Book contents
- Encounters with Islam
- Encounters with Islam
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Plates and Figures
- Acknowledgments
- Note on Transcription
- Introduction
- Part I Expressive
- Part II Legal
- 2 Tribal Law as Islamic Law
- 3 The Meaning of the Gift
- 4 Islamic Conceptions of the Rule of Law
- Part III Political
- Part IV Critical
- Envoi
- Bibliography
- Index
- Plate Section (PDF Only)
4 - Islamic Conceptions of the Rule of Law
from Part II - Legal
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 09 September 2023
- Encounters with Islam
- Encounters with Islam
- Copyright page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Plates and Figures
- Acknowledgments
- Note on Transcription
- Introduction
- Part I Expressive
- Part II Legal
- 2 Tribal Law as Islamic Law
- 3 The Meaning of the Gift
- 4 Islamic Conceptions of the Rule of Law
- Part III Political
- Part IV Critical
- Envoi
- Bibliography
- Index
- Plate Section (PDF Only)
Summary
The rule of law, it has been said, is at best a vague concept and at worst a myth. Yet as one looks at any given society, it is a notion that takes on local meaning, in the Middle East and North Africa no less than elsewhere. In this chapter, it is suggested that there is a significant reality to the concept of the rule of law in Muslim nations but that much of that local meaning turns not on substantive rules or the formal organization of institutions so much as the procedures followed and the cultural presumption that inform the finding of facts. By tracing these features through concrete cases and related sources, we can see that Islamic concepts of the rule of law are mostly about process and the assessment of persons, rather than of material evidence and the structure of judicial power. As such, we can also see that when various Muslim cultures encounter one another and the legal systems of the West, some misunderstanding of why failing to appreciate that no cases are thought to be identical and that persons take precedence overs ‘facts’ can readily lead to misperception and misguided encounters.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Encounters with IslamStudies in the Anthropology of Muslim Cultures, pp. 61 - 78Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2023