Andrew March | Harvard University (original) (raw)
Books by Andrew March
Papers by Andrew March
is article surveys four approaches towards moral obligation to non-Muslims found in Islamic lega... more is article surveys four approaches towards moral obligation to non-Muslims found in Islamic legal thought. I refer to the first three approaches as the "revelatorydeontological," the "contractualist-constructivist" and the "consequentialist-utilitarian." e main argument is that present in many contemporary works on the "jurisprudence of Muslim minorities" (fiqh al-aqalliyyāt) is an attempt to provide an Islamic foundation for a relatively thick and rich relationship of moral obligation and solidarity with non-Muslims. is attempt takes the form of a fourth "comprehensive-qualitative" approach to political ethics that appeals not to juridical reasoning of the type "is x permissible and in which conditions?" but rather to Islamic ideals of what it means
Anwar Al-'Awlaqi Against the Islamic Legal Tradition
What Is Comparative Political Theory?
The Review of Politics, 2009
Page 1. What Is Comparative Political Theory? Andrew F. March Abstract: This paper examines what ... more Page 1. What Is Comparative Political Theory? Andrew F. March Abstract: This paper examines what is involved in using comparative methods within political theory and whether there should be a comparative political theory subfield. ...
Philosophy <html_ent glyph="@amp;" ascii="&"/> Public Affairs, 2006
Ambivalent Universalism? Jus ad Bellum in Modern Islamic Legal Discourse
European Journal of International Law, 2013
n this paper, we discuss the trajectory of modern Islamic legal discourse on jus ad bellum questi... more n this paper, we discuss the trajectory of modern Islamic legal discourse on jus ad bellum questions, challenging the ideas that the choice is between either a defensive or an aggressive jihad doctrine, and that declaring and waging war is regarded in Islamic law as properly a matter to be monopolized by legitimate state authorities. The dominant modern doctrine of just war in Islamic legal thought is not quite as simple as a bare doctrine of mutual non-aggression. While it is understandable that many Muslims have been eager to conclude that the proper understanding of jihad in Islam is that it authorizes only defensive or humanitarian war, virtually indistinguishable from modern international norms, the reality of modern Islamic just war thinking is somewhat more interesting than this. In this paper, we introduce a third modern Islamic concept of just war that would permit war against a country that does not allow for peaceful proselytization of Islam within its borders, and discuss some of the ambiguities of this doctrine.
Speaking about Muhammad, Speaking for Muslims
Critical Inquiry, 2011
Behold, thy Lord said to the angels: "I will create a vicegerent [khalifa (caliph)] on earth." Th... more Behold, thy Lord said to the angels: "I will create a vicegerent [khalifa (caliph)] on earth." They said: "Wilt Thou place therein one who will make mischief therein and shed blood?-whilst we do celebrate Thy praises and glorify Thy holy (name)?" He said: "I know what ye know not."
Anwar Al-'Awlaqi Against the Islamic Legal Tradition
![Research paper thumbnail of “Falsafa [Islamic Philosophy] and Law,” Oxford Handbook of Islamic Law (2016, forthcoming).](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/46024129/thumbnails/1.jpg)
](This article examines the place of law in the falsafa (philosophy) tradition. Political philosoph... more This article examines the place of law in the falsafa (philosophy) tradition. Political philosophy was largely a derivative topic for the philosophers of the Islamic world. One indication of this is that the falsafa tradition did not produce a coherent philosophy of law that would concern itself with the meaning, essence, source, and forms of "law": as such. This article looks at several philosophers in the Islamic tradition who are associated with political philosophy, including Abu Nasr al-Farabi and Ibn Sina, with particular emphasis on their view that the highest form of human existence consists in intellectual and spiritual perfection. It also considers the views of Ibn Bajja, Ibn Tufayl, and Ibn Rushd.
This article examines some treatments of the meaning and extension of the Islamic legal purpose (... more This article examines some treatments of the meaning and extension of the Islamic legal purpose (maqṣad) of protecting religion (ḥifẓ al-dīn), with an eye towards Islamic legal theorists' explicit or implicit encounter with modern liberal and secularist understandings of what it means to 'protect religion'. The theory of the 'purposes of divine law' (maqās. id al-sharī'ah), which the author refers to as a form of 'Complex Purposivism' in legal interpretation and argumentation, is often viewed as a panacea for modern reformers and pragmatists who want to establish Islamic legitimacy for new substantive moral, legal and political commitments in new socio-political conditions, because it allows Muslims to ask not whether a given norm has been expressly endorsed within the texts, but whether it is compatible with the deeper goods and interests which God wants to protect through the law.
![Research paper thumbnail of “What Can the Muslim Past Teach Us about Secular Modernity?” [Review Essay], Political Theory, vol. 43, no. 6 (December 2015), pp. 838-49.](https://attachments.academia-assets.com/46024094/thumbnails/1.jpg)
](Review of Wael Hallaq's The Impossible State and Hussein Agrama's Questioning Secularism.
Without confidence in revelation, we can only discover what we know.
This article intervenes in the debate on the place of religious arguments in public reason. I adv... more This article intervenes in the debate on the place of religious arguments in public reason. I advance the debate not by asking whether something called " religious reasons " ought to be invoked in the justification of coercive laws, but by creating a typology of (a) different kinds and forms of religious arguments and, more importantly, (b) different areas of political and social life which coercive laws regulate or about which human political communities deliberate. Religious arguments are of many different kinds, are offered to others in a variety of ways, and the spheres of life about which communities deliberate pose distinct moral questions. Turning back to the public reason debate, I argue then that political liberals ought to be concerned primarily about the invocation of a certain subset of religious reasons in a certain subset of areas of human activity, but also that inclusivist arguments on behalf of religious contributions to public deliberation fail to justify the use of religious arguments in all areas of public deliberation.
From Leninism to Karimovism: Hegemony, Ideology, and Authoritarian Legitimation
Page 1. 307 Post-Soviet Affairs, 2003, 19, 4, pp. 307336. Copyright © 2003 by VH Winston & S... more Page 1. 307 Post-Soviet Affairs, 2003, 19, 4, pp. 307336. Copyright © 2003 by VH Winston & Son, Inc. All rights reserved. From Leninism to Karimovism: Hegemony, Ideology, and Authoritarian Legitimation Andrew F. March1 ...
Islamic Legal Theory and the Legitimacy of Secular Positive Law: Is Modern Religious Liberty Sufficient for the Islamic Legal Maqsad ('Ultimate Objective') of Hifz Al-Din ('Preserving Religion')?
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000
This essay discusses an important feature of much modern Islamic writing on law, politics and mor... more This essay discusses an important feature of much modern Islamic writing on law, politics and morality. The feature in question is the claim that Islamic law and human nature (fiṭra) are in perfect harmony, that Islam is the "natural religion" (dīn al-fiṭra), and thus that the demands of Islamic law are easy and painless for ordinary human moral capacities. My discussion proceeds through a close reading of the Moroccan independence leader and religious scholar ʿAllāl al- Fāsī (d. 1974). I discuss the ambiguities within Fāsī's theory and suggest that the natural religion doctrine might be better understood less as a reduction of Islamic law to "natural law" and more as an apologetic effort to defend the realism and feasibility of Islamic law. In the hands of reformers like Fāsī, this project is beset with unresolved ambiguities around the constraining quality of revealed law in practice and the moral validity of non-Islamic political and ethical systems.
Annual Review of Political Science, 2015
This essay focuses on questions that pertain to the ideological, normative, symbolic, and epochal... more This essay focuses on questions that pertain to the ideological, normative, symbolic, and epochal aspects of political Islam. Political theorists, historians, sociologists, and anthropologists have disagreed on whether political Islam is an exclusively modern political phenomenon or is indebted to longstanding Islamic religious commitments. More specifically, they have also disagreed on whether the shape and ambitions of political Islam are entirely determined by the powers and institutions of the modern, bureaucratic state, particularly its secular desire to control, regulate, and reshape religion. These interpretive debates have often sat uneasily with ongoing normative debates about what kind of secularism democracy requires and whether democracy has priority over liberal rights and freedoms.
Contemporary Political Theory, 2015
Ethics & International Affairs, 2007
is article surveys four approaches towards moral obligation to non-Muslims found in Islamic lega... more is article surveys four approaches towards moral obligation to non-Muslims found in Islamic legal thought. I refer to the first three approaches as the "revelatorydeontological," the "contractualist-constructivist" and the "consequentialist-utilitarian." e main argument is that present in many contemporary works on the "jurisprudence of Muslim minorities" (fiqh al-aqalliyyāt) is an attempt to provide an Islamic foundation for a relatively thick and rich relationship of moral obligation and solidarity with non-Muslims. is attempt takes the form of a fourth "comprehensive-qualitative" approach to political ethics that appeals not to juridical reasoning of the type "is x permissible and in which conditions?" but rather to Islamic ideals of what it means
Anwar Al-'Awlaqi Against the Islamic Legal Tradition
What Is Comparative Political Theory?
The Review of Politics, 2009
Page 1. What Is Comparative Political Theory? Andrew F. March Abstract: This paper examines what ... more Page 1. What Is Comparative Political Theory? Andrew F. March Abstract: This paper examines what is involved in using comparative methods within political theory and whether there should be a comparative political theory subfield. ...
Philosophy <html_ent glyph="@amp;" ascii="&"/> Public Affairs, 2006
Ambivalent Universalism? Jus ad Bellum in Modern Islamic Legal Discourse
European Journal of International Law, 2013
n this paper, we discuss the trajectory of modern Islamic legal discourse on jus ad bellum questi... more n this paper, we discuss the trajectory of modern Islamic legal discourse on jus ad bellum questions, challenging the ideas that the choice is between either a defensive or an aggressive jihad doctrine, and that declaring and waging war is regarded in Islamic law as properly a matter to be monopolized by legitimate state authorities. The dominant modern doctrine of just war in Islamic legal thought is not quite as simple as a bare doctrine of mutual non-aggression. While it is understandable that many Muslims have been eager to conclude that the proper understanding of jihad in Islam is that it authorizes only defensive or humanitarian war, virtually indistinguishable from modern international norms, the reality of modern Islamic just war thinking is somewhat more interesting than this. In this paper, we introduce a third modern Islamic concept of just war that would permit war against a country that does not allow for peaceful proselytization of Islam within its borders, and discuss some of the ambiguities of this doctrine.
Speaking about Muhammad, Speaking for Muslims
Critical Inquiry, 2011
Behold, thy Lord said to the angels: "I will create a vicegerent [khalifa (caliph)] on earth." Th... more Behold, thy Lord said to the angels: "I will create a vicegerent [khalifa (caliph)] on earth." They said: "Wilt Thou place therein one who will make mischief therein and shed blood?-whilst we do celebrate Thy praises and glorify Thy holy (name)?" He said: "I know what ye know not."
Anwar Al-'Awlaqi Against the Islamic Legal Tradition
This article examines the place of law in the falsafa (philosophy) tradition. Political philosoph... more This article examines the place of law in the falsafa (philosophy) tradition. Political philosophy was largely a derivative topic for the philosophers of the Islamic world. One indication of this is that the falsafa tradition did not produce a coherent philosophy of law that would concern itself with the meaning, essence, source, and forms of "law": as such. This article looks at several philosophers in the Islamic tradition who are associated with political philosophy, including Abu Nasr al-Farabi and Ibn Sina, with particular emphasis on their view that the highest form of human existence consists in intellectual and spiritual perfection. It also considers the views of Ibn Bajja, Ibn Tufayl, and Ibn Rushd.
This article examines some treatments of the meaning and extension of the Islamic legal purpose (... more This article examines some treatments of the meaning and extension of the Islamic legal purpose (maqṣad) of protecting religion (ḥifẓ al-dīn), with an eye towards Islamic legal theorists' explicit or implicit encounter with modern liberal and secularist understandings of what it means to 'protect religion'. The theory of the 'purposes of divine law' (maqās. id al-sharī'ah), which the author refers to as a form of 'Complex Purposivism' in legal interpretation and argumentation, is often viewed as a panacea for modern reformers and pragmatists who want to establish Islamic legitimacy for new substantive moral, legal and political commitments in new socio-political conditions, because it allows Muslims to ask not whether a given norm has been expressly endorsed within the texts, but whether it is compatible with the deeper goods and interests which God wants to protect through the law.
Review of Wael Hallaq's The Impossible State and Hussein Agrama's Questioning Secularism.
Without confidence in revelation, we can only discover what we know.
This article intervenes in the debate on the place of religious arguments in public reason. I adv... more This article intervenes in the debate on the place of religious arguments in public reason. I advance the debate not by asking whether something called " religious reasons " ought to be invoked in the justification of coercive laws, but by creating a typology of (a) different kinds and forms of religious arguments and, more importantly, (b) different areas of political and social life which coercive laws regulate or about which human political communities deliberate. Religious arguments are of many different kinds, are offered to others in a variety of ways, and the spheres of life about which communities deliberate pose distinct moral questions. Turning back to the public reason debate, I argue then that political liberals ought to be concerned primarily about the invocation of a certain subset of religious reasons in a certain subset of areas of human activity, but also that inclusivist arguments on behalf of religious contributions to public deliberation fail to justify the use of religious arguments in all areas of public deliberation.
From Leninism to Karimovism: Hegemony, Ideology, and Authoritarian Legitimation
Page 1. 307 Post-Soviet Affairs, 2003, 19, 4, pp. 307336. Copyright © 2003 by VH Winston & S... more Page 1. 307 Post-Soviet Affairs, 2003, 19, 4, pp. 307336. Copyright © 2003 by VH Winston & Son, Inc. All rights reserved. From Leninism to Karimovism: Hegemony, Ideology, and Authoritarian Legitimation Andrew F. March1 ...
Islamic Legal Theory and the Legitimacy of Secular Positive Law: Is Modern Religious Liberty Sufficient for the Islamic Legal Maqsad ('Ultimate Objective') of Hifz Al-Din ('Preserving Religion')?
SSRN Electronic Journal, 2000
This essay discusses an important feature of much modern Islamic writing on law, politics and mor... more This essay discusses an important feature of much modern Islamic writing on law, politics and morality. The feature in question is the claim that Islamic law and human nature (fiṭra) are in perfect harmony, that Islam is the "natural religion" (dīn al-fiṭra), and thus that the demands of Islamic law are easy and painless for ordinary human moral capacities. My discussion proceeds through a close reading of the Moroccan independence leader and religious scholar ʿAllāl al- Fāsī (d. 1974). I discuss the ambiguities within Fāsī's theory and suggest that the natural religion doctrine might be better understood less as a reduction of Islamic law to "natural law" and more as an apologetic effort to defend the realism and feasibility of Islamic law. In the hands of reformers like Fāsī, this project is beset with unresolved ambiguities around the constraining quality of revealed law in practice and the moral validity of non-Islamic political and ethical systems.
Annual Review of Political Science, 2015
This essay focuses on questions that pertain to the ideological, normative, symbolic, and epochal... more This essay focuses on questions that pertain to the ideological, normative, symbolic, and epochal aspects of political Islam. Political theorists, historians, sociologists, and anthropologists have disagreed on whether political Islam is an exclusively modern political phenomenon or is indebted to longstanding Islamic religious commitments. More specifically, they have also disagreed on whether the shape and ambitions of political Islam are entirely determined by the powers and institutions of the modern, bureaucratic state, particularly its secular desire to control, regulate, and reshape religion. These interpretive debates have often sat uneasily with ongoing normative debates about what kind of secularism democracy requires and whether democracy has priority over liberal rights and freedoms.
Contemporary Political Theory, 2015
Ethics & International Affairs, 2007
The Use and Abuse of History: ‘National Ideology’ as Transcendental Object in Islam Karimov's ‘Ideology of National Independence’
Central Asian Survey, 2002
... The appeal to peace, stability and order is the centrepiece of the consequentialist legitimat... more ... The appeal to peace, stability and order is the centrepiece of the consequentialist legitimation: 'I admit: perhaps in Andrew March is at St John's College, Oxford University, Oxford OX1 3JP, UK and Lecturer in Politics, Hertford College, Oxford University, Oxford OX1 3BW, UK. ...