Islam and Liberal Citizenship : The Search for an Overlapping Consensus

Abstract

This book examines both the liberal and the Islamic legal and doctrinal treatments of the moral and political terms of residence and citizenship in a non-Muslim liberal democracy. It seeks to stage an ideal moral encounter between contemporary political liberalism and evolving Islamic doctrinal discourses, first elaborating a uniquely detailed methodology for normative inquiry across ethical and religious traditions, asking what is involved morally and epistemically in justifying conceptions of justice and political morality in an ethical framework not one’s own. It then proposes an ideal-typical Islamic “doctrine of citizenship” in a non-Muslim liberal democracy, based on a survey of Islamic objections to liberal citizenship. It then examines Islamic doctrinal responses to the minority condition, from early juridical prohibitions on residing in non-Muslim lands to contemporary fatwas and treatises on the “jurisprudence of Muslim minorities” (fiqh al-aqalliyyat al-muslima). The specific questions comprising the general problem of citizenship in Islamic discourses include the terms and conditions of residence in non-Muslim polities; balancing Islamic commitments with loyalty to non-Muslim polities; the recognition of moral pluralism and solidarity with non-Muslim fellow citizens. This book establishes that classical Islamic jurisprudence already contains many powerful resources for justifying moral commitment to a non-Muslim society and that even conservative, classically-minded Islamic scholars are engaged in a theorization and theologizing of principled moral obligation to non-Muslims and non-Islamic polities.