Islamophobia in the West : Measuring and Explaining Individual Attitudes

Since the late 1980s, growing migration from countries with a Muslim cultural background, and increasing Islamic fundamentalism related to terrorist attacks in Western Europe and the US, have created a new research field investigating the way states and ordinary citizens react to these new phenomena. However, whilst we already know much about how Islam finds its place in Western Europe and North America, and how states react to Muslim migration, we know surprisingly little about the attitudes of ordinary citizens towards Muslim migrants and Islam. Islamophobia has only recently started to be addressed by social scientists.

With contributions by leading researchers from many countries in Western Europe and North America, this book brings a new, transatlantic perspective to this growing field and establishes an important basis for further research in the area. It addresses several essential questions about Islamophobia, including:

• what exactly is Islamophobia and how can we measure it?
• how is it related to similar social phenomena, such as xenophobia?
• how widespread are Islamophobic attitudes, and how can they be explained?
• how are Muslims different from other outgroups and what role does terrorism and 9/11 play?

Islamophobia in the West will be of interest to students and scholars of sociology, religious studies, social psychology, political science, ethnology, and legal science.

Marc Helbling is Head of the research group 'Immigration Policies in Comparison' (IMPIC) at the Social Science Research Centre Berlin (WZB), Germany. His recent publications include Restructuring Political Conflict in Western Europe (Cambridge University Press, 2011, with Hanspeter Kriesi, Edgar Grande et al.) and Practising Citizenship and Heterogeneous Nationhood: Naturalisations in Swiss Municipalities (Amsterdam University Press, 2008). He has also published articles in journals such as the European Journal of Political Research, Ethnic and Racial Studies, and the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies.