What is Islamophobia, and How Much Is There?

Theorizing and Measuring an Emerging Comparative Concept

Erik Bleich, Middlebury College

ebleich@[Link]

Prepared for the American Political Science Association Annual Meeting

Washington, DC
September 2-5, 2010

PLEASE DO NOT QUOTE OR CITE WITHOUT THE AUTHOR’S PERMISSION

Abstract
Islamophobia is an emerging comparative concept in the social sciences. Yet most
writers have an impressionistic understanding of the term at best. There is no widely-
accepted, usable definition of Islamophobia that permits systematic comparative and
causal analysis. In this essay, I analyze how the term Islamophobia has been deployed in
public and scholarly debates in order to reveal how these discussions have taken place on
multiple registers. I then draw on theoretical work on concept formation to offer a
systematic definition of Islamophobia that is useful for social scientific purposes. I
discuss the types of indicators that are most appropriate for measuring Islamophobia as
well as the benefits of concept development for enabling comparative and causal analysis.

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

 What is Islamophobia, and How Much Is There?
Theorizing and Measuring an Emerging Comparative Concept
Erik Bleich, Middlebury College

Islamophobia is an emerging comparative concept in the social sciences. Its usage has

migrated from the world of NGOs and journalists to that of scholars. Yet most writers

have an impressionistic understanding of the term at best. There is no widely-accepted,

usable definition of Islamophobia that permits systematic comparative and causal

analysis. In this essay, I analyze how the term Islamophobia has been deployed in public

and scholarly debates in order to reveal how these discussions have taken place on

multiple registers. I then draw on theoretical work on concept formation to offer a

systematic definition of Islamophobia that is useful for social scientific purposes. I

discuss the types of indicators that are most appropriate for measuring Islamophobia as

well as the benefits of concept development for enabling comparative and causal analysis.

I. Theorizing Islamophobia as an Emerging Comparative Concept

In some senses, Islamophobia is a new term for an old problem. At least since the

publication of Edward Said’s Orientalism in the late 1970s (Said 1979), it has been

widely accepted that “the West” has associated Islam with negative stereotypes. 1 Yet the

term Islamophobia only emerged in contemporary discourse with the 1997 publication of

the report “Islamophobia: A Challenge for Us All” by the British race relations NGO the

Runnymede Trust (1997). Since then, and especially since 2001, the term has been

regularly used by the media, by citizens, and by NGOs in Britain, France, and the United

1
Recent scholarship typically identifies a more nuanced and complex nature to early attitudes toward Islam,
but still emphasizes the presence of anti-Muslim prejudice in early modern Europe (Matar 2009).

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

States. 2 Database searches of two newspapers each from those three countries give a

sense of the frequency of media usage (by journalists or columnists, by their interviewees,

and by citizens writing letters to the newspaper).

Islamophobia in the Media

140
US (NY Times and Washington Post)
UK (Financial Times and Guardian)
Number of Newspaper Articles Containing Term

120
France (Le Monde and Le Figaro)

100
Islamophobia

80

60

40

20

0
1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008 2010
Year
Note: Figures represent media searches on LexisNexis from January 1, 1990 to December 31, 2009. The term
Islamophobia was used for searches in the US and UK, the term Islamophobie was used for searches in France.

The term Islamophobia has also spread to international organizations at the highest levels.

The European Union issued several reports on the topic in the mid-2000s (EUMC 2002,

2003, 2006), and in 2004 United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan opened a UN

conference on “Confronting Islamophobia” with the lament “when the world is

compelled to coin a new term to take account of increasingly widespread bigotry, that is a

sad and troubling development. Such is the case with Islamophobia.” 3

2
There is even a website called [Link]
3
Video available at [Link] accessed 10 August 2010.

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

 Although the term has become relatively common, there is little agreement about

Islamophobia’s precise meaning. The original 1997 Runnymede Trust report contains

varied and sometimes contradictory perspectives. It describes Islamophobia as “a useful

shorthand way of referring to dread or hatred of Islam - and, therefore, to fear or dislike

of all or most Muslims” (Runnymede Trust 1997: 1), but it then nuances that position by

making a distinction between “legitimate criticism and disagreement” with Islamic

doctrine or with the policies and practices of Muslim states as contrasted with true

Islamophobia, defined as “unfounded prejudice and hostility” (Runnymede Trust 1997:

4). The report uses the term to cover not just hostile sentiments, but also extends it to

“the practical consequences of such hostility in unfair discrimination against Muslim

individuals and communities, and to the exclusion of Muslims from mainstream political

and social affairs” (Runnymede Trust 1997: 4).

In spite of its limitations, the Runnymede Trust report offers a relatively specific and

well-developed sense of the term, even when compared to its increasingly popular use by

scholars. Some authors deploy Islamophobia without explicitly defining it (Bunzl 2007;

Cole 2009). Some use vague characterizations that amount to little more than U.S.

Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart’s attempt to identify hard-core pornography, “I

know it when I see it.” 4 Gottschalk and Greenberg (2008: 5), for example, call it as “a

social anxiety toward Islam and Muslim cultures.” Geisser (2003: 10) discusses a

“rejection of the religious referent…the Muslim religion as an irreducible identity marker

between ‘Us’ and ‘Them.’” In the United States context, Semati (2010: 1) calls it “a

single, unified and negative conception of an essentialized Islam, which is then deemed

incompatible with Euro-Americaness.”

4
Jacobellis v. Ohio, 378 U.S. 184 (1964).

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

 As imprecise as they may be, what unites the above definitions, proto-definitions, and

underlying assumptions is a sense that Islamophobia is a social evil. Yet there are also

interpretations of Islamophobia that reject this core proposition. Two prominent British

journalists have openly embraced Islamophobia as a valuable and justifiable stance.

Shortly after publication of the 1997 Runnymede Trust report, Guardian columnist Polly

Toynbee wrote “I am an Islamophobe, and proud of it,” while Sunday Times columnist

Rod Liddle presented a talk a decade later entitled “Islamophobia? Count me in” (cited in

Oborne and Jones 2008: 14). These writers emphasized their distrust of a religious

ideology rather than hatred of Muslims as a group. Approaching the topic from a

different angle, scholar Christian Joppke stressed that the very concept of Islamophobia

heightens Muslims’ claims on the British state and raises expectations to the point that he

argues cannot be met (Joppke 2009). For these reasons, Joppke is doubtful that the term

is a useful or progressive development. Kenan Malik takes the critique further,

suggesting there is little evidence of widespread Islamophobia, and that the term serves

primarily as a way for Muslim leaders to cement their power, and for politicians to

demonstrate sensitivity to Muslims while simultaneously pursuing war in Iraq or anti-

terrorism policies that engender frustration or that have negative consequences for many

Muslims (Malik 2005). 5

This dissonance surrounding the meaning of Islamophobia is problematic for an

emerging concept, but it is far from unusual. Even seemingly well-established terms like

“democracy” are fluid and subject to scholarly disagreement (Goertz 2006: ch. 4). One

5
Other bloggers and journalists have also argued that Islamophobia is more fiction than fact. Writing from
the United States, see Daniel Pipes ([Link] accessed 10 August
2010), and from Australia, see Paul Sheehan ([Link]
[Link]?page=-1, accessed 10 August 2010).

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

solution to this problem is to cede the term Islamophobia to the field of cultural studies,

which analyzes the politicized and contested nature of concepts and their shifting

definitions depending upon the particular social and political context in which they are

embedded. This kind of analysis has its purposes, but it is not particularly useful for the

social scientific study of the causes and consequences of prejudice over time and place.

If we want to formulate Islamophobia a workable term, we have to do it in light of a

broader discussion about concept formation. Political scientist Gary Goertz has

developed an analysis of social scientific concepts that focuses on their multilevel and

multidimensional nature. He starts by breaking down terms like democracy, revolution,

and the welfare state into three core levels: the basic level, the secondary level, and the

indicator level. 6 The basic level is the thing itself, while the secondary level consists of

the key constitutive elements that are most useful for causal analysis. For example, the

basic level concept of copper can be defined by many secondary or indicator level

properties, one of which is “reddish.” As Goertz argues, that is important for some

purposes (for example, if you are an interior designer), but if you are interested in

knowing what copper does—why it is causally important for scientific purposes—color is

not the best property around which to build your definition. It is much more useful to

define the concept “copper” based on the secondary-level property of its atomic structure,

because that is what explains its malleability, conductivity and other crucial aspects

useful for scientific analysis.

Viewed through this lens, the basic level concept of Islamophobia is best defined by

the following secondary level components: an un-nuanced or unjustified fear of, hatred

6
Goertz (2006: 1-5) recognizes many ways of thinking about concepts, but identifies this structure as the
most useful formulation for social scientists.

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

toward, or aversion to Islam or Muslims. 7 These are the ontologically significant aspects

of Islamophobia because they are the ones that we assume influence societal interactions

that we care about. This way of defining Islamophobia is therefore in keeping with

Goertz’s (2006: 28) observation that “We tend to identify as core dimensions those that

have causal powers when the object interacts with the outside world.” 8 Equally

importantly, these aspects are not causally related to Islamophobia—they do not cause it,

nor are they consequences of it—rather, they are the dimensions of Islamophobia itself

that are most salient for social scientific analysis.

As I have laid it out, there are three central aspects to this definition. First, un-

nuanced or unjustified means there can be nuanced and justified fears, hatreds and

aversions. If a young Muslim women grows up in a household or in a country where

Islam is used by Muslims to justify forced subservience or female circumcision, she (and

others aware of her plight) may be justified in taking a nuanced view that some

interpretations of Islam by some Muslim communities are worthy of fear, hatred and

aversion. At the other extreme are people who hold sweeping negative stereotypes about

Islam or Muslims that generate un-nuanced or unjustified attitudes.

Second, fear, hatred or aversion encompass a range of negative reactions and stances.

Third, Islam or Muslims suggest that the target may be the religious doctrine or the

people who follow it (or whose ancestors have followed it). This recognizes the

multidimensional nature of Islamophobia, and the fact that attitudes toward Islam and

Muslims are often inextricably intertwined. But it also comes with a word of warning—

7
This is similar to Sniderman et al.’s (2000: 16-19) discussion of standard definitions of prejudice, though
it is a specific form of it, and it includes the dimension of negative attitudes toward a religion/philosophy
which is not common in standard definitions of prejudice that focus on attitudes toward groups of people.
8
He goes on to state “Much of what good ontology entails is an analysis of those properties which have
causal powers and which are used in causal explanations and mechanisms” (Goertz 2006: 30).

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

there may be causal relationships that complicate the links between attitudes toward

Islam as a religion and Muslims as a people. Fear of Islam may lead to hatred of

Muslims in a causal way or vice-versa. This is not ideal in the definition of a concept,

but it is not unprecedented. 9 Each of these three components is necessary and together

they are sufficient to identify the basic level concept Islamophobia. 10

Identifying the key aspects of Islamophobia helps to recast and to make sense of the

cacophony of perspectives laid out above. The Runnymede Trust definition focuses

largely on the secondary dimensions of the concept, but it also mixes in some measures

and consequences of Islamophobia (such as discrimination and exclusion) that are best

kept separate. 11 The self-proclaimed Islamophobes have trimmed down the definition to

focus on justified aversion to Islamic doctrine (and perhaps even to a nuanced view of the

portions of the doctrine that are objectionable). In doing so, they have redefined the

concept to render it harmless (or even laudable). Christian Joppke is not taking issue

with the definition of Islamophobia, but rather with the purported effects of public

debates about Islamophobia. These effects are perfectly debatable and amenable to

empirical observation. Kenan Malik is challenging the measures of Islamophobia, but

more importantly he is assessing its causes, attributing them to narrow, instrumental self-

interest rather than to forces that suggest it is a greater societal evil.

9
For example, the civil rights dimension of democracy may cause the commitment to a one-person-one-
vote principle, and vice-versa, reflecting similar causal relationships between two core dimensions of
democracy.
10
Technically, together the three components are necessary and sufficient, but each individual component
operates with a family resemblance structure. In the first component, attitudes may be either un-nuanced or
unjustified; in the second, there may be fear or hatred or aversion; and in the third, the target may be Islam
or Muslims. See Goertz (2006: 39-46) for an extended discussion of necessary and sufficient versus family
resemblance structures.
11
The report also does something else Goertz calls for when formulating concepts, namely identifying the
“negative pole” of the definition. The report not only identifies eight specific dimensions of Islamophobia
but also their opposites (Runnymede Trust 1997: 5).

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

 In short, debates about Islamophobia are taking place across several levels: around its

definition and key components; around its causes; and around its effects. Building a clear,

justifiable, and useable definition of Islamophobia is a first step toward making sense of

these debates and toward understanding what is at stake at the three levels.

II. Measuring Islamophobia

Beyond identifying and understanding its key definitional components, developing

Islamophobia as a workable social scientific concept also involves measuring its intensity.

How do we know just how much Islamophobia exists? To date, most observers, scholars,

activists, and politicians have relied on one or more of four strategies for assessing

Islamophobia. Some authors combine observations about its deep historical roots with

anecdotal evidence—such as anti-Muslim statements by politicians, policies involving

surveillance of mosques or minorities, or the use of “Bin Laden” as a schoolyard taunt—

to assert the prevalence of Islamophobia in contemporary society (Cole 2009: 1681-2;

Fekete 2004; Goldberg 2006: 344-8). Others enumerate a sampling of attacks against

Muslims to illustrate the significance of the problem (EUMC 2002: 13-30, 2006: 62-89).

A third perspective examines prejudice directed at particular ethnic or racial minorities

that are likely to be Muslim. In these examples, discrimination against Asians, North

Africans, or immigrants from predominantly Muslim countries implies anti-Muslim

prejudice (EUMC 2006: 44-62). A fourth type of research asserts that socio-economic

disadvantages concentrated in Muslim communities constitute evidence of Islamophobia

(Tausch et al. 2007).

Electronic copy available at: [Link]

 These approaches are each useful to a degree. Yet, because they use primarily

anecdotal or indirect measures, they cannot provide a systematic baseline for analyzing

and comparing Islamophobia across time, across country, and compared to prejudice

directed at other minority groups. If we cannot do this, it is impossible to identify

whether Islamophobia is a pressing social problem or largely a figment of the

imagination, whether it is getting better or worse, or what factors are associated with its

rise or fall, or with the different forms it takes in different places or at different times.

What are the indicators that best reflect “an un-nuanced or unjustified fear of, hatred

toward or aversion to Islam or Muslims?” Developing adequate indicators of an

underlying concept always poses a challenge because of the distance between what we

can actually observe in the real world and the abstraction of a theoretical concept. This

gulf can be bridged in a number of ways. According to Goertz (2006: 55), there are at

least three types of relationships between indictors and concepts: “(1) concept causes

indicator, (2) indicator causes concept, and (3) a noncausal relationship.” Within each

type, there may also be a qualitative difference in the directness with which different

specific indicators reveal the underlying concept.

To clarify some of these distinctions, it is helpful to draw on Goertz’s (2006: 27-8,

57-9, 64-5) discussion of the “disease-symptom” model of concept indicators. If the

disease is cirrhosis, the secondary level definition of the concept is scarring of the liver.

If we biopsy a liver and find scar tissue, this is not a symptom of cirrhosis (relationship

type 1), nor is it cause of it (type 2), but rather it is a noncausal indicator of the disease

(type 3). There are, however, also symptoms (effects) of cirrhosis that function as

indicators of the underlying condition in a type 1 manner, although these vary widely in

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their ability to reveal the disease. Some are quite indirect, such as nausea, lack of

appetite, weight loss, and tiredness—problems associated with a wide number of illnesses.

Some are much more directly correlated with cirrhosis, such as jaundice. This may in

fact reveal another liver-related disease such as hepatitis. But jaundice is a more direct

indicator than many other symptoms because it has a higher probability of revealing a

problem with the liver and potentially of cirrhosis. At the other end of the spectrum are

indicators associated with cirrhosis that may themselves be causes of the disease in a type

2 fashion, such as alcohol abuse, cystic fibrosis, or too much copper in the liver. 12

Since Islamophobia is defined by a set of attitudes which cannot be biopsied, there

are no pure type 3 noncausal indicators. However, direct and nuanced survey, focus-

group, or interview data about attitudes toward Islam and Muslims come as close as

possible—where the expression of the attitude is viewed as a type 1 effect of the

underlying attitude. The ideal measures are polls where respondents truthfully address

whether they feel fear, hatred or aversion towards Islam as a whole or towards Muslims

in an unjustified or un-nuanced fashion. Of course, we do not have this information

because most verbal response data are not gathered with this goal in mind. Yet, there are

some surveys that could be formulated with this purpose, such as French polls that ask

respondents to estimate their levels of sympathy or antipathy toward status minority

groups on a sliding scale (Commission Nationale Consultative des Droits de l'Homme

1997: 374). 13 Unfortunately, these particular polls from the 1990s do not contain a direct

question about Muslims. Even if they did, there would remain certain ambiguities with

these sorts of indicators—are respondents answering truthfully? Are they conflating

12
On cirrhosis, see [Link] and [Link]
[Link]/cirrhosis, accessed 13 August 2010.
13
See CNCDH.

10

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Islamophobia with anti-Arab racism? Is Islamophobia a constant and durable presence in

respondents’ lives, or is it triggered or modulated based on circumstances or survey

question priming?—but these are about as close as we can come in the real world to ideal

measures of Islamophobia.

Other surveys ask questions that are less direct indirect indicators of Islamophobia.

These can sometimes be quite revealing, but they also run the risk of having an

ambiguous relationship to the underlying phenomenon. One survey asks “Which of the

following groups would you NOT like to have as a neighbor?” Answering “Muslim”

may reflect Islamophobia, but this is like diagnosing cirrhosis based on jaundice—there

is a high probability that it is correlated with the underlying phenomenon, but the

indicator may also be caused by something else entirely (a racist’s desire not to live next

to someone who is likely to have dark skin, or an atheist’s desire not to live next to a

religious person). Other survey questions ask “Would you favor the building of a

mosque in your neighborhood?” Negative answers may easily reflect concerns that have

nothing at all to do with the phenomenon, such as a desire to minimize traffic disruption.

Survey questions like these may indicate Islamophobia, but they are much less direct

measures than some others.

Looking beyond survey questions, there is an extremely wide range of type 1

indicators that can be used to infer the presence of Islamophobia just as a wide range of

symptoms are used to infer the presence of most diseases. Anti-Muslim hate crimes or

discrimination; negative rhetoric by mainstream or far right politicians; disparaging

portrayals of Islam or Muslims in popular culture (such as in movies, on TV, in cartoons

in best-selling books, in music) or in the media or textbooks; local leaders decrying Islam

11

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within their communities; sparse or conflict-prone social relations between Muslims and

non-Muslims; oppressive public policies toward Islam and Muslims; a low proportion of

Muslim representatives in politics; socio-economic disadvantage among Muslims

compared to non-Muslims; and Muslims’ own perceptions of high levels of prejudice or

suspicion can all help reveal Islamophobia.

Each of these may be an extremely important indicator, but each has to be examined

carefully and critically. Some of these measures, such as right-wing politicians’ overt

rejection of Islam or hate crimes directed against Muslims, are likely to be relatively

direct indicators with a high probability of reflecting the underlying phenomenon. 14

Others, such as mainstream journalists embracing a watered-down definition of

Islamophobia or scholars identifying socio-economic disparities between Muslims and

non-Muslims without controlling for other salient explanatory variables, are indirect

indicators with a much lower probability of revealing Islamophobia.

Some of these indicators function not only as effects of Islamophobia, but also as

causes. When far-right politicians or local activists make anti-Muslim statements, they

are not just likely indicators of their own Islamophobia, they are also likely to be a cause

of Islamophobia among some of their devotees. Complicating the picture even further,

those same statements may engender a sympathetic response among other listeners,

having the effect of both aggravating and diminishing Islamophobia simultaneously

among different audiences. It is easy to get caught up in the cross-currents of causality

when examining indicators. The most important point is to be explicit about what type of

14
There are exceptions and caveats here too. Attacks on Muslims may be more the result of xenophobia or
racism than of Islamophobia. Conversely, attacks against non-Muslims—such as those perpetrated against
Sikhs in the United States in the wake of the 9/11 bombings—may be the direct result of Islamophobia.

12

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indicator is being used, what relationship(s) it may have to the underlying concept, and

whether it is a direct or indirect measure of Islamophobia.

Is it possible to measure Islamophobia? It is. But it is not straightforward or a simple

task. Analysts and observers frequently disagree over which indicators best represent

levels of racism, economic health, public well-being, or democracy. This is a standard

challenge for social scientists, and it is one that applies to Islamophobia too. The best

way to measure Islamophobia is to rely heavily on the most direct indicators of “an un-

nuanced or unjustified fear of, hatred toward or aversion to Islam or Muslims.” It is also

important to use multiple indicators and to provide an estimate of just how direct and true

each indicator is. 15 It may not be possible to provide a meaningful aggregate index of

Islamophobia given the currently available data, but it is vital to move beyond using

anecdotes, historical allusions, or broad differences in socio-economic status as proof of

contemporary Islamophobia.

III. Putting the Concept of Islamophobia to Use: Comparative and Causal Analysis

Given the inherent difficulties, is it worth the effort to establish a definition and concrete

measures of Islamophobia? It is both intellectually interesting and analytically important

to bring rigor and clarity to a vague concept. But there is little point to this—at least for

social scientists—if the goal is purely theoretical. Developing Islamophobia as a concept

has to enable systematic comparison and causal analysis.

15
It is crucial to investigate the extent to which indirect indicators—and especially the least-direct ones
such as ambiguous survey questions or public statements, social contact between Muslims and non-
Muslims, or socio-economic disparities—actually reveal Islamophobia as opposed to other motives.

13

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 Measuring Islamophobia allows us to compare its levels over time within a country, 16

its relative strength and manifestations across countries, and its intensity relative to other

forms of prejudice directed at status minority groups defined by race, religion, ethnicity,

national origin, immigration status, or other factors. This is the first step toward

answering descriptive questions like: Is Islamophobia becoming more or less widespread

and entrenched? Is it particularly acute in some places (or among some communities) and

not very salient in others? And, has Islamophobia become a more important vector of

prejudice than that directed at Jews, blacks, Roma, Pakistanis, North Africans, asylum-

seekers, etc.? Right now, we have no systematic way to answer these questions.

Defining Islamophobia precisely and identifying its indicators are prerequisites to

answering these kinds of comparative questions that are of tremendous interest to

scholars, journalists, and citizens.

If the concept of Islamophobia is useful for social scientists, though, it has to have

value for causal analysis. Once we are able to analyze Islamophobia across the three

comparative dimensions, we can look for factors that correlate with rises and falls over

time, those that affect strength and weakness across countries, and those that explain the

relative significance of Islamophobia compared to other types of prejudice. We can use

qualitative process-tracing or other investigative methods to discern the origins of

Islamophobia among particular communities or at particular times. Identifying factors

that influence levels of Islamophobia could have a substantial impact on the kinds of

policies enacted by governments and on the lives of victims of Islamophobia and perhaps

of other forms of racism. Accurate comparison is the key to causal analysis, and a clear

and well-developed concept is the foundation for accurate comparison.

16
Or region, state, city, neighborhood, or any other geographic unit.

14

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 In addition to identifying the factors that affect Islamophobia, we can also look more

carefully at Islamophobia’s effects. Of course, as outlined above, many indicators of

Islamophobia are themselves consequences of an un-nuanced or unjustified fear of,

hatred toward, or aversion to Islam or Muslims. Some observers may want to analyze

discrimination or hate crimes directed against Muslims, repressive policies that fall

disproportionately on Muslim communities, or socio-economic disparities between

Muslims and non-Muslims. Sorting out the relative importance of Islamophobia on these

dependent variables—as opposed to the influence of generic racism, justified fears of

Islamist terrorism, or differences in educational attainment levels—and the precise way

Islamophobia functions to generate these outcomes is only possible if we have an

analytically meaningful definition of the concept.

Concept formation is the foundation for social scientific comparison and causal

analysis, and this essay’s goal is to lay the groundwork for future systematic studies. At

this stage, unfortunately, it is not yet possible to develop rigorous, overarching measures

of Islamophobia. Most of the data that could be useful for doing this either does not yet

exist, or is partial and difficult to use to gain precise answers. As mentioned above, there

are a few surveys that come close to asking direct questions about Islamophobia, some of

which have been asked across time and in comparison to attitudes toward other status

minority groups. But most of the surveys about attitudes toward Muslims do not ask the

same questions over time, do not compare across country, do not compare across

minority group, or ask questions that are indirect rather than direct indicators of

Islamophobia (see Bleich 2009; Field 2007).

15

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 Looking to other indicators, some jurisdictions—such as the FBI, London’s

Metropolitan Police Service, and a few other places—have begun to collect information

on anti-Muslim hate crimes. Yet this data typically only covers the past few years and

different districts use different methodologies, which makes comparison difficult. There

are also some institutes and researchers that have conducted “situation tests” to sort out

the effect of belonging to different status minority groups—such as being an immigrant

or an ethnic minority—on discrimination in the job market, in housing, or in access to

businesses like nightclubs (Adida, Laitin, and Valfort 2010; Banton 1997; Cediey and

Foroni 2008; Political and Economic Planning 1967). 17 Only a few of these are

specifically designed to test the effect of being a Muslim (see, for example, Adida, Laitin,

and Valfort 2010), and they tend not to be comparative across time or country. We also

lack good systematic studies examining Islamophobia in the media, in political

participation, in political rhetoric, in public policies, in popular culture, or in daily

interactions among average citizens. In short, we are at the beginning of the process of

thinking through what Islamophobia is and how to measure it. The next step is to

develop concrete and replicable ways to do so.

Conclusion: What Is at Stake?

Most people assume that Islamophobia exists in Western liberal democracies. But the

stories that support this presumption are anecdotal and the facts partial; taken together,

they cannot tell us how much Islamophobia there is, whether levels are changing over

time, whether it is worse in some locations than others, or how it compares as a problem

17
See also the Observatoire des Discriminations in France, and the Migration Policy Group’s project on
situation testing: [Link]

16

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to fear, aversion, or hatred based on other identity markers. We also have few tools for

understanding what factors encourage generic Islamophobia to express itself in terms of

hate crimes, discrimination, or social aversion, or for analyzing what policies may

reinforce or attenuate Islamophobia as a public phenomenon. Developing Islamophobia

as a usable concept for social scientists is a first step toward making progress in

understanding the comparative and causal questions that we are interested in.

There are also critical policymaking stakes involved in making progress on these

questions. How politicians, bureaucrats and civil society groups allocate their money,

their time, and their effort in the fight against Islamophobia should be determined by

grounded measures of the problem rather than by mere impressions. When civil society

groups, anti-racist bureaucracies, or public budgets, or even scholars turn to the problem

of Islamophobia, they often shift resources away from other serious concerns (such as

racism, anti-Semitism, anti-Roma sentiments, anti-immigrant prejudice, sexism,

homophobia, etc.). How much attention each of these issues receives should be dictated

by an accurate estimate of the extent of the problem. Developing Islamophobia as a

concrete and usable social scientific category is the basis for meaningful comparative and

causal analysis, and is the foundation for more influential findings in both academic and

public debates.

17

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