Hizmet in Transitions

In this open-access monograph, Paul Weller explores how the movement known as Hizmet (meaning “service”) is undergoing a period of transitions in Europe. Inspired by the teaching and practice of the Turkish Islamic scholar, Fethullah Gülen, Hizmet has been active in Europe (and other continents) for several decades. It has always been subject to some degree of contestation, which has intensified following the July 2016 coup attempt in Turkey, for which the current Turkish government holds Fethullah Gülen and Hizmet as responsible – a claim they strongly deny. In Turkey, thousands of people associated with Hizmet have been imprisoned. In Europe, pressures have been brought to bear on the movement and its activities. In charting a way forward, Hizmet finds itself in a significant transitional period, the nature and possible future trajectories of which are explored in this volume. The book is informed by a comprehensive literature review and a recent research project which includes primary research interviews with key Hizmet figures in Europe and beyond. It contends that to properly understand Hizmet in Europe, one has to situate it in its interactive engagement both with its diverse European national contexts and with Fethullah Gülen’s teaching and practice. 

“The failed coup attempt in Turkey in 2016 brought the Hizmet movement, inspired by the exiled Turkish religious thinker Fethullah Gülen, to the attention of a wide public. In this first in-depth study of the movement since then, Paul Weller provides a critically sympathetic analysis of Hizmet’s origins and its development since 2016. In his assessment of the challenges that the movement faces today, Weller’s masterly study sets the foundation for future study of the movement.” Jørgen S. Nielsen, Professor Emeritus, University of Birmingham, UK, and Affiliate Professor, University of Copenhagen, Denmark

“This book is the first new spark of hope for the continuity of the message of the inspiring and deep thinking, but also practical and social, figure of Fethullah Gülen.” Karel Steenbrink (deceased), formerly Professor Emeritus of Intercultural Theology, Utrecht University, The Netherlands

“In this brilliant book about the contextualisation of a global Turkish-Islamic movement in Europe, Paul Weller masterfully explores the the diverse responses of the movement’s participants to the challenges of being declared as undesired citizens and securitised by an authoritarian regime. Based on in-depth interviews with participants in many European countries, Weller does an excellent job in his investigation of the movement’s trials and tribulations in trying to reinvent itself in diaspora.” Professor İhsan Yılmaz, Research Chair of Islamic Studies, Deakin University, Australia

Paul Weller is Non-Stipendiary Research Fellow in Religion and Society at Regent’s Park College, University of Oxford, from which base he conducted the research that informs this book, and where is he is Associate Director (UK) of the Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture and an Associate Member of the University's Faculty of Theology and Religion.