Muslim Cultures of Care and the Fracture of Civil Society

Dear Colleagues,

Scholars examining the role of religion in society dispute the idea that religion organically integrates individuals into public life. For some, religion is not just a mode of civic engagement, but also a site of governance and control. Religion in civic life is neither neutral nor universally empowering; it is deeply entangled in political hierarchies, state authority, and exclusionary practices. Recent research interrogates how religion operates in those entanglements to regulate subjectivities and align communities with post secular and security-driven regimes. This perspective views religion as a tool of power, integral to biopolitical regulation.

Earlier studies argued that religious institutions foster civic participation, volunteering, and community engagement, often acting as civic incubators that offer leadership training and political development. This functionalist perspective views religion as a social institution that helps maintain social cohesion, stability, and integration. Many scholars in this vein recognized the moral and civic functions of religion, extending beyond personal belief, and have emphasized how religious communities instill virtue. In the American context, religion is linked to projects of building social capital, developing civic virtue, and cultivating a sense of community and belonging.

Both perspectives broadly debate whether civil society is in decline. Research has shown how religious charities have adopted neoliberal logics of personal responsibility, such as focusing on teaching poor clients how to manage themselves by disciplining their bodies and spirits. Other scholars explore how faith-based care institutions, such as hospitals and hospices, once played a significant role in shaping community morals, criticizing their decline as a consequence of secularization and increasing diversity. Still, others argue that today’s religious care is no longer primarily spiritual; it is managerial and therapeutic, often aligned with state and market ideologies. A growing concern among many scholars is the reconfiguration of care under current conditions. As civil society fragments, the ethics of care becomes a battleground, either co-opted by market logics or reimagined as a radical framework for justice.

Scholars observe how care—simply defined as providing for others—is being reconfigured as a site of power, moral labor, and subject formation across various settings. In the wake of neoliberal restructuring of the state and global economy, as well as the weakening of welfare institutions, religious actors and institutions have become crucial sites in transforming regimes or moral economies of care, stepping in when the state pulls back or being co-opted into governance systems that internalize responsibility for individual and community wellbeing and sustenance.

This Special Issue invites scholars in the humanities and humanistic social sciences to critically examine the concept of care, with a focus on care in the lived realities of Muslims in diaspora and those navigating marginalizing conditions, whether rooted in race, gender, law, or geopolitics. While we especially welcome papers focused on the United States, we also encourage contributions that explore other regional or transnational contexts. How do Muslim individuals and groups perform, challenge, or reshape care in settings where civil society is under strain? What forms of solidarity and ethical living develop in mosques, mutual aid networks, youth and women’s organizations, support groups, or Muslim-led clinics, schools, NGOs, professional and leisure associations, and chaplaincies? How are these practices connected, morally or theologically, to obligations of care? What are the policy implications of this shift in moral economies of care? How might this influence interfaith advocacy? Submissions should examine Muslim care work or theological and ethical perspectives through the lens of religion-as-care, highlighting how Islamic frameworks shape caregiving practices, ethical orientations, and affective relationships. This Special Issue encourages interdisciplinary approaches, drawing from religious studies, anthropology, sociology, history, political science, law, philosophy, literature, gender studies, ethnic studies, cultural studies, and related fields. Theoretical, theological, and empirical papers (including ethnographic studies) will be considered.

We hope that this Special Issue will open new pathways for thinking about responsibility, kinship, and relational ethics in Muslim contexts, and encourage new research that will challenge binary views of religion as either salvation or condemnation. Instead, it will highlight religion-as-care as a contested space of power, solidarity, and ethical discussion within fractured civic landscapes. We especially welcome original research articles that examine resilience and vulnerability amidst societal divisions, although submissions on other relevant topics will also be considered. Possible research areas may include, but are not limited to, the following:

• State outsourcing of care to religious actors (e.g., refugee resettlement, trauma care, foster care, natural disaster relief).
• Care’s complicated relationship with its converse—neglect and violence.
• Muslim grassroots care networks in the post-pandemic era.
• Relations between Muslims and non-Muslims facilitated by faith-based care.
• Ethical and relational entanglements of care that extend beyond humans to encompass animals, plants, ecosystems, the environment, microbial life, and technology.
• Gender, labor, and care within Muslim communities.
• Islamic social enterprises, philanthropy, and outreach efforts.
• Muslim prison work.
• Comparative analysis of Muslim and Christian, Jewish, or other faith-based approaches to care and civil repair.

We request that, prior to submitting a manuscript, interested authors initially submit a proposed title and an abstract of 200-300 words summarizing their intended contribution. Please send it to the Guest Editor or to the Assistant Editor Ms. Amity Zhang (amity.zhang@mdpi.com) of Religions. Abstracts will be reviewed by the Guest Editor for the purposes of ensuring proper fit within the scope of the Special Issue. Full manuscripts will undergo double-blind peer review.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Prof. Dr. Kathleen M. Moore
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a double-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Religions is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• Islamic ethics
• moral economy
• civil society
• faith-based organizations
• Muslims in diaspora
• religion and governance
• ethics of care
• affective labor
• spiritual care
• pastoral care
• intergenerational care
• caring subjectivity