Contesting Justice : Women, Islam, Law, and Society [review] [Middle East]
Contesting Justice- Women, Islam, Law , and Society; SUNY Press, 195 pp., by A. Souaiaia; Appendices , Bibliography, Index; $70.00 (hardcover, 2008), ISBN13: 978-0-7914-7397-9; $20.95 (paperback, 2009), ISBN13: 978-0-7914-7398-6;
Reviewed by: Adis Duderija [Centre for Muslim States and Societies, University of Western Australia]
Over the last two decades in particular a significant number of scholarly books and articles have been written by Muslim female and male scholars on the subject of what we could broadly term women emancipation on the basis of novel approaches to Islamic hermeneutics and Islamic legal theory (usul-ul fiqh). The works of scholars such as A.Wadud, H. Baranzagi, Z. Mir-Hosseini, Abou El-Fadl, F. Esack and A. Barlas, to name but a few, come to mind. These works primarily focused on exposing, explaining, contesting and dislodging the male epistemic privilege in the formation and interpretation of religious sciences and tradition seen as the principal culprits for the andocentric, patriarchal and misogynist elements that persist in the understanding and interpretation of the Islamic tradition and its fountainheads, the Qur’an and the Sunnah. Moreover these women unfriendly (to put it mildly) dimensions of the Islamic tradition were considered as significantly contributing to the unenviable legal, political and economic status of Muslim women both in the historical and in the contemporary context. The solution advocated by these scholars was primarily restricted to the call for the inclusion of women’s voices and opinions in the interpretive processes and the subsequent demands for legal reform based on alternative more women egalitarian or just interpretations of the Islamic tradition. For reasons outlined below A. Souaiaia’s book under review is both a continuation of and a significant departure from this body of scholarly knowledge.
“Contesting Justice” is in many ways a groundbreaking and pioneering study that links discourses pertaining to the nature, origins, development and the scope of Islamic law and practices with the concept of justice as it relates to the legal and economic status of women with special attention to the Islamic laws of polygamy and inheritance.
The book addresses a vast array of important questions such as: What is the nature of Islamic law, its origins and development? What is the nature and meaning of the concept of justice in the Islamic tradition/law? How does this impact upon the legal, political and economic status of women? What is the relationship between Islamic law (defined as “the corpus of legal rulings and determinations that are inspired or based on Islamic teachings, p.xii) and explicitly stated legal proofs found in the Qur’an? How do we account for the gap between these two if one existed? How do we determine the level of explicitness of legal proofs in the Qur’an? Similarly, what is the interplay between practices, legal rules and legal proofs in Islamic law? What is the nature of morality and law in general? What is the place and function of morality and ethics in revealed scriptures? Are there any legal moral absolutes in the Islamic legal system? How do Qur’an and Islamic legal philosophies view men and women? Are social justice, fairness and equality going to be achieved on the basis of democratising of religious knowledge and interpretational practices or by developing abstract meanings and scope of these concepts? Similarly, is desired change (such as improving the status of women and other marginalised groups in a society) going to be engendered and vouchsafed in an enduring and effective fashion for each individual though the of creation of strong and vibrant educational and civil society and institutions or through legal reform?
Professor Souaiaia tackles these and other questions in a coherent and systematic fashion offering a number of very original findings and recommendations to which I shall turn shortly.
The objective behind the book according to the author is to “recount the historical, philosophical, and legal contexts that contribute to the negative and positive impact on women” (p.10), and Muslim women in particular. To achieve this the author adopts a multi-layered methodology that is normative, analytical, historical and quantitative (empirical) in character. Let me describe some of the main arguments and findings of this important study.
Middle East Studies Online Journal. - Volume 1, Issue 2 (19 oktober 2010)
