City University of New York (CUNY) CUNY Academic Works All Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects 2-2015 Policy Advocacy and the Performance of Muslim American Identity Emily Cury Graduate Center, City University of New York How does access to this work benefit ou?y Let us know! More information about this work at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/544 Discover additional works at: https://academicworks.cuny.edu This work is made publicly available by the City University of New York (CUNY). Contact: [email protected] Policy Advocacy and the Performance of Muslim American Identity By Emily Cury A dissertation submitted to the Graduate faculty in Political Science in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy, The City University of New York 2015 © 2015 Emily Cury All Rights Reserved ii This manuscript has been read and accepted for the Graduate Faculty in Political Science in satisfaction of the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Professor Dov Waxman _________________ _____________________________________ Date Chair of Examining Committee Professor Allison Cole _________________ _____________________________________ Date Executive Officer Professor Susan Woodward Professor Joe Rollins Supervisory Committee THE CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW YORK iii Abstract Policy Advocacy and the Performance of Muslim American Identity by Emily Cury Adviser: Professor Dov Waxman In much of the political science literature, lobbying is conceptualized as a strategic attempt to influence policy. Policy actors are seen as independent agents competing to achieve policy outcomes that closely resemble their preferences. This understanding of policymaking has acquired a taken-for-granted nature and is therefore seldom questioned. Thus, the discourse of policy advocacy as a bargaining process has becomes, in part, a constraining discourse, leading academic inquiry to focus on questions of tactics and policy outcomes and ignore questions of how the policy process itself shapes and influences actors’ identities and behavior. Understood in purely strategic terms, Muslim American foreign policy advocacy post- 9/11 seems puzzling, since it appears to confirm the perception of Muslims as outsiders concerned not with American interests, but with those of other nations. This work argues that in order to explain why Muslim American organizations continue, and in some cases intensify, their lobbying on U.S. foreign policy, we must problematize the way lobbying and policy engagement have been traditionally theorized. Rethinking policymaking as a number of acts through which actors perform and communicate a particular identity can have important implications for our understanding of the policymaking process and the role interest groups play in that process. I will present an in-depth case study of the two existing Muslim American interest groups, the Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Muslim Public Affairs iv Council (MPAC), focusing in particular on their post-9/11 foreign policy advocacy. The primary goal of this paper is to analyze how CAIR and MPAC are (re)presenting Muslim American identity through the various policy acts in which they engage. I argue that examining these acts will help us better understand how, and what kind of, Muslim American identity is being performed. Methodologically, this paper relies on a critical discourse analysis approach. Consequently, the data sources examined and used to illustrate this argument are the policy discourse produced by these organizations, which include policy reports and recommendations, public statements, action alerts, op-eds, and qualitative interviews. v Acknowledgments I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my mentor, Dov Waxman, for his constant guidance, support, and patience. He has been an unremitting source of support, an academic role model, and a staunch advocate; I am forever indebted to him. I would also like to thank the members of my dissertation committee, Susan Woodward and Joe Rollins, for pushing me to think in new ways and always prodding me to be clearer. Their feedback, questions, and at times tough critique have been invaluable for this dissertation as well as for my own academic development. Finally, I would like to thank my husband, Ziad, my bedrock, friend, and intellectual partner; my mother, who has taught me to value the fluidity and instability of life; and my father, who sacrificed so much so that his children could have the formal education he could not. vi Contents Title Copyright Approval Abstract Dedication Acknowledgments Introduction: Dilemmas of Engagement……………………………………………...1 Literature Review……………………………………….………………5 Methodology…………………………………………………………...13 Plan of the Study……………………………………………………….17 Chapter 1: Negotiating Integration…………………….………………………….18 Immigration and Critical Juncture………………...…………………….22 A Contested Community………………………………………………..25 Establishing Roots……………………………………………………....28 Trauma, Victimhood and Belonging…………………………………....41 Chapter 2: The Post 9/11 Backlash: Constraints and Opportunities…………….44 US Legal Discourse and the Othering of Muslim Americans…..………..46 Media Discourse and the Othering of Muslim Americans……………....52 The Backlash as a Structure of Opportunity……………………………..61 Muslim American Political Elites………………………………………..66 Muslim American Interest Organizations………………………………..71 vii Chapter 3: Muslim American Foreign Policy Activism……………………..…….75 Counterterrorism Advocacy……………………………………………...79 Democratization in the “Muslim World”………………………………...89 Countering Violent Religious Extremism………………………………..97 U.S.-Iranian Relations…………………………………………………...107 Foreign Policy as Discourse……………………………………………..110 Chapter 4: Case-Study: Muslim American Activism and.…………………….…..112 The Palestinian Israeli Conflict Defining the Conflict……………………………………….………...…..115 Solving the Conflict………………………………………………….…...123 The 2014 Gaza-Israeli War…………………………………………….....129 Social Media and the Construction of an Imagined Community…….…...134 Chapter 5: Muslim American Public Opinion………………………………….…..140 Collective Identity and Public Opinion……………………………….…..147 Attitudes Toward Foreign Policy…………………………………….…...151 Interest Group Advocacy and Public Opinion……………………….…...163 Chapter 6: Conclusion and Significance……………………………………….…...166 References:…………………………………………………………………….……..…..174 viii List of Tables Table 1 Support for a two-state solution in the U.S. …………………………………….154 Table 2 Support for a two-state solution in the Muslim-majority World…………...........155 Table 3 Muslim American public opinion toward the Peace Process……………………156 Table 4 U.S. foreign policy and the Muslim American vote……….…………………….157 Table 5 American public opinion toward the Iraq war………………..……….……........159 Table 6 Muslim American public opinion toward the Iraq war…………………………..161 Table 7 Muslim American public opinion toward the Arab Spring…………….…….......164 ix List of Figures Fig. 1 The Islamic Cultural Center of New York………………………………………....38 Fig. 2 MPAC’s “I Speak Out Because” campaign……………………………………….138 Fig. 3 MPAC’s Gaza Campaign………………………………………………………….138 Fig. 4 Tariq Abu Khdeir………………………………………………..………………...139 Fig. 5 Gaza Rally…………………………………………………………………………140 x Introduction The annual White House iftar dinner, established by the Clinton administration in 1992, is as much a celebration of America’s national values as it is a celebration of Ramadan. It is an affirmation of Muslims’ place in our nation’s diverse cultural fabric, a testament to inclusivity and religious freedom. Through events like these, the national identity of the United States, as the multicultural land of freedom and equality, is maintained and reproduced. More specifically, the dinner is a chance for the government to acknowledge the contributions of Muslims and publicly recognize those leaders who have sought active political engagement. Thus, the White House iftar is a highly symbolic event. It is an official embrace of (certain kinds of) Muslims and (certain kinds of) Islam, a formal recognition of those invited as the legitimate leaders of the community, and an endorsement of certain kinds of oppositional tactics as legitimate. For President Obama, the 2014 dinner was also an opportunity to deflect growing criticism about his administration’s continued encroachment of civil and political rights. It was a chance to appease the Muslim American community with rhetorical claims of equality, such as those expressed by the president when he told his guests, “we are all Americans, equal in rights and dignity.”1 This could have been the case; the event could have gone as unnoticed as in prior years, were it not for the 2014 Gaza-Israel conflict, which was raging as the dinner took place, and for the president’s readiness to lecture his guests on Israel’s right “to defend itself against … inexcusable attacks from Hamas.”2 Not surprisingly, Muslim Americans took the comments as a 1 President Barack Obama, “Remarks by the President at the Annual Iftar Dinner,” July 14, 2014. Accessed July 15, 2014. http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/07/14/remarks- president-annual-iftar-dinner-july-14-2014. 2 Ibid. 1 palpable testimony of their social and political marginalization. The message was clear: Even if invited to the White House, their opinions, feelings, and policy preferences remained irrelevant. Controversy surrounding the decision to attend these government-sponsored events is not new.