This volume on the role of Sufi Islam in Senegalese politics is based on a series of papers presented in 2008 at Columbia University's Institute of African Studies. The introduction by the director of the Institute, Senegalese historian Mamadou Diouf, sets out an apparent paradox: Despite predictions that religion would be eclipsed by the rise of secularism due to modernisation in the 20th century, Senegal's Sufi Islam has not only been resilient but critical to the development of a more open, democratic society. In contrast with popular views of political Islam as antithetical to pluralism and tolerance, Diouf argues that the Senegalese experience reflects the historical construction of a social contract between religious and political authorities, echoing a dominant theme in the vast literature on religion and politics in Senegal. Revisiting the Islamo–Wolof model of socio-political incorporation that he and Momar Coumba Diop developed in the 1990s, Diouf asserts that this contract has survived the profound mutations that Senegalese society has undergone over the last century. The contributions to the volume aim to analyse the effect of this metamorphosis on the role of Sufi Islam and its impact on political norms and practices in Senegalese society.

The highly erudite contribution by Senegalese philosopher Souleymane Bachir Diagne considers two different kinds of Islamic responses to the secularisation narrative: the intellectual responses of Muslim philosophers and the practical ones of Senegalese religious and political leaders. Diagne describes how these leaders are seen in Senegal not as interfering in politics but assuming a social responsibility by intervening as ‘firefighters’ in the political arena. The subsequent two chapters by Beth Buggenhagen and Erin Augis focus on contemporary social forces that have influenced popular conceptions of religion, politics and social relations including gender and sexuality. While Buggenhagen discusses the impact of the radical transformation of media and communication on Sufi Muslims, Augis analyses how Sunnite women in Dakar negotiate globalising capitalist forces with transnational discourses on Islamic orthodoxy.

Both Diouf's chapter on the Muslim traders of Saint-Louis and Etienne Smith's on ethnicity and kinship consider the interaction among the multiple identities of Senegalese, reminding us that religion ‘is not the only game in town’. Smith's analysis of the microprocesses of tolerance from below, such as interethnic joking relationships, demonstrates how pluralist worldviews, secular and Islamic alike, are expressed. Meanwhile at the elite level, Smith explains how an informal policy of ‘proportional equidistance’ from both religious and cultural groups, routinely practiced by Senegalese politicians with the notable exception of former President Wade, provides an alternative method for promoting tolerance and pluralism to Arend Liphart's highly institutionalised form of consociationalism.

Informality is equally critical to Joseph Hill's conception of sovereignty in his chapter on the disciples of Shaykh Ibrahim Niass. Hill proposes that ‘informal’ religious sovereignty exists alongside formal political authority in Senegal, challenging the standard view of the Senegalese social contract as one of religious accommodation to the political sovereignty of the nation-state, and more generally the distinction between ‘political’ and ‘nonpolitical’ Islam. Hill argues that ‘hybrid approaches to authority’ like the one found in Senegal ‘are among many answers to the problem of coexistence’. In his chapter on the Muridiya, Cheikh Anta Babou also challenges the notion of a Senegalese social contract through his critique of the assertion that Sufi leaders ‘enjoyed unfettered obedience and control over their disciples’ and thus unlimited ‘power to make them endorse whatever deal’ they struck with the State. It is dubious, however, whether this reductionist view has ever been ‘a cornerstone of [Senegalese] social contract theory’ as Babou contends. Since the early writings of Donal Cruise O'Brien, analyses of the relationship between marabouts and their disciples have been much more nuanced, recognising limits on the power of the former and the relative autonomy of the latter.

The final two final chapters of the volume provide enriching comparative perspectives. Incorporating Senegal more fully into modern democratisation theory, Alfred Stepan argues that along with Indonesia and India, Senegal is an example of a democratic country with a large Muslim population that ‘appropriately violates’ the ‘lessons of secularism’ drawn from Western experiences. Arguing that all religions are multivocal, Stepan maintains that Senegal's ‘particular form of Islam … fosters ‘rituals of respect’ by emphasising those parts of the Qu'ran's multivocality that urge tolerance as a response to diversity’. This theme is reinforced in the concluding chapter by Leonardo A. Villalon, in which he insists that Sufism itself is multivocal, challenging generalisations about its promotion of democratic pluralism or tolerance. His comparison with other Sahelian Muslim-majority countries reveals that Senegal is less exceptional than often depicted in terms of their negotiation and institutionalisation of democratic reform that have been profoundly influenced rather than purely obstructed by their deeply religious Sufi societies. A rich set of writings covering an array of topics and disciplines, this volume offers new insights into Senegalese ‘exceptionalism’ and an important contribution to the literature on Islam and democratisation.