The European Dilema and The future belongs to Islam

In 'The European Dilemma,' Stephen Holmes uses the coinciding work of two separate authors as a catalyst for opening his own discussion about the future of Islam in Europe. Holmes' writing is mostly a critical juxtaposition of the two text in which he allows the reader to infer what possible significance the contrast and correlations may have. He pulls the works together by posing rhetorical questions that link the theories of each author. For example on page two when Holmes' has explicated a point made by Ian Burma, he transitions to a common theme addressed by the second author of his subject, Ayaan Hirsi, with the question 'Why have many Islamic immigrants failed to integrate successfully in countries such as Holland?'

In this way Holmes balances his review between the two authors and involves the inference of the reader in his comparison.

As a political piece, and not merely a review of two political works, Holmes' comparison implies a message: that there is a polarization between Islamic Europeans and the rest of secular Christian Europe. Rather than arguing his point, Holmes' implies it as a working assumption of his entire article; readers accept its reality as they read the headline, before they even begin considering the two text Holmes uses to reinforce his constructed theory.

Mark Steyn's 'The future belongs to Islam' is a far more explicitly political piece. Steyn's prose is dynamic and written to enforce his point, and his point is this:

'Age + Welfare = Disaster for you;

Youth + Will = Disaster for whoever gets in your way.'

This excerpt, an abstract breakdown of the factors at play between the new wave Islamic Europeans and the White Europe of old, exemplifies the immediacy of Steyn's thesis and his stylistic argument. Much of Steyn's writing is hypotactic, he argues that the sum of contemporary conditions in Europe is the Islamic tension he portrays. He constructs an argument in which the situation in Europe is a developing equation, and each of the issues at hand -age, history, racial tensions- are each factors increasing the inevitable.