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Death of the Spirit: How and Why the Shahbag

Movement Failed

Working Paper December 2016

DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.18887.70566

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 Death of the Spirit:

How and Why the Shahbag Movement Failed

Anupam D. Roy

November 28, 2016

 1

Abstract

This paper evaluates the 2013 Shahbag protests in Bangladesh through the

theoretical framework from Mancur Olson and other contributors of the resource

mobilization school of social movement theory. The paper employs the framework to

analyze the 2013 Shahbag movement and the Hefazat-e-Islam countermovement. It

hypothesizes that the 2013 Shahbag movements was a failed social movement because it

lost the previous advantages its ideological predecessors had secured for secularism and

facilitated the rise of Islamism in the form of Hefazat-e-Islami. The paper will then explore

the reasons of the failure of the movement through following the metrics developed by the

resource mobilization school. It will also compare and contrast the Shahbag movement

with its counterpart, the Hefazat movement, and explore why the latter received full

response and the first completely collapsed. The contemporary effects of the outcomes of

the episode of this movement and countermovement are also addressed in the last section

of the paper.

Keywords: Mancur Olson, social movement theory, resource mobilization, Anthony

Oberschall, William Gamson, Shahbag, Hefazat-e-Islami, Bangladesh.

 2

Introduction

The Shahbag movement, also known as Gonojagoron Moncho, started on 5

February 2013 to protest against Jamaat-i-Islam leader Abdul Quader Mollas verdict of life

imprisonment by the International Crimes Tribunal (ICT) for committing crimes against

humanity. This verdict was viewed as too soft by a number of online activists and they

initiated the protest at Shahbag, a busy intersection of the capital city of Bangladesh, in

demands of death sentence for the war criminal.1 By the end of the first week, the

protesters organized the largest mass demonstration the country has seen in 20 years.2

Qadar Mollah was hanged on 12 December 2013 after the Supreme Court revised the

sentence to the death penalty following an appeal by the Prosecution. 3

The death sentence of Quader Mollah was seen as the evidence of success of

Shahbag movement by the activists. However, a deeper dialectic behind the Shahbag

movement in the form of an ideological battle between secularism and Islamism still

existed and a clash of ideologies was imminent. Eventually, Hefazat-e-Islami, an

ultraconservative Islamist group based on Qawmi Madrasas in Bangladesh, quickly

mobilized thousands of activists to gather in Dhaka in demands of hanging the atheist

bloggers that lead the Shahbag movements.4 Hefazat-e-Islam also placed The 13-point

demands to be conceded by the government that included a ban on the mixing of men and

women in public places, the removal of sculptures and a demand that the former wording

1
Fahmida Zaman, Agencies of Social Movements: Experiences of Bangladeshs Shahbag Movement and
Hefazat-e-Islami, Journal of Asian and African Studies. 1-11: (2016).
2
Ibid.
3
Ibid.
4
Ibid.
 3

of the constitution be reinstated, affirming Absolute trust and faith in the Almighty Allah

as one of the fundamental principles of state policy. By the end of the end of 2013, the

Shahbag movement was all but completely demobilized and Hefazat movement became a

major interest group with massive lobbying powers. The effects of Hefazat lobbying is still

prominent in Bangladeshi politics whereas Shahbag movement leaders cannot even rely on

the government for protection.

Now that the basic context of these two movements has been set up, I would like to

clarify my hypothesis regarding the results of these movements. Following the metric

provided by William Gamson, Shahbag movement can be assessed as a collapse whereas

the Hefazat-e-Islam movement can be assessed as one that received full response. Mancur

Olson and other contributors in the resource mobilization school provide a vivid lense

through which the 2013 Shahbag movement and Hefazat-e-Islam countermovements can

be seen. This paper would characterize the successes and failures in the 2013 Bangladesh

protests and also explain the reasons behind those outcomes. To be clear, the objective of

this analysis is not to assign any normative value or ethical judgement to either the

Shahbag or the Hefazat movement, it is simply to analyze why one failed and the other

succeeded.

Literature Review

Mancur Olsons seminal work The Logic of Collective Action looks at collective action

as a congregation of rational actors. Olson defines groups as organizations that are

expected to further the common interest of the members of the group.5 The author

5
Ibid, 6.
 4

theorizes that people do not join groups for the functional reason of the achievement of the

collective good, but for other reasons.6 He later reveals that this reasons is the achievement

of noncollective incentives.

Olson also argues that there is a tendency of the exploitation of the great by the

small in groups.7 This small is not the small in power, but the small in number. The limited

number of people have such a vested interest in achieving the common good that they

agree to pay the whole cost. This explains why successful groups boil down to a small

number of leaders with vested interests. Olson substantiated his thesis by citing the senate

committees and subcommittees as examples of the residence of power in the hands of a

few. He showed that this boiling down of a larger group into smaller pieces is not to unique

to senate. It is pretty common across the different forms of organization. Olson

hypothesizes that stakeholders are only interested to contribute to the needs of the group

when they believe that their portion of the common good would be substantial to cover

their costs. Therefore, for any group to prevail, the power, control and responsibility must

reside in the hands of a small group of people.

Olson argues that large groups based on volunteer subscription are not effective. He

also argues that groups of voluntary nature do not exist due to general consensus on the

achievement of a common good, but simply due to strong noncollective incentives.8 He also

introduces social pressure as a non monetary incentives which can make latent group

members active. From this idea, Olson theorizes that a large group can only be successful if

it is a federal group, which he defines as a group that is a collection of numerous groups

6
Ibid, 12
7
Ibid, 35.
8
Ibid, 51.
 5

sufficiently small for the members to have face to face interaction and therefore have social

leverage on each other.9 Olson therefore advocates for the establishment of groups that

have both economic and social incentives and calls a collection of these incentives a double

blessing.

In the later chapters, Olsons main argument transitions to the necessity of

compulsion to maintain the power and position of an organization. He cites historical

evidence of compulsion devices such as closed shops or union shops are not modern

devices that have been instrumental for the survival of large labor organizations. Olson

argues that coercion is necessary to keep protesters from crossing the picket line and to

sustain any sort of power or influence that the protesting organization commands.10

The final chapter of the book is where the author provides his main theory. His

central thesis is that collective action is only possible when: a) the groups are strong

enough to have the authority to be coercive and/or b) the group provides some sort of a

noncollective by-product exclusively to the group members.11

Olsons work can be contextualized in the broad frame of social movement theory

and be assessed, compared and contrasted with other theories through Steven Buechlers

Understanding Social Movements. Buechler chronicles major social movement theories from

Marx, Weber and Michels to contemporary social movement theories. He also puts social

movement theories under specific theoretical schools that is useful to assess the evolution

9
Ibid, 62.
10
Ibid, 66.
11
Ibid, 133.
 6

of the field and also to inform one specific theory with the theories of same or contrasting

schools of thought.

Olsons work is important in understanding collective action since his theory is not

only an end in itself, but it is a culmination and explanation of earlier theories of collective

action. Marxs theory is discussed in the original text of Olson but the works of Lenin,

Weber and Michels is also reflected in his work implicitly. Olsons idea of large

organizations boiling down to a handful of deciders, that he describes in the first couple of

chapters, is very similar to Lenins idea of a vanguard party of professional revolutionaries

as described in Steven Buechlers Understanding Social Movements. As Olson(1965)

theorizes that there is a tendency in large groups of the exploitation of the large by the few,

so does the theories of Max Webers iron cage of bureaucracy or Robert Michels iron law of

oligarchy.12

Although Olsons theory is very useful in detecting what leads to the success or

failures of a social movements, it is lacking in analyzing the reasons for social movements.

Olsons analysis starts from the context of a pre established collective action and he does

not attempt to explain the reasons of the rise of that collective action. This is why we would

need to consult other social movement theories in order to build an understanding of

conditions that espouse collective action.

The strain and deprivation model is a good theoretical frame that explains the rise

of social movements. According to this model, systems survive by meeting functional

12
Steven Buechler,Understanding Social Movements: Theories from Present and the past (Durham: Duke
University Press, 2009).
 7

requisites of adaptation to the requisites of the circumstances. If this evolution does not

happen: strain, disequilibrium, and disintegration can occur. Relative deprivation theory,

developed by James Davies, provides further insight into this situation by claiming that, a

gap between expectations and conditions is created if more rapidly improving groups are

taken as a reference group for comparison.13 This gap of social prestige or economic well

being creates the backdrop against which collective action to reclaim their previous status

starts to seem rational.

Ted Gurr adds to this idea and theorizes that relative deprivation leads to discontent

and discontent leads to politicization of that discontent which actualizes through violent

action against political objects and actors. Gurr goes on to further explain the relative

deprivation through his psychological foundation by citing the demonstration effect,

according to which a new reference group or a new ideology provides a standard for

comparison which leads to the realization of relative deprivation even though any real

deprivation might not have actualized.14 Although Gurrs ideas are viewed as tangential to

social movement theory, it helps us to analyze periods of political violence caused by social

movements.

Olsons thesis falls under the broader social movement paradigm theory of resource

mobilization and it can be argued that the whole school of resource mobilization was

founded upon the work done by Olson. Olsons work started a new trend in social

movement theory that built upon rational choice.Oberschall supported Olsons frame and

13
Ibid.
14
Ibid.
 8

further developed it to include the roots of collective action. He saw social movements and

collective action as rational responses to self and group interests.

Oberschalls most important contribution, however, is in identifying individuals who

join social movements. He disproved the former supposition of the irrationalist school that

only alienated and isolated individuals join social movements and proved that people who

are socially connected are more likely to join social movements . Oberschall thereby

provided a resource mobilization model stating that pre organized people are available for

bloc movement and therefore easier to recruit into collective action. This bloc recruitment

is facilitated if there is rigid group segregation in the society and the recruitment becomes

harder if the groups routinely interact with each other and established cross cutting ties. 15

A deciding metric for measuring the success of a social movement can be drawn

from William Gamsons work. Gamson addresses measurement of movement success by

specifying two dimensions: a.winning acceptance from elites and recognition as a

legitimate representative of a given constituency; b. winning new advantages for a

movement constituency. This creates four possible outcomes: 1. full response: both

acceptance and new advantages; 2.collapse: neither acceptance or advantage; 3.

preemption: new advantages without acceptance; and 4. cooptation: acceptance without

new advantages.16 This metric will be used for measuring movement success in the

subsequent parts of this paper.

15
Ibid.
16
Ibid, 115.
 9

The paradigm of resource mobilization is then further strengthened by the analysis

of the framing tasks theory. What this suggests is that framing of grievances is more

important than the mere existence of grievances in terms of social movement mobilization.

The first method of achieving this end is frame bridging which connects two or more

preexisting grievance frames that are ideologically connected but structurally unconnected.

The second method is frame amplification that essentially explains the current frame of the

movement in a broad fashion to include other frames. The third method is frame extension,

that basically connects the frame of the movements with nonconnected frames and urges

their support for the broad ideological banner that they interpret the other groups to be

sympathetic to. The last method is frame transformation that implants a new and broad

grievance frame to fit the existing grievances.17

The framing and rational choice ideas from the resource mobilization school can be

applied to gauge the reasons behind the success or failure of a social movement and

Gamsons metric can be a strong measure for coming to a final conclusion about the effects

of special interest, byproduct and framing mechanisms through the success or failure of a

social movement and how they employed the mentioned tactics in reaching their ends.

Discussion and Findings

The Roots of Shahbag: Development of the Secularist Movement around the demands

of prosecution of the war criminals

17
Ibid.
 10

The roots of the Shahbag movement go way back in the history of secularism in

Bangladesh. Demands for the prosecution of the war criminals started right after the end of

the Liberation war of 1971. But the first organized movements for the prosecution of War

Criminals started in 1992 under the title of Ekatturer Ghatak-Dalal Nirmul Committee

(EGDNC) headed by Jahanara Imam, the mother of a freedom fighter who was killed by the

war criminals. At a symbolic tribunal arranged in a public park, the committee produced a

verdict of death penalty for the chief of Jamaat-e-Islami, a major Islamist political party on

ten specific allegations of war crime.18

The movement that started on 1992 carried through the military rule and into the

new decade with the committee gaining more followers and more traction in the civil

society. The committee became prominent during the 2001-2006 period when

Jamaat-e-Islam ,the major political party of which the most of the alleged war criminals

were member of, was in power. At the end of the 2006 term, the approval for

Jamaat-e-Islam and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) coalition was very low and

public opinion for the war crimes trial was very high and this was evident from the election

manifesto of the opposition coalition force led by Awami League (AL) which made the

support of this popular sentiment its main selling point. The 2008 election manifesto of the

AL provides testament to this claim. It reads:

The rape of the democratic constitution, rehabilitation of war criminals and

religious fanatics, criminalization of politics and promotion of militancy,
institutionalization of corruption, and the sway of black money and muscle power overtook
the post-Bangabandhu governmentsEstablishment of Good Governance: Terrorism and

Partha S. Ghosh Bangladesh at the Crossroads: Religion and Politics, Asian Survey, 23, no. 7 (Jul,
18

1997): 697-710.
 11

religious extremism will be controlled with iron hand. Trial of war criminals will be
arranged. 19

This bid against Islamist politics and appeal to the secular civil society helped the

AL-led coalition achieve a landslide victory in the 2008 parliamentary elections, with

Awami League itself winning 230 out of the 350 seats.20 After winning, the AL government

soon arranged the prosecution of war criminals to start in order to fulfil its electoral

mandate. The government establishment of the International Crimes Tribunal in 2013 to

prosecute the alleged War Criminals. So the demands of the dominant social movement

were being fulfilled right after the political party backed by the movement formed the

government.

What the secularist coalition achieved in this time period is remarkable. Firstly they

achieved frame transformation by using the event of Jamaat-e-Islam selecting Ghulam

Azam, an identified war criminal, as their party leader to argue that what previously was

unfortunate but tolerable (the existence of JIB as a legal political party) had become

inexcusable by their appointment of the leader of all war criminals. Then they went

through frame bridging and brought other organizations from the civil society to support

their cause. They formed an alliance with the Sammilita Sangskritik Jote (Combined

Cultural Alliance-CCA),Sammilita Samajik Andolon (Combined Social Movement-CSM), the

Citizens Voice, Security and Human Rights, The Hindu, Buddhist and Christian Unity

Alliance (HBCUA) and other groups and fought for broader causes than prosecuting war

19
Bangladesh Awami League, Election Manifesto of Bangladesh Awami League, 9th Parliamentary
Election, 2008,www.albd.org, accessed 28 November, 2016, http://albd.org/~parbonc/index.php/hme/
80-articles/4070-election -manifesto -of- bangladesh-awami-league,-9th-parliamentary-election,-2008
20
Bangladesh Jatiya Sangsad (Parliament) elections in 2008, ipu.org. accessed 28 November, 2016,
http://www.ipu.org/parline-e/reports/arc/2023_08.htm
 12

criminals like protesting communal violence .21 Their frame gradually extended and the

secularist community(SC) was formed. The community achieve the organizational

structure of a federated union. After the formation, the community again transformed its

frame to include countering communalism and advancing secularism. Through these

seemingly apolitical tasks, the secularist community actually protested against the political

regime of the BNP and Jamaat Alliance and formed a strong ideological framework that

defined itself as the Spirit of the Liberation War.

Time Period Frame Organizations

1992 War criminals must be prosecuted EGDNC

Frame Bridging

2001-2006 Communalism must be countered with secularism EGDNC+

CCA+CSM+
HBCUA=SC

Frame Extension

2001-2006 SC represents the spirit of liberation while JI (and Islamists SC

in general) represent the spirit of anti-liberation forces.

Frame Extension and

Frame Transformation

2008 Anti liberation forces must be defeated by pro-liberation SC+AL

forces (in the elections)

21
Rangalal Sen, Role of Civil Society in Combating Violence against religious minorities during the
Post-2011 General Election of Bangladesh in Minorities and the State: Changing Social and Political Landscape of
Bengal, (California: Sage Publishing, 2011), 125.
 13

Figure: Framing shift of the secularist community (1992-2008)

Awami League, being the major political opposition to the BNP-Jamaat Alliance and

also having been the major political party behind the liberation war, bridged their own

political frame with this ideological frame created by the broad secularist community and

manipulated it to achieve political success in terms of a landslide victory in the 2008

elections.

How Shahbag Betrayed its Roots: The Distortion of the Secularist Ideology to Meet

Political Ends

In the backdrop of such enormous success of the secularist community in the

sociocultural realm, the Gonojagoron Moncho (GM) movement arose as an

anti-government protest that sensed some sort of agreement between Jamaat and AL and

thus nullifying the frame bridging of AL that encompassed the secularist communitys

ideals. The enraged student-protesters of Shahbag started the movement as a rejection of

mainstream politics and rejected to create a renewed political platform as well.22 They

denied the requests from the AL leaders to speak at the stage of the movement.23 What this

meant was that the broad secularist community ideology of the Spirit of the Liberation

War was now left without any political foundation. Soon the Shahbag movement drifted

away from the secularist community in an effort to distinguish itself. Student leaders arose

22
Amena Mohsin, Dont Politicise the Shahbag Protest, www.tehelka.com,last modified March 16, 2013,
http://www.tehelka.com/2013/03/dont-politicise-the-shahbag-protest/
23
Mass dissatisfaction, The Economist, accessed November 28, 2016. http://www.economist.com
/news/asia/21571941-huge-protest-capital-against-Islamist-party-and-its-leaders-mass-dissatisfaction
 14

from the Shahbag movement who were solely brought to prominence by the existence of

the movement. These young student leaders were distinctly different from the leaders of

the secularist community who were mainly reputed academics, writers and cultural

figures. Many of these students were simply online bloggers who had very limited contact

with mainstream politics. As such, it was easy for adept politicians to infiltrate the ranks of

these novice leaders and, for the most part, coopt the movement.

Under this new leadership, the movement soon drifted away from the sociocultural

frame for the prosecution of the war criminals, Shahbag had to transform their frame to

remain viable. Therefore, soon the stage for capital punishment became the stage to ban JIB

as a political party which then transformed again to include all kinds of political use of

religion.24

Time Period Frame Organizations

2013 AL has an understanding with Jamaat. GM

Early Anti-liberation forces must be resisted. (Lead by
February bloggers and
Students)

Frame Bridging

2013 The anti-liberation political party (only Jamaat at this GM

Late point) must be banned (Lead by Leftists
February- & AL)
Early March

Frame Extension

24
Ibid.
 15

2013 Religion based politics must be banned. GM

Mid-march (Mostly lead by
AL)

Figure 2. Framing timeline of the Gonojagoron Moncho (2013)

Thus the secondary frame of secularism that the SC gradually incorporated with

their primary frame of war criminal prosecution was brought into the forefront as a

primary frame by the Shahbag movement. This awkward situation fueled the relative

depravity of the Islamist groups that have been feeling a loss of power in comparison with

the newly emergent secularist coalition. The broad vilification of all Islamist groups gave

the Islamists an avenue to retaliate with the characterization of all Sahabagis (participants

of the Shahbag movement) as Anti-Islamic. This characterization soon got political

foundation from the BNP-Jamaat alliance and a major Islamist alliance named

Hefazat-e-Islam planned to march to the capital and occupy another major city square in a

very similar style of the Shahabagis.25 The gathering in Shahbag started growing thinner as

the Hefazat arrived to Dhaka and continued protests, gatherings and demonstrations

otherwise. Although the movement continued in paper, but in reality it shrunk to a handful

of people.

The huge crowds that the Shahbag movement drew were not signs of success of its

own but a continuation of the ideological frame developed by the SC. However, the loss of

the crowd was a fault of Shahbag itself. Following Olsons theory, people first joined

Shahbag because they had a noncollective incentive of moral gratification. Joining Shahbag

meant joining the new liberation war, demanding justice for the victims of genocide and

Tension rises over Hefazat-e-Islam Long March, accessed on 28 Novemebr 2016, Click Ittefaq, http://
25

www.clickittefaq.com/tension-rises-over-hefazat-e-Islamis-long-march/
 16

protesting against the political establishment. These incentives vanished, firstly, simply

because of elongation of the sit-in. There was no specific time period of when the sit-in

would end. Primarily the sitiin was organized on the sole demand of capital punishment for

Quader Mollah, but then it expanded to broader demands like capital punishment for other

identified war criminals, banning JIB, cutting off the funding sources of JIB etc.26 This

reframing of demand created uncertainty among the protestors and gave them a sense that

this protests will go on for an uncertainly long period of time. Therefore, the uncertain

prolonging of the sit-in diminished the noncollective incentive of actively sitting in the

square all day and night until the demands were met. The noncollective incentive then

became available even to those who did not attend the sit-in continuously, but only visited

it frequently or simply expressed solidarity to it remotely. Therefore, following Olsons

frame, nobody solely incentivized by the moral gratification had an incentive to actively

participate in the sit-in at all since they knew that the movement would continue even if

they participated or not. Following this model, the only people left to actively participate in

the movement after the frame expansion are the people who have some other non

collective incentive than the freely available moral incentives. One explanation of the

extramoral incentive would be political incentive.

The only people left to control the people after the original moralists had left were,

firstly, the members of the major political groups that had political incentives in banning

Jamaat-e-Islami. This is when the protest of the masses boiled down to a small group of

Shahbagh protesters submit 6-point demand to Speaker, The Financial Express, accessed on 28
26

November, 2016. http://print.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/old/index.php?ref=MjBfMDJfMTFfMTNfMV8 xXzE1OT

g2Mw==
 17

people who saw their interest in carrying out the movement even if they had to pay the

largest share of the effort. This explains why banning Jamaat-e-Islam and in extension,

other Islamists groups had become a major frame for Shahbag in this period because the

Islamist political parties were the opponents of the politicians and the Islamist nonpolitical

groups were a threat to the safety of the atheists. The political agents that had an incentive

in calling for a ban for Islamist political parties were mainly the socialist political parties

and the AL who were already in a political coalition that headed the government. What

started as a deliberately apolitical sociocultural anti-government movement lead by

university students had become an agent of the government to gain political benefit of

diminishing the legitimacy of the opposition political force. If the government could prove

that the civil society was demanding the ban of a major opposition, it would prove that the

opposition does not have any popular base at all. The ruling party thus gets a scope of

legitimizing the election of 2014 where it won without any contest from the opposition

party. 27

The second group of people that stayed after the moralists left were the original

organizers who were brought into celebrity-like prominence simply for organizing the

initial gathering. Many of these original organizers were painted as anti-Islamists and

perpetrators of blasphemous statements by the Hefazat movement and capital punishment

of these activists was demanded. Soon, many blog posts containing atheist sentiments

surfaced that were interpreted as blasphemous and were, in fact, composed by some of the

27
David Bergman, Bangladesh prime minister: 'Elections were legitimate' The Telegraph. (2014),
accessed November 28, 2016. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/bangladesh/10553249
Bangladesh-prime-minister-Elections-were-legitimate.html
 18

originators of the movement. The movement, however, was not interested in disavowing

these comments and instead they continued to protect the individuals that made those

comments. This happened, because by that time, the leadership was co opted by people

who required the non collective good of protection from the movement. This sentiment

especially took hold after the murder of a leading activist Rajib Haider, who was hacked to

death by Islamist militants for writing anti-Islamic blogs.28 Rajib Haider was treated as a

martyr and other atheist bloggers were treated as the crusaders for the movement. So what

started as a secularist movement against political Islam soon turned into an asylum for the

branded atheists.

By the time the Hefazat movement became popular, the main groups that controlled

Shahbag were young politicians and atheist bloggers who needed protection. At this point,

most moralists left Shahbag who did not have any other incentive since the cost of the

moral incentive was raised by Hefazat through branding anybody who went to Shahbag as

an anti-Islamist. Therefore, even though a lot of moralists still supported Shahbag in spirit,

it was not rational for them to attend the sit-ins since the sit-ins would still be carried out

by the vested interests anyway and the marginal cost of attending the sit-ins (getting

tagged as anti-Islamist) exceeded the marginal benefit (moral gratification).

However, the Hefazat movement did not face similar complications. Firstly, because

it was a federated group of smaller organizations of Islamists from different parts of the

country. It was not a large group like Shahbag, but a federation of smaller groups, much like

28
Samanth Subramaniam, The Hit List. The New Yorker. Accessed November 28.
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/ 2015/12/21/ the-hit-list
 19

the SC but with more groups. Hefazat is made up of 25,000 madrasas or religious schools

and a strong central body that provides it a much stronger federated constitution29 The

activists had noncollective incentives of advancing inside the organization which provided

them with social status, employment, education and other benefits through the madrasas

that the organization controls. Hefazat had a preorganized bloc of activists and they were

quick to mobilize them.

How Hefazat Defeated Shahbag: The Legitimization of Islamism and Delegitimization

of Secularism

Hefazat-e-Islam movement was born out of the relative deprivation felt by the

islamist organization in the context of the rise of a massive secularist protest. Non-JI

Islamists had also been waiting for a long time to distinguish themselves from JI and fight

back against the SCs common characterization of all Islamist groups as anti-Bangladeshi

liberation.

Hefazat was quick to mobilize when they got a chance to counter Shahbag. Their

members were ready for bloc recruitment and were energized to act upon their

noncollective interest of gaining political and social legitimacy. They were also energized

by the strain that the SCs characterization of Islamism had caused for the community and

the relative deprivation that the rise of Shahbag caused for the islamist community. Under

these circumstances, Hefazat was able to achieve in six months what the took the SC over

two decades to achieve. Hefazat brought the contested ideological frame of Islamism in the

Bangladesh's radical Muslims uniting behind Hefazat-e-Islami. The Guardian. Accessed on 28

29

November, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/30/bangladesh-hefazat-e-Islami-shah-ahmad -shafi

 20

forefront over the primary ideological frame of Islamic emotion. Hefazat appealed to the

religious spirit of Bangladeshis and legitimized Islamism as an addendum just like SC had

appealed to the patriotic spirit and legitimized secularism. And all of this was facilitated by

the misdirected Shahbag movement.

Table 1. Comparison between Gonojagoron Moncho and Hefazat-e-Islam: organization,

methods and end result.

Metric Gonojagoron Moncho (GM) Hefazat-e-Islam (HI)

Noncollective incentive Moral incentive: eroded after Moral incentive: strong.

(Olson) the formation of HI
Economic incentive: none
Political incentive: some
(saving Islam)
Economic incentive: strong.
(employment via HI)
Political incentive: strong.
(increased prominence in
HI)

Strong Central Body Disorganized Organized and definitive

(Weber, Michels, Lenin)

Size and organization Large, unfederated Large, federated

(Olson)

Compulsion None Absolute

(Olson)

By-product Benefit Discrediting political Legitimizing non-JI islamist

(Olson) opposition. movements.

Bloc recruitment Some Absolute

(Oberschall) (SC, online activists, leftists, AL) (Qawmi madrasa students)

End result Collapse Full response

(Gamson) (delegitimizing the secularist ( legitimizing the islamist
movement) movement and earning
massive lobbying power)
 21

After the Hefazat movement gained momentum, the government started

negotiations with Hefazat. On the other hand, the atheist bloggers were being murdered.

After the Hefazat movement, the Government started further normalizing the death of

atheist bloggers when it arrested a number of bloggers because of offensive blog posts

towards religion30 . The effect of the AL-Hefazat negotiations showed in the AL election

manifesto of 2014 which read:

No law contradicting the Quran and Sunnah will be passed.Necessary guidelines

will be formulated to prevent the abuse of online newspapers and social networks, and to
ensure that they act responsibly (Awami League, 2014).

Surely enough, the post 2014 AL government kept this promise and started enacting

the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) Act-2006 by arresting a number of

journalists and bloggers that wrote against the war criminals and joined or organized the

Shahbag movement.31 If government followed the rough list of war criminals published by

the SC in prosecuting war criminal, it followed the list of the eighty four bloggers prepared

by the Hefazat movement in prosecuting bloggers.

Meanwhile the SC and Shahbag movement still had to side with the government in

hopes of getting security from murderous extremists. But the Islamists were still up for

grabs. Therefore the government sided with the Islamists while also getting the secularists

as a bonus. As the situation stands now, the Islamists have won the socio cultural battle and

hold more power over the government than do the secularists. And this is all due to the

misdirected Shahbag movement.

30
See Note 58
31
Free speech vs section 57 The Daily Star, Last modified on August 22,2015.http:// www.
thedailystar.net/frontpage/free-speech-vs-section-57-130591
 22

Conclusion

Readings from Olson and the broad ideological frame of resource mobilization

dictates that the Shahbag movement failed because it lost its non collective incentive of

moral gratification by indefinitely prolonging its demonstrations. Shahbag failed to provide

their members selective non collective incentives when expressing solidarity with the

movement remotely became equally gratifying as active sit-in protests since continuing

sit-ins for an indefinite time period became rationally unjustifiable. In such circumstances,

moralists left the movement and political benefit seekers and atheist protection seekers

took over the movements leadership in aims of gaining selective non collective incentives.

The new leadership transformed the frame of the movement and made Shahbag a force

against all political Islam, Reframing of Shahbag opened it up for criticism as an

anti-Islamic movement which is exactly what Hefazat framed it as. Hefazat also had a larger

federation of smaller madrasa-based organization and greater non-collective incentives for

its members which helped it quickly mobilize its preorganized bloc. This lead to the success

of Hefazat over a misguided Shahbag that achieved acceptance of Islamism in the form of

bending the governmental rhetoric towards Islamism and criminalizing their ideological

opponents or the secularists. Overall, the failed Shahbag movement foiled the cultural

victory of the decade long socio cultural movement lead by the secularist coalition and

provided means for the Islamists to hit back and gain an upper hand in the ongoing

ideological conflict.
 23

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