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Presents maps of the population density of Muslims in Europe. Dates of data collection in several countries; Sources of data; Details on the density of Muslim population during the inter-war period in Bulgaria.

There has been some controversy recently over the identity of the first mayor of Nicosia during British rule. This paper seeks to clarify the issue by putting it into context. What was Nicosia like between 1878 and 1882? What exactly do we mean by the words 'mayor' and 'municipal council'? How was the town administered then and how and to what extent did municipal procedures change in the subsequent years? The material researched suggests that the unusual circumstances of the occupation created a prolonged period of transition during which basic municipal functions were essentially directed by British officials. It was not until 1882 that a substantial shift from an Ottoman to a more British colonial form of administration took place. The resulting reforms provided the islanders with a judiciary independent of the executive, and a partially elected legislature. Nicosia was, on the whole, slower than the coastal towns to make the most of the opportunity for municipal self-government that the new legislation also offered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we show how judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) have provided nationalists with an unexpected opportunity to promote a nationalist discourse that is seemingly in line with human rights while fundamentally at odds with the counter-majoritarian core of human rights. We start our analysis with two judgments in which the Court accepted the arguments of liberal democratic states to infringe fundamental rights of persons belonging to (immigrant) Muslim minorities in the name of "requirements of living together" or "social integration": SAS v France (2014) and Osmanoglu and Kocabas v Switzerland (2017). Strikingly, the justifications by the states for these infringements point to concerns about perceived threats to national identity and culture. We show how nationalist politicians in countries with minority populations, including those in East Central Europe, have used justifications in terms of national self-protection, tacitly or explicitly, to pursue old anti–human rights agendas. The case law discussed here enabled them to present these justifications as ECtHR proof, notwithstanding the underlying nationalism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although Europe has experienced unprecedented numbers of refugee arrivals in recent years, there exists almost no causal evidence regarding the impact of the refugee crisis on natives' attitudes, policy preferences, and political engagement. We exploit a natural experiment in the Aegean Sea, where Greek islands close to the Turkish coast experienced a sudden and massive increase in refugee arrivals, while similar islands slightly farther away did not. Leveraging a targeted survey of 2,070 island residents and distance to Turkey as an instrument, we find that direct exposure to refugee arrivals induces sizable and lasting increases in natives' hostility toward refugees, immigrants, and Muslim minorities; support for restrictive asylum and immigration policies; and political engagement to effect such exclusionary policies. Since refugees only passed through these islands, our findings challenge both standard economic and cultural explanations of anti-immigrant sentiment and show that mere exposure suffices in generating lasting increases in hostility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the last decades, Europe debates on Islam have been framed increasingly through the lens of cultural difference. In this discursive climate, culture constitutes a crucial terrain of investment for European Muslims in their struggle for inclusion and recognition. Based on two different ethnographic research projects among European Muslims, this essay examines two distinct types of culture discourses. One employs an Islam-versus-culture trope that serves to disconnect Islam from certain patriarchal practices perceived to exist within Muslim communities. The other discourse defends the intrinsic and symbiotic link between Islam and culture, especially in order to elevate the place of artistic practices within Muslim communities. To make sense of these seeming contradictions, I explore the multivalent meanings contained in my interlocutors' uses of the culture concept by tracing the respective genealogies of these meanings. This includes an investigation of culture's conceptual histories, formulated successively by Enlightenment thinkers, Romanticists, and early anthropologists, as well as by Islamic reformers and their more recent successors. My investigation into these conceptual histories exposes broader concerns about individual freedom and agency on the part of cultural theorists, which have furthermore enabled various claims about modernity and backwardness. While European Muslims creatively integrate various articulations of the culture concept into their world-making projects, I argue that the ontological assumptions underpinning the culture concept continue to haunt and render precarious efforts to demonstrate Muslim belonging to Europe via culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on social conditions of Muslims living in Western countries. Topics mentioned include the increase in the anti-Muslim sentiment after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York, the reports of a growing number of violations of civil rights in a context of securitization, and the work of researchers regarding discrimination against Western Muslims and their reaction.

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses various reports within the issue on topics including Muslims living in Western countries, Islamophobia, and Muslims' integration.

Focuses on the development of national identities among the Muslim populations in Europe. Contrasts in the perceptions of Christians on the Balkan Muslims and the self-perceptions of Balkan Muslims; Significance of Islam to national identity.

Investigates the Muslim population in Europe for the period 1800 to 1912. Unreliability of Balkan population estimates; Significance of migration and Islamic conversion to the demography; Impact of the 1877-1878 Russo-Turkish War and the Balkan wars on population dynamics.

Challenges the associations between alphabetic literacy and the growth of knowledge and between restricted literacy and traditional societies by presenting material from medieval Europe, in which the milieu of restricted literacy is creative, and from Muslim Africa, in which widespread literacy does not lead to criticism or the revision of basic religious tenets. Reasons for the vitality of Islamic reform in West Africa; Western education; Scriptural literacy.