Professor Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im
Charles Howard Candler Professor of Law, School of Law, Emory University
Islam, Human Rights and Secularism
17 February 2005
The protection of human rights is now more necessary than ever before precisely because of the serious challenges they are facing since 9/11. Secularism can play critical role in responding to these challenges provided this principle is seen as balancing the institutional separation of religion and the state with ensuring a positive public role for religion.
The lecture will discuss these propositions in relation to Muslims and Islamic societies, but emphasis is that the same approach must be applied to all religious traditions. Regarding Islamic societies, the speaker’s position is that an Islamic state to enforce Shari’ah principles as positive law or public policy is neither possible nor desirable, though those principles should remain a source of law and policy subject to constitutional human rights safeguards.
About The Speaker
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na'im is a world-renowned scholar of Islam and human rights.
He is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of Law at Emory Law, Associate Professor in the Emory College of Arts and Sciences and faculty affiliate at the Emory University Center for Ethics. Professor An-Na'im teaches courses in international law, comparative law, human rights and Islamic law.
Professor Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na`im has received two major awards for his dedication to human rights: the 2011 Lifetime Achievement Award by the Journal of Law and Religion and the 2011 Johnson Medal by the James Weldon Johnson Institute for the Study of Race and Difference at Emory University.
His research interests include constitutionalism in Islamic and African countries, secularism, and Islam and politics. Professor An-Na'im directed the Women and Land in Africa, Islamic Family Law, and Fellowship Program in Islam and Human Rights research projects which focus on advocacy strategies for reform through internal cultural transformation.
Professor An-Na'im's current research projects include a study of American Muslims and the secular state, and of human rights, universality and sovereignty. He continues to further develop his theory of Islam and the Secular State (Harvard University Press, 2008), also published in Arabic and Indonesian.