HEBA RAOUF EZZAT: A Model of Muslim Women’s Leadership Through Soft Power

Heba Raouf Ezzat (b. 1965) is assistant professor of political theory, Alliance of Civilizations Institute (ACI), Ibn Haldun University (IHU), Turkey. She has published widely in both English and Arabic. Ezzat’s political thought is rooted in an interdisciplinary scholarly approach to research, critically engaging with traditional Islamic sources and Western intellectual heritage. Her work is informed by her political activism in Egypt. Ezzat focused on three main themes: First, she explores the “question of the state” and its manifestations in Islamic and Western modernist secular political thought. Second, based on the Qur’anic conceptual framework, Ezzat supports the need to detach concepts of “an Ummah” (community/nation) from confinement withinWestern constructions of “the national state” integral to its violent historical development. Third, she examines Muslim women’s rights and political roles in Muslim societies. This chapter presents a glimpse of Ezzat’s life alongside a contextualization of her scholarship and activism. Three key themes of renewal are examined, followed by crucial lessons derived from enduring and shared principles of human civility.