Demographics and Muslim Destinies

By Rod Dreher – Director of Publications

What comes to mind when you think “Asian religions”? Buddhism, certainly, as well as Hinduism. Shinto from Japan, and Taoism from China would also make the list. Many people wouldn’t think of Islam, the world’s second-largest faith, which we associate with the land and people of its origin, the Arab Middle East.

But today, more of the world’s Muslims now live in Asia—Indonesia, Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh—than in the rest of the globe combined. And that’s not the only surprising demographic finding in a comprehensive new report published by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion & Public Life, The Future of the Muslim Population, which documents global Islam’s demographic present, and projects its likely future.

“The portion of Muslims living in the Middle East and North Africa will also remain steady, at about 20 percent. But the portion of the world’s Muslims living in sub-Saharan Africa is projected to rise,” says Brian J. Grim, the Pew Forum’s senior researcher. “In 20 years, for example, more Muslims are likely to live in Nigeria than in Egypt, in large part because Nigeria has higher fertility rates.”

©Michael S. Yamashita/CORBIS

A $3 million grant from the John Templeton Foundation supported this research, which is part of ongoing Pew-Templeton collaboration in the study of global religions. Last year, TR reported on an earlier grant to Pew, which underwrote a demographic survey of Islam and Christianity in Africa.

“The Pew-Templeton Global Religious Futures Project will use rigorous data to separate hype from facts about changes in religion globally,” says Kimon Sargeant, vice president of human sciences at the Foundation. “Religion is not disappearing, as some social scientists once predicted, but it is changing dramatically. The project will enable us to understand better these changes—and the conditions which can lead to a beneficial competition between religions and a general increase in human liberty."

Among other key discoveries in the report:

The worldwide Muslim population is expected to grow at nearly twice the rate of non-Muslim populations, increasing to 26.4% of the total world population by 2030, up from 23.4% today.

“Generally, Muslim populations tend to have higher fertility rates (more children per woman) than non-Muslim populations,” says Grim, adding that a large share of the global Muslim population is now or soon will be in its prime reproductive years.
But that growth rate is slowing, in line with the rest of the world.

“Rather than a runaway train, you can think of it as a decelerating engine,” Grim says. “Fertility rates among Muslims are dropping. We also warn in the report that one should not simply assume, just because fertility tends to be higher in Muslim-majority countries than in other developing countries, that Islamic teachings are the reason. Cultural, social, economic, political, historical and other factors may play equal or greater roles.”
In the U.S., the Muslim population will more than double over the next two decades, reaching an estimated 6.2 million, or 1.7% of the overall population.

That means that American Muslims in 2030 will be about as numerous as Jews and Episcopalians are today. Though the Muslim population in Europe will be far larger than in the U.S., thanks to a much larger base population at present, Pew’s numbers show that populist fears of Europe’s Islamification appear groundless.

“The data that we have do not point in the direction of what some call ‘Eurabia’ scenarios, in which Muslims dominate Europe numerically,” says Grim. “Indeed, by 2030 we project that Muslims will make up just 8 percent of Europe’s overall population, up from 6 percent today.”

(To read the full interview with Pew Forum’s Brian J. Grim, see Big Questions Online.)

This latest Pew report helps put current events rocking the Arab Muslim world in perspective, with data showing that the countries now witnessing mass protest movements are struggling to provide economic opportunities for a large and growing youth population. Cautions Grim: “But, at the same time, the unrest is predominantly political and social in nature, and this report does not delve into politics. Social and political attitudes will be explored in much greater depth in the upcoming Pew-Templeton survey of the Muslim world.”

Pew expects to release that report within the year.

From the Bookshelf

Last week, the BBC reported that the Kepler space telescope team had discovered 54 new planets where life might potentially exist. In December, NASA announced that one of its astrobiology researchers trained a bacterium to subsist on arsenic instead of phosphorous—a feat that, if replicated, expands the potential for life to thrive in extraterrestrial environments now thought inhospitable. From the far reaches of space to the ends of the earth, scientists are making new discoveries that bring the search for alien life closer to a conclusion. Washington Post reporter Marc Kaufman, a 2008 Templeton-Cambridge journalism fellow, joins the scientific scouting parties in the hunt for extraterrestrials in his forthcoming book First Contact. Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson praises the author for his “crisp, clear, and engaging narrative that, at times, leaves you to think you were conducting the research yourself.” First Contact will be in bookstores in April.

Meanwhile, Cambridge University cosmologist and JTF Trustee John D. Barrow has just published the UK version of his new title, The Book of Universes. Barrow, a best-selling popular science author and the 2006 Templeton Prize winner, explores the underappreciated fact that Einstein’s theory of relativity predicts the existence of multiple and varied universes. What might these universes be like? And what do the latest scientific findings tell us about our own universe? Barrow’s Book gives readers a comprehensive overview of what we know, and what we may yet learn, about our universe, and beyond. The Book of Universes will be published in North America in March.

Creativity and the Brain

In the February issue of O: The Oprah Magazine, journalist Peggy Orenstein explores scientific research showing that everyone has the power to be creative—but they have to work at it. Writes Orenstein:

“The point of little-c creativity is to express and challenge yourself, to make meaning, to enhance your life. It's not about being the best at something, but about becoming better than you are. And as you tinker with your poem, or work on your rendition of "I Dreamed a Dream," you might even change your brain: Rex Jung, Ph.D., a neuropsychologist at the University of New Mexico, has found that people who consistently engage in creative activities become better and faster at marshaling the brain's creative networks. In other words, the more you are, the more you will be.”

A three-year, $600,000 Foundation grant helped underwrite Dr. Jung’s work on the neuroscience of creativity. See TR (July 8, 2009) for more details about the Jung team’s fascinating discoveries.