“ Islamic Law in the Law of National States in the Middle East and Southeast Asia ” Baber Johansen

Under this title I organized, on March 26 and 29, 2010, a workshop that discussed the place of Islamic law in the national codes of states with predominantly Muslim populations in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. What place do their codes assign to Islamic law? As none of the states concerned—with the exception of Turkey—declares itself to be a secular state, they can all claim that the law they enact is the law of an Islamic state and therefore Islamic law, even if the dependence of the codes onWestern models often is obvious. The question is how the states’ claim to create new “Islamic law” affects the interpretation of the content of their codes that seem to be entirely “Western” and distinct from classical Islamic fiqh.