Islamic law and human rights: A contribution to an ongoing debate

In this essay the author criticizes two opposite approaches to the relationship between Islam and human rights: the incriminating and the apologetic approach. They are either anachronistic in that they judge the rules of classical Islamic jurisprudence by present‐day standards, or they entirely ignore its heritage. The author attempts instead to develop a new approach whereby classical Islamic jurisprudence is analyzed in its historical context. In order to examine whether Islam recognized a notion of fundamental rights, the author first tries to establish to what extent the notion of legal equality is recognized in Islamic law. Secondly, he examines two hierarchical legal relationships, viz. that between master and slave and that between husband and wife, in order to find which basic and inalienable rights Islamic law assigns to the weaker party in these relationships. His conclusion is that classical Islamic law offers points of departure for the development of a modern theory of human rights rooted in Islamic notions.>     

The Problem of Authorship and the Project of Chinese Philosophy: Zhuang Zhou and the <Emphasis Type="BoldItalic">Zhuangzi</Emphasis><Emphasis Type="Bold">between Sinology and Philosophy in the Western Academy</Emphasis>

This essay looks into a particular aspect of Sinological challenge to the modern project of Chinese philosophy within the Western academy through the lens of authorship, using the Zhuangzi 莊子 as a case study. It explores philosophical implications for texts whose authorship is in doubt and develops a new heuristic model of authorship and textuality, so that a more robust intellectual space for the philosophical discourse on Chinese classics can be carved out from the dominant historicist Sinological discourse. It argues that philosophical and Sinological approaches to Chinese classics have divergent scholarly objectives and follow different disciplinary norms. To clarify such divergence, it proposes a heuristic model to distinguish two sets of scholarly objects operative in Sinology and philosophy respectively, namely original text versus inherited text, historical author versus textual author, and authorial intent versus textual intent. These two sets of scholarly objects are related, at times overlapping but often irreducibly distinct, with the former in the pairs belonging to Sinologists and the latter to philosophers.     

Articles of Faith: Freedom of Expression and Religious Freedom in Contemporary Multiculture

ABSTRACT

This article examines the relationship between freedom of religion and freedom of speech and expression within contemporary multicultural liberal democracies. These two fundamental human rights have increasingly been seen, in public and political discourse, in terms of tension if not outright opposition, a view reinforced by the Charlie Hebdo killings in January 2015. And yet in every human rights charter they are proximate to one another. This essay argues that this adjacency is not coincidental, that it has a history and that, in illuminating this history, it is possible to explore how the contemporary framing of these two rights as being in opposition has come about. Looking back to the framing of the First Amendment of the US Constitution, the essay offers an historical perspective that, in turn, facilitates a reappraisal and re-evaluation of these two liberties that is the necessary, albeit insufficient, predicate to the task of addressing the problematic of multicultural ‘crisis' in the contemporary liberal democracies of Western Europe, North America and Australasia, in which the presence of certain religious communities (Muslims, in particular) and the role of religion in public and political life more generally (and, conversely, of secularism) has assumed a central importance.     

Human dignity in Muslim perspective: building bridges

This essay argues that Islam, understood as a historically produced body of knowledge, contains resources from which we can reconstruct a conception of human dignity understood as a human right. This reconstruction requires a critical reinterpretation of some of these resources. Pursued with historical sensitivity and a comparative lens, this interpretative activity can bring about considerable benefits. It can help us overcome the religious/secular and Islam/West binaries which have limited the human rights debate. It can help us envision a human rights agenda that is universal and yet appreciative of cultural difference.     

DIRECTIONS IN HISTORICISM: LANGUAGE, EXPERIENCE, AND PRAGMATIC ADJUDICATION

Abstract. This article examines the current affirmation within theology of historicism, with its assumption that the historical realm, broadly construed, is the only arena of human activity and knowledge and its repudiation of traditional forms of foundationalism and correspondence theories of truth. The essay performs this task by analyzing the work of Gordon Kaufman and William Dean, setting forth their commonly shared historicism, pragmatism, and constructivist approaches to theology, as well as their differences concerning nonlinguistic dimensions of experience. The essay also focuses on the move by both thinkers to include nature in their understanding of history and to offer biocultural interpretations of human existence.     

Religion,Violence, and Human Rights

Beginning with the support given by religious groups to humanitarian intervention for the protection of basic human rights in the debates of the 1990s, this essay examines the use of the human rights idea in relation to international law on armed conflict, the “Responsibility To Protect” doctrine, and the development of the idea of sovereignty associated with the “Westphalian system” of international order, identifying a dilemma: that the idea of human rights undergirds both the principle of non‐intervention in the internal affairs of states and the idea of an international responsibility for humanitarian intervention in cases of oppression. The pre‐Westphalian conception of sovereignty as moral responsibility for the common good is then examined as an alternative that avoids this dilemma, and the essay concludes by suggesting that religious ethics also has other resources that, if used, may shed useful light on resolving this problem.     

Human Rights and Religion: A Sociological Perspective

This essay aims to review mainstream literature and research perspectives on the sociology of human rights with the further focus on relationship between human rights and religion. We consider the challenges of late engagement of sociology with human rights and current narratives of the relationship of human rights and religion that encompass normativity as the central category of historically oriented sociology. We discuss the contribution of two empirical research mainstreams on human rights and religion and focus on a new field of study—sociology of religious freedom. A detailed new agenda for sociological research on human rights and religion is explored in the final part of our assessment.     

K. H. TING'S CONTRIBUTION TO THE CONTEXTUALIZATION OF CHRISTIANITY IN CHINA

The spirituality and theology of Chinese Protestant believers and pastors is rooted in the profoundly conservative Evangelical‐revivalist and Pietistic missionary background of the Chinese church. Bishop K. H. Ting (b. 1915), the most prominent church leader and theologian of the Protestant church of China during the last decades, intends to broaden the narrow theological scope of the Chinese Christians. He emphasizes Trinitarian theology, natural theology, the theology of creation, and ethical principles common to all human beings. On the basis of these concepts, Ting attempts to find points of contact between the Christian faith, on the one hand, and traditional Chinese culture and modern secular Chinese society, on the other. Some critics of K. H. Ting claim that he is trying to introduce into Chinese Christianity liberal theological views which would eventually destroy some of the main pillars of the Evangelical faith. The present essay argues that this, in fact, is not the case; rather, K. H. Ting speaks for theological perspectives which belong to the theological mainstream, the ecumenical heritage of classical theology commonly accepted by a large number of both Protestant and Catholic theologians. Moreover, the essay points out that the contextualization of Christianity in China has been successful in adapting the Christian faith and life to the social, historical, and political context where the Chinese Christians live today. But the cultural aspect of contextualization, or inculturation, is just in the beginning. Younger Chinese theologians have a great challenge in facing the question: How to relate the Gospel of Jesus Christ to five thousand years of Chinese cultural experience, and how to connect this with various global cultural, economic, and other influences which so deeply affect the life of all people on this planet?     

Gender bias and moral decision making: The moral orientations of justice and care

This study investigated gender related moral reasoning in student essays containing arguments on moral issues. Undergraduate students in a medical ethics course viewed two films on morally controversial issues. The students wrote brief essays about the films which were transcribed and numerically coded to conceal the author's gender from the evaluator. Using a coding scheme originated by Lyons, the evaluator classified each essay as a justice/right essay or a care/response essay or an equal response essay. Subsequently, calculations were made to determine the percentage of male authored essays that were justice/rights essays or care/response essays and the percentage of female authored essays that were justice/rights or care/response essays. The males (87.7%) tended to exhibit the justice/rights moral orientation, and the females (69.4%) exhibited the care/response moral orientation. Several different calculations were made to determine various degrees of gender related orientations also. The difference in orientation was highly statistically significant (p≤0.001). These data contribute to understanding moral orientation and development. Interpretations are given to explain some differences between the genders and help explain the traditional roles in society that males and females have played historically.     

Tradition, Authority and the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) was passed into law in 1990 and since that time has been implemented in ways that merit attention from scholars of religion. This article explores the legislative history of the law, analysing Native American appeals to ‘tradition’ in their quest to establish authority over disputed human and cultural remains. After a preliminary theoretical section that sets out relevant issues and questions, the essay engages a close reading of pivotal legislative hearings and reports, with attention to uses of religious and moral language. Building upon this reading, a dual analysis of Native American ‘traditional’ rhetoric is developed that examines the persuasive features of minority-specific claims, majority-inclusive claims and the combined force of these. Next, this line of analysis is framed in comparative and historical terms through a consideration of ‘revitalisation movements’. In light of this comparison, a case is made for interpreting NAGPRA and related movements as a primary means by which Native Americans manage their relationship to modernity, acting as critical citizens who demand their rights as Indians, Americans and human beings. The essay concludes by arguing for an understanding of social and discursive boundaries that neither limits nor is limited by ‘tradition’.     

西方表象活动周期理论与中国周易思想的一致性

在表象研究方面,继表象认知理论之后,新近提出的表象活动周期理论对表象的作用进行了深入的研究。它重申表象在问题解决中对目标计划、管理和调控的促进作用;更强调表象活动是一个周而复始的循环动态过程。同时,文章把表象活动周期理论与中国古传统文化周易等思想做了比较,发现两者有某些一致性,在表象研究方面中西方文化将趋于高度融合,其研究成果将为世界范围内的教育改革提供心理学理论依据。     

Human Rights and Pluralism in CatholicSocial Thought

The essay argues that a Catholic tradition of natural law and its conception of human rights depend on the continuing life of institutions that stand apart from and sustain standards of justice independent from the modern state and its corresponding economy. Christians contribute to a defense of human rights precisely as members of their Churches, through their social and institutional presence across the globe. Catholic social thought deals with matters of human rights from within a tradition of natural law that assumes a common human end, a common good. This ecclesiological tradition of the human good is precisely what Catholics have to offer in a context of pluralism. The Church has a task of sustaining institutions where its practical rationality about human goods offers a practical alternative in a world where the self-interest of states and purely economic interests win the day.     

Must we choose our leaders? human rights and political participation in China

The essay begins from Alan Gewirth's influential account of human rights, and specifically with his argument that the human right to political participation can only be fulfilled by competitive, liberal democracy. I show that his argument rests on empirical, rather than conceptual grounds, which opens the possibility that in China, alternative forms of participation may be legitimate or even superior. An examination of the theory and contemporary practice of ‘democratic centralism’ shows that while it does not now adequately support the right to political participation, a reformed version could. I focus in particular on the roles that could be played by consultative institutions, looking both to recent Chinese proposals and to analogues currently existing in Japan. I conclude that a reformed democratic centralism may well be the objective toward which Chinese people should strive.     

从道德本位到权利本位的转换——梁启超《新民说》审视

梁启超《新民说》是对以《大学》为代表的中国传统“新民”思想的改造和发展。他以民权、独立、自由的资产阶级“公德”代替以伦理道德为核心的封建主义的“私德” ,用中西文化中的优秀道德传统构建新国民 ,实现了从以伦理道德为本位的旧道德向以权利为本位的新道德的转换 ,“旧国民”向“新国民”的转换。     

阴阳五行说的发展演变与中华民族思维方式的基本形成

阴阳五行说的形成经历了一个漫长的历史时期,是我国古代农业文明的结晶,对于秦汉及其以后的封建社会的发展影响深远,成为封建统治者建立政权的历史哲学。与西方文明的发展路径相比有所不同的是,阴阳五行说所体现出的关联思维方式,是中国人的思想律,是古人对于天人之际这一问题加以思考所得出的结论。这一学说在《内经》医学哲学的思想框架中被采纳,并在现实的医学实践中被广泛运用,从而将精神与身体有机地结合在一起。     

Human rights,transnational actors and the Chinese government: Another look at the spiral model

This article assesses the usefulness of Thomas Risse, Stephen Ropp and Kathryn Sikkink's spiral model as an explanation of the changes in the Chinese government's human rights practices from the time of the ‘anti-rightist’ campaign in 1957–1958 to the end of 2003. It is concluded that the spiral model has provided a valid explanation for many of the changes in the Chinese government's human rights practices, and its responses to its internal and external critics, over this time period. Many of the responses of the transnational human rights network and the Chinese government by the end of this period indicate that the latter had progressed to phase three of the model. It is also concluded that the spiral model only conceptualises part of the constitutive relationship between the target state and international human rights norms—the influence of these norms on the identities, interests and behaviours of a target state. It does not conceptualise the influence of a target state on international human rights norms or the transnational human rights network. Therefore, the spiral model cannot explain why the Chinese government has had such a significant influence over the enforcement mechanisms of these norms.     

Religion and the Human Rights Idea

Three recent books focus, in different ways, on the idea of human rights and its relation to religion and religious ethics. All three books discussed here address criticisms of the human rights idea and seek to establish the relationship of religion and human rights with regard to the field of policy. The present discussion begins with an overview that places these three books in the larger context of the development of the human rights idea and its historical relationship with religion. It then turns to Little's book, next to the collection of essays edited by Twiss, Simion, and Petersen, which is described internally as a Festschrift for Little, and then to Hogan's book, and in the final section it explores comparisons among the books.     

RESPONSIBILITY TO PROTECT AND MILITARIZED HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION: When and Why the Churches Failed to Discern Moral Hazard

This essay addresses moral hazards associated with the emerging doctrine of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). It reviews the broad acceptance by the Vatican and the World Council of Churches of the doctrine between September 2003 and September 2008, and attempts to identify grounds for more adequate investigation of the moral issues arising. Three themes are pursued: how a changing political context is affecting notions of sovereignty; the authority that can approve or refuse the use of force; and plural foundations for human rights in a religiously and otherwise plural world such that the human rights protection does not become tyrannical.