Fluent Essays

Your response to EACH question should be between 600 and 700 words. You are required to integrate readings and themes from the course into your responses in a coherent fashion. I expect to see a minimum of three relevant references to course readings/films for each question. Demonstrate that you have undertaken the readings relevant to each question in a timely fashion and that you have critically reflected on these readings. Note that more than one reading might be relevant to a question. It is your responsibility to ascertain what are the full range of relevant readings for any question. When appropriate, refer to the readings in a formal manner. Cite sources when appropriate and include page numbers for direct quotes. Your essays will be read with the following criteria in mind: clarity of central argument; logical reasoning; demonstrated engagement of course readings and classroom discussions; use of relevant examples (I suggest a minimum of four per essay); and comprehension of central concepts.     The Questions - Assess the degree to which the human rights situation in Syria and Iraq is a function of “power relations” between the state and minority groups. - Identify and explain the most important “exogenous” and “endogenous” factors driving the human rights situation in TWO of the following cases: a. Iraq       b. Syria           c. Lebanon        d. Iran - What accounts for the progress in second generation rights in Iran? - Explain the fluctuations in the human rights of women in the Islamic Republic of Iran. Identify both the areas where improvements have been experienced as well as those areas where problems still exist. - Explain the similarities and difference between the Arab Spring and the Green Movement in Iran.  In this context, how have each affected the human rights situation in the Middle East? - According to Monshipouri, what are the main patterns of human rights violations in the Middle East region? Which pattern does the struggle portrayed in “The Square” come closest to? Explain. - We have reviewed several perspectives on social movements, democratization and human rights in the Middle East.  First, list several of these perspectives.  Then, explain which perspective you find more persuasive? - Compare and contrast the film “The Square” with Amr Hamzawy discussion of “Egypt 2011-15: How can a democratic revolution fail to improve human rights conditions? in chapter 33 of Chase, Routledge Handbook. In your view how effectively are the challenges of democratization in Egypt explained through these lenses? - How does the literature reviewed in class help understand the CURRENT status of TWO ethnic or religious minorities in the Middle East? - Explain TWO possible “future directions” for democracy and human rights in the Middle East. In your view, which scenario is most likely to succeed?  Explain why. I post a example you have done it before. Just answer each answer one by one. And make it clear which answer is for which questions.Human Rights: An Introduction ©2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. ©2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. I. Human Rights Individual Human Rights Freedom from specific abuses or restrictions Collective Human Rights The right to have a quality of life that does not detract from human dignity The Universal Declaration of Human Rights The International Bill of Human Rights ©2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 2 II. Sources of Rights Universalists Human rights are derived from sources external to society Belief in a single, prevailing set of standards that are immutable Sources include theological or ideological doctrine Reject cultural imperialism as a poor excuse Relativists Positivist approach claiming that rights are a product of a society’s contemporary values Belief that no single standard of human rights exist, emphasize cultural imperialism Rights are not timeless, they change with changing social norms ©2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 3 III. Individual and Community Rights Value system scale Individualism on one end Individual rights more important than societal rights Communitarianism on the other end Good of the community takes precedence over good of the individual ©2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. 4 IV. Human Rights: Problems and Progress Widespread oppression still exist. According to Freedom House, in 2015: More aggressive tactics by authoritarian regimes and an upsurge in terrorist attacks contributed to a disturbing decline in global freedom in 2014. Freedom in the World 2015 found an overall drop in freedom for the ninth consecutive year. Nearly twice as many countries suffered declines as registered gains—61 to 33—and the number of countries with improvements hit its lowest point since the nine-year erosion began. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a rollback of democratic gains by Egyptian president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s intensified campaign against press freedom and civil society, and further centralization of authority in China were evidence of a growing disdain for democratic standards that was found in nearly all regions of the world. Overview of human rights situatioMINORITY RIGHTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST This page intentionally left blank Minority Rights in the Middle East JOSHUA CASTELLINO and KATHLEEN A. CAVANAUGH 1 Great Clarendon Street, Oxford, OX2 6DP, United Kingdom Oxford University Press is a department of the University of Oxford. It furthers the University’s objective of excellence in research, scholarship, and education by publishing worldwide. Oxford is a registered trade mark of Oxford University Press in the UK and in certain other countries © Joshua Castellino and Kathleen A. Cavanaugh, 2013 Th e moral rights of the authors have been asserted First Edition published in 2013 Impression: 1 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior permission in writing of Oxford University Press, or as expressly permitted by law, by licence or under terms agreed with the appropriate reprographics rights organization. Enquiries concerning reproduction outside the scope of the above should be sent to the Rights Department, Oxford University Press, at the address above You must not circulate this work in any other form and you must impose this same condition on any acquirer Crown copyright material is reproduced under Class Licence Number C01P0000148 with the permission of OPSI and the Queen’s Printer for Scotland British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data Data available ISBN 978–0–19–967949–2 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY Links to third party websites are provided by Oxford in good faith and for information only. Oxford disclaims any responsibility for the materials contained in any third party website referenced in this work. 1 In Memory of Lian Abu Hussein نيسح وبأ نايل ىركذل This page intentionally left blank Table of Contents Table of Case Law ix Table of Legislation x United Nations Documents xii Table of International Organizations’ Documents xvi Introduction 1 1 Th e Contemporary Middle East 9 Introduction 9 1 Th e Territorial Ambit 11 2 Th e Crucial Peace and Security Questions 14 3 Islam, the Middle East and Human Rights Law 29 4 Constructing Minorities 47 5 Approach to Human Rights by Middle Eastern States 54 Conclusion 78 2 Minority Identities in the Middle East: Religious Minorities 79 Introduction 79 1 Non-Muslim Religious Minorities 82 2 Islamic Minorities 127 Conclusion 140 3 Minority Identities in the Middle East: Ethno-national and Other Minorities 141 Introduction 141 1 Trapped Minorities 142 2 Ethnic/National Minorities 165 3 Political Minorities 176 4 MajoH u m a n R i g h ts i n t h e M i d d l e E a s t This page intentionally left blank H u m a n R i g h ts i n t h e M i d d l e E a s t F r a m e w o r k s, G o a l s, a n d S t r at e g i e s E d i t e d b y M a h m o o d M o n s h i p o u r i HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE MIDDLE EAST Copyright © Mahmood Monshipouri, 2011. All rights reserved. First published in 2011 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN® in the United States – a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Where this book is distributed in the UK, Europe and the rest of the world, this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Pub- lishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Human rights in the Middle East : frameworks, goals, and strategies / edited by Mahmood Monshipouri. p. cm. 1. Human rights—Middle East. 2. Human rights—Religious aspects—Islam. 3. Islam and politics—Middle East. I. Monshipouri, Mahmood, 1952– JC599.M53H85 2011 323.0956—dc23 2011020954 A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library. Design by MPS Limited, A Macmillan Company First edition: December 2011 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 ISBN 978-1-349-29882-2 ISBN 978-1-137-00198-6 (eBook) DOI 10.1057/9781137001986 Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2011 978-0-230-12061-7 C o n t e n ts List of Tables vii Acknowledgments viii Introduction 1 Part I Introduction I: Problems with the Current Frameworks 23 1 Framing the Human Rights Discourse: The Role of Natural Localism and the Power of Paradigm 27 Lawrence Davidson 2 Islam and Human Rights: Ideals and Practices 41 Manochehr Dorraj 3 Human Rights through the Lens of Islamic Legal Thought 57 Halim Rane 4 Islamophobia, Defamation of Religions, and International Human Rights 73 Turan Kayaoğlu Part II Introduction II: Common Goals and Case Studies 91 5 Human Rights and the Kurdish Question in the Middle East 95 Nader Entessar 6 The Janus Nature of Human Rights in Iran: Understanding Progress and Setbacks on Human Rights Protections since the Revolution 111 Barbara Ann Rieffer-Flanagan 7 From Omission to Reluctant Recognition: Political Parties’ Approach to Women’s Rights in Turkey 129 Zehra F. Kabasakal Arat 8 Minorities and Marginalized Communities in the Middle East: The Case for Inclusion 153 Mahmood Monshipouri and Jonathon Whooley 9 Lessons from Movements for Rights Regarding Sexual Orientation in the Arab World 171 Anthony Tirado Chase Part III Introduction III: Strategies 189 10 A Prospect of Democratic Uprisings in the 1 Routledge Handbook on Human Rights and the Middle East and North Africa Recent events su as ‘Iran’s Green Revolution’ and the ‘Arab Uprisings’ have exploded notions that human rights are irrelevant to Middle Eastern and North African politics. Increasingly seen as a global concern, human rights are at the fulcrum of the region’s on- the-ground politics, transnational intellectual debates, and global political intersections. e Routledge Handbook on Human Rights and the Middle East and North Africa: emphasises the need to consider human rights in all their dimensions, rather than solely focusing on the political dimension, in order to understand the structural reasons behind the persistence of human rights violations; explores the various frameworks in whi to consider human rights—conceptual, political and transnational/international; discusses issue areas subject to particularly intense debate— gender, religion, sexuality, transitions and accountability; contains contributions from perspectives that span from global theory to grassroots reflections, emphasising the need for academic work on human rights to seriously engage with the thoughts and practices of those working on the ground. 2 A multidisciplinary approa from solars with a wide range of expertise allows the book to capture the complex dynamics by whi human rights have had, or could have, an impact on Middle Eastern and North African politics. is book will therefore be a key resource for students and solars of Middle Eastern and North African politics and society, as well as anyone with a concern for Human Rights across the globe. Anthony Tirado Chase is a Professor in International Relations at Occidental College, USA. Professor Chase is a theoretician of human rights, most oen in the context of the Middle East. 3 Routledge Handbook on Human Rights and the Middle East and North Africa Edited by Anthony Tirado Chase 4 First published 2017 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 5 711 ird Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2017 Anthony Tirado Chase e right of the editor to be identified as the author of the editorial material, and of the authors for their individual apters, has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, meanical, or other means, now known or hereaer invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing in Publication DMIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA 1 MIDDLE EAST AND NORTH AFRICA 24 Politics of the Middle East and North Africa Name Institution 1. We have identified numerous stereotypes about the Middle East and North Africa through the readings and classroom discussions. Identify and discuss three of these stereotypes. Explain how these stereotypes may hamper our ability to understand human rights challenges in the region. The word stereotype means a mistaken idea that people may have about someone or something. There are numerous stereotypes about the Middle East and North Africa that the media have mostly generated over a long period. According to Hobbs et al. (2010), the men and women from the Middle East and Northern Africa are either stereotyped as villains or weak. The image of Arab males is that of villains, terrorists, oil sheiks, and kidnappers (Hobbs et al., 2010). This is usually due to Western medias influence that has depicted the people from these regions in a negative way. The movies always portray the Arabs from these regions as the villains who are both brutal and ruthless. In the Western world, children are raised knowing that these regions men are bad and should be avoided. The women are seen as naïve, passive, and weak, with their faces always covered by hijab (Hobbs et al., 2010). This misconception shows that the Middle East and North Africa people are not ordinary people with families. The other stereotype is that all the people from the Middle East and North Africa are Muslims. However, this is far from the truth as the Middle East, North Africa, and the Islamic world is not the same (Ridouani, 2011). Arabs inhabit the two regions, and not all are Arabs are Muslims. The Islamic religion may have started in the Middle East, but it spread to other parts of the world. This shows that most Arabs are not Muslims, and most Muslims are found outside the Middle East. The nation with the largest Muslim population in the world is Indonesia. The image of the whole of the Middle East and North Africa being one big dessert where the majority of the people are nomads is wrong. The two regions are urbanized, with very few people living as nomads. Most of the Middle East population lives in large cities like Damascus, Cairo, Istanbul, and Dubai. The cities in North Africa and the Middle East are some of the worlds oldest towns, like Cairo and Damascus. These stereotypes may hamper our ability to understand human rights challenges in the region. Like all parts of the world, the area experiences human rights challenges that need to be addressed. However, stereotypes will always hamper equal access to justice. The misconception about Islam and the region is one of the most significant challenges in understanding human rights challenges in the areas. The misconceptions about Islam and how Muslims are violent are continuously being linked to the region. This misconception shows that the part is full of conflict, whereas most people in the area live in