Exploring the Role of Islam in Mali

The absence of Islamist parties or religious candidates in Mali conceals the important role that Muslim leaders have played in politics during the multiparty era. Unlike other contexts, where religious leaders have leveraged networks of service provision to launch mass parties, Islamic service provision fuels personalist networks for major religious figures in Mali, who exist in varying degrees of complementarity with the secular state. This chapter examines clerics’ roles in politics and governance in Mali. As trusted providers of social services, including education and justice provision, Muslim clerics also offer patronage networks that are an alternative to those embedded in the secular state. Rather than explicitly challenge the regime, the country’s leading clerics have struck a delicate balance between competition and complementarity with the state. They use their close proximity to the state to influence politics, gain power, and engage in contentious politics, but minimize reputational costs associated with running for office. The chapter demonstrates that the introduction of jihadist groups, and their repertoires of service provision, which explicitly challenges the state, is a strong departure from existing patterns of political engagement by Muslim clerics and their networks. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the ways that jihadist presence, with its explicit challenge to the secular state, could challenge existing patterns of accommodation between religious leaders and the state.