The Civil Sphere and its Resilient Tribalist Discontents: A Muslim Ban Cloaked in Sacralized Binaries

Daniel Joseph Belback

doi:10.2298/FID2501063B

Authors

Daniel Joseph Belback University of California, San Diego

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.2298/FID2501063B

Keywords:

civil sphere, tribalism, muslim ban, liberty, repression, relativization, backsliding, resilience, frontlash, backlash

Abstract

This article explores how primordial, tribally rooted bonds become sacralized within the Civil Sphere (CS), challenging prevailing assumptions about the sphere’s inertial universal horizon. Through a structuralist- hermeneutic analysis of communicative and regulatory institutions surrounding the Trump Administration’s Muslim Ban (2017–2021), the study reveals how exclusionary, anti-civil policies become legitimized within ostensibly civil frameworks. Central to this dynamic is a paradox within the CS, wherein the discourse of liberty inherently justifies repression when targeted groups are represented as threats to democratic universality. This analysis demonstrates the persistence of a “tribal solidaristic horizon,” rooted in primordial ties to blood, land, and religion, strategically mobilized through civil motives, relations, and institutions to narrow solidarity. The Muslim Ban initially faced fierce opposition, characterized by widespread protests and judicial scrutiny framed by civil binaries profaning the ban as un-American, anti-democratic, and unconstitutional. Subsequent iterations adapted strategically to these cultural binaries, gaining legitimacy through orderly, procedural implementation. This strategic civil rebranding exemplifies how primordial ties—grounded in race, place, and religious identity—continue to shape and constrain the civil sphere, facilitating democratic backsliding through the relativization and manipulation of civil motives, relations, and institutions. Ultimately, the study extends Civil Sphere Theory by underscoring vulnerabilities to relativization of core cultural binaries, highlighting that resilience in democratic societies requires critical recognition of how civil discourses themselves can be co-opted to legitimize exclusion. The Muslim Ban case thus reveals significant deficits in universalistic CS resilience, signaling vulnerability to sustained exclusion despite apparent civil repair.

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