This timely edited volume on West Africa by well-established scholars fills a gap in the larger picture of contemporary cross-currents in the Muslim world, and especially the impact of reformist movements on traditional societies. The focus is on how such changes play out politically within six national states in the region. A basic premise is that “the state still counts. No matter how important and resurgent a political factor, Islamism is still inflected and mediated by the ethnic composition, colonial legacy, political actors, governmental politics, and unforeseen contingencies unique to each West African nation in which Muslims constitute a significant size of the population” (p. 4).

What then is “Islamism” within this context? The editor suggests that “Islamism refers to organized activity and/or a systematic thought process that forcefully (but not necessarily violently) strives to bring politics into line with Islamic precepts. Such activity and/or thought process self-consciously positions itself within a wider, transnational movement of similarly inspired political change” (p. 4).

Thus, the stage is set to examine such “Islamism” (or “political Islam”) within the six states of Niger (Robert B. Charlick), Nigeria (Roman Loimeier), Mali (Victor Le Vine), Mauritania (Cedric Jourde), The Gambia (Momodou N. Darboe), and Senegal (Leonardo A. Villalon). The editor (William Miles) provides an introduction on emerging political dynamics in West African Islam, and a conclusion on “West Africa Transformed: The New Mosque-State Relationship.”

A note must be inserted on the selection of “units” (i.e., states) in this study. There are 15 states in the Economic Community of West African States [ECOWAS] (Mauritania was the sixteenth, but it dropped out in 2002). These states are generally aligned across the interior “Sahel” region in the north, and the coastal “rainforest” area, generally in the south. The latter states have far more Western political and religious contact than the interior, largely Muslim areas. Several of these coastal states, including Guinea, Côte d'Ivoire, and Ghana, have significant Muslim populations in the northern parts of the country, and hence have a different challenge in managing ethno-religious diversity than the Sahelian states that are overwhelmingly Muslim, ranging from southern Mauritania and Senegal through northern Nigeria. Indeed, the Nigerian case study is complicated by the fact that this country is by far the largest in the world—current population 150 million—that is about half Muslim and half Christian, and hence the politics are distinctive from the other states in this study. In short, Political Islam in West Africa focuses on the Sahelian states, including the northern portions of Nigeria. This focus is especially salient because of the international concern about North African influence and/or other Arab world influences, including the Saudis.

The time frame for this selection of six states is generally postindependence, that is, around 1960. However, to understand the historical baseline, each of the studies incorporates crucial references to the precolonial and colonial eras. (With the exception of The Gambia and Nigeria, all of the other states are former French colonies.) In the postcolonial era, each of these states—with the exception of Senegal, which has remained “democratic” throughout—has undergone a series of authoritarian and/or military regimes, sometimes oscillating with elected/civilian regimes. The ways in which such regimes seek to legitimize themselves, or simply remain in power, has turned out to include manipulation of religious factions and elites (even democratic Senegal has seen the direct involvement of the Sufi Brotherhoods, especially the Mourides, in the political life of the country).The details of this process of balancing Muslim factions are spelled out in each case. Yet an overall pattern emerges in that the line between “religion” and “the state” gets increasingly blurred over time. Hence, the book's emphasis on “transformation.”

Within this time frame, the impact of two larger megatrends has impacted Sahelian West Africa: 1) globalization, with its various forms of connectivity, and 2) the increased wealth of oil-producing (predominantly Muslim) states, such as Libya, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, and the Gulf states, which have reached out to West Africa in various ways. Indeed, a major theme of the book is the impact of the Saudis, not only through direct financial interventions but through the hadj pilgrimage. This sets the stage for confrontation between traditional Sahelian forms of Islam, especially Sufism and ethnic-based blends of Muslim culture, and the more Koran/Sunni-based, back-to-“fundamentals” versions of Islam, denoted by different names in West Africa, from Wahhabism and Salafism in The Gambia and Mali, to the Izala of Niger and Nigeria. The book uses the term “Islamic reformism” to denote such movements, although there are a wide variety of tendencies involved.

In some cases, the state tries to balance the Sufi/traditionalists versus the “reformers.” In other cases, such as Mauritania or The Gambia, the state tries to identify such reform movements as “foreign,” and hence not indigenous or suitable for their societies. It is significant that except in a very few instances, the Saudi-inspired reform movements are nonviolent. Indeed, it is the political mediation of the state that becomes the context for challenge and counterchallenge.

In the conclusion, Miles suggests that in these six states, “the likelihood of a national theocratic state arising in any of them is virtually nil” (p. 183). Yet there is also a “blurring of the postcolonial lines between mosque and state” (p. 184). The editor assesses six themes: 1) how democracy impacts the relationship of religion and politics, for example, in Senegal, Nigeria, The Gambia, and Mauritania; 2) the impact of the “reformism renaissance,” that is, the new Islamist groups, such as Izala (Niger and Nigeria) and the Groupe Salafist pour la Predication et le Combat (GSPC) in Mali and Mauritania, and how they are challenging traditional Muslim hierarchies; 3) how the Sufi Brotherhoods are responding to the challenges of the reformists, especially through their longtime roots in West African society; 4) how “Islamist anti-Westernization” is playing out in the six states, including the perceived need to “decolonize” Western legal institutions in these countries; 5) how “antifeminism” has become part of the Islamist agenda; and 6) the way in which external influences from the Muslim world are impacting West Africa.

In all, this is an outstanding volume. The contributors are deeply rooted in the research of their areas, and the results are credible and scholarly. Miles, who is especially knowledgeable about northern Nigeria and the Niger Republic, has done an excellent job of conceptualizing the issues, and in achieving a balance between the individual cases and the general themes. This book will be of great interest to political and social scientists, as well as to scholars of Africa and the Muslim world.