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Nagamine, “The Legitimization Strategy of the Taliban’s Code of Conduct”

In October, Palgrave Macmillan will release “The Legitimization Strategy of the Taliban’s Code of Conduct: Through the One-Way Mirror” by Yoshinobu Nagamine (World Economic Forum, Geneva). The publisher’s description follows:

The Afghan Taliban are often judged against international norms; what is,9781137537164 however, less known is that they have produced their own set of norms designed to guide their conduct. In this insightful study, Yoshinobu Nagamine examines the Taliban’s internal code of conduct, the Layeha. Nagamine analyzes the Layeha in comparison with Islamic Law and international humanitarian law and conducts interviews with Taliban members to understand how they interpret and refer to the Layeha. The results of these interviews give readers an insider’s view of the legitimization strategy of the Taliban leadership. This work makes a significant contribution to research on non-state actors, counterinsurgency, and Islamic fundamentalism, and it serves as an indispensable resource for scholars of the Afghan Taliban.

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Around the Web This Week

Some interesting law and religion news stories from around the web this week:

Posted on by Christina Vlahos

Esposito et al, “Islam and Democracy after the Arab Spring”

In November, the Oxford University Press will release “Islam and Democracy after the Arab Spring,” by John L. Esposito (Georgetown University), Tamara Sonn (Georgetown University), and John O. Voll (Georgetown University).  The publisher’s description follows:

The landscape of the Middle East has changed dramatically since 2011, as have the political arena and the discourse around democracy. In Islam and Democracy after the Arab Spring, John L. Esposito, John Voll, and Tamara Sonn examine the state of democracy in Muslim-majority societies today. Applying a twenty-first century perspective to the question of whether Islam is “compatible” with democracy, they redirect the conversation toward a new politics of democracy that transcends both secular authoritarianism and Political Islam.

While the opposition movements of the Arab Spring vary from country to country, each has raised questions regarding equality, economic justice, democratic participation, and the relationship between Islam and democracy in their respective countries. Does democracy require a secular political regime? Are religious movements the most effective opponents of authoritarian secularist regimes? Esposito, Voll, and Sonn examine these questions and shed light on how these opposition movements reflect the new global realities of media communication and sources of influence and power. Positioned for a broad readership of scholars and students, policy-makers, and media experts, Islam and Democracy after the Arab Spring will quickly become a go-to for all who watch the Middle East, inside and outside of academia.

Posted on by Christina Vlahos

Conroy-Krutz, “Christian Imperialism”

In August, the Cornell University Press released “Christian Imperialism:  Converting the World in the Early American Republic,” by Emily Conroy-Krutz (Michigan State University). The publisher’s description follows: 

In 1812, eight American missionaries, under the direction of the recently formed American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, sailed from the United States to South Asia. The plans that motivated their voyage were no less grand than taking part in the Protestant conversion of the entire world. Over the next several decades, these men and women were joined by hundreds more American missionaries at stations all over the globe. Emily Conroy-Krutz shows the surprising extent of the early missionary impulse and demonstrates that American evangelical Protestants of the early nineteenth century were motivated by Christian imperialism—an understanding of international relations that asserted the duty of supposedly Christian nations, such as the United States and Britain, to use their colonial and commercial power to spread Christianity.

In describing how American missionaries interacted with a range of foreign locations (including India, Liberia, the Middle East, the Pacific Islands, North America, and Singapore) and imperial contexts, Christian Imperialism provides a new perspective on how Americans thought of their country’s role in the world. While in the early republican period many were engaged in territorial expansion in the west, missionary supporters looked east and across the seas toward Africa, Asia, and the Pacific. Conroy-Krutz’s history of the mission movement reveals that strong Anglo-American and global connections persisted through the early republic. Considering Britain and its empire to be models for their work, the missionaries of the American Board attempted to convert the globe into the image of Anglo-American civilization.

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Anderson, “The Declaration of Independence and God: Self-Evident Truths in American Law”

In October, Cambridge University Press will release “The Declaration of Independence and God: Self-Evident Truths in American Law” by Owen Anderson (Arizona State University). The publisher’s description follows:

“Self-evident truths” was a profound concept used by the drafters of the American Declaration of Independence to insist on their rights and freedom from oppressive government. How did this Enlightenment notion of self-evident human rights come to be used in this historic document and what is its true meaning? In The Declaration of Independence and God, Owen Anderson traces the concept of a self-evident creator through America’s legal history. Starting from the Declaration of Independence, Anderson considers both challenges to belief in God from thinkers like Thomas Paine and American Darwinists, as well as modifications to the concept of God by theologians like Charles Finney and Paul Tillich. Combining history, philosophy, and law in a unique focus, this book opens exciting new avenues for the study of America’s legal history.

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Zakariyah, “Legal Maxims in Islamic Criminal Law”

In November, Brill will release “Legal Maxims in Islamic Criminal Law: Theory and Applications” by Luqman Zakariyah (International Islamic University Malaysia). The publisher’s description follows:

Using contemporary illustrations, Legal Maxims in Islamic Criminal Law delves into the theoretical and practical studies of al-Qawaid al-Fiqhiyyah in Islamic legal theory. It elucidates the importance of this concept in the application of Islamic law and demonstrates how the concept relates to the objectives of Islamic law (maqāṣid al-Sharī‘ah), generally. Included in this examination are the following maxims: al-Umūr bi-Maqāṣidihā (“Matters shall be Judged by their Objectives”); al-Yaqīn lā Yazūl bi-sh-Shakk (“Certainty Cannot be Overruled by Doubt”); al-Mashaqqa Tajlib at-Taysīr (“Hardship begets Facility”); Lā Ḍarar wa-lā Ḍirār (“No Injury or Harm shall be Inflicted or Reciprocated”); and al-ʿĀda Muḥakkama (“Custom is Authoritative”).

Posted on by Mark Movsesian

Center Appoints Student Fellows for 2015-2016

combined
Cipolla and Vlahos

We’re delighted to report that the Center for Law and Religion has appointed two student fellows for 2015-2016, Stephanie Cipolla (3L) and Christina Vlahos (2L). Cipolla, who served as a fellow last year as well, graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a B.A. in political science. Before coming to St. John’s, she spent a year working for the CEO of Catholic Charities – Archdiocese of New Orleans. She is a staff member on the St. John’s Law Review.

Vlahos, who joins us as a new fellow this year, graduated from Columbia College (Columbia University) with a B.A. in English Literature and Modern Greek Studies.  She is a staff member on the St. John’s Law Review.

Our student fellows help out with various Center activities, including, most importantly, keeping this blog updated with daily Scholarship Roundup posts and our weekly Around the Web feature. This is our fifth class of student fellows. We selected our first in 2011.

We welcome Stephanie and Christina and wish them success in the year ahead!

Posted on by Christina Vlahos

Wong, “Discerning the Powers in Post-Colonial Africa and Asia”

This month, Springer Press releases “Discerning the Powers in Post-Colonial Africa and Asia: A Treatise on Christian Statecraft,” by Pak Nung Wong (University of Bath).  The publisher’s description follows:

Qualifying post-Westphalian sovereign statehood as a ‘power’ as argued for in Hendrik Berkhoff’s political theology, this book addresses the decades-long theological-spiritual debate between Christian realism and Christian pacifism in U.S. foreign policy and global Christian circles. It approaches the debate by delving into the pacifist Anabaptist political theology and delineates empirically how sovereign statehood in post-colonial Africa and Asia has fallen into the hands of the devil Satan, as a ‘fallen power’ in the Foucaultian terms of power structures, techniques and episteme. While the book offers intervention schemes and options, it holds that Christian statecraft remains the source of hope to effectively address a number of serious global issues. By extension, the book is thus an invitation to ignite debates on the suitability of Christian statecraft and the nexus between spirituality and world politics, making it especially interesting for scholars and students in the fields of International Politics, Politics of Asian and African States, Post-colonial Studies and Political Theology.

Posted on by Christina Vlahos

Hogan, “Keeping Faith with Human Rights”

This month, the Georgetown University Press releases “Keeping Faith with Human Rights,” by Linda Hogan (Trinity College Dublin). The publisher’s description follows:

The human rights regime is one of modernity’s great civilizing triumphs. From the formal promulgation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 to the subsequent embrace of this declaration by the newly independent states of Africa, human rights have emerged as the primary discourse of global politics and as an increasingly prominent category in the international and domestic legal system. But throughout their history, human rights have endured sustained attempts at disenfranchisement.

In this provocative study, Linda Hogan defends human rights language while simultaneously reenvisioning its future. Avoiding problematic claims about shared universal values, Hogan draws on the constructivist strand of political philosophy to argue for a three-pronged conception of human rights: as requirements for human flourishing, as necessary standards of human community, and as the basis for emancipatory politics. In the process, she shows that it is theoretically possible and politically necessary for theologians to keep faith with human rights. Indeed, the Christian tradition—the wellspring of many of the ethical commitments considered central to human rights—must embrace its vital role in the project.

Posted on by Mark Movsesian · 2 Comments

Won’t Somebody Please Think of the Lawyers?

Pope_Francis_in_March_2013I’ll leave it to others more knowledgeable than I to assess the changes Pope Francis announced this morning with respect to the procedure for granting annulments. To an outsider, the changes certainly seem sweeping. Francis has eliminated the requirement that two tribunals agree to grant an annulment — a kind of mandatory appeal procedure. Now, the ruling of only one tribunal will suffice. Moreover, unlike in the past, the tribunal need not contain an expert in canon law. Indeed, the number of judges on the tribunal has been reduced from three to one.

In addition, the reforms greatly expand the authority of the local bishop to grant annulments. (For what it’s worth, in my own Armenian Orthodox Church, divorces–we don’t have annulments–are handled by the local bishop in a more or less informal process). If there is an appeal from a tribunal’s decision, the local bishop will hear it, rather than church courts in Rome–though a second appeal would go to Rome. In some cases, where grounds for annulment are “evident,” the bishop can grant an annulment in an even more expedited process. Papal biographer Austen Ivereigh told the Washington Post that Francis’s granting these powers to local bishops is “the most-far reaching reform to the Church’s nullity process in 300 years.”

As I say, I will leave if for others to assess the effect of all this — whether the benefits that come from streamlining the process outweigh the danger that unwilling people, who don’t want their marriages annulled, will be railroaded — and what the impact will be for the upcoming synod on the family. As to that, my guess is that some of the heat has been taken off. It would only be reasonable to wait to see how these new reforms work before tackling other neuralgic issues, like communion for divorced and remarried Catholics who have not received annulments. But, as I say, I’m an outsider.

There is one thing that strikes me, however, as a professor at a Catholic law school. As a result of the new, streamlined process, canon law will be even less important to the lives of most American Catholics than it already is. In America, anyway, canon law is, in practice, mostly a matter of marriage annulments. If you don’t need canon law for that, what do you need it for? Chad Pecknold tells the Washington Post that many of his canon-lawyer friends are thinking of a new line of work. No wonder.

I do wish the Vatican had considered all this. Do they have any idea how hard it is to convince American law students to take canon law? And haven’t they heard about the employment crisis for American lawyers?