Table of Contents

Introduction - Lynn Welchman Part I: Muslim Personal Status Law in Egypt: The Current Situation and Possibilities of Reform through Internal Initiatives - Essam Fawzy 1. Introduction 2. Social Context 3. Personal Status Law in Egypt: Historical Overview 4. Understanding the Law, Egyptian Family and Social Attitudes 5. Law No.1 of 2000: A New Personal Status Law and a Limited Step on the Path to Reform 6. General Conclusions Part II: Islamic Law and the Transition to Palestinian Statehood: Constraints and Opportunities for Legal Reform - Rema Hammami, Penny Johnson, Fadwa Labadi, and Lynn Welchman 1. Introduction - Penny Johnson and Lynn Welchman 2. Legal Context: Shari`a Courts and Muslim Family Law in the Transitional Period - Lynn Welchmann 3. Palestinian Interim Governance: State Legislation, Legal Reform, and the Shari`a - Penny Johnson 4. Attitudes Towards Legal Reform of Personal Status Law in Palestine - Rema Hammami 5. Agents for Reform: The Women's Movement, Social Politics and Family Law Reform - Penny Johnson Part III: No Altars: A Survey of Islamic Family Law in the United States - Asifa Quraishi and Najeeba Syeed-Miller 1. Introduction 2. Islamic Family Law in American Muslim Hands 3. The Muslim Family in the US: Law in Practice 4. Islamic Family Law in US Courts

Promotional Information

Present day realities of Islamic family law are explored in this volume, with the focus on the rights of women. It draws on three case studies - Egypt, the West Bank and Gaza and the US - which illustrate the different social environments in which Moslem communities live.

About the Author

Lynn Welchman is director of the Centre of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in the University of London. Previously she worked with the Palestinian non-governmental human rights movement and undertook research on human rights in the Middle East and Africa.

Reviews

...a useful and coherent collection.
*Journal of Middle East Women's Studies*