain and Ireland and the World Islamic League wereinitiated by the marja‘s, B�aqer al-Sadr and Golp�ayeg�ani, and established in 1967and the 1970s, respectively (Sindawi, 2007: 846). The Khojas’ World Federation ofKSIMC (Khoja Shia Ithna-Asheri Muslim Communities) was established inLondon in 1976. Hawza graduates from the Middle East are reported to havestarted missionary work in Europe in the 1970s, and it seems to have increasedin the 1980s (Sindawi, 2007), as did the migration of Shiites to Europe, often inconnection with repression and war (Neijenhuis, 2008: 25). The establishment ofmajor Shiite institutions continued into the 1990s. It was observed that, inGermany, ‘there has been a clear resurgence of religious Shiite activities’ sincethe fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 (Bottcher, 2007: 213).

Britain was from the beginning a primary destination for Shiite migration toEurope, and has remained so. The bulk of the Shia are thought to have arrivedfrom the early 1970s, with the Khojas’ expulsion from Uganda, followed byIraqi, Iranian and Afghan migrants in the late 1970s.15 This was preceded by awave of South Asian, particularly Pakistani, migration in the early 1960s(Nielsen, 2005: 40–41). Hereafter, from the late 1960s many Shiite organizationswith Pakistani boards or audiences were established, such as Idara-e-Jaaferiya.The Khoei Foundation, the Imam Ali Foundation and the Dar al-IslamFoundation in London (founded, respectively, in 1989, 1994 and 1993) areamong the primary foreign representations of the marja‘s, (the late) Abu’l-Q�asem al-Khu’i, ‘Ali Sist�ani and (the late) Muhammad Husayn Fadhlall�ah.Numbers and percentages given for Shiites in Britain vary widely, but are usuallywithin the range of 10–25% of the total British Muslim population, implying200,000–500,000 individuals.16

The emergence of Shiism in the Netherlands has been associated with Turkishlabour migration in the 1960s and with Pakistani or Indian migrants seeking eitherwork or political refuge (Shubbar, 2008). In 1976, Idara-e Jaferia, representing thelatter two groups, established the first Dutch hoseyniya in Amsterdam (Shubbar,

van den Bos 561



2008).17 The main growth of the community, however, is thought to have startedonly in the early 1990s with the influx of Iraqi refugees.18 Other major groups ofShiites include Iranians, Indians, Pakistanis and Afghans (see OSV, 2008). Shiiteorganizations in the Netherlands have issued many often short-lived print andelectronic publications (see Ibrahim 2005: 82–83). Percentages given for Shiitesin the Netherlands vary widely as well (none are based on Statistics Netherlandsfigures), but numbers are usually within the range of about 70,000 to 125,000.19

Even when accepting the lower estimate, the figure for the Dutch situationalone indicates exponential growth of the Shiite population in Europe at large,when seen in light of Momen’s 1980 estimate of 100,000 for that group (Momen,1985: 282).

Major Dutch and British Shiite organizations20

The largest single group of the 20 major Shiite organizations in Britain and theNetherlands is cross-ethnic (containing five cross-ethnic organizations); four areIraqi and four are Pakistani; there are three Iranian organizations; ‘Afghan’ occurstwice; and there is one Khoja21 and one Turkish organization. The dominance ofcross-ethnic organizations is underscored by the fact that only one is a peak orga-nization (peak organizations tend to be more diverse than their constituent mem-bers). The larger reality, however, remains one of ethnic, as opposed to cross-ethnic, organization, accounting for 75% of the sample.

Of the 10 key Shiite organizations in Britain taken into account, in terms of theirboard memberships or audiences catered for (see legend to Table 1), three areIranian, two have cross-ethnic identities, two are Pakistani, two are Iraqi andone is Khoja. Of the 10 principal Shiite organizations in the Netherlands, threeare cross-ethnic, two are Iraqi, two are Afghan, two are Pakistani and one isTurkish. In other words, the ethnic articulations of Shiism are quite different ineach country, with Iranian organizations in Britain standing out.22 ‘Cross-ethnic’,‘Khoja’ and ‘Turkish’ define smaller differences (with three of five cross-ethnicorganizations in the Netherlands, one Khoja organization in Britain and oneTurkish organization in the Netherlands).

Separate national identities also come to the fore when taking board-member interlocks into account. In regard to the absence of such overlaps,the major Shiite organizations in Britain stand in mutual isolation (although,as previously explained, a notable ICAS is on the board of the MuhammadiTrust). Among the listed prominent Shiite organizations in the Netherlands,there are three board-member interlocks – between the SIR and StichtingSaqalein Delft; Stichting Saqalein Delft and Stichting Ahlalbait Jongeren;and the Unie van Irakese Organisaties in Nederland (UVIO) and SIR. Thenational difference is crucial, because the latter pair of Dutch institutions areumbrella organizations linking the majority of Shiite organizations in theNetherlands, whereas Shiites represented by different British umbrella organi-zations remain separate.23




The lack of board-member interlocks among the major Shiite organizations inBritain occurs despite their greater geographical proximity when compared withmajor Dutch Shiite organizations. Whereas Shiite organizations in the Netherlandsare dispersed throughout the country, British Shiite key organizations are con-centrated in London (and within London, particularly in a small area in thenorth-west).

Table 1. Major Shiite organizations in Britain and the Netherlands

Britain The Netherlands

Organization locationa Ethnic profileb Organization locationa Ethnic profileb

Al-Khoei Foundation,

London

Iraqi Hussaini Mission

Nederland, Den Haag

Pakistani

Al-Mahdi Institute,

Birmingham

Cross-ethnic Idare E Jafria 1976

Nederland, Amsterdam

Pakistani

Imam Ali Foundation,

London

Iraqi Overkoepelende Sjiitische

Vereniging, Oud-

Beijerland

Iraqi

Islamic Centre of England,

London

Iranian Stichting Ahlulbait

Jongeren, Arnhem

Cross-ethnic

Islamic College for

Advanced Studies,

London

Iranian Stichting Al Cauther

Nederland, Den Haag

Cross-ethnic

Islamic Unity Society,

Manchester

Cross-ethnic Stichting Cultureel

Centrum Iman voor

Afghanen in Nederland,

Rotterdam

Afghan

Islamic Universal

Association, London

Iranian Stichting Saqalein Delft,

Delft

Afghan

Majlis-E-Ulama Shia

Europe, London

Pakistani Stichting Sji’itische

Islamitische Raad in

Nederland, Den Haag

Cross-ethnic

Muhammadi Trust,

London

Pakistani Stichting Sociaal Cultureel

Islamitisch Centrum,

Rotterdam

Turkish

World Federation of

KSIMC, London

Khoja Unie van Irakese

Organisaties in

Nederland, Nieuw

Vennep

Iraqi

aLocation refers to organizations’ centres of activities or place of registration in the Chamber of Commerce.bBased on dominant tendencies of board members’ identities or audiences catered for (except in the case of

the Islamic College for Advanced Studies, where the directorate has been relied upon). Thus, the ethnic labels

do not imply ethnically exclusive organizations.

van den Bos 563



The separation between the Dutch and British spheres of foremost Shiiteorganizations is also evident in a straightforward way, in that they are isolatedfrom one another in the sense that institutional interlocks between them arelacking.

The four mentioned links are each cross-ethnic (Iranian–Pakistani in the Britishcase, and twice Afghan–cross-ethnic and once Iraqi–cross-ethnic in the Dutchcase). This indicates a degree of cross-ethnic integration of major Shiite organiza-tions in Britain and the Netherlands. However, this tendency is superimposed on alarger reality defined by networks which are, in the British case, wholly fragmented,and in both cases scarce,24 and whose grassroots organization is ethnicallyarticulated.

These summaries of the Dutch and British landscapes indicate an organizationof Shiism that is ethnic and national (and nationally particular) rather than trans-ethnic and transnational.

The larger sample of Dutch and British Shiite organizations

The above samples are part of a larger data set that includes 240 Shiite organiza-tions, 76 of which are based in the Netherlands and 151 of which are based inBritain. It has been possible to assemble board-member data for 169, or 74%, ofthe combined Dutch and British Shiite organizations, and to label 78% of them forethnic-national background. This record, which includes near-complete informa-tion for the 20 Dutch and British key organizations, allows for a fair impression ofthe larger data set as regards major trends in organization, interlocking andumbrella formation.

Organizations

Pakistani and Khoja organizations emerge as ethnic centres of gravity amongShiites in Britain, while Iraqis and Turks are more strongly represented in Shiiteinstitutions in the Netherlands.25 The particular significance of ‘Pakistani’ and‘Khoja’ in the British case, and of ‘Turkish’ in the Dutch (‘Iraqi’ is less straight-forward to interpret), illustrates nationally differentiated patterns of Shiites’migrancy into Europe. Whereas the ethnic composition of Shiite organizations asseen through their board members is significantly different in the Netherlands andBritain, ethnic as opposed to cross-ethnic organization nevertheless dominates inboth countries.

Other commonalities between the two national spheres of Shiism surface, forinstance, when comparing them with degrees of ethnic organization in Europe.Taking organization densities of Moroccans and Turks in the Netherlands intoaccount (i.e. their organization numbers in relation to population size), both Shiitespheres, whether relying on high or low estimates for their populations, emerge assignificantly sparser (see Table 2). The analysis of Dutch and British Shiite orga-nization density, that is, suggests that Shiism in Europe ranks significantly below




ethnic organization as a contributor to ‘civil society as associational life’ (Edwards,2008).

Interlocks

The overlaps between Shiite organizations, as understood through the interlocks oftheir board members,26 may be represented by 43 lines: 22 lines between Shiiteorganizations in the Netherlands, 20 between Shiite organizations in Britain andone line linking a Dutch and a British Shiite organization.27 These figures allow forseveral observations on the general compactness of the Shiite organizational land-scape in each country, as can be seen in the measurements of network density andfragmentation.

A network’s density indicates the ratio of lines (which represent board-memberinterlocks in this study) between nodes (that is, organizations) to the total numberof possible links, which is based on the number of organizations,28 while fragmen-tation indicates the percentage of isolated organizations in a network.29 The den-sity and fragmentation of Shiite organizations break down, for the Netherlandsand Britain respectively, into 0.015 and 56%, and 0.003 and 72%.30 In other words,the board-member interlocks of Shiite organizations in the Netherlands have amuch higher density and a much lower fragmentation – thus showing far greatercompactness.

In order to gain a clearer perspective on what these different compactness figuresmean in light of civil associational life in Europe, it will be worthwhile to comparethem with European data for ethnic organization – for which the previouscases from the Dutch context will again be referred to. This comparison is givenin Table 3.

The density of Shiite organization in the Netherlands is 15 times higher than thatof the Dutch ethnic organization figures, whereas its fragmentation does not standout from the range of ethnic organization. Contrasting with the Dutch context,Shiite organization in Britain diverges only slightly from ethnic organization in

Table 2. Comparative ethnica and religious organization densityb in Europe

Ethnic organization Religious organization

Population Organization density Population Organization density

Year Year

Turks/Netherlands 3.44 Shiites/Netherlands 0.60–1.08

2001 2008

Moroccans/Netherlands 2.65 Shiites/Britain 0.30–0.76

2001 2008

aNetherlands’ ethnic data derive from Van Heelsum, 2001: 8, 22; 2005: 23; and Van Heelsum et al., 1999: 22.bOrganization density consists of organization numbers divided by population number, multiplied by 1000.

van den Bos 565



terms of density, while its fragmentation degree ranks higher than that of any othercommunity considered. Thus, Dutch and British realms of Shiite organizationstand apart, not only from one another but also from these samples of ethnicorganization. The differences particularly involve, respectively, network densityand fragmentation.

Taking the ethnic make-up of all organizational overlaps into account, theDutch Shiite interlocks were between Iraqi organizations (10); cross-ethnic andIraqi organizations (7); cross-ethnic organizations (3); cross-ethnic and Turkishorganizations (3); and Turkish organizations (1). British Shiite institutional link-ages were between organizations labelled Pakistani (4); cross-ethnic and Khoja (3);cross-ethnic and ethnically unknown (3); Iraqi (3); Afghan and cross-ethnic (1);Bahraini and cross-ethnic (1); cross-ethnic and Iraqi (1); cross-ethnic and Iranian(1); cross-ethnic and Pakistani (1); Iraqi and ethnically unknown (1); Iranian andIraqi (1); Iranian (1); and Khoja and ethnically unknown (1). One linkage betweena cross-ethnic and an Iraqi organization connected the British and Dutch Shiitelandscapes.

Most ties involve cross-ethnic organizations (25), and the majority of links ineither case cross ethnic divides (55% of the links between ethnically known orga-nizations). However, the record is ethnically divergent for the two countries,broadly replicating the ethnically separate patterns of Shiite organization, withIraqi links in the Netherlands and Pakistani links in Britain, representing the larg-est groups of organizations, defining the difference. As in the smaller sample,furthermore, the majority of organizations are not linked either ethnically orcross-ethnically (see Table 3).

Whereas the link between the Dutch and British Shiite organizations acts as anethnic bridgehead, its effect remains limited given that it does not connectumbrella organizations. The transnational connection therefore indicates stronglyself-contained, national organizational enclaves. This conclusion is reinforced bythe fact that only one link connects the two spheres – indicating the paucity of

Table 3. Comparative compactness of ethnic and religious organization in Europea

Ethnic organization Religious organization

Population

(2001)

Network

density

Fragmentation Population

(2008)

Network

density

Fragmentation

Turks/Netherlands 0.001 48% Shiites/

Netherlands

0.015 56%

2008

Moroccans/Netherlands 0.001 65% Shiites/

Britain

0.003 72%

aNetherlands’ ethnic data derive from Van Heelsum (2001: 8, 22; 2005: 23), Van Heelsum et al. (1999: 11, 22);

and Van den Bos and Achbari (2007: 174, 176). See Van den Bos and Achbari (2007) for further methodo-

logical considerations.




Shiite transnational ties – in the absence of legal restrictions for foreign nationals ineither the Netherlands or Britain to participate in foundations (stichtingen) orcharities as board members.

Umbrellas

Umbrella organizations offer an additional indication of the ethnic composition,cross-ethnic identity and degree of communal organization of Shiism in Europe.These organizations particularly allow one to explore the degree to which theEuropean tendencies observed for ethnic organization and cross-ethnic linkingalso apply where Shiite organization is aimed explicitly at overarching communalrepresentation.

Presently, there are at least three Shiite umbrella organizations in Britain: theWorld Federation of Khoja Shia Ithna-Asheri Muslim Communities, established in1976; the British Shia Muslim Council, which is to be established shortly;31 and thelong-established Islamic Students’ Association in Britain (stemming probablyfrom the early 1970s).32 There was talk of a Shia Students’ Council being estab-lished in September 2006 (see www.aimislam.com/activities/studentcouncil.html),but this does not seem to have materialized. British universities do host a rangeof student associations named ‘Ahlul Bayt [Islamic] Society’ (a quick Internetsearch finds references for Imperial College; Roehampton University; QueenMary, UCL and King’s College at the University of London; and Bradford,Cardiff, Leeds, City, De Montfort and Keele Universities). A unitary logo,shared URLs and a central referral page for Ahlul Bayt Islamic Societies (http://absoc.co.uk/) indicate mutual coordination, but they are not apparently led by anindependent coordinating body. The model claimed is one of non-centralized self-organization.33

The first institution is straightforwardly an ethnic organization (for Khoja ShiaIthna Asheri Muslims) and this equally applies to its regional and local subsidiar-ies, among which is the Council of European Jamaats. The many ties and interac-tions between these institutions and non-Khoja Shiite individuals andorganizations may suggest fluid ethnic boundaries. This also relates to the factthat, in the absence of Khoja marja‘s, many ‘emulate’ a non-Khoja (the majorityof Khoja Shia Ithna Asheri communities reportedly follow �Ayatoll�ah Sist�ani – seeProfessor A Sachedina’s 2004 statement available at http://www.uga.edu/islam/sachedina_silencing.html). However, the mentioned emulation, or taqlid, is infact a collective arrangement (the World Federation speaks in several of itsonline documents of ‘our marja‘’);34 in terms of organizations, while geographicallydispersed across the continents, Khojas retain a distinct and exclusive profile.

The second organization, the British Shia Muslim Council, encompasses Shiiteorganizations across ethnic divides (including Iraqis, Iranians and Khojas),although it was observed to have a strong Pakistani colouring.35 It was statedby the Central Coordinator of the Council’s Interim Working Committee thatthe aim of improving Shiites’ representation to the government lay behind the

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establishment of the council, given dissatisfaction among British Shiites with theShiite voice within the Muslim Council of Britain.36

One of the most important Shiite organizations in Britain or anywhere else, theKhoei Foundation, was not on the council’s list of supporting organizations. TheKhoei Foundation was seen also to conceive of itself as an umbrella organization,as doing ‘a lot of good work’, and in fact as having been ‘very well establishedwith the government’, that is fulfilling the functions envisioned by the BritishShia Muslim Council. The foundation was similarly observed to have taken thelead on the cross-sectarian Mosques and Imams National Advisory Board(MINAB), which had ‘brought the Shia’s [in Britain] together’. However, somequestioned the foundation’s general Shiite representation, given the role of partic-ular family ties in the organization and its historical representation of a particularmarja‘.37

The third is an Iranian body. The Union of Islamic Students Associations (InEurope) (Etteh �adiye-ye anjomanh �a-ye esl �ami-ye d �aneshjuy �an dar Orup �a), or UISA,is a prominent organization among the globally dispersed Iranian Islamic students’societies outside Iran. It has many national sub-branches (indicated by ‘region’ –manteqe – as in ISA-UK) and sub-sub-branches at local levels (with city designa-tions, as in ISA-London). In Britain, the Islamic Students’ Societies gather incentres that are often called ‘Kanoon towhid’ (for example, in Cardiff, Liverpooland London) after their namesake in Tehran on Towhid Square, originally headedby �Ayatoll�ah Musavi-Ardabili (presently a marja‘residing in Qom). Besides Cardiff,Liverpool and London, there are centres in Glasgow, Manchester and Newcastle,whose buildings are owned by the Islamic Republic.38 In 1993, the Iranian govern-ment established the Towhid Universal Charity Foundation to take charge of themaintenance of Kanoon centres worldwide.39 In 1984, it purchased the LondonKanoon Towhid, which serves as UISA’s headquarters. Through a representativeof Iran’s leader on its board, who is currently strongly supported by many localISAs within the British branch (but not by all of their members),40 the UISAeffectively extends �Ayatoll�ah Kh�amene’i’s rahbari into Europe.41

There are presently at least three Shiite umbrella organizations in theNetherlands as well: the SIR (founded in 2004), the OSV (OverkoepelendeShiitische Vereniging, established in 2004) and the UVIO (Unie van IrakeseOrganisaties in Nederland, founded in 2003), which is a member of the SIR. TheSIR was in the national news in 2005 for an initiative developed in coordinationwith the largest Sunni Muslim organization in the Netherlands aimed at nationallybased imam education (Santing, 2005). Just like the SIR, the OSV has been recog-nized as an interlocutor by the Dutch government, and it aims at the generalrepresentation of Shiites in the Netherlands (OSV, 2008: http://www.shiaparle-ment.com/nl/).42 The OSV is probably the most prominent among the threeumbrella organizations, having made headlines in 2006 because of an ‘integrationcourse’ (inburgeringscursus) which it designed, and which the Minister forForeigners Affairs and Integration recommended for other Islamic organizationsin the Netherlands to follow (De Volkskrant, 26 April 2006). Whereas the SIR




represents an ethnic range, however, both the OSV and the UVIO are exclusivelyIraqi organizations.

In sum, the number of Dutch and British umbrella bodies is considerable, indi-cating a high degree of Shiite peak organization, which stands in contrast to theoverall low organization density of Dutch and British Shiism. Processes ofumbrella formation indicate Shiites’ increasing efforts at national organization inEurope. In Germany, for instance, Shiite notables gathered in May 2008, in theIslamische Zentrum Hamburg, to discuss the ‘prospects for a nationwide registeredShia federation’ (IRNA, 31 May 2008). The location controlled by Kh�amene’i’srepresentative in Germany (see www.al-shia.de/persoenlichkeiten/ghaemmagha-mi.htm), and scarce non-Iranian publicity, suggest that it concerned an Iranian(and pro-Islamic Republic) rather than a cross-ethnic (and otherwise pluralistic)initiative. ‘Umbrella’ organization hardly connotes ‘cross-ethnic’ in the Dutch andBritish cases either, as one-third of them represent different communities, althoughthis figure is somewhat higher than the overall number of cross-ethnic Shiite orga-nizations. However, of the two cross-ethnic community-wide organizations (i.e.those not restricted to students), one remains only virtual, as it is still in the processonly of establishing itself (see the British Shia Council’s online ‘about’ note). Theumbrellas’ transnational isolation and divergent ethnic make-up (Khoja andIranian in the British case, Iraqi in the Dutch case) underscore findings for orga-nizations and interlocks pointing to self-contained national enclaves of Shiism.

European Shiism in civil society

European Shiism has been explored here through the indicators of transnationalEuropean links and transethnic organizational identities and relations, and chartedfor powerful organizations and a sample approaching the larger sociologicalreality.

The one outstanding difference between the latter two probes concerns the cross-ethnic nature of the few links in the smaller sample (100%, as opposed to 55% oflinks in the larger sample). This fact accords with the overall characterizationof Shiism in each country by low organization density, with a considerabledegree of overarching representation, or centralization, in umbrella groups(although most peak organizations are articulated ethnically rather than cross-ethnically). In these samples, European Shiite organization mirrors the theologicalideal type that conceives Shiism as a hierocracy of multiple sources of high religiousauthority (mar �aje‘) in relation to which the Shiite community at large is definedthrough individual emulation.

Most importantly, there is only one transnational linkage between the largerDutch and British Shiite spheres, which, while it provides an ethnic bridgehead,remains limited in its effect as it does not connect umbrella organizations. Second,the lack of cross-border ties sustains, and is likely to be caused by, national differ-ences between the British and the Dutch organizational settings. This applies espe-cially to the ethnic composition of Shiite organizations and their linking patterns,

van den Bos 569



including those of umbrella organizations. These differences are paralleled by dif-ferential compactness, both mutually between the two spheres and in the compar-ative light of European ethnic organization, with high density defining Dutch Shiiteorganizational interlocks and high fragmentation defining the British ones.

It remains to be explored whether organizational differences, such as the rela-tively more articulate cross-ethnic and by implication more religious organizationand interlock patterns for major Dutch Shiite organizations, relate to differences insize between the Dutch and British Shiite communities. Do smaller (ethnic) com-munities necessitate lower common (transethnic, religious) denominators for orga-nization?43 Far higher ethnic than religious organization density in the Netherlands(Table 2) does not support this contention. Another factor more visibly relevant todifferences in national transethnic organization degree is that of ethnic residentialsegregation, whereby the British debate focuses on similarities with highly segre-gated American cases (Johnston et al., 2010; Peach, 2009), while for the Dutch casean article recently concluded ethnic residential segregation to be ‘moderate or aver-age by European standards’ for large Dutch cities (Musterd and Ostendorf, 2010).

Furthermore, the Shiite landscape in both the Netherlands and Britain is definedby ethnic rather than cross-ethnic organization (88%) and umbrella formation(67%), while cross-ethnic interlocks reach a minority of 18% of Shiite organiza-tions with ethnicity and board-member details available (26/144). Finally, thatethnic (as opposed to transethnic) features define a trend is suggested by the factthat the three Dutch peak organizations, two-thirds of which are ethnically artic-ulated, were all established recently, in the twenty-first century.

With the contours of the sampled European Shiism now established, the taskremains of drawing out some of their sociopolitical implications. First, EuropeanIslam’s indicator of organization transcending national state boundaries may beinterpreted through the concept of ‘civil society as associational life’ (Edwards,2008), which often turns on the notion of its density, measured through interlocks.Putnam’s neo-Tocquevillian argument that ‘a dense network of secondary associ-ations both embodies and contributes to effective social collaboration’ (Putnamet al., 1993: 90) is echoed in the widely held view that ‘a well developed civil societyis characterized by dense networks’ (Fullinwider, 1999: 39). Such dense associa-tionism is often also posed as a political agent (as in Putnam’s argument), eithersupporting or weakening democracy (Berman, 1997), and has been suggested towork both nationally and transnationally (Katz and Anheier, 2006: 246–247).

European Shiism would be a transnational political agent, in this line ofthought, were it to involve dense networks. Among the conclusions that theDutch and British data permit, however, is the shallowness of formal Shiite orga-nization – organization degrees are low, networks of major organizations sparseand interlocking boards across the North Sea few.44 The three organizations fromthe larger sample that carry ‘Europe’ in their names (the Council of EuropeanJamaats (Khoja), the Majlis-E-Ulama Shia Europe (Pakistani) and the Union ofIslamic Associations of Students in Europe (Etteh�adiye-ye anjomanh�a-ye esl�ami-yed�aneshjuy�an dar Orup�a) (Iranian)) are isolated. In the early 1980s, Momen wrote




that ‘[e]thnic . . . and political differences have prevented much cohesiveness amongthe Shi‘is in Europe . . . although a number of ‘‘umbrella’’ organizations have beenset up’ (Momen, 1985: 281).45 Leaving aside the issue of political differences, whichrequires further research,46 this citation indicates remarkable continuity withrespect to Shiites’ organization in Europe. Their ethnically articulated social frag-mentation remained, despite the growth of the community and the establishment ofmarja‘s’ offices in London that aspire to global reach, and it has been substantiatedhere both nationally and on the transnational European plane. Warner andWenner’s (2006) exploration of European Muslims’ peak organizations, by andlarge Sunni, found the same pattern of ethnically articulated social fragmentation.This suggests a widespread, cross-European and trans-sectarian Islamic phenome-non, and the importance, as they indicate, to consider facts of decentralized Islamicorganization for its explanation. Further research would be required to establishthe balance between internal religious dimensions and contextual factors ofEuropean Shiism – such as state policy (but see note 41) or the weight of theearly migrant generations on religious life.

I found doubt as to the substance of European Shiism in regard to its associa-tional life to be confirmed in interviews with leading Shiites in Britain and theNetherlands. Among them was the chairman of the Union of IraqiOrganizations in the Netherlands, who emphasized that contacts between Shiitesin Europe were mostly informal and indicated that it was trans-European tieswhich mattered: ‘I do not know how long it will take for European Shiism todevelop . . .Until presently, Shiites in Europe . . . are connected with the hawza’.47

A representative of the Muhammadi Trust – one of the oldest and most prestigiousof Shiite institutions in Britain – characterized the European connections of hisorganization as ‘minimal.’48 These facts indicate that European Shiism does notconstitute a political agent on account of dense associationism, although otherfactors are also relevant to that question.

A second pillar of civil society theorization – civility – has been notably absentfrom the conceptualization of global or transnational civil society. It ‘overlaps withconcepts such as civic engagement’ (Anheier, 2007: 11), and, when conceivedthrough Hayek’s definition of ‘a method of collaboration which requires agreementonly on means and not ends’, serves the political function of enabling ‘agreementand peace’ (Hayek, 1976: 3) in a modern pluralistic society (Boyd, 2006: 871).Scratching the surface of European Shiism along ideational lines, and examiningthe ways in which it is disseminated and articulated, does allow glimpses of such areality. One finds examples of civic engagement, for instance, in the outreach tonon-Muslim audiences for lectures or celebrations by an array of Shiite organiza-tions such as Noor Youth (see Moss, 2008: 45), in the officers of the KhoeiFoundation, which holds ‘monthly meetings with the metropolitan police onpolice/youth interactions’ (Leichtman, 2006: 6) or in the yearly ‘Imam HussainBlood Donation Campaigns’ organized by the Islamic Unity Society (IUS).

The IUS caters for students and young professionals in Britain. Its executivecommittee contains members of mainly Arab, and to some extent Asian, descent,49

van den Bos 571



and it first launched the Imam Hussain Blood Donation Campaign in 2006.Promotional footage for the 2007 campaign (featured on the 2008 promotionsite) hosts two prominent Shiite scholars, �Ayatoll�ah Seyyed F�adhil al-Mil�ani andSeyyed Mahdi Modaressi, who offer religious backing for blood donation.Modaressi mentions Quran 5:32, which says: ‘And whoever saves one life, it is asif he had saved the whole of mankind’. Mil�ani presents blood donation as is �ar –altruism/sacrifice. Asked for his opinion on giving blood to non-Muslims, Mil�anistates emphatically that there is ‘[n]othing wrong [with] that, no’ (see CAMPAIGN– Islamic Unity Society, 2008).

When compared with the words of the two religious authorities, there is aslightly more affirmative, societal emphasis in various IUS statements. Two repre-sentatives of the organization portrayed the religiously inspired social act to me asone that involved bringing various ethnic groups together, and one stated that itwas hoped that, through blood donation, ‘members of the Muslim community willbe more encouraged to contribute to British society and that members of theBritish society will recognize the Muslim community’s efforts in taking activesteps to participate’.50

The dual-country sample undercuts the idea of a European Shiism defined bysignificantly transnational or transethnic organization. Dutch and British Shiiteorganizations do not integrate into civil society through dense networks, but someof their prominent representatives do shape Shiism as a political actor in Europeansettings, through civic engagement. Whether civic engagement reflects deep commit-ment to a plural society or deflects from contrary political purposes is not always easyto tell (although the given cases do not suggest the latter), and, like dense associa-tionism, the concept remains ambiguous. But it is in such local religious articulations,rather than in organizational features, that ‘Shiism’ and ‘Europe’ meet.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for their comments.

Funding

Research for this paper was funded by the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological

Research.

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declares that he does not have any conflicts of interest.

Notes

A simplified transliteration method for Persian and Arabic has been adopted in thisarticle, with >�a<, >u< and >i< for long vowels, >a<, >o/a< and >e/i<for short vowels, >‘< and >’< for ‘eyn and hamze, and >ey< and >ow< fordiphthongs, except where different renderings have gained wide currency, as in thecase of ‘Khoei Foundation’ or ‘Kanoon Towhid’.




1. The usage of ‘transnational’ in this paper builds on the general meaning of ‘actionsconducted across national borders . . . by non-institutional actors from civil society’(Portes, 2001: 185) to distinguish from international and multinational phenomena,

but broadens the concept to any cross-border fact to include the overlapping boardmemberships that this article focuses on, and to society at large, to include organizationsfounded on primordial ties.

2. For example, a motif resonating to the prophetic saying that ‘Islam began as a strangerand will return a stranger . . . ’ (Meier, 1992: 105) figures in the imam Ja‘far al-S�adiq’sview of Shiism as the religion of ‘expatriates’ (ghorab �a’) among Muhammad’s commu-

nity (Corbin, 1971: 33).3. Chehabi (2006) is an exception, as are a few very recent studies (e.g. Louer, 2008).4. Long before the Iraq war, it was ‘becoming increasingly apparent that the United States

and Great Britain are growing strongholds of Shi‘ism’ (Walbridge, 2001: 243). A study

of the Khoei Foundation states the Shiite Muslims ‘have chosen London to becometheir new capital’ (Leichtman, 2006: 5).

5. One finds the connection of religious identification and transethnic Muslim organiza-

tion implied, for instance, in Nielsen’s statement that ‘parts of the youngergeneration [of Muslims in Europe] increasingly see themselves as Muslims first’(Nielsen, 2003: 42).

6. Both terms refer to organizations that claim representation of a group of otherorganizations.

7. ‘Cross-ethnic’ refers to multiple ethnic backgrounds, implying transethnic identity.8. Transnational social interaction is conceivable in other shapes beyond the focus in this

article on organizational ties and identities, such as (arranged) marriages, religious edu-cation, ritual manifestations and web forums – none of which, however, give an equallypowerful sense of social organization.

9. Dutch Chamber of Commerce files register board members’ place of birth. The BritishRegister of Charities lists trustees’ names only – which I examined with the aid of Mr TFouda to establish likely national background. Ethnic data have also been collected

through other Internet searches and direct contacts. In cases where audiences catered forand board memberships had different ethnic identities, the board-membership data wasrelied upon.

10. Interview with Dr Sajjad Rizvi, 4 January 2008.11. I am grateful to Ms K Neijenhuis for having offered this information on the existence

of European Ahl-e Beyt and its members, which derives from an interview that sheconducted with Mr Demirtekin in 2008. The latter further mentioned that he heads the

Dutch-Belgian section, that Mr Q�a’em-Maq�ami was the chairman in Germanyand that they would meet in Iran once every four years. Ibrahim indicates that theDutch Society is a part of the international [al-Majma‘ al-‘ �Alam�i li-] Ahl al-Bayt

(Ibrahim, 2005: 25), organization which ‘pursues one main objective, namely to gaincontrol over the political, social and religious affairs of the Shii communities through-out the world in order to centralize them under the leadership of the Iranian wal��-yefaq��h’ (Buchta, 2001: 351).

12. ‘[T]he broader European context facilitates the multiplication of Islamic groups . . .Withtheir civil liberties and constitutional guarantees of freedom of religion, European statesallow the expression of multiple varieties of Islam. This has enabled multiple competing

schools and sub-schools of Islam to go public and work to attract supporters, producing

van den Bos 573



a variety of orientations and organizations much broader than that available in most ifnot all of the ‘‘exporting’’ countries.’

13. The Netherlands data were largely collected by Ms K Neijenhuis on my behalf and for

her MA thesis. Future additions will include Shiite Sufi orders in the Netherlands.14. There is one hypothetical category of Shiite organizations that the survey does not

reach. This includes organizations not included by umbrella organizations or Islamic

directories, not visibly referred to online and not identifiable as Shiite by name. As it isdifficult to imagine that such bodies would also be ‘formal,’ their impact on the samplecannot be significant.

15. Interview with Yusuf Al-Khoei, available at: audio.theguardian.tv/sys-audio/Guardian/Islamophonic/2007/03/21/Islamophonic21032007.mp3 (accessed 8 December 2011).

16. It was reported in April 2008 that the Home Office thought there might be around 2million Muslims in Britain (Travis, 2008).

17. Hoseyniya refers to a Shiite religious centre named after the third Imam, Hoseyn(d. 680).

18. Interview with Dr Hussain Alkhateeb (a key figure in Dutch Shiism), 22 August 2008.

19. Several Dutch media reproduce the figure of an estimated 70,000 Shiites in theNetherlands (for example, De Volkskrant, 2 April 2006); Alkhateeb approximatedtheir number at 125,000 (email correspondence, 12 October 2008).

20. ‘Major’ is relative to Shiite organization in each country, and includes smallorganizations.

21. The ‘Khoja’ category differs from other labels in referring to a transnational ethnicgroup, and may overlap with place of birth categories. But place of birth labels here

imply ‘non-Khoja’.22. The Dutch listing resulted from consultations with one expert on Shiite organizations in

the Netherlands and one key participant in them. For the British listing, I consulted with

two widely respected insiders. The listings for a few of both the Dutch and Britishorganizations are slightly arbitrary, in that a few other organizations might also havequalified on such subjective scales as influence and respectability. However, the listings

are congruent with my reading of both spheres of Shiites’ organization and the organi-zations that were mentioned to me in interviews. None of the alternatives would dimin-ish the contrast between the Dutch and the British Shiite landscapes.

23. The informal link in the British Shiite landscape between ICAS and the MuhammadiTrust involves major Shiite institutions, but neither organization is an umbrella orga-nization. The bridging function of that link, therefore, is far more limited than that ofthe Dutch Shiite interlock.

24. The networks may be considered scarce given that one expects the more prominentShiite bodies with a presence in the public sphere to figure in a dense cluster ofinterconnections.

25. Regarding ethnic–national background, and in descending order of numbers, thelabelled Shiite organizations in Britain and the Netherlands are Iraqi, Pakistani,Khoja, Iranian, Turkish, Afghan and Turkmen. Lebanese, Kuwaiti and Bahraini orga-

nizations have equal lowest numbers. Most of the British-labelled entries are, respec-tively, Pakistani, Khoja, Iraqi and Iranian. Lebanese, Kuwaiti, Bahraini and Afghanorganizations have equal lowest numbers. In the Dutch case, labels include, first, Iraqi,second, Turkish, third, Afghan, Pakistani or Turkmen, and fourth, Khoja or Iranian.

Besides ethnically particular organizations, nine Shiite organizations in the Netherlands




count as cross-ethnic (15% of the labelled Dutch Shiite organizations), while 27 count inBritain (23% of the labelled British Shiite organizations).

26. There are likely to be some more board-member interlocks among Dutch and British

Shiite organizations, and their ethnic make-up will be slightly at variance with the recordgiven here. The linkages outlined here represent an exploration of interlocks between the74% of organizations for which board-member data have been assembled. For those

organizations with board-member data available, 85% (144/169) could be labelled forethnic identity.

27. Actual lines that include multiple overlaps between pairs of organizations amount to 47:

24 (Netherlands), 22 (Britain) and one (Netherlands–Britain). I am using the reducednumber of a simple graph, where only one line is taken into account if two organizationsare connected, to avoid methodological uncertainties involved in computing multipli-city-based density (see Scott, 2000: 76–77).

28. Density is computed here on the basis of the undirected network of overlapping boardmembers, where tie direction is irrelevant. This is expressed in the formula 2l/n(n-1),where ‘l’ represents lines and ‘n’ the number of organizations (see Wasserman and Faust,

1997: 101).29. I focus on fragmentation rather than centralization, first, because it is more intuitive

as an indicator of cohesion – a decentralized, unfragmented network looks more

cohesive than a centralized, fragmented network. Second, the focus on fragmenta-tion allows for the comparison with other ethnic communities, for which percent-ages of isolated organizations are available (see Van den Bos and Achbari, 2007:171–181).

30. Density and fragmentation apply here to the record of organizations with board-member data available (as in Van Heelsum’s (2005) rendering of ethnic minorities’organization data in the Netherlands, used for the comparison in Table 3, which

amounts to 169, or 74%.31. The decision to establish the council was taken on 18 June 2006 (see BRITISH SHIA

COUNCIL (2007): http://shiacouncil.org/index.php).

32. The Islamic Students’ Association in Britain is part of the Union of Islamic Students’Associations in Europe (UISA), which was founded in 1966 (see STATEMENT 42/1098/6 (2008): http://www.islamicsa.com/manchester/files/20080124-uisa-2008-pro-

grammes.pdf). Iranian Shiite Muslim students started organizing in private homesfrom 1973, and these activities later evolved into the Islamic Students’ Society inLondon (Tarikhche (2008): http://www.kanoontowhid.org/history.php). It seems likelythat the national British UISA branch evolved from this local organization and these

local activities.33. A representative of Roehampton University’s ABSOC stated to me that ABSOCs were

not coordinated by a central organization (Facebook correspondence, 23 November

2008).34. For example, see www.world-federation.org/Secretariat/Articles/Archive/Update_

Ayatullah_Seestani.htm (World Federation Secretariat message of 6 February 2004).

35. Interview with an academic expert on Shiism, 4 January 2008.36. Interview with Ali Ridha Jaffar, 28 July 2008.37. Interview with Ali Ridha Jaffar, 28 July 2008.38. Interview former UISA president, 16 January 2008.

39. Interview former UISA president, 16 January 2008.

van den Bos 575



40. The UISA chairman’s alleged disrespect of the Leader’s representative was among sev-eral critiques of the chairman by a range of the British branches in 2007 (see UISAELECTION (1386/2007, 7 �azar/28 November) in Khabargoz �ari-ye F �ars/Fars New

Agency).41. A former UISA president stated that, while the representative’s position had been con-

tested at times, he had generally remained a powerful figure in the union (interview, 16

January 2008).42. Additional research is necessary to assess and compare the effects of state policy on

Shiite organization in each country – which I expect to be able to report on in future

writings. Anecdotal evidence suggests that the role of the state should not be over-estimated. An account by SIR founder and chairman Sheykh Israfil Demirtekin indi-cated that a plan for the national representation of Shiites had emerged among Shiites inthe Netherlands, who subsequently approached the Dutch state (interview, 17 October

2008).43. The question for further exploration of how population size relates to the observed

organization patterns was usefully suggested to me by a peer reviewer of this article.

Besides approaching this issue empirically, as I have done in the body text, theoreticalinquiry in the realm of social networks also suggests itself. Particularly, the literatureconcerning scale effects for density comes to mind here as well as that exploring the

conditions for and modalities of bridging and bonding.44. It remains for future research to assess this reality relative to trans-European networks.45. Momen’s conclusion applied to both Europe and the United States, and reinforces my

findings, but the details are different. Ethnic differences that Momen remarked upon

occurred between Lebanese, East African Asians and Iranians, whereas the ethnic fault-lines of contemporary Dutch and British Shiism lie between Iraqi, Iranian, Turkish,Pakistani and East African-Asian (i.e. Khoja) Shiites. As to political differences,

Momen referred to Iranian communities. Whereas the main political fault-line stillspecifically involves issues crucial to Iranian Shiism – namely Kh�amene’i’s marja‘iyatand, beyond that, Khomeini’s legacy (the two of which, inter alia, are not always eval-

uated equally: some appreciate the second but dislike the first) – their evaluation is notonly divisive among Iranians, but among other Shiite communities as well. For instance,I encountered a similar duality of sentiment and opinion among Pakistani Shiites in

London.46. Political differences so far observed have broadly involved the extent to which

political readings of Shiism are favoured, and whether these readings implyvel �ayat-e faqih or support for Iran (which is not always the case). Another, partially

overlapping divide that also requires separate treatment concerns attitudes towardscorrect ritual practice during ‘ �Ashur�a (and more broadly, the classification of thevarious activities that organizations engage in). A third area for further research

concerns gender articulations of the observed organization patterns – which areapparent even at first glance in the fact that the great majority are strongly maledominated, with subsidiary women’s representation (e.g. a ‘lady’s representative’) in

some cases, and that in some subsidiary or independent youth organizations,women have assumed leading roles. The factor of class, fourthly, is more difficultto discern in Shiite organizations and remains to be explored. Beyond questions oforganization, lastly, further research is required into which ideational tendencies and

debates predominate. This applies, for instance, to doctrinal religious dimensions of




European Shiism – including the question of whether there exists any independentarticulation.

47. Interview with Dr Hussain Alkhateeb, 22 August 2008.

48. Interview with Ali Ridha Jaffar, 28 July 2008.49. Email correspondence with IUS National Community Officer Dr Marwan Al-Dawoud,

23 February 2008. He gave a precise figure: ‘The . . . committee is comprised of 67 per-

cent Arab and 37 percent Asian descent’.50. Email correspondence, 23 February 2008.

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