"How do we account for the relationship between the secular state and pious society? Rather than viewing the two as mutually exclusive, the studies in this volume, built on the Turkish experience, skillfully illustrate how a secular state can engage and accommodate the exigencies of a religious society. The lesson may be highly instructive to the emerging democracies in the Middle East today.'

Asef Bayat, professor of Sociology and Middle East Studies, University of Illinois