Indian Journalist Explains Roots of Religious Extremism

November 14, 2011

"Where Do Jihadis Come From" was a subject of a discussion led by Sadanand Dhume of the American Enterprise Institute. The event was held at the American Center on November 8, 2011. Mr. Dhume is the author of My Friend the Fanatic (2008) about his travels with a radical Muslim in Indonesia, and has done extensive research on the origins of religious extremism. In his lecture Mr. Dhume dispeled many myths about religious extremism.

"The key thing that's driving it is neither poverty, nor American foreign policy. The key thing that driving it is the vision of creating a Utopia on Earth. Utopia of society that is ordered by what Islamists see as God's laws," said Sadanand Dhume on the topic of his lecture. For more information about  the causes of religious extremism and why people choose to become jihadis you can watch in the interview with Sadanand Dhume. 

Indian writer and journalist based in Washington D.C. spent five years in Asia, where he served as India bureau chief of the Far Eastern Economic Review and as Indonesia correspondent of FEER and The Wall Street Journal Asia. His essays, op-eds and reviews have also been published in The Washington Post, Forbes and many more.