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Book | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | Islam and human rights: tradition and politics |
Author: | Mayer, Ann Elizabeth |
Year: | 1991 |
Pages: | 258 |
Language: | English |
City of publisher: | Boulder, CO |
Publisher: | Westview Press |
ISBN: | 081338091X; 0861870913 |
Geographic term: | Islamic countries |
Subjects: | Islam human rights |
Abstract: | In this book the author offers a critical assessment of recent human rights schemes proposed by Muslim conservatives as alternatives to the International Bill of Human Rights. She argues that these schemes possess no direct antecedents in the premodern Islamic tradition but are legal hybrids of Islamic and international principles. She contrasts the position of Muslim conservatives with that of Muslims who endorse international human rights standards as fully compatible with Islam and offers evidence that the provisions of Islamic human rights schemes tend to dilute and nullify rights guaranteed by international law, particularly women's rights. In addition, she evaluates the political significance of Islamic rights schemes by examining the actual patterns of rights deprivations in Muslim countries, notably in the Middle East, and the policies of governments that have pursued Islamization campaigns, amongst others in the Sudan. She demonstrates that it is not Islamic tradition that discourages respect for human rights, but the selective interpretation and application of Islamic law and tradition by Muslim groups who are threatened by the demand for democratic freedoms throughout the Muslim world. |