The Impossible State: Islam, Politics, and Modernity’s Moral Predicament

273 Pages·2012·2.73 MB·English

by  Wael B. Hallaq

T
Wael Hallaq is the Avalon Foundation “In this fascinating work, one of our most influential historians of Wael B. Hallaq boldly argues that the
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Professor in the Humanities at Columbia Islamic law and society draws carefully elaborated and sure-to-be “Islamic state,” judged by any standard
University and has previously taught at controversial conclusions about the merits of the premodern Islamic E definition of what the modern state rep-
McGill University, where he was named a resents, is both impossible and inherently
worldview and the problems of both modern Western and Islamic I
James McGill Professor in Islamic Studies. M self-contradictory. Comparing the legal,
political thought. An important and thought-provoking work, it is
Hallaq’s research spans several fields, includ- political, moral, and constitutional histories
sure to engender productive debate.” P
ing law, legal theory, philosophy, politi- of premodern Islam and Euro-America,
cal theory, and logic, and his publications Clark Lombardi, University of Washington School of Law O he finds the adoption and practice of the
include Shari’a: Theory, Practice, Transforma- S modern state to be highly problematic for
tions; An Introduction to Islamic Law; and “This is a bracing, erudite, and compelling account of the moral, politi- S modern Muslims. He also critiques more
Authority, Continuity, and Change in Islamic cal, and structural features of Islamic governance and the modern I expansively modernity’s moral predicament,
B
Law. His works have been translated into which renders impossible any project resting
state, as well as of the multiple incongruities that hamper any attempt
several languages, including Arabic, Indone- L solely on ethical foundations.
to establish one in terms of the other. Wael Hallaq delivers a wel-
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sian, Hebrew, Japanese, Persian, Turkish,
and Russian. come rejoinder to much of the dogmatic bluster swirling around the The modern state not only suffers from seri-
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subject of shari’a and the Islamic state. At the same time, he brings ous legal, political, and constitutional issues,
T
into sharp focus the often overlooked resources for reconceptualizing Hallaq argues, but also, by its very nature,
A
‘the modern project’ from within both Islamic and Euro-American fashions a subject inconsistent with what
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it means to be, or to live as, a Muslim. By
traditions of moral and political thought. The historical, theoretical, E
Islamic standards, the state’s technologies
and political richness of this account makes The Impossible State a new
of the self are severely lacking in moral sub-
standard against which any claims about the possibility of establish-
stance, and today’s Islamic state, as Hallaq
ing Islamic governance in the contemporary world must HALLAQ
shows, has done little to advance an accept-
now be evaluated.” able form of genuine Shari’a governance.
Roxanne L. Euben, Wellesley College The Islamists’ constitutional battles in Egypt
and Pakistan, the Islamic legal and politi-
M I
s cal failures of the Iranian Revolution, and
“A provocative and wide-ranging rumination by one of the leading l
o a
r m similar disappointments underscore this fact.
scholars of Islamic law, this book poses tough questions to champions a
and critics of shari’a alike. Wael Hallaq makes a powerful argument l P , P Nevertheless, the state remains the favored
r o template of the Islamists and the ulama
for the relevance of shari’a as a moral discourse while remaining ed lit (Muslim clergymen).
i i
critical of its compatibility with the modern state. The Impossible State c c
a s
,
is bound to elicit debate among scholars of Islam, moral philosophy, m a Providing Muslims with a path toward real-
e n
and modernity across the Western and non-Western divide.” n d izing the good life, Hallaq turns to the rich
t
M moral resources of Islamic history. Along the
Saba Mahmood, author of Politics of Piety: The Islamic
o way, he proves political and other “crises of
Revival and the Feminist Subject d
e Islam” are not unique to the Islamic world
r
n nor to the Muslim religion. These crises are
Jacket design by MARTIN N. HINZE COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY PRESS NEW YORK ity integral to the modern condition of both
’s
cup.columbia.edu isbn: 978-0-231-16256-2 East and West, and by acknowledging these
parallels, Muslims can engage more produc-
PRINTED IN THE U.S.A.
tively with their Western counterparts.
columbia
THE
IMPOSSIBLE
STATE
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T H E
I M P O S S I B L E
S TA T E
Islam, Politics, and Modernity’s Moral Predicament
Wael B. Hallaq
Columbia University Press
New York
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Columbia University Press
Publishers Since 1893
New York Chichester, West Sussex
cup.columbia.edu
Copyright © 2013 Columbia University Press
All rights reserved
COVER DESIGN: Martin Hinze
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hallaq, Wael B., 1955–
The impossible state : islam, politics, and modernity’s moral
predicament / Wael B. Hallaq.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-231-16256-2 (alk. paper) —ISBN 978-0-231-53086-6 (e-book)
1. Islam and state. 2. Islam and politics. I. Title.
BP173.6.H29 2013
297.2′72—dc23
2012014567

Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid-free paper.
This book is printed on paper with recycled content.
Printed in the United States of America

c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

References to Internet Web sites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither
the author nor Columbia University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired
or changed since the manuscript was prepared.
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Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments  vii
Introduction  ix
1 Premises  1
2 The Modern State  19
3 Separation of Powers: Rule of Law or Rule of the State?  37
4 The Legal, the Political, and the Moral  74
5 The Political Subject and Moral Technologies of the Self  98
6 Beleaguering Globalization and Moral Economy  139
7 The Central Domain of the Moral  155
Notes  171
Glossary of Key Terms  215
Bibliography  221
Index  245
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Preface and Acknowledgments
Although the greater part of this book was written during 2011, it has
been in the making for at least a decade. It formed part of the prepara-
tion necessary to write my Sharīʿa: Theory, Practice, Transformations ,
published by Cambridge University Press in 2009. The plan and struc-
ture of Sharīʿa did not allow for a full, or at least fuller, statement about
the modern state and the reasons for and meanings of its incompat-
ibility with the Sharīʿa. The present book may therefore be regarded as
a continuation of and expansion upon Sharīʿa ’s interest in the state, in
both empirical substance and theoretical direction . In terms of substance,
it is clear that much more needed to be said about the modern state in
the 2009 book that could not be included in an already very long work.
In terms of direction—by which I mean teasing out the wider theoreti-
cal implications of the empirical narrative of so-called Islamic law and
its governance— Sharīʿa was largely silent. The present work attempts
to fi ll this gap and in the process engage the Western disciplines of po-
litical science, moral philosophy, and law.
In thinking about the themes of this book, I have benefi ted from the
intellectual companionship of a number of individuals. My graduate
students and former colleagues at McGill University have for years af-
forded me the luxury of engagement in fi rst-rate conversations about the
modern state and much else. At Columbia, my department’s fortnightly
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colloquium and other extensive conversations with colleagues have
continued this engagement, providing me with much insight that re-
sulted in sharpening the text. I am grateful to Talal Asad’s and Sudipta
Kaviraj’s always fruitful intellectual companionship; to Akeel Bilgrami
and Kaoukab Chebaro for insightful remarks they made on the second
part of chapter 5; to Mahmood Mamdani’s observations on chapter 3;
to Abed Awad’s useful critique of the entire manuscript, but most es-
pecially of chapter 3, which benefi ted greatly from his comments; and
last but certainly not least to Muhammad Qasim Zaman, for reading
and perspicaciously and constructively commenting on the entire text.
I am also grateful to my gifted and effi cient research assistants:
Maura Donovan, Shawn Higgins, Aelfi e Starr Tuff, and Elizabeth Rghebi.
Stephen Millier of McGill continues to make what I write appear more
elegant. To all these individuals and to others I may have neglected to
mention, I record here my profound gratitude.
PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
viii
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Introduction
The argument of this book is fairly simple: The “Islamic state,” judged
by any standard defi nition of what the modern state represents, 1 is both
an impossibility and a contradiction in terms.
Until the early nineteenth century, and for twelve centuries before
then, the moral law of Islam, the Sharīʿa, had successfully negotiated
customary law and local customary practices and had emerged as the
supreme moral and legal force regulating both society and government.
This “law” was paradigmatic, having been accepted as a central system
of high and general norms by societies and the dynastic powers that
ruled over them. It was a moral law that created and maintained a
“well-ordered society,” to borrow John Rawls’s effective expression.2
However, beginning in the nineteenth century, and at the hands of co-
lonialist Europe, the socioeconomic and political system regulated by
the Sharīʿa was structurally dismantled, which is to say that the Sharīʿa
itself was eviscerated, reduced to providing no more than the raw ma-
terials for the legislation of personal status by the modern state.3 Even
in this relatively limited sphere, the Sharīʿa lost its autonomy and social
agency in favor of the modern state; Sharīʿa was henceforth needed
only to the limited extent that deriving certain provisions from it—
provisions that were reworked and r e-created according to modern
expediency—legitimized the state’s legislative ventures.
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