Fundamentalism and international human rights in Islamic constitutions

Abstract

This thesis explores how Islamic states can simultaneously remain faithful to Sharia and Islamic principles of governance, and uphold modern international human rights norms. This presents several distinct analytical challenges. First, both Sharia and international law claim a certain universal supremacy over any other source of law—if they collide, in principle neither can yield to the other. Second, within Sharia lies an intricate, ancient set of rules that can be understood today as a system of human rights—it is necessary to determine the degree to which this system and international norms are mutually compatible. Third, Sharia was revealed, and political Islam developed, long before the international state system evolved this raises the question of how Sharia affects an Islamic state’s external relations and its ability to participate alongside other states within a system that nominally considers all states sovereign and equal. Fourth, any discussion of human rights in an Islamic state or of the participation of an Islamic state in the international system faces a deceptively simple threshold question: what exactly is an ‘Islamic state’? Finally, since the thesis argues that one defining feature of an Islamic state is that it governs in accordance with Sharia, it becomes necessary to assess how Sharia enters the municipal law of Islamic states.