ABSTRACT
As argued in Chapter 5, there emerged during the 1980s, and during the period 2000-2005, greater ideological convergence and mobilizational symmetries, which, coupled with a favorable political opportunity structure, allowed for greater alliance building between Islamists and secularists. However, the ideological convergence and the mobilizational asymmetries that occurred in both of these periods proved to be fleeting and shallow in nature and did not entail long-term strategic and structural changes in the ideological positions and the mobilizational capabilities of the parties involved. These convergences and asymmetries were largely the result of tactical calculations by the political elite, which proved to be fleeting in nature.
