In the last few years, issues related to human rights, including encouraging the democratization of Muslim societies from the Middle East to Southeast Asia, have acquired great importance in shaping the character of U.S.-Muslim relations and U.S. policy toward Muslim countries. An important impetus behind this development were the tragic events of 9/11, which demonstrated the destructive potential of militant groups that use a distorted interpretation of Islam as justification for their actions. These events also led to a greater realization by the United States--and the West--that a lack of democracy and lack of respect for human rights have been contributory factors to the rise of militant Islam. Consequently, in its approach toward the Muslim world, the United States has emphasized the themes of human rights and democracy. Within the Islamic world, too, both secular and moderate Islamists have begun focusing on issues related to human rights. Although many conservative Muslims believe that Islam is incompatible with Western notions of democracy and human rights, reformist Muslim thinkers and activists maintain that a proper reading of Islamic injunctions and the ethical values underpinning those injunctions shows there is no such incompatibility. Complicating the debate is the fact that many Muslims--secular as well as conservative and reformist--doubt the seriousness of the U.S. commitment to the cause of human rights and democracy in the Muslim world, believing that the United States applies human rights' standards selectively to suit its strategic and economic interests. Irrespective of the validity of these charges, they are part of the context of the U.S.-Muslim dialogue on human rights. And it is this complex dialogue that this volume seeks to advance.

The existence of human rights helps secure the peace, deter aggression, promote the rule of law, combat crime and corruption, and prevent humanitarian crises. These human rights include freedom from torture, freedom of expression, press freedom, women's rights, children's rights, and the protection of minorities. This book surveys the countries of the Near East and North Africa, and is augmented by a current bibliography and useful indexes by subject, title and author.

This book examines the legal nature of Islamic states and the human rights they have committed to uphold. It begins with an overview of the political history of Islam, and of Islamic law, focusing primarily on key developments of the first two centuries of Islam. Building on this foundation, the book presents the first study into Islamic constitutions to map the relationship between Sharia and the state in terms of institutions of governance. It then assesses the place of Islamic law in the national legal order of all of today's Islamic states, before proceeding to a comprehensive analysis of those states' adherences to the UN human rights treaties, and finally, a set of international human rights declarations made jointly by Islamic states. Throughout, the focus remains on human rights. Having examined Islamic law first in isolation, then as it reflects into state structures and national constitutional orders, the book provides the background necessary to understand how an Islamic state's treaty commitments reflect into national law. In this endeavour, the book unites three strands of analysis: the compatibility of Sharia with the human rights enunciated in UN treaties; the patterns of adherence of Islamic states with those treaties; and the compatibility of international Islamic human rights declarations with UN standards. By exploring the international human rights commitments of all Islamic states within a single analytical framework, this book will appeal to international human rights and constitutional scholars with an interest in Islamic law and states. It will also be useful to readers with a general interest in the relationships between Sharia, Islamic states, and internationally recognised human rights.

Islam and Human Rights is a probing examination of how the Islamic tradition has been exploited for political ends by regimes and institutions seeking to legitimize policies inimical to human rights. Ann Elizabeth Mayer critically appraises Islamic human rights schemes that dilute the human rights afforded by international law, comparing them with the complex Islamic legal heritage and international human rights law. Challenging stereotypes about a supposedly monolithic Islam inherently incompatible with human rights, Mayer dissects the political motives behind the selective deployment of elements of the Islamic tradition by conservative forces seeking to delegitimize demands for democracy and human rights. The fifth edition provides an updated consideration of government policies on Islam and human rights activism and how they are affecting developments in several Middle Eastern countries, and features a new chapter on the resistance of human rights for sexual minorities by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) project to co-opt international human rights law to criminalize “defamation of Islam” occurring in the West. The new edition also analyzes the other most recent and important issues of the region, including: The burgeoning pressures in the Middle East for human rights leading up to the Arab Spring; The ambitious campaign of the (OIC) to influence the UN human rights system by forging alliances with non-Muslim states hostile to human rights; The concerted efforts by this cross-cultural alliance to subvert international human rights law under pretenses of supporting human rights; The intensifying controversies over issues of sexual orientation and gender identity in the Middle East; The Danish Cartoons controversy and the OIC project to co-opt international human rights law to criminalize “defamation of Islam” occurring in the West.

In Human Rights Between Universality and Islamic Legitimacy, Mahmoud Bassiouni addresses the debate surrounding the compatibility of Islam and human rights. He argues that to understand their compatibility, we need to better understand the dynamic way in which Islamic tradition has evolved relative to international human rights. Including analyses of different Muslim positions, Bassiouni identifies their merits and shortcomings and asks how we can rethink and answer open questions in human rights philosophy by bringing the resources of the Islamic tradition to bear upon them.

This book discusses human rights law, focusing on Chinese contributions to international human rights viewed from a perspective of global governance. The original research presented here integrates a variety of research methods: inter-disciplinary approaches, historical and comparative methods, documentary research and so on. The research findings can be described briefly as follows: In global governance, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) serves as a historic cross-cultural heritage, while Pengchun Chang, the Chinese representative, made great contributions to the establishment of the international human rights system. After examining the characteristics of the Chinese discourse on human rights in global governance, the book suggests fundamental principles for improving human rights standards in China. In addition, it explores Chinese concepts of human dignity concerning the Declaration on Human Dignity for everyone, everywhere. The target readers are global scholars and students of law, politics, philosophy, international relations, human rights law, religion and culture. The book will provide these readers a vivid picture of China’s contributions to international human rights, and a better understanding of the significance of traditional Chinese culture and wisdom.

In this 'Dickensian century' of human rights, the world has cultivated the best of religious rights protections, but witnessed the worst of religious rights abuses. In this volume, Jimmy Carter, John T. Noonan, Jr., and a score of leading jurists assess critically and comparatively the religious rights laws and practices of the international community and of selected states in the Atlantic continents. This volume and its companion Religious Human Rights in Global Perspective: Religious Perspectives are products of an ongoing project on religion, human rights and democracy undertaken by the Law and Religion Program at Emory University.