While reading the papers in this collection on the far right, I have found myself in wondering how to locate the newly rising far right in the non-Western world and their global connectivities to each other and to the Western far right. The emotive and imaginative connectivities matter as they often feed each other. As such, Islamophobia in the European far right is used to strengthen the anti-Western sentiments in Islamist populisms in the Middle East, and vice versa. Turkey’s Erdoğan’s revivalist imperial dreams are not disconnected from the rest of the world either. Therefore, the rise of the far right could better be understood as a global phenomenon.

The newly emerging literature on the far right, so far, seems to have failed to capture these interconnected imaginative forces in the formation of Islamist politics for three reasons: (i) the global interconnectivity in populist political aspirations is missed due to Western-oriented tendencies in calibrating the scholarly foci; (ii) the region does not fit into the foci employed by area studies; and (iii) rationality-oriented Eurocentric theories are limited in their ability to grasp and analyse the imaginative forces that are at stake.

In a new project that takes place in 12 countries and in which I take lead, the members of the research team aim to develop theories that will allow for nuanced accounts of the way imaginative and affective elements impact people’s attitudes and opinions. For instance, although the last Islamic Empire ceased to exist almost 100 years ago, the dream of reviving Islamic Empires still haunts and even fuels political aspirations.

It is therefore crucial to examine the rising far right in Europe vis-à-vis the currency of current imperial Islamist revivalist aspirations. It is equally crucial to see the interconnectivities within those revivalist movements. We therefore study the homes of three of the greatest Islamic Empires (Islamdom: Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal/Timurid). This geography, recently coined as the Balkan-to-Bengal complex (BtB) (Ahmed 2015), a historically, politically and socially interconnected zone, has been the heartland of Islamist resurgences. In the West of the BtB, Erdogan’s charisma and a series of philanthropic and media projects have gained him support within and beyond Turkey, particularly among Sunni Muslims (Akdoğan 2017; Carkoglu 2014; Martin 2015). The common theme in those investments is the revivalist dreams, presenting the Ottoman legacy as a protector against non-Muslims, from the (Albanian and Bosnian) Muslim minorities in the Balkans to Sunni Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa (Cagaptay 2009; Cetin 2014; Küçük and Türkmen 2018; Rüma 2010; Tabak 2016; Walton 2010; Yavuz 1998). In the East, the charismatic leaders of Islamists and Sufi groups (i.e. Pashtun Tahafuz movement, Jama’at-e-Islami in Pakistan and Hefazat-e-Islam in Bangladesh) (Ahmad 2009; Iqtidar 2011; Riaz 2012) enchant a large and ethnically diverse following beyond national borders, by intimately connecting them to each other through emotive elements against the colonial powers, and with dreams of just Islamic polities and futures.

The historical interconnectedness imposed by the imperial Islamic past across the BtB informs and shapes the ways these political actors tap into the imaginative capacities of their audience, their audiences’ various social references, religious cosmologies, nationalist discourses, resentments, and other imaginative realms. Islamist actors appropriate those existing affective and emotive registers to further their often highly ambitious politics: including the dream of resurrecting the Islamic Empires, or of connecting them under a unified leadership for the Muslims in their region. Equally, they are able to use the elements of imperial nostalgia, post-imperial malaise and political rage not as autonomous entities, but highly calibrated to the far-right discourses taking place in the West.

在阅读极右翼收藏中的论文时，我发现自己想知道如何定位在非西方世界中新兴的极右翼及其彼此之间以及与西方极右翼之间的全球联系。情感和富有想象力的联系很重要，因为它们经常相互促进。因此，欧洲极右翼的伊斯兰恐惧症被用来加强中东伊斯兰民粹主义的反西方情绪，反之亦然。土耳其的埃尔多安的复兴主义帝国梦想也与世界其他地区没有脱节。因此，极右翼的崛起可以更好地理解为一种全球现象。

迄今为止，极右翼新出现的文献似乎未能捕捉到伊斯兰政治形成中这些相互关联的想象力量，原因有以下三个：(i) 由于西方倾向，民粹主义政治抱负的全球互联性被遗漏了校准学术焦点；(ii) 该地区不适合区域研究使用的焦点；(iii) 以理性为导向的欧洲中心论在把握和分析处于危险中的想象力量的能力有限。

在我领导的一个在 12 个国家/地区进行的新项目中，研究团队的成员旨在开发理论，以便对想象力和情感因素影响人们态度和观点的方式进行细致入微的解释。例如，尽管最后一个伊斯兰帝国在将近 100 年前不复存在，但复兴伊斯兰帝国的梦想仍然萦绕心头，甚至助长了政治抱负。

因此，将欧洲崛起的极右翼与当前帝国伊斯兰主义复兴主义愿望的货币进行比较至关重要。看到这些复兴运动内部的相互联系同样重要。因此，我们研究了三个最伟大的伊斯兰帝国（伊斯兰国：奥斯曼帝国、萨法维王朝和莫卧儿/帖木儿）的家园。这一地理最近被称为巴尔干到孟加拉地区 (BtB)（艾哈迈德，2015 年），这是一个在历史、政治和社会上相互关联的地区，一直是伊斯兰主义复兴的中心地带。在 BtB 西部，埃尔多安的魅力以及一系列慈善和媒体项目为他赢得了土耳其国内外的支持，尤其是在逊尼派穆斯林中（Akdoğan 2017 ; Carkoglu 2014; 马丁2015 年）。这些投资的共同主题是复兴主义的梦想，将奥斯曼帝国的遗产作为抵御非穆斯林的保护者，从巴尔干地区的（阿尔巴尼亚和波斯尼亚）穆斯林少数民族到中东和北非的逊尼派阿拉伯人（Cagaptay 2009；Cetin 2014 年；Küçük 和 Türkmen 2018 年；Rüma 2010 年；Tabak 2016 年；Walton 2010 年；Yavuz 1998 年）。在东方，伊斯兰主义者和苏菲派（即普什图塔哈夫兹运动、巴基斯坦的伊斯兰运动和孟加拉国的伊斯兰运动）的魅力领袖（Ahmad 2009 ; Iqtidar 2011 ; Riaz 2012）通过反对殖民列强的情感元素将他们彼此紧密联系起来，并怀有对正义的伊斯兰政体和未来的梦想，从而吸引了大量不同种族的追随者，超越了国界。

帝国伊斯兰过去在 BtB 上强加的历史相互联系，影响并塑造了这些政治演员挖掘观众想象力、观众的各种社会参照、宗教宇宙论、民族主义话语、怨恨和其他想象领域的方式。伊斯兰主义者利用那些现有的情感和情感记录来推进他们通常非常雄心勃勃的政治：包括复兴伊斯兰帝国的梦想，或者在他们地区的穆斯林的统一领导下将它们联系起来。同样，他们能够使用帝国怀旧、后帝国萎靡不振和政治愤怒的元素，而不是作为自治实体，而是高度校准西方发生的极右翼话语。