Introduction2
The notion of ummah has long been a source of identity for Muslims, with a strong symbolic, normative, and political appeal. In a generic sense, the ummah “denotes a cluster of believers bounded by their faith and religious and moral responsibilities, in a single borderless community.”3 Regardless of this broad understanding, reflecting a global sense of belonging to Islamic brotherhood and sisterhood, the ummah has been constructed and reconstructed theologically, ideologically, politically, socially, and strategically in different times and contexts. While it is a lexically and semantically contested concept, a quality which manifests in the plurality of understanding, for many Muslims, ummah remains a powerful source of overarching identity in the public consciousness, even after decades of nation-state experience.4 Moreover, the concept of ummah reflects the political conditions of the modern Muslim world, which “affects, and is affected by Muslim politics.”5
