Divine Law (Sharī‘ah) & Jurisprudence (fiqh) in Islam

Having recently introduced the subjects of constitutionalism and democracy vis-à-vis Islam, I thought it would help to say a few basic things about Sharī‘ah and fiqh, in particular as they have bearing upon our concerns about human rights and democracy, concerns of course common to Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Perhaps needless to say, there persists an inexcusable lack of fundamental understanding among non-Muslims about the meaning of divine law and jurisprudence in Islam. And it should be said that not a few Muslims may possess a less than sophisticated knowledge of Sharī‘ah and fiqh as well, as contemporary Muslim scholars have made plain. Whatever the occasional "wisdom of crowds" or the truth captured by Condorcet's "jury theorem" (which provides some theoretical support for democracy...or perhaps not), the hoi polloi or masses, by definition, are not intellectuals, this being one of several reasons defenders and critics alike have understood the importance of formal and informal education in democratic polities if they are to have any realistic prospect for long-term survival, let alone flourishing, and accounts for the fact that democracies can never, or at least should not be, purely "participatory" (let alone 'deliberative'), that is, allow for literal "rule by the people" (or, literally, 'popular sovereignty'), even if we find sufficient reason here and there or now and again to expand the parameters of participation and deliberation. In other words, democracies in the (post-) modern world are necessarily "representative."

We first introduce Sharī‘ah, followed by a sketch of the meaning of fiqh, both of these being basic and introductory treatments of their respective subjects. For further exploration interested readers should consult the works listed under "Jurisprudence" in my Islamic Studies Bibliography.

Sharī‘ah: literally, something like ‘the way,’ or ‘the path to the watering hole (or spring),’ and refers to divine law or God’s will in Islam. Historically, the term Sharī‘ah refers to all the elements of a proper, i.e. righteous life; this includes moral behavior, proper respect towards Allāh, correct belief, personal piety, and so on. In other words, it means the right way to live one's life as a Muslim in conformity to God’s will. In more recent times, the scope of its reference has narrowed to that which falls under the rubric of Islamic law (fiqh), but there is a logical, conceptual and practical difference between Sharī‘ah and fiqh. The latter involves the human process of understanding and implementing the divine law. It is a serious (religious, epistemological, ontological, ethical…) mistake to conflate Sharī‘ah and fiqh, or to use these terms, as often happens today, as synonyms. The Sharī‘ah, writes Khaled Abou El Fadl, ‘is God’s Will in an ideal and abstract fashion, but the fiqh is the product of the human attempt to understand God’s Will. In this sense, the Sharī‘ah is always fair, just and equitable, but fiqh is only an attempt at reaching the ideals and purposes of Sharī‘ah (maqāsid al-Sharī‘ah). [….] The conceptual distinction between Sharī‘ah and fiqh was the product of a recognition of the inevitable failures of human efforts at understanding the purposes or intentions of God.’

The function of Sharī’ah is here analogous or similar to that of Natural Law intimations among the Stoics and both religious and secular Natural Law doctrine as it developed from and after Grotius. Recently, Abdullahi An-Na‘im has made the provocative argument that ‘precisely because sharī‘a is supposed to be binding on Muslims out of religious conviction, a believer cannot be religiously bound except by what he or she personally believes to be a valid interpretation of the relevant texts of the Qur’ān and Sunnah. Yet, given the diversity of opinions among Muslim jurists, whatever the state elects to enforce as positive law is bound to be deemed an invalid interpretation of Islamic sources by some of the Muslim citizens of the state.’ Moreover, such ‘objections to the enforcement of sharī‘a through positive law and the notion of an Islamic state do not, of course, preclude Muslims from personally conforming with every aspect of sharī‘a.’

We might describe the function of Sharī‘ah along the order of a Platonic Form, at least in its ‘bedrock version’ as outlined by T.K. Seung in Intuition and Construction: The Foundation of Normative Theory (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1993). In this account, intuition and construction are two integral processes intrinsic to the functional role of Platonic Forms (or ‘Ideas,’ ‘Archetypes,’ etc.). Platonic Forms—like the Sharī‘ah—are (is) fairly indeterminate, while nonetheless serving as normative, intuitive, and largely nonpropositional foundations (in theory, accessible to any Muslim) for constructing (propositional, hence legal) models as guides for determinate social realities, thus, for example, (the Form) Justice is only the normative foundation for constructing principled models of determinate social orders, none of which fully realizes Justice, and all of which endeavor to approach Justice, succeeding by degrees. What is more, the attempt to instantiate or embody the model is never wholly successful, given the nature of the human condition and the model’s idealized qualities in reference to the Form itself: ‘The indeterminacy of Platonic Forms makes them flexible standards, and their flexibility assures their eternal durability.’ Sharī‘ah is like the Platonic Form in being universal, abstract, and ‘indeterminate,’ and thus cannot directly serve as a normative standard (i.e., any interpretation of the Divine Will needs religiously rationalized and principled justification by way of textual hermeneutics and exegesis). This is perhaps one reason Norman Calder writes that, ‘in modern academic analysis of Islamic law, the word Sharī‘ah is of little use: what we can study and describe is always fiqh.’ Fiqh represents a Platonic-like endeavor to translate Sharī‘ah into direct, concrete, and normative models for particular contexts. As with Platonic intuitionism in which all human beings have access to Platonic Forms, all Muslims, as noted by An-‘Naim above, have access to Sharī‘ah, indeed, they are under a spiritual obligation to attempt to understand (and live by that understanding) the divine law. Such understanding is necessarily partial and fallible and may vary according to the individual (every Muslim is different): ‘Indeterminacy and relativity are inseparable in the domain of realization.’ The divine nature of Sharī‘ah means that it retains a normatively transcendent and evaluative function whatever the extent of its positivization as fiqh. In other words, law as such, or positive law, cannot exhaust the evaluative function of divine law as one’s understanding of same can always deepen, one’s intuitive discernment can always be keener. As a transcendent (nonpropositional) guide for action, and despite its integral relation to Islamic law, Sharī‘ah should not be confused or conflated with any of its specific principled and propositional constructions by way of fiqh, or any political proposal for a putatively Islamic state. Nonetheless, fiqh can serve as an aid in coming to understand divine law insofar as it enables us to obtain further, dialectical insight into that which transcends positive law; discursive reasoning and rational understanding, in other words, and in this case intrinsic to the Islamic science of jurisprudence, are part and parcel of the process of acquiring (intuitive or nonpropositional) insight into divine law. That is to say, there is a dialectical relation between divine and human law that represents, in epistemic terms, a dialectic between propositional knowledge and ‘knowledge by acquaintance’ in a Platonic sense or ‘knowledge by presence’ after Shihāb al-Dīn Suhrawardī: ‘The insight that transcends words cannot be attained except by means of words; what cannot be spoken of becomes manifest in the very act of speaking.’ Like Socrates in the agora, Islamic scholars (jurists, theologians and philosophers) can examine and refute propositions that claim to fully or finally capture the nature or essence of the Divine Will, that pretend to fully embody or ‘positivize’ the Sharī‘a. The jurist’s fallible, limited, and historical understanding of Sharī‘ah, in other words, is evidenced by his facility with ’usūl al-fiqh: how he has arrived at the determination of law, rather than simply the result, that is, the legal determination or ruling itself, or, in the case of furū‘ al-fiqh, the persuasiveness of the arguments explicating the concepts and rules that relate to religious rituals and ethico-religious conduct in the widest sense.

And it is fitra, the Islamic term that designates our primordial inclination or general predisposition to the good as a constituent feature of human nature, that allows individual qua individuals, to have insight into the Divine Will (and thus functions like soul memory in Platonic thought: permitting individual intuitive awareness, however dim or partial, into the Good; this insight is what Socrates set out to awaken in the interlocutors of the dialectical dialogues). In fact, fitra can serve as the Islamic equivalent of individual conscience, according individuals in effect the right of principled objection to interpretations of Sharī‘ah that violate their sincere and sustained endeavors (made in the context of the Islamic tradition) to realize this dispositional awareness of ‘the Good,’ the Divine Will or Sharī‘a.

That said, consider the following comments from Professor Haider Ala Hamoudi, as a ‘legal realist,’ from his blog ‘Islamic Law in Our Times: A Realistic Assessment of Islamic Law in Today’s World’ (http://muslimlawprof.org/), as they help us appreciate the difference between concern with the ‘conceptual’ and focus on the ‘empirical’ or how, in practice, the normative is entangled or even conflated with the descriptive (what others term 'fact/value' entanglement):

In Islamic studies departments, there's this notion of shari'a as this sort of idealized, highly stylized logic driven system that is sort of somewhere in the sky that nobody can see, and then there's fiqh, which is any given juristic interpretation of this beauty written down on paper always with the flaws of that jurist, and then there's actual law, which bears no necessary relationship to either. [….] Certainly shari'a and fiqh, the ideal and then the imperfect reflection of the ideal (still not real) is a favorite of this group, their law review articles go to great lengths to explain the difference between the two, because one must understand how this all works, this lovely thing up there in the sky, its shadow in the academy and then if you're lucky they'll attempt to relate all of that to reality in a way that is, ummm, perplexing. [….] [A]s with any law or rule of social order, when you want to understand what the shari'a is, you have to see what the shari'a actually does. What role in the social order? How? Who has the authority to declare it? Where and when does it conflict with national law and how do Muslims of various sorts react to that? Where is it important to most? Where do some care and not others? THAT is law.

And in one sense that is true enough, but in principle and practice we need to keep in mind the necessary metaphysical, logical or conceptual, and legal distinctions that make a difference to our understanding of what is normative, prescriptive and descriptive (this allows, for instance, appreciation for the fact that what we might describe in any given case as normative or prescriptive is contingent or contestable and that there are may be principled differences of opinion--and arguments to be made--as to what is to properly count as prescriptive or normative).

So, for example, we should bear in mind the normative argument made by Abdullahi An-Na‘im:

When observed voluntarily, Sharī‘ah plays a fundamental role in shaping and developing ethical norms and values that can be reflected in general legislation and public policy through the democratic political process. But…Sharī‘ah principles cannot be enacted and enforced by the state as public law and public policy solely on the grounds that they are believed to be part of Sharī‘ah. If such enactment is attempted, the outcome will necessarily be the political will of the state and not the religious law of Islam. The fact that ruling elites sometimes make such claims to legitimize their control of the state in the name of Islam does not mean that such claims are true. The fact that the state is not a religious institution is the historical experience and current political reality of Islamic societies. [….] [D]ispelling the dangerous illusion of an Islamic state that can enforce Sharī‘ah is necessary for legitimizing and implementing the principles and institutions of constitutionalism, human rights, and citizenship in Islamic societies. Abdullahi An-Na‘im, Islam and the Secular State: Negotiating the Future of Sharī‘a. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008).

Finally, we will grant the last word to Mohammad Hashim Kamali as evidence for the proposition that there need not be any inherent conflict—let alone contradiction—between Sharī‘a and democratice theory and praxis. This is true despite the historical fact that ‘with reference to justice and basic rights…the traditional fiqh in the areas of al-ahkām al-sultāniyyah (principles of government) and siyāsah shar‘iyyah (Sharī‘ah) has fallen short of reflecting the Qur’ān’s comprehensive conception of justice in the sphere particularly of rights and liberties.’ The following is a summary of points made by Kamali on behalf of our claim:

1. Notwithstanding certain reservations, some Muslim commentators have noted the Islamic credentials of formal constitutions in present-day Muslim countries; these constitutions, on the whole, pay greater attention to basic rights and liberties, the foundations of accountable and representative government, and as such tend to be in greater harmony with the basic principles of Islam. [….]

2. In response to the question whether a formal constitution was Islamic, and whether any objectionable elements therein invalidated the whole of a constitution, Muhammad Rashīd Ridā (d. 1935) issued a fatwā that may be summarized as follows: If a constitution seeks to establish a good government, defines the limits of power and ascertains criteria of accountability, then it would be in harmony with Islam. Should there be an instance of disagreement with any of the principles of Islam, only that element should be addressed and amended. For after all many of the great works of fiqh also contain errors, but this does not invalidate the whole of the endeavor or manual in which such an error might have occurred. [….]

3. [Despite] a lack of consensus over the basic definition of “right” in the
Islamic discourse, the word “haqq” is often said to convey a basic meaning
regardless of definitions. Haqq (right) in the Qur’ān occurs in several places and carries a variety of meanings, which include justice, right as opposed to falsehood, a legal claim, an obligation, something that is proven and an assigned portion. The many meanings of haqq in the Qur’ān may be said to be a cause sometimes of ambiguity, even misunderstanding. For instance the shared meaningof haqq between a right and an obligation has persuaded Western Islamologists to draw…the unwarranted conclusion that Islam recognizes only obligations but no right inhering in the individual. This is tantamount to turning a blind eye to the affirmative stance of the Qur’ān and Sunnah on the rights of the individual, including his right to life, right to justice, right to equality, right of ownership, rights to sustenance and support within the family, parental rights, right of inheritance and so forth. Islam’s commitment to justice and its advocacy of human dignity could not be sustained without the recognition of rights. [….] We may add…that Islam’s perspective on rights and liberties is somewhat different from that of constitutional law and democracy and their underlying Western postulates. Islam, like other great religions, is primarily concerned with human relations. In ordinary life, people do not live primarily in terms of rights against others but in terms mutual relationships involving love, compassion, self-preservation and self-sacrifice in pursuit of happiness and peace for themselves and their loved ones. The great religious traditions teach people, with good reason, that such things are not a matter of course nor are they always a question of rights. This would partially explain why most religions tend to emphasize moral virtue, obligation, love and sacrifice even more than the individual’s rights and claims. [….]

4. [T]here are differences between the theistic view of right and freedom when compared to what they mean in a secular context, but we also note that taking a totally secular approach to them is not advisable in the Islamic context. We believe that human rights and democratic values would benefit if religious values are also taken into consideration. [….] For the religious reformers to carry forward their struggle for democracy and human rights, they should be seen as authentic articulators of change espousing an alternative from within rather than without the tradition. [….]

5. For moderate Muslim thinkers, Islam’s exhortation to justice does not preclude people’s interpretation of it. On the subject of women’s rights, for example, it is suggested that women’s isolation from public life has been due to backward customary impositions on the Qur’ānic discourse. Thus what is needed is to restore women’s originally independent status in the Qur’ān, and provide a social context where women can exercise their freedom and independence. [….] Political parties and associations are permitted, and Islam stands for consultative and constitutional government with limited powers subjected to the rule of law. Basic rights and freedoms must be protected and government is accountable to the people. Mohammad Hashim Kamali, Sharī‘ah Law: An Introduction (Oxford, England: Oneworld, 2008).

Fiqh: understanding, knowledge; Islamic jurisprudence (law) as derived from Sharī‘ah (lit., the way; divine law, God’s will). Strictly speaking, Sharī‘ah is perfect: immutable and infallible, God’s will as abstractly and ideally understood, while fiqh is fallible and changeable, the product of a human attempt to understand that which is divine. There is, in other words, a logical, conceptual and practical distinction between Sharī’ah and fiqh, however much the latter is inspires the former. Nonetheless, and in the words of Knut S. Vikø, ‘It is more common to use “Sharī’a” as a name for the Islamic legal rules that we actually see applied in our human existence. Then one distinguishes between fiqh as the science used to derive the legal rules from their sources and the Sharī’ah as the result of this endeavor, the actual body of laws and rules in all their variations and internal inconsistency.’ As Norman Calder observes, there are two broad types of jurisprudential literature: usūl al-fiqh (‘roots’) and furū‘ al-fiqh (‘branches’) (there is a third type, the tabaqāt—biographical—genre which is common beyond fiqh proper and not treated here). Islamic law itself is the product of the application of usūl al-fiqh (the ‘roots’ or sources of law), the principles and methods through which practical rules are developed from the tradition’s foundational sources: a) the Qur’ān, b) the Sunnah, (or ahādīth) c) ijmā‘ (consensus) of Muslim scholars on a legal rule about a topic not explicitly covered in the aforementioned sources (Shī‘ī jurists deny this is possible; and differences arise as to the possible value of ‘implied’ or ‘silent’ consensus, with Hanafī jurists speaking in its favor), and d) analogy (qiyās), involving reliance on precedent. In conjunction with these sources, subsidiary or supplemental presumptions and principles may aid the jurist in deriving interpretive rules: istihsān (considerations of equity and the application of discretion or preference, the ratio legis or ‘effective cause of the ruling’ differing from one obtained strictly through qiyās); ‘unregulated interest’ or masālih mursalah, explained by Wael Hallaq as arising in relation to a rationally suitable benefit motivated by public interest ‘that is not sustained by textual evidence,’ later this method of reasoning was approved provided ‘it could be shown that the feature of public interest adopted in a case was suitable (munāsib) and relevant (mu‘tabar) whether to a universal principle of the law or to a specific…piece of textual evidence’ (Hallaq); and istishāb, the rational presumption of continuity. There are four major schools (madhhabs) (five, when we add the Shī‘ī) of Islamic law: the Hanafī, the Hanbalī, the Mālikī and the Shāfi‘ī, along with a fair number of other teachers and ‘schools’ (e.g. the Zāhirī, Zaydī, Ibādī, and Ismā‘īlī) throughout Islamic history. In Twelver Shī‘ism, the Usūlī school of jurisprudence predominates. After Shāfi‘ī, the jurist’s decision in a new case of law must fall into one of five categories: the obligatory (wājib), the recommended (mandūb), the permissible (mubāh), the prohibited (harām), or the repugnant (makrūh). Calder defines the scope of the second type of jurisprudential literature:

[Furū‘ al-fiqh] sets out…concepts and rules that relate to conduct, and arguments about them. Its headings are purity, prayer, fasting, alms, pilgrimage…and then such topics as warfare, marriage, divorce, inheritance, penalties, buying and selling, judicial practice, etc., in variable order. The whole is a conceptual replica of social life, not necessarily aspiring to be either complete or practical, but balanced between revelation, tradition and reality, all three of which feed the discussion and exemplify the concepts.

Thus described, this literature is reminiscent of both Mishnah and Talmud in Judaism.

Governor Mark Sanford faces the music

In a genuinely remarkable piece of American political theater, Governor Mark Sanford of South Carolina admitted that he had not in fact taken a hike on the Appalachian Trail during a five-day absence, but rather conducted an extramarital affair in Argentina. Extensive news coverage abounds, among other places, in The State (Columbia, S.C.), The Washington Post, and The New York Times.

Even more remarkably, Mark Sanford has a theme song. With very few modifications, the lyrics from "Don't Cry for Me Argentina," the climactic song from the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Tim Rice musical, Evita, come very close to describing Governor Sanford's story:

It won't be easy, you'll think it strange
When I try to explain how I feel
that I still need your love after all that I've done

You won't believe me
All you will see is a guv you once knew
Although he's dressed up to the nines
At sixes and sevens with you

I had to let it happen, I had to change
Couldn't stay all my life down at heel
Looking out of the window, staying out of the sun

So I chose freedom
Running around, trying everything new
But nothing impressed me at all
I never expected it to

Chorus:
Don't cry for me Carolina
The truth is I never left you
All through my wild days
My mad existence
I kept my promise
Don't keep your distance

And as for fortune, and as for fame
I never invited them in
Though it seemed to the world they were all I desired

They are illusions
They are not the solutions they promised to be
The answer was here all the time
I love you and hope you love me

Don't cry for me Carolina

Repeat chorus

Have I said too much?
There's nothing more I can think of to say to you.
But all you have to do is look at me to know
That every word is true

Neda ندا

This video is as compelling as it is graphic:

In death she is being called Neda ندا, which in Farsi means the voice or the call.

Islamic Studies: A Bibliography

This bibliography for Islamic Studies is the last of our compilations covering religious worldviews in the Directed Reading series. We thus have bibliographies for Hinduism, Classical Chinese Worldviews, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam here at Ratio Juris. The length of the latest list is owing to an ardent professional and personal interest in Islamic Studies, particularly Islamic philosophy and theology, Islamic mysticism (Sufism), and Islamic art and architecture. The fact that I can speak of a "professional interest" in this subject is owing largely to the remarkable generosity, kindness and guidance of Oliver Leaman, Professor of Philosophy and Zantker Professor of Judaic Studies at the University of Kentucky. Oliver Leaman is a prolific philosopher, both within Judaic and Islamic philosophy and outside his areas of specialization (e.g., books on death and dying, in film studies, and on friendship), having written or edited some two dozen works of the highest caliber. I want to avail myself of this forum to thank him publicly for giving me the opportunity to publish in this field, beginning with an invitation to contribute to a groundbreaking work in the discipline, namely, the two volume Biographical Encyclopedia of Islamic Philosophy (2006).

How Do We Treat Our Veterans?

Early this morning, unable to sleep, I watched this video broadcast on our local community television. Aaron Glantz is the author of How America Lost Iraq (2005), and the subject of this talk is his latest book, The War Comes Home: Washington's Battle Against America's Veterans (2009). This lecture was sponsored by the Walter H. Capps Center for the Study of Ethics, Religion and Public Life at the University of Califiornia, Santa Barbara. Please view the podcast, but in any case, consider the book absolutely essential reading, part of one's myriad civic obligations.

Islam & Constitutionalism: A Modest Introduction

Minimally, constitutionalism means government can and should be legally limited in its powers, and that authority is derived from and depends upon those limitations. Such constitutionalism, in principle when not in practice, is part and parcel of Islamic history. Indeed, in this minimal sense, all nation-states are “constitutional” states. In the Muslim world today, however, the baseline for discussion is liberal and, therefore, democratic constitutionalism, including the exemplary relevance of the archetype of Islamic constitutionalism: namely, the Charter of Medina, Muhammad’s compact with the Muslim and Jewish communities that constituted the first Islamic polity.

Sociologically speaking, a constitution is a “co-ordinating convention” that establishes “self-regulating” institutions that both “enable” and “constrain” democratic behavior (indeed, the ‘enabling’ function of ‘constraints’ is well explained by Stephen Holmes in Passions and Constraints: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy, 1995). As Russell Hardin has made clear, social contract theories or analogies invoked to explain the mechanisms of constitutional construction are misleading inasmuch as “agreement” or “tacit consent” is not a condition for accepting the constitutional order; mere acquiescence will suffice (cf. the response of the anti-Federalists to the U.S. Constitution). This renders the conception of “popular sovereignty” a fictional rhetorical contrivance or metaphor which, in turn, has important consequences for Islamic political theory: one oft-cited reason for Muslim hostility to liberal constitutionalism is the notion of popular sovereignty, seen as infringing upon or contradicting the sovereignty that properly belongs to God. In any case, the doctrine of sovereignty as such has never had the “absolutist” implications sometimes imputed to it and thus should not be construed as contradicting the sovereignty of God. A democratic political and/or legal notion of sovereignty can play a role in constitutionalism if the Islamic conception of God’s conferral of “vice-regency” implies some sort of individual sovereignty. Here sovereignty (in a distributive sense) entails according man theological/metaphysical freedom (e.g., free will), which is logically prior to any notion of rights/liberties set forth in a constitution. The citizen-sovereign in a democracy—through delegation or representation—would thus make the laws, be bound by those laws, and yet somehow remain “above” the law: in acts of civil disobedience, in amending or reforming the constitution, or in a constitutional revolution. Conceding this account, the literal reading of popular sovereignty (in a collective sense) commits the (informal) logical fallacy of composition.

Among the criteria for a liberal constitution are limits on majority decision-making; recognition of human and civil (and increasingly, social and economic) rights (liberties); an independent and impartial judiciary to guarantee and protect these rights (including judicial review); and separation of executive, legislative and judicial powers. And among the concepts within the Islamic tradition suggestive of or compatible with constitutionalism are shūrā (consultation), ijmā‘ (consensus), ijtihād (as independent legal reasoning), maslahah (public welfare), majlis (tribal council; public audience granted the caliph), bay‘ah (an unwritten contract or pact involving the recognition of, and allegiance to, political authority), and wilāyah (custodianship, guardianship, trusteeship).

In the 19th century Ottoman Empire, Egypt and Tunisia, constitutions were honored in the breach. Autocracy, patrimonialism, tribalism, and colonialism have left their indelible marks on periodic and protracted efforts at liberal reform and the democratic aspirations of Muslims. In the second half of the 20th century, socialist and nationalist ideologies were added to the mix. That said, and keeping the Islamic Middle East and North Africa in mind, one can endorse Noah Feldman’s remark “that the world is littered with beautifully drafted constitutions that have been ineffective or ignored in practice.” The Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905-11) prefigured much of the potential and some of the problems that were to attend later democratic experiments, most conspicuously, the Iranian Revolution of 1978-79. The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran contains ostensibly democratic features: in Malise Ruthven’s words, it is a “hybrid of Islamic and western liberal concepts.” But Ayatollah Khomeini’s conception of the “guardianship of the jurist” (vilayāt-i faqī) ensconced in the Constitution by way of the “chief jurisconsult” and the 12-member Council of Guardians, has blocked democratic methods and processes, enshrining an insidious form of religious authoritarianism.

Feldman contends the constitutional monarchies of Jordan and Morocco “represent the best hope for development of Islamic democracy in the Arab world.” The machinations of the military in Pakistan, Algeria, and--less frequently and less confidently--in Turkey, can make mincemeat of constitutional law; nonetheless, Turkey is rightly described as an “emerging democracy.” The constitutional monarchy of Malaysia is betwixt and between authoritarianism and democracy, while Indonesia’s democratic evolution has relied on well-crafted and well-timed constitutional reform.

Constitution-making has been taking place in Iraq, Afghanistan, and in the Palestinian occupied territories courtesy of the Palestinian National Authority. With regard to the latter, after enacting the proto-constitutional and provisional Basic Law, a constitutional committee has completed its third draft [when this was first written] of the Constitution for an independent and sovereign Palestinian State (subject to further amendments). Islam is declared the official religion of the future Palestinian State, while the Constitution guarantees “equality in rights and duties to all citizens irrespective of their religious beliefs.” The “principles” of “Islamic sharī‘ah” are termed “a major source of legislation;” perhaps not unlike the way in which principle(s) of Natural Law have functioned in some Western constitutions.

Further Reading:

• Amanat, Abbas and Frank Griffel, eds. Shari‘a: Islamic Law in the Contemporary Context (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007)
• An-Na‘im, Abdullahi Ahmed. Islam and the Secular State (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008)
• Bayat, Asef. Making Islam Democratic: Social Movements and the Post-Islamist Turn (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007)
• Black, Antony. The History of Islamic Political Thought: From the Prophet to the Present (New York: Routledge, 2001)
• Black, Antony. The West and Islam: Religion and Political Thought in World History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008)
• Dahl, Robert A., Ian Shapiro and José Antonio Chiebub, eds. The Democracy Sourcebook (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003)
• El Fadl, Khaled Abou. Speaking in God’s Name: Islamic Law, Authority and Women (Oxford, England: Oneworld, 2001)
• El Fadl, Khaled Abou. et al., Islam and the Challenge of Democracy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2004)
• Enayat, Hamid. Modern Islamic Political Thought (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1982)
• Esposito, John L. and John O. Voll. Islam and Democracy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996)
• Fadel, Mohammad. “Public Reason as a Strategy for Principled Reconciliation: The Case of Islamic Law and International Human Rights,” Chicago Journal of International Law, Vol. 8, No. 1, p. 1, 2008; University of Toronto, Legal Studies Research Paper No. 981777. Available: http://ssrn.com/abstract=981777
• Fadel, Mohammad. “The True, the Good and the Reasonable: The Theological and Ethical Roots of Public Reason in Islamic Law,” Canadian Journal of Law and Jurisprudence, Vol. 21, No. 1, 2008; Islamic Law and Law of the Muslim World Paper No. 08-08; University of Toronto, Legal Studies Research Paper No. 977206. Available: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1085347
• Feldman, Noah. After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003)
• Hamoudi, Haider Ala. “Baghdad Booksellers, Basra Carpet Merchants, and the Law of God and Man: Legal Pluralism and the Contemporary Muslim Experience,” Berkeley Journal of Middle Eastern and Islamic Law (Inaugural Issue), Vol. 1, No. 1, 2008; University of Pittsburgh Legal Studies Research Paper No. 2008-14; Islamic Law and Law of the Muslim World Research Paper Series at New York Law School 08-26. Available: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1128293
• Hardin, Russell. Liberalism, Constitutionalism, and Democracy (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1999)
• Holmes, Stephen. Passions and Constraints: On the Theory of Liberal Democracy (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1995)
• Kamali, Mohammad Hashim. Shari‘ah Law: An Introduction (Oxford, England: Oneworld, 2008)
• Mayer, Ann Elizabeth. Islam and Human Rights: Tradition and Politics (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 4th ed., 2007)
• Sabet, Amr G.E. Islam and the Political: Theory, Governance and International Relations (London: Pluto Press, 2008)
• Vikor, Knut S. Between God and the Sultan: A History of Islamic Law (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005)
• Wing, Adrien K. “The Palestinian Basic Law: Embryonic Constitutionalism,” 31 Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law 383 (1999)
• Wing, Adrien K. and Hisham A. Kassim. "Hamas, Constitutionalism, and Palestinian Women,” University of Iowa Legal Studies Research Paper No. 08-21; Howard Law Journal, Vol. 50, No. 2, 2007. Available: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1130219
• Wing, Adrien K. and Hisham A. Kassim, “The Future of Palestinian Women's Rights: Lessons from a Half-Century of Tunisian Progress,” University of Iowa Legal Studies Research Paper No. 08-22; Washington and Lee Law Review, Vol. 64, 2007; Islamic Law and Law of the Muslim World Paper No. 08-40. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1130413
• Wing, Adrien K. and Varol, Ozan O. “Is Secularism Possible in a Majority-Muslim Country?: The Turkish Example,” University of Iowa Legal Studies Research Paper No. 08-17; Texas International Law Journal, Vol. 42, No. 1, 2007; Islamic Law and Law of the Muslim World Paper No. 08-33. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1130262

Muslims & Democracy: A Précis

Historically, an Islamic rhetorical idiom has legitimated many a manner of governance: from the despotic to the benign. And the bountiful intellectual fruits of Islamic traditions—philosophical, theological, jurisprudential, mystical—are capable of justifying a wide array of political models and forms of political behavior, including models and forms of democratic provenance. Professors, pundits, policy makers, and the public in their wake, have argued or assumed that Islam and democracy are inherently incompatible, that cultural and political properties intrinsic to Islamic civilization preclude the birth of anything remotely resembling “Islamic democracy.” Yet empirical studies conclude that such culturalist explanations “have little relevance for the emergence and durability of democracies” (Przeworski, et al., in Dahl, Shapiro, Cheibub, eds.).

Today a clarion call from Muslims around the world is heard on behalf of the virtues of democratic values and principles, methods and processes. The overwhelming preference of the “Arab street” and the majority of non-Arabic Muslims is for ballots (‘paper stones’) not bullets, as militant, jihadist Muslims prove the exception to the rule. In short, Islamic democracy is not an oxymoron.

Minimalist or thin theories of democracy focus on the electoral components of the democratic process, the desiderata being free and fair, multiparty elections by secret and universal ballot. An electoral democracy is a constitutional order in which the (chief) executive and legislative offices are filled through regular and competitive elections. In Przeworski’s words, “In the end, the miracle of democracy is that conflicting political forces obey the results of voting.” By these standards, for example, Turkey, Bangladesh, and Indonesia are democratic, as are several states of the former Soviet Union; Egypt and Malaysia are quasi- or semi-democratic; Jordan and Morocco democratic by fits and starts; Algeria has democratic pretensions, as does Kuwait and Bahrain; interestingly, Iran also scores high on this electoral scorecard. Even Saudi Arabia is unable to resist the reformist clamor for electoral democracy: the Kingdom’s cabinet has announced that it will hold its first elections for municipal councils. As various fora of dialogue or “talking shops” are essential forms of democratic participation, the fact that the Saudi leaders are talking about reform with “reform groups” perhaps portends changes on the desert horizon, however distant.

Problems persist: executive offices are often uncontested; opposition parties face unwarranted if not unreasonable government restrictions (and not a few parties are ‘banned’ for this or that reason), with often limited access to media. In addition to voting fraud, authoritarian elites do not hesitate to resort to insidious forms of “electoral engineering” to achieve favorable electoral outcomes. In this case, the maxim “something is better than nothing” holds. Perchance international election monitoring can play a more effective part in preventing or discouraging attempts at electoral manipulation.

As a consequence of electoral participation, some of the more militant Salafi Islamists have formed alliances and coalitions with both Islamic and “secularist” parties and movements, often renouncing the methods of violence in ending the campaign for an “Islamic revolution.” Denying Islamists participation in electoral politics can have deleterious results: as in Algeria, when the Islamic Salvation Front (FIS) resorted to rebellion and violence; other times it simply compels Islamist to engage in the politics of civil society, as with the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Islamist parties demonstrating a commitment to democratic principles and procedures—i.e., to play by the “rules of the game”—are found, for example, in Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Egypt, Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Malaysia, and Indonesia, as well in most of the republics of the former Soviet Union. Indeed, both Hamas and Hezbollah have evidenced a substantial preference for and appreciation of the value of democratic political participation

The growth and consolidation of democracy in the Islamic world faces enormous obstacles: authoritarian political traditions and communalist orientations (including recalcitrant ‘ulamā’ with medievalist responses to the conditions of modernity); histories of colonialist rule and imperialist interference; the need to implement economic reforms by way of integration into the global economy; by-products of nationalist struggles that lacked democratic priorities; economically bloated and inefficient States with excessive military expenditures; to list the more egregious difficulties. Fortunately, the level of economic development provides little information about the chances of transition to democracy, although per capita income does correlate with the sustainability of democratic regimes. And political economists and democratic theorists alike well know that rentier states pose peculiar problems for democratic development. Of course “thick,” more substantive participatory and deliberative democratic theories elaborate a motley of social and institutional conditions that serve as prerequisites of, or that are at least conducive to, full-fledged democratic consolidation and flourishing. When or if the variegated potential forms of Islamic democracy do develop, the corresponding criteria of assessment will be more stringent, and the eudaimonistic consequences more satisfying, than the “thin” electoral variety.

One of the foremost students of civil society, John Keane, suggested in his book, Reflections on Violence (1996), “that Islam, the most socially conscious of world religions, can partly overcome the transition-to-democracy dilemma by concentrating the considerable sum of its energies on the nooks and crannies of civil society.” Both prescriptive and prescient, the prescriptive part was belied by the fact that, descriptively, Muslims from many walks of life had, for some time already, been actively engaged in the arena of civil society, carving out a social space for a “politics of identity” that strove to be at once moral/religious, nonviolent, egalitarian, welfarist, justice-seeking, and democratic. Keane’s remark remains prescient insofar as few observers outside the Islamic world had yet to acknowledge the presence of a vigorous civil society in many of the Muslim majority countries.

Civil society is located between the intimate/private spheres of familial life, and the various organs of the State: administrative, legislative, judicial, economic, etc. In large measure, it is beholden to those selfsame institutions, for the State serves to “frame” or structure social relations outside its immediate purview (e.g., the legal system). The nature, complexity and differentiation of power relations, nodes and networks account for the interdependence and feedback loops between the State and civil society. The institutions, associations, organizations, gathering places, and social movements on the terrain of civil society act as a Deweyan schoolhouse for democracy, or as a dress rehearsal for more traditional forms of political participation. While authoritarian regimes routinely attempt to “de-politicize” or “privatize” (‘atomize’) relations within society, the modern Leviathan finds it difficult to implement this divide-to-conquer strategy, that is, to be truly totalitarian, to manipulate and control the entire spectrum of activities and dialogue constitutive of the various “publics” in civil society.

The moral, political and cultural capacities of actors in civil society are based on norms of trust, reciprocity, friendship, commitment, and the like that are metaphorically termed “social capital.” The strength and circulation of this social capital signals both the desire and potential for democratization (i.e., as a variable in the transition from non-democratic to democratic rule) and may be the very locus of “democracy” in societies with governments that suffer from democracy deficits.

Delineating the lineaments of civil society involves (1) reconfiguring the boundaries of the political, e.g.: the samizdat, the Workers’ Defense Committee (KOR), the “Flying University” (TKN) in the former Soviet Union and East-Central Europe; CORE, the Highlander Folk School, Citizenship Schools, and SNCC of the civil rights era; the Free Speech movement, SDS, and countercultural communes, cooperatives, and clinics of the 1960s; the Beijing Spring of 1989; the United Democratic Front of South Africa; and the comunidades de base of Liberation Theology in Latin America—it entails (2)reconceptualizing the nature of power, e.g.: the intellectuals of the Velvet Revolutions (Vaclav Havel, Adam Michnik, et al.); Gandhian political theory; post-Gramscian Marxism (Carl Boggs); Michel Foucault; the late Fundi Green theorist Rudolf Bahro; and Johan Galutung—and, finally, it includes (3) an appreciation of the financial systems, capital flows, markets, and property rights essential for the material resources that sustain (as both cause and product) civil society (cf.: Henry and Springborg’s Globalization and the Politics of Development in the Middle East, 2001).

In the Middle East (keeping in mind that the vast majority of Muslims reside outside this region), civil society consists of “a mélange of associations, clubs, guilds, syndicates, federations, unions, parties and groups [that] come together to provide a buffer between state and citizen.” (Augustus R. Norton) Professional syndicates (niqabat) are particularly strong in Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Sudan, and among the Palestinians. These associations (of doctors, lawyers, engineers, teachers, etc.) are often the leading edge of civil society owing to the high level of education, political awareness, and financial resources of their members. In Egypt, Muslim Brothers are elected majorities on the boards of most of these associations.

Among the Arab Gulf States, Kuwait’s civil society deserves mention, with its fairly free press, professional associations and cultural clubs. In particular, the diwaniyyah function as a gathering place in citizens’ homes where men socialize while discussing a variety of topics, political and otherwise. Some women have started their own diwaniyyah, and it was the diwaniyyah that gave birth to the country’s pro-democracy movement. While Kuwait’s constitution provides the framework for its civil society, the State has never recognized independent voluntary organizations. Turkey, with its Kemalist/laicist state, has a yet more energetic civil society, much of it Islamic. Still, its Islamist members “possess contradictory motivations and goals and sometimes radically different interpretations of fundamental religious principles and political platforms” (Jenny B. White). When the Kemalist regime crushed the Left in the early 1980s, Muslim activists filled the void: charitable, welfarist, and educational projects persist against a backdrop of agitation for economic and social justice. The electoral success of the Islamic Justice and Development Party (‘AK’) provides evidence of the mobilizational and organizational skills of Muslims in civil society, apart from continuity with the legacy of the Welfare and Virtue Parties.

Finally, note should be made of the attraction of militant Islamist groups like Hezbollah and Hamas. These groups draw young recruits and galvanize popular support for several reasons, not the least of which is their “provision of substantial social services and charitable activities, from education to housing and financial support of the members of families killed, wounded, or detained by authorities" (John L. Esposito).

Further Reading:

Asef Bayat, Making Islam Democratic: Social Movements and the Post-Islamist Turn (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2007); Robert A. Dahl, Ian Shapiro and José Antonio Chiebub, eds., The Democracy Sourcebook (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003); Khaled Abou El Fadl, "Islam and the Challenge of Democracy," Boston Review (April/May 2003); John L. Esposito and Franςois Burgat, eds., Modernizing Islam: Religion in the Public Sphere in Europe and the Middle East (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, 2003); John L. Esposito and John O.Voll, Islam and Democracy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996); Noah Feldman, After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2003); John Keane, Civil Society: Old Images, New Visions (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1998); Augustus Richard Norton, ed., Civil Society in the Middle East, 2 Vols. (Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1995-96); James Piscatori, “Islam, Islamists, and the Electoral Principle in the Middle East” (Leiden, The Netherlands: International Institute for the Study of Islam in the Modern World [ISIM], 2000); Jenny B. White, Islamist Mobilization in Turkey: A Study in Vernacular Politics (Seattle, Wash.: University of Washington Press, 2002); and Carrie Rosefsky Wickham, Mobilizing Islam: Religious Activism and Political Change in Egypt (New York: Columbia University Press, 2002).

A slightly different version of the above appeared in Juan E. Campo, ed., Encyclopedia of Islam. New York: Checkmark Books, 2009.

Iran: Toward an Understanding of Contemporary Events

Inspired by Dean Jim Chen's post, Tehran, June 15, 2009, I thought I would provide a list of books that enable one to better understand contemporary events, if only by placing them in socio-political context and historical perspective.

Portraits of armed Baluchis, Turks and Persians involved in the constitutional revolution in Persia, c.1905-09, the declaration of the deposition of Shah Muhammad Ali, and guns on the streets of Mashhad. [shelfmark:Photo 851/4(91)] © The British Library Board.

• Abdo, Geneive and Jonathan Lyons. Answering Only to God: Faith and Freedom in Twenty-First Century Iran. New York: Henry Holt & Co., 2003.
• Abrahamian, Ervand. Iran Between Two Revolutions. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1982.
• Abrahamian, Ervand. The Iranian Mojahedin. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989.
• Abrahamian, Ervand. Khomeinism: Essays on the Islamic Republic. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1993.
• Abrahamian, Ervand. Tortured Confessions: Prisons and Public Recantations in Modern Iran. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1999.
• Adelkhah, Fariba. Being Modern in Iran. New York: Columbia University Press, 2000.
• Afary, Janet. The Iranian Constitutional Revolution, 1906-1911. New York: Columbia University Press, 1996.
• Afkhami, Mahnaz and Erika Friedl, eds. In the Eye of the Storm: Women in Post-Revolutionary Iran. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1994.
• Afshari, Reza. Human Rights in Iran: The Abuse of Cultural Relativism. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2001.
• Akhavi, Shahrough. Religion and Politics in Contemporary Iran: Clergy-State Relations in the Pahlavi Period. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1980.
• Algar, Hamid. The Islamic Revolution in Iran. London: Open Press, 1980.
• Algar, Hamid. Religion and State in Iran 1785-1906: The Role of the Ulama in the Qajar Period. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1969.
• Alizadeh, Parvin, ed. The Economy of Iran: The Dilemma of an Islamic State. London: I.B. Tauris, 2000.
• Ansari, Ali M. Iran, Islam, and Democracy: The Politics of Managing Change. London: Chatham House, 2nd ed., 2006.
• Ansari, Ali M. Modern Iran Since 1921: The Pahlavis and After. London: Longman, 2003.
• Arjomand, Said Amir. The Turban for the Crown: The Islamic Revolution in Iran. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1988.
• Azimi, Fakhreddin. Iran: the Crisis of Democracy. London: I.B. Tauris, 1989.
• Bakhash, Shaul. The Reign of the Ayatollahs: Iran and the Islamic Revolution. New York: Basic Books, 1990.
• Baktiari, Bahman. Parliamentary Politics in Revolutionary Iran: The Institutionalization of Factional Politics. Gainseville, FL: University Press of Florida, 1996.
• Bayat, Asef. Street Politics: Poor People’s Movements in Iran. New York: Columbia University Press, 1997.
• Bayat, Asef. Workers and Revolution in Iran. London: Zed Books, 1987.
• Bayat, Mangol. Iran’s First Revolution: Shi‘ism and the Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1909. New York: Oxford University Press, 1991.
• Bill, James A. The Eagle and the Lion: The Tragedy of American-Iranian Relations. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1988.
• Bonine, Michael E. and Nikki R. Keddie, eds. Modern Iran: The Dialectics of Continuity and Change. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1981.
• Browne, Edward G. The Persian Revolution, 1905-1909. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1910.
• Chehabi, H.E. Iranian Politics and Religious Modernism: The Liberation Movement of Iran under the Shah and Khomeini. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1990.
• Ehteshami, Anoushiravan. After Khomeini: The Iranian Second Republic. New York: Routledge, 1995.
• Esfandiari, Haleh. Reconstructed Lives: Women & Iran’s Islamic Revolution. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997.
• Farsoun, Samih K. Iran: Political Culture in the Islamic Republic. London: Routledge, 1992.
• Fischer, Michael M.J. Iran: from Religious Dispute to Revolution. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1980.
• Foran, John. Fragile Resistance: Social Transformation in Iran from 1500 to the Revolution. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993.
• Foran, John, ed. A Century of Revolution: Social Movements in Iran. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1994.
• Ganji, Akbar. The Road to Democracy in Iran. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2008.
• Gasiorowski, Mark. U.S. Foreign Policy and the Shah: Building a Client State in Iran. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991.
• Ghani, Cyrus. Iran and the Rise of Reza Shah: From Qajar Collapse to Pahlavi Power. London: I.B. Tauris, 2000.
• Ghani, Cyrus. Iran and the West: A Critical Bibliography. London: Kegan Paul Int’l., 1987.
• Gheissari, Ali. Iranian Intellectuals in the Twentieth Century. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1998.
• Gheissari, Ali, ed. Contemporary Iran: Economy, Society, Politics. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
• Graham, Robert. Iran: the Illusion of Power. London: Croom Helm, revised ed., 1979.
• Hairi, Abdu’l-Hadi. Shī‘ism and Constitutionalism in Iran. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1977.
• Hooglund, Eric, ed. Twenty Years of Islamic Revolution: Political and Social Transition in Iran since 1979. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2002.
• Irfani, Shuroosh. Revolutionary Islam in Iran: Popular Liberation or Religious Dictatorship? London: Zed Books, 1983.
• Kamrava, Mehran. Iran’s Intellectual Revolution. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2008.
• Katouzian, Homa. Mussadiq and the Struggle for Power in Iran. London: I.B. Tauris, 1991.
• Katouzian, Homa. The Political Economy of Modern Iran. London: Macmillan, 1981.
• Kazemi, Farhad. Poverty and Revolution in Iran: The Migrant Poor, Urban Marginality, and Politics. Washington Square, NY: New York University Press, 1981.
• Keddie, Nikki R. Iran and the Muslim World: Resistance and Revolution. Washington Square, NY: New York University Press, 1995.
• Keddie, Nikki R. Iran: Religion, Politics and Society. London: Frank Cass, 1980.
• Keddie, Nikki R. Religion and Rebellion in Iran: The Tobacco Protest of 1891-1892. London: Frank Cass, 1966.
• Keddie, Nikki R. Roots of Revolution: An Interpretative History of Modern Iran. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1981.
• Keddie, Nikki R. Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006 ed.
• Keddie, Nikki R., ed. Religion and Politics in Iran: Shi‘ism from Quietism to Revolution. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1983.
• Menashri, David. Post-Revolutionary Politics in Iran: Religion, Society and Power. London: Frank Cass & Co., 2001.
• Milani, Mohsen M. The Making of Iran’s Islamic Revolution: From Monarchy to Islamic Republic. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, revised ed., 1994.
• Mir-Hosseini, Ziba. Islam and Gender: The Religious Debate in Contemporary Iran. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1999.
• Mir-Hosseini, Ziba and Richard Tapper. Islam and Democracy in Iran: Eshkevari and the Quest for Reform. London: I.B. Tauris, 2006.
• Moaddel, Mansoor. Class, Politics, and Ideology in the Iranian Revolution. New York: Columbia University Press, 1992.
• Moghissi, Haideh. Populism and Feminism in Iran: Women’s Struggle in a Male-Defined Revolutionary Movement. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1996.
• Moslem, Mehdi. Factional Politics in Post-Khomeini Iran. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2002.
• Mottahedeh, Roy. The Mantle of the Prophet: Religion and Politics in Iran. Oxford, UK: Oneworld, 2000.
• Nabavi, Negin. Intellectuals and the State in Iran: Politics, Discourse and the Dilemma of Authenticity. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2003.
• Nabavi, Negin, ed. Intellectual Trends in 20th Century Iran. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2003.
• Paidar, Parvin. Women and the Political Process in Twentieth-Century Iran. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995.
• Postel, Danny. Reading Legitimation Crisis in Tehran: Iran and the Future of Liberalism. Chicago, IL: Prickly Paradigm Press, 2006.
• Rajaee, Farhang, ed. The Iran-Iraq War: The Politics of Aggression. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 1993.
• Rejali, Darius M. Torture and Modernity: Self, Society and State in Modern Iran. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1993.
• Ringer, Monica M. Education, Religion, and the Discourse of Cultural Reform in Qajar Iran. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publ., 2000.
• Sanasarian, Eliz. The Women’s Rights Movement in Iran: Mutiny, Appeasement, and Repression from 1900 to Khomeini. New York: Praeger, 1982.
• Schirazi, Asghar (John O’Kane, trans.). The Constitution of Iran: Politics and the State in the Islamic Republic. London: I.B. Tauris, 1997.
• Takeyh, Ray. Guardians of the Revolution: Iran and the World in the Age of Ayatollahs. New York: Oxford University Press, 2009.
• Tavakoli-Targhi, Mohamad. Refashioning Iran: Orientalism, Occidentalism and Historiography. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2001.
• Vahdat, Farzin. God and Juggernaut: Iran’s Intellectual Encounter with Modernity. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2002.
• van den Bos, Matthijs. Mystic Regimes: Sufism and the State in Iran, from the late Qajar Era to the Islamic Republic. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2002.
• Wright, Robin. The Last Great Revolution: Turmoil and Transformation in Iran. New York: Vintage Books, 2001.

Serious intellectual writings and discussions involving secularists, religious liberals, and reformist clerics have grown since the early 1990s, and even when their outlets in the periodical press were restricted, books and treatises could still be published. [....] Thinkers who have written since 1990 are generally more sophisticated and more knowledgeable about a variety of Western and Islamic sources than were their intellectual predecessors. These predecessors, like their contemporaries in many parts of the world, if they were politically oriented, tended to have ideological views that emphasized one factor as central to solving Iran's problems--whether class, economics, and socialism for the Marxists, science, nationalism, or racism for many modernizers, or varying interpretations of Islam for both Islamic modernists and Islamic conservatives. (Similar simplifications were also characteristic of many intellectuals elsewhere.) Nearly all tended to stress foreign imperialist evils far more than internal reasons for Iran's problems. Reformists who stressed Islam usually took the path known as Islamic modernism--basically the claim that all the positive values they had seen in the West--science, representative government, a better position for women, and so forth--were found in Islam if it were rightly understood. The Mojahedin-e Khalq, Shariati, and Khomeini had different views of Islam, but all were ideological and convinced that their path would solve the problems of the world. The popularity in the Pahlavi period of ideological views, especially Marxism-Leninism and nationalism, helped encourage competing political-ideological constructions of Islam, the most influential being those of Shariati and Khomeini.

Thinkers of the 1990s were more complex and sophisticated; they broke with ideologies that implied that ideological correctness could bring about an ideal society. They also considered Western ideas to be complex and varied, and not a solution to all problems (as had some earlier Iranian nationalists), not simple extensions of ideas already present in Islam or Iran, and not, alternatively, simply dangerous aspects of imperialism. Several of the new thinkers are well acquainted with both Western and Islamic thought, and, unlike many of their ideological predecessors, do not think huge social advances can be attained if people act in favor of a particular ideology. There has been a new stress on freedom of thought, including of religion, which earlier thinkers had tended to subordinate to anti-imperialism or other values, and also on the importance of democracy, greater gender equality, and new and fair laws. There have also been a variety of strong criticisms of clerical rule. Nikki Keddie, Modern Iran: Roots and Results of Revolution (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006 ed): 304-305.

Terrorism: A Selected Bibliography

This bibliographic installment in the Directed Reading series treats terrorism. The material below will have to suffice as a cursory introduction of sorts to the topic, albeit one colored by my particular moral, legal and political perspectives. We would do well to recall that "Bismark 'terrorized' Prussia by using the army as a means of social control; Nazi Germany imposed a reign of terror across Europe; German and allied air forces resorted to 'terror bombing' in the Second World War; and Stalin ruled Russia by terror." Aerial bombardment ('carpet bombing') of North Vietnam and Cambodia by the United States during the Vietnam War is likewise aptly termed terror bombing. Thus, although the focus in the media, the academy, and the commanding heights of political power of late has been on the terrorist acts of non-State actors, as Noam Chomsky has not tired of telling us, terrorism is not only a weapon of the weak and desperate but is also prominent in the arsenal of those acting on behalf of the most powerful nation-state on the planet...and to far more devastating effect.

Few words are plagued by so much indeterminacy, subjectivity, and political disagreement as 'terror,' 'terrorize,' 'terrorism,' and 'terrorist.' The ordinary linguistic meanings of these variant terms are instantly evocative and highly emotive, referring at a literal level to intense fear, fright or dread. By itself, a literal meaning is not particularly instructive in distilling a legal concept of terrorism, since 'every form of violence is potentially terror-inspiring to its victim,' from mugging to warfare.

...[T]he peculiar semantic power of the term [terrorist], beyond its literal signification, is its capacity to stigmatize, delegitimize, denigrate, and dehumanize those at whom it is directed, including legitimate political opponents.

There are no clean lines between terrrorism and other forms of political violence, and the debate about defining terrorism is also a debate about the classification of political violence in all its myriad forms: riot, revolt, rebellion, war, conflict, uprising, revolution, subversion, intervention, guerilla warfare, and so on.

Invidious moralization tends to accompany reference to terrorism, casting it as a titanic, Manichean, existential struggle of polarities: humanity and inhumanity; civilization and barbarism; freedom and fear; modernity and pre-modernity; liberal democracy and apocalyptic, eschatological, phantasmagorical nihilism; the rational and the pathological; law and outlaw; friend and enemy; the West and Others; Christianity and Islam; light and dark; good and evil.

If terrorism is presented as an absolute threat, then counter-terrorism measures must also be unlimited. Labeling opponents as terrorists delegitimizes, discredits, dehumanizes and demonizes them, casting them as fanatics who cannot be reasoned with.

[I]f international law is not to become complicit in oppression by criminalizing legitimate political resistance, justifications for terrorist violence must be taken seriously by the law. [....] While a narrow class of terrorist acts may be excused by individual or group defences, some acts considered justifiable may still fall outside the scope of defences. To maintain the law's legitimacy, [we need to take seriously the possibility] that some acts of terrorism could, in exceptional cases, be regarded as 'illegal but justifiable' (or at least excusable) in stringently limited, objectively verifiable circumstances, possibly under the rubric of a 'collective defence of human rights.'

[T]hree iconic figures — Yasser Arafat (PLO), Gerry Adams (IRA), and Nelson Mandela (ANC) — were at some point arguably responsible for terrorism by their organizations. While their degree of responsibility differs (particularly in organizations with ostensibly separate political and military wings), it is startling how persons once regarded as terrorists were later embraced as legitimate representatives of political movements, entitled to a share of State power, or even to Nobel Prizes (Arafat in 1994, Mandela in 1993). All were absolved of criminal responsibility for terrorism, as a precondition of involvement in political settlements.
— Ben Saul, Defining Terrorism in International Law. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.

[We might view the terrorist] as a representative of this or that political, or politico-religious, grievance or program, with a range of tactics at his or her disposal, just like the rest of us, and, just like the rest of us, resorting from time to time to morally dubious or outrageous tactics.

Terrorism is not a tactic restricted to revolutionaries and other non-governmental groups. Doubtless many people would be surprised at the idea that governments and authorized governmental agencies do or can use terrorist methods for their political purposes, but such surprise is quite often the product of naivete or prejudice.
— C.A.J. Coady, Morality and Political Violence. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2008.

Terrorism is not an organization or a movement or even an 'enemy' that one can declare war on; terrorism is simply the tactic of indiscriminately attacking enemy targets--especially civilians--in order to sow fear, undermine morale, and provoke counterproductive reactions from one's adversary. It is a tactic that many different groups sometimes employ, usually when they are much weaker than their adversaries and have no good option for fighting against superior military forces. Zionists [e.g., especially the members of Irgun (or 'Etzel') and Lehi (or the Stern Gang)] used terrorism when they were trying to drive the British out of Palestine and establish their own State...and the United States has backed a number of 'terrorist' organizations in the past (including the Nicaraguan contras and the UNITA guerillas in Angola). American presidents have also welcomed a number of former terrorists to the White House (including PLO chairman Yasser Arafat and Israeli Prime Ministers Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir, who played key roles in the main Zionist terrorist organizations) which merely underscores the fact that terrorism is a tactic and not a unified movement.
— John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt, The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007.

The reduction of the Palestinian Authority to a mere terrorist entity with no political character is a denial of reality. But reducing Hamas to this concept is equally so, whatever its methods of action and reactionary nature. Hamas is primarily a nationalist movement that inserts the national claim into a religious logic
— Sylvain Cypel, Walled: Israeli Society at an Impasse. New York: Overlook Press, 2006.

...[T]o be justified, terrorism should be subject to certain constraints, the most important of which is that it should be selective whenever possible and should initially at least be directed only against the actual perpetrators of the injustice against those who are now considering the use of violence as a response.

...[T]errorism in our time has probably been more concerned with the right to national self-determination than with any other single cause.
— Burleigh Taylor Wilkins, Terrorism and Collective Responsibility. New York: Routledge, 1992.

[There are a host of reasons that] suggest...the recent political philosophy of the affluent, liberal west may not afford the most useful point of entry for an investigation into problems of terror and terrorism.

All too often terrorism is the tactical choice simply because the perceived advantages it offers are so great. It costs relatively little in money and manpower. It has immediate effects and generates extensive and highly sensationalized publicity for one's cause. It affords an emotionally satisfying outlet for feelings of rage and the desire for vengeance. It induces an acute sense of vulnerability in all those who identify with its immediate victims. And insofar as those victims are chosen randomly from among some very large group, the class of people who identify with them is maximized, so that an extraordinary number of people are given a vivid sense of the potential costs of resisting one's demands. Figuratively and often literally, terrorism offers the biggest bang for one's buck.
— Samuel Scheffler, "Is Terrorism Morally Distinctive?" The Journal of Political Philosophy, Vol. 14, No. 1 (2006): 1-17.

When it comes to terrorism, a phenomenon that almost always stirs fear and insecurity disproportionate to the actual danger, the temptation for governments to bend the rules and the truth becomes irresistible.

...[A]part from being a massive propaganda gift to militant Islamist extremism, the war in Iraq has led to terrorism on an even bigger scale.

One of bin Laden's intentions back in 2001 [was to] portray the West as scared, emotionally vulnerable, overreactive, decadent and hypocritical about liberal values. The West has done a very good job of proving him right. The invasion of Iraq, the images of torture and the widely documented abuses of prisoners at Guantanamo and other U.S. detention facilities has left the U.S. reviled not only in the Arab world but throughout the West, undercutting the moral authority which is vital for any liberal democracy in dealing effectively with persistent terrorist violence.

There never was a 'terrorist threat' to western civilization or democracy, only to western lives and property. Such a threat becomes systemic only when democracy loses its confidence and when its leaders exploit public fear for political ends.
— George Kassimeris in the volume he edited, Playing Politics with Terrorism. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008.

There are a number of clear political advantages to be gained from the creation of social anxiety and moral panics. In the first place, fear is a disciplining agent and can be effectively deployed to de-legitimize dissent, mute criticism, and constrain internal opponents. In an atmosphere of national peril, the appeal for political unity takes on greater moral force and voicing disagreement can be characterised as an act of disloyalty. Fear can lead ordinary citizens to act as the primary agents of censure themselves, both in terms of self-censorship (choosing to withhold their own doubts and disagreements in public discourse) and the censorship of others (expressing disapproval when confronted with dissenting or 'disloyal' opinions in others). This is because fear is corrosive of both political expression and moral courage. Either way, its primary function is to ease the pressure of accountability for political elites. An instrument of elite rule, political fear is in effect a political project aimed at reifying existing structures of power.

Within the pragmatic logic of counterterrorism, it seems obvious that the politics of fear can too easily become self-fulfilling prophesy. Exaggerating the terrorist threat and maintaining social fear actually emboldens and empowers terrorists; it provides them with incontrovertible evidence of their own ability to gain unlimited publicity and influence a terrified society through the threat of violence. Given that terrorism is essentially a form of political communication and therefore relies on the widest possible publicity, the politics of fear plays directly into the hands of militants. From this perspective, it is strategically counter-productive.

It can easily be demonstrated that state terrorism--the use or threat of state-sponsored violence to instil fear for political purposes--remains a far greater threat to individual and social security than the threat of dissident terrorism. Over the last few decades, states, including several liberal democracies, have tortured and murdered hundreds of thousands of political opponents and caused massive social destruction to communities in places like Vietnam, Cambodia, South Africa, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Cuba, Chile, Spain, Northern Ireland, Rwanda, Serbia, and Turkey--to name just a few. And government forces continue to employ violent repression and state terror in places like Chechniya, Palestine, Kashmir, Afghanistan, Iraq, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Uzbekistan, Zimbabwe, and Myanmar, among many others. State terror has always been a far greater threat to security than non-state terror, and yet, state terror is conspicuous by its absence from the public narrative of the terrorist threat--except of course, when it is cynically deployed to justify wars of 'regime change.'
— Richard Jackson in George Kassimeris, ed., Playing Politics with Terrorism. New York: Columbia University Press, 2008.

Today, U.S. Special Operation Forces--who do not wear uniforms, operate behind enemy lines, do not openly display their weapons, and generally fail to conform to the rules of war--...could be considered terrorists in that they are neither soldiers nor civilians.

...[T]errorists are fighters who are even more in need of the traditional protections of the rules of war, for they inspire emotional reactions that are themselves often inhumane.

...[S]ome terrorists engage in indiscriminate violence and others do not.

[Setting aside for the moment the larger obligation of humane treatment], from the standpoint of retributive justice, terrorists--and all others, for that matter--are owed procedural due process considerations that are involved in establishing what they have done.

If terrorists are combatants, then they are owed the type of mutual respect that is paid to all combatants according to the Just War tradition. If we are to use the law/crime model, then terrorists are owed the full due process considerations that apply to any criminal suspect.
— Larry May, War Crimes and Just War. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007.