Philosophers of law ask "what is law?" and "what should it be?"

Jurisprudence is the study and theory of law. Scholars of jurisprudence, or legal theorists (including legal philosophers and social theorists of law), hope to obtain a deeper understanding of the nature of law, of legal reasoning, legal systems and of legal institutions. Modern jurisprudence began in the 18th century and was focused on the first principles of the natural law, civil law, and the law of nations.^[1] General jurisprudence can be broken into categories both by the type of question scholars seek to answer and by the theories of jurisprudence, or schools of thought, regarding how those questions are best answered. Contemporary philosophy of law, which deals with general jurisprudence, addresses problems in two rough groups:^[2]

• 1.) Problems internal to law and legal systems as such.
• 2.) Problems of law as a particular social institution as it relates to the larger political and social situation in which it exists.

Answers to these questions come from four primary schools of thought in general jurisprudence:^[2]

• Natural law is the idea that there are rational objective limits to the power of legislative rulers. The foundations of law are accessible through human reason and it is from these laws of nature that human-created laws gain whatever force they have.^[2]
• Legal positivism, by contrast to natural law, holds that there is no necessary connection between law and morality and that the force of law comes from some basic social facts although positivists differ on what those facts are.^[3]
• Legal realism is a third theory of jurisprudence which argues that the real world practice of law is what determines what law is; the law has the force that it does because of what legislators, judges, and executives do with it. Similar approaches have been developed in many different ways in sociology of law.
• Critical legal studies is a younger theory of jurisprudence that has developed since the 1970s which is primarily a negative thesis that the law is largely contradictory and can be best analyzed as an expression of the policy goals of the dominant social group.^[4]

Also of note is the work of the contemporary Philosopher of Law Ronald Dworkin who has advocated a constructivist theory of jurisprudence that can be characterized as a middle path between natural law theories and positivist theories of general jurisprudence.^[5]

The English term is based on the Latin word jurisprudentia: juris is the genitive form of jus meaning "law", and prudentia means "prudence" (also: discretion, foresight, forethought, circumspection; refers to the exercise of good judgment, common sense, and even caution, especially in the conduct of practical matters). The word is first attested in English in 1628,^[6] at a time when the word prudence had the now obsolete meaning of "knowledge of or skill in a matter". The word may have come via the French jurisprudence, which is attested earlier.

History of jurisprudence[link]

The Central Criminal Court of England and Wales at the Old Bailey

Jurisprudence already had this meaning in Ancient Rome even if at its origins the discipline was a (periti) in the jus of mos maiorum (traditional law), a body of oral laws and customs verbally transmitted "by father to son". Praetors established a workable body of laws by judging whether or not singular cases were capable of being prosecuted either by the edicta, the annual pronunciation of prosecutable offense, or in extraordinary situations, additions made to the edicta. An iudex then would judge a remedy according to the facts of the case.

Their sentences were supposed to be simple interpretations of the traditional customs, but effectively it was an activity that, apart from formally reconsidering for each case what precisely was traditionally in the legal habits, soon turned also to a more equitable interpretation, coherently adapting the law to the newer social instances. The law was then implemented with new evolutive Institutiones (legal concepts), while remaining in the traditional scheme. Praetors were replaced in 3rd century BC by a laical body of prudentes. Admission to this body was conditional upon proof of competence or experience.

Under the Roman Empire, schools of law were created, and the activity constantly became more academic. In the age from the early Roman Empire to the 3rd century, a relevant literature was produced by some notable groups including the Proculians and Sabinians. The scientific depth of the studies was unprecedented in ancient times.

After the 3rd century, Juris prudentia became a more bureaucratic activity, with few notable authors. It was during the Eastern Roman Empire (5th century) that legal studies were once again undertaken in depth, and it is from this cultural movement that Justinian's Corpus Juris Civilis was born.

In ancient Indian vedic society, the law or Dharma, as followed by Hindus was interpreted by use of "Manu Smrti" - a set of poems which defined sin and the remedies.^{[citation needed]} They were said to be written between 200 BC - 200 AD. In fact, these were not codes of law but norms related to social obligations and ritual requirements of the era.

Natural law[link]

Natural law theory asserts that there are laws that are immanent in nature, to which enacted laws should correspond as closely as possible. This view is frequently summarised by the maxim an unjust law is not a true law, lex iniusta non est lex, in which 'unjust' is defined as contrary to natural law. Natural law is closely associated with morality and, in historically influential versions, with the intentions of God. To oversimplify its concepts somewhat, natural law theory attempts to identify a moral compass to guide the lawmaking power of the state and to promote 'the good'. Notions of an objective moral order, external to human legal systems, underlie natural law. What is right or wrong can vary according to the interests one is focused upon. Natural law is sometimes identified with the maxim that "an unjust law is no law at all", but as John Finnis, the most important of modern natural lawyers has argued, this maxim is a poor guide to the classical Thomist position.

Aristotle[link]

Aristotle, by Francesco Hayez

Aristotle is often said to be the father of natural law.^[7] Like his philosophical forefathers, Socrates and Plato, Aristotle posited the existence of natural justice or natural right (dikaion physikon, δικαίον φυσικόν, Latin ius naturale). His association with natural law is due largely to the interpretation given to him by Thomas Aquinas.^[8] This was based on Aquinas' conflation of natural law and natural right, the latter of which Aristotle posits in Book V of the Nicomachean Ethics (= Book IV of the Eudemian Ethics). Aquinas's influence was such as to affect a number of early translations of these passages,^[9] though more recent translations render them more literally.^[10]

Aristotle's theory of justice is bound up in his idea of the golden mean. Indeed his treatment of what he calls "political justice" derives from his discussion of "the just" as a moral virtue derived as the mean between opposing vices, just like every other virtue he describes.^[11] His longest discussion of his theory of justice occurs in Nicomachean Ethics and begins by asking what sort of mean a just act is. He argues that the term "justice" actually refers to two different but related ideas: general justice and particular justice.^[12][13] When a person's actions are completely virtuous in all matters in relation to others, Aristotle calls her "just" in the sense of "general justice;" as such this idea of justice is more or less coextensive with virtue.^[14] "Particular" or "Partial justice", by contrast, is the part of "general justice" or the individual virtue that is concerned with treating others equitably.^[13] Aristotle moves from this unqualified discussion of justice to a qualified view of political justice, by which he means something close to the subject of modern jurisprudence. Of political justice, Aristotle argues that it is partly derived from nature and partly a matter of convention.^[15] This can be taken as a statement that is similar to the views of modern natural law theorists. But it must also be remembered that Aristotle is describing a view of morality, not a system of law, and therefore his remarks as to nature here are about the grounding of the morality enacted as law not the laws themselves. The passage here is silent as to that question.

The best evidence of Aristotle's having thought there was a natural law comes from the Rhetoric, where Aristotle notes that, aside from the "particular" laws that each people has set up for itself, there is a "common" law that is according to nature.^[16] The context of this remark, however, suggests only that Aristotle advised that it could be rhetorically advantageous to appeal to such a law, especially when the "particular" law of ones' own city was adverse to the case being made, not that there actually was such a law;^[17] Aristotle, moreover, considered two of the three candidates for a universally valid, natural law suggested in this passage to be wrong.^[18] Aristotle's theoretical paternity of the natural law tradition is consequently disputed.^{[citation needed]}

Thomas Aquinas[link]

Thomas Aquinas was the most important Western medieval legal scholar

Saint Thomas Aquinas [Thomas of Aquin, or Aquino] (c. 1225 – 7 March 1274) was a philosopher and theologian in the scholastic tradition, known as "Doctor Angelicus, Doctor Universalis". He is the foremost classical proponent of natural theology, and the father of the Thomistic school of philosophy, for a long time the primary philosophical approach of the Roman Catholic Church. The work for which he is best-known is the Summa Theologica. One of the thirty-three Doctors of the Church, he is considered by many Catholics to be the Church's greatest theologian. Consequently, many institutions of learning have been named after him.

Aquinas distinguished four kinds of law: eternal, natural, human and divine. Eternal law refers to divine reason, known only to God, God's plan for the universe; man needs this, without which he would totally lack direction. Natural law is the human "participation" in the eternal law in rational creatures and is discovered by reason. Divine law is revealed in the scriptures and is Gods positive law for mankind. Human law is supported by reason and enacted for the common good.^[19] Natural law, of course, is based on "first principles":

. . . this is the first precept of the law, that good is to be done and promoted, and evil is to be avoided. All other precepts of the natural law are based on this . . .^[20]

The desires to live and to procreate are counted by Aquinas among those basic (natural) human values on which all other human values are based.

Thomas Hobbes[link]

Thomas Hobbes was an English Enlightenment scholar

In his treatise Leviathan, (1651), Hobbes expresses a view of natural law as a precept, or general rule, found out by reason, by which a man is forbidden to do that which is destructive of his life, or takes away the means of preserving the same; and to omit that by which he thinks it may best be preserved. Hobbes was a social contractarian^[21] and believed that the law gained peoples' tacit consent. He believed that society was formed from a state of nature to protect people from the state of war between mankind that exists otherwise. Life is, without an ordered society, "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short". It is commonly commented that Hobbes' views about the core of human nature were influenced by his times. The English Civil War and the Cromwellian dictatorship had taken place, and he felt absolute authority vested in a monarch, whose subjects obeyed the law, was the basis of a civilized society.

Lon Fuller[link]

Writing after World War II, Lon L. Fuller notably emphasised that the law must meet certain formal requirements (such as being impartial and publicly knowable). To the extent that an institutional system of social control falls short of these requirements, Fuller argues, we are less inclined to recognise it as a system of law, or to give it our respect. Thus, law has an internal morality that goes beyond the social rules by which valid laws are made.

John Finnis[link]

Sophisticated positivist and natural law theories sometimes resemble each other more than the above descriptions might suggest, and they may concede certain points to the other "side". Identifying a particular theorist as a positivist or a natural law theorist sometimes involves matters of emphasis and degree, and the particular influences on the theorist's work. In particular, the older natural lawyers, such as Aquinas and John Locke made no distinction between analytic and normative jurisprudence. But modern natural lawyers, such as John Finnis claim to be positivists, while still arguing that law is a basically moral creature.

Sharia and Fiqh in Islam[link]

The first sura in a Qur'anic manuscript by Hattat Aziz Efendi.

Sharia (شَرِيعَةٌ) refers to the body of Islamic law. The term means "way" or "path"; it is the legal framework within which public and most private aspects of life are regulated for those living in a legal system based on Islamic principles of jurisprudence. Fiqh is the term for Islamic jurisprudence, made up of the rulings of Islamic jurists. A component of Islamic studies, Fiqh expounds the methodology by which Islamic law is derived from primary and secondary sources.

Mainstream Islam distinguish fiqh, which means understanding details and inferences drawn by scholars, from sharia that refers to principles that lie behind the fiqh. Scholars hope that fiqh and sharia are in harmony in any given case, but this cannot be assured.^[22]

Early forms of logic in Islamic philosophy were introduced in Islamic jurisprudence from the 7th century with the process of Qiyas. During the Islamic Golden Age, there was a logical debate among Islamic philosophers and jurists whether the term Qiyas refers to analogical reasoning, inductive reasoning or categorical syllogism. Some Islamic scholars argued that Qiyas refers to reasoning, which Ibn Hazm (994-1064) disagreed with, arguing that Qiyas does not refer to inductive reasoning, but refers to categorical syllogism in a real sense and analogical reasoning in a metaphorical sense. On the other hand, al-Ghazali (1058–1111) (and in modern times, Abu Muhammad Asem al-Maqdisi) argued that Qiyas refers to analogical reasoning in a real sense and categorical syllogism in a metaphorical sense. Other Islamic scholars at the time, however, argued that the term Qiyas refers to both analogical reasoning and categorical syllogism in a real sense.^[23]

Analytic jurisprudence[link]

Hume made the famous is-ought distinction

Analytic, or 'clarificatory', jurisprudence means the use of a neutral point of view and descriptive language when referring to the aspects of legal systems. This was a philosophical development that rejected natural law's fusing of what law is and what it ought to be.^[24] David Hume famously argued in A Treatise of Human Nature^[25] that people invariably slip between describing that the world is a certain way to saying therefore we ought to conclude on a particular course of action. But as a matter of pure logic, one cannot conclude that we ought to do something merely because something is the case. So analysing and clarifying the way the world is must be treated as a strictly separate question to normative and evaluative ought questions.

The most important questions of analytic jurisprudence are: "What are laws?"; "What is the law?"; "What is the relationship between law and power/sociology?"; and "What is the relationship between law and morality?" Legal positivism is the dominant theory, although there are a growing number of critics, who offer their own interpretations.

Legal positivists[link]

Positivism simply means that law is something that is "posited": laws are validly made in accordance with socially accepted rules. The positivist view on law can be seen to cover two broad principles: Firstly, that laws may seek to enforce justice, morality, or any other normative end, but their success or failure in doing so does not determine their validity. Provided a law is properly formed, in accordance with the rules recognized in the society concerned, it is a valid law, regardless of whether it is just by some other standard. Secondly, that law is nothing more than a set of rules to provide order and governance of society. No legal positivist, however, argues that it follows that the law is therefore to be obeyed, no matter what. This is seen as a separate question entirely.

• What the law is - is determined by historical social practice (resulting in rules)
• What the law ought to be" - is determined by moral considerations.

Bentham and Austin[link]

Bentham's utilitarian theories remained dominant in law until the twentieth century

One of the earliest legal positivists was Jeremy Bentham. Bentham was an early and staunch supporter of the utilitarian concept (along with Hume), an avid prison reformer, advocate for democracy, and strongly atheist. Bentham's views about law and jurisprudence were popularized by his student, John Austin. Austin was the first chair of law at the new University of London from 1829. Austin's utilitarian answer to "what is law?" was that law is "commands, backed by threat of sanctions, from a sovereign, to whom people have a habit of obedience".^[26] Contemporary legal positivists have long abandoned this view, and have criticised its oversimplification, H. L. A. Hart particularly.

Hans Kelsen[link]

Hans Kelsen is considered one of the preeminent jurists of the 20th century and has been highly influential in Europe and Latin America, although less so in common-law countries. His Pure Theory of Law aims to describe law as binding norms while at the same time refusing, itself, to evaluate those norms. That is, 'legal science' is to be separated from 'legal politics'. Central to the Pure Theory of Law is the notion of a 'basic norm (Grundnorm)'—a hypothetical norm, presupposed by the jurist, from which in a hierarchy all 'lower' norms in a legal system, beginning with constitutional law, are understood to derive their authority or 'bindingness'. In this way, Kelsen contends, the bindingness of legal norms, their specifically 'legal' character, can be understood without tracing it ultimately to some suprahuman source such as God, personified Nature or—of great importance in his time—a personified State or Nation.

H. L. A. Hart[link]

In the Anglophone world, the pivotal writer was H. L. A. Hart, who argued that the law should be understood as a system of social rules. Hart rejected Kelsen's views that sanctions were essential to law and that a normative social phenomenon, like law, can not be grounded in non-normative social facts. Hart revived analytical jurisprudence as an important theoretical debate in the twentieth century through his book The Concept of Law.^[27] As the professor of jurisprudence at Oxford University, Hart argued that law is a 'system of rules'.

Rules, said Hart, are divided into primary rules (rules of conduct) and secondary rules (rules addressed to officials to administer primary rules). Secondary rules are divided into rules of adjudication (to resolve legal disputes), rules of change (allowing laws to be varied) and the rule of recognition (allowing laws to be identified as valid). The "rule of recognition", a customary practice of the officials (especially judges) that identifies certain acts and decisions as sources of law. A pivotal book on Hart was written by Neil MacCormick ^[28] in 1981 (second edition due in 2007), which further refined and offered some important criticisms that led MacCormick to develop his own theory (the best example of which is his recently published Institutions of Law, 2007). Other important critiques have included that of Ronald Dworkin, John Finnis, and Joseph Raz.

In recent years, debates about the nature of law have become increasingly fine-grained. One important debate is within legal positivism. One school is sometimes called exclusive legal positivism, and it is associated with the view that the legal validity of a norm can never depend on its moral correctness. A second school is labeled inclusive legal positivism, a major proponent of which is Wil Waluchow, and it is associated with the view that moral considerations may determine the legal validity of a norm, but that it is not necessary that this is the case.

Joseph Raz[link]

Some philosophers used to contend that positivism was the theory that there is "no necessary connection" between law and morality; but influential contemporary positivists, including Joseph Raz, John Gardner, and Leslie Green, reject that view. As Raz points out, it is a necessary truth that there are vices that a legal system cannot possibly have (for example, it cannot commit rape or murder).

Joseph Raz defends the positivist outlook, but criticised Hart's "soft social thesis" approach in The Authority of Law.^[29] Raz argues that law is authority, identifiable purely through social sources, without reference to moral reasoning. Any categorisation of rules beyond their role as authoritative is best left to sociology, rather than jurisprudence.^[30]

Ronald Dworkin[link]

Ronald Dworkin sought a theory of law which would justify judges' ability to strike down democratically decided laws.

In his book Law's Empire^[31] Dworkin attacked Hart and the positivists for their refusal to treat law as a moral issue. Dworkin argues that law is an 'interpretive' concept, that requires judges to find the best fitting and most just solution to a legal dispute, given their constitutional traditions. According to him, law is not entirely based on social facts, but includes the morally best justification for the institutional facts and practices that we intuitively regard as legal. It follows on Dworkin's view that one cannot know whether a society has a legal system in force, or what any of its laws are, until one knows some moral truths about the justifications for the practices in that society. It is consistent with Dworkin's view—in contrast with the views of legal positivists or legal realists—that *no one* in a society may know what its laws are (because no one may know the best justification for its practices.)

Interpretation, according to Dworkin's law as integrity theory, has two dimensions. To count as an interpretation, the reading of a text must meet the criterion of fit. But of those interpretations that fit, Dworkin maintains that the correct interpretation is the one that puts the political practices of the community in their best light, or makes of them the best that they can be. But many writers have doubted whether there is a single best justification for the complex practices of any given community, and others have doubted whether, even if there are, they should be counted as part of the law of that community.

Legal realism[link]

Oliver Wendell Holmes was a self-styled legal realist

Legal realism was a view popular with some Scandinavian and American writers. Skeptical in tone, it held that the law should be understood and determined by the actual practices of courts, law offices, and police stations, rather than as the rules and doctrines set forth in statutes or learned treatises. It had some affinities with the sociology of law. The essential tenet of legal realism is that all law is made by human beings and, thus, is subject to human foibles, frailties and imperfections.

It has become quite common today to identify Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., as the main precursor of American Legal Realism (other influences include Roscoe Pound, Karl Llewellyn and Justice Benjamin Cardozo). Karl Llewellyn, another founder of the U.S. legal realism movement, similarly believed that the law is little more than putty in the hands of a judge who is able to shape the outcome of a case based on personal biases.^[32] The chief inspiration for Scandinavian legal realism many consider to be the works of Axel Hägerström. Despite its decline in facial popularity, realists continue to influence a wide spectrum of jurisprudential schools today, including critical legal studies, feminist legal theory, critical race theory, sociology of law and law and economics.

Historical School[link]

Historical jurisprudence came to prominence during the German debate over the proposed codification of German law. In his book On the Vocation of Our Age for Legislation and Jurisprudence,^[33] Friedrich Carl von Savigny argued that Germany did not have a legal language that would support codification because the traditions, customs and beliefs of the German people did not include a belief in a code. The Historicists believe that the law originates with society.

Normative jurisprudence[link]

In addition to the question, "What is law?", legal philosophy is also concerned with normative, or "evaluative" theories of law. What is the goal or purpose of law? What moral or political theories provide a foundation for the law? What is the proper function of law? What sorts of acts should be subject to punishment, and what sorts of punishment should be permitted? What is justice? What rights do we have? Is there a duty to obey the law? What value has the rule of law? Some of the different schools and leading thinkers are as follows.

Virtue jurisprudence[link]

Plato (left) and Aristotle (right), a detail of The School of Athens

Aretaic moral theories such as contemporary virtue ethics emphasize the role of character in morality. Virtue jurisprudence is the view that the laws should promote the development of virtuous characters by citizens. Historically, this approach is associated mainly with Aristotle or Thomas Aquinas later. Contemporary virtue jurisprudence is inspired by philosophical work on virtue ethics.

Deontology[link]

Kant was a pre-eminent Enlightenment thinker

Deontology is "the theory of duty or moral obligation."^[34] The philosopher Immanuel Kant formulated one influential deontological theory of law. He argued that any rule we follow must be universalisable: we must be willing to will everyone to follow that rule. A contemporary deontological approach can be found in the work of the legal philosopher Ronald Dworkin.

Utilitarianism[link]

Mill believed law should create happiness

Utilitarianism is the view that the laws should be crafted so as to produce the best consequences for the greatest number of people possible. Historically, utilitarian thinking about law is associated with the great philosopher, Jeremy Bentham. John Stuart Mill was a pupil of Bentham's and was the torch bearer for utilitarian philosophy through the late nineteenth century.^[35] In contemporary legal theory, the utilitarian approach is frequently championed by scholars who work in the law and economics tradition. Also see Lysander Spooner

John Rawls[link]

John Rawls was an American philosopher, a professor of political philosophy at Harvard University and author of A Theory of Justice (1971), Political Liberalism, Justice as Fairness: A Restatement, and The Law of Peoples. He is widely considered one of the most important English-language political philosophers of the 20th century. His theory of justice uses a device called the original position to ask us which principles of justice we would choose to regulate the basic institutions of our society if we were behind a 'veil of ignorance.' Imagine we do not know who we are - our race, sex, wealth status, class, or any distinguishing feature - so that we would not be biased in our own favour. Rawls argues from this 'original position' that we would choose exactly the same political liberties for everyone, like freedom of speech, the right to vote and so on. Also, we would choose a system where there is only inequality because that produces incentives enough for the economic well-being of all society, especially the poorest. This is Rawls's famous 'difference principle'. Justice is fairness, in the sense that the fairness of the original position of choice guarantees the fairness of the principles chosen in that position.

There are many other normative approaches to the philosophy of law, including critical legal studies and libertarian theories of law.

See also[link]

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Austin, John (1831). The Province of Jurisprudence Determined. 
• Cotterrell, R. (1995). Law's Community: Legal Theory in Sociological Perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Cotterrell, R. (2003). The Politics of Jurisprudence: A Critical Introduction to Legal Philosophy, 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Freeman, M.D.A. (2008). Lloyd's Introduction to Jurisprudence. 8th ed. London: Sweet and Maxwell.
• Fruehwald, Edwin Scott, Law and Human Behavior: A Study in Behavioral Biology, Neuroscience, and the Law (Vandeplas 2011). ISBN 978-1-60042-144-0
• Hart, H. L. A. (1961; 1994, 2nd ed with Postscript). The Concept of Law. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-876122-8. 
• Hartzler, H. Richard (1976). Justice, Legal Systems, and Social Structure. Port Washington, NY: Kennikat Press.
• Engle, Eric (2010-07). Lex Naturalis, Ius Naturalis: Law as Positive Reasoning & Natural Rationality. Eric Engle. ISBN 9780980731842. http://books.google.com/books?id=nz4DasoEUesC. 
• Hutchinson, Allan C., ed. (1989). Critical Legal Studies. Totowa, NJ: Roman & Littlefield.
• Kempin, Jr., Frederick G. (1963). Legal History: Law and Social Change. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.
• Llewellyn, Karl N. (1986). Karl N. Llewellyn on Legal Realism. Birmingham, AL: Legal Classics Library. (Contains penetrating classic "The Bramble Bush" on nature of law).
• Murphy, Cornelius F. (1977). Introduction to Law, Legal Process, and Procedure. St. Paul, MN: West Publishing.
• Rawls, John (1999). A Theory of Justice, revised ed. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. (Philosophical treatment of justice).
• Wacks, Raymond (2009). Understanding Jurisprudence: An Introduction to Legal Theory Oxford University Press.
• Zinn, Howard (1990). Declarations of Independence: Cross-Examining American Ideology. New York: Harper Collins Publishers.

External links[link]

Look up jurisprudence in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• John Witte, Jr: A Brief Biography of Dooyeweerd, based on Hendrik van Eikema Hommes, Inleiding tot de Wijsbegeerte van Herman Dooyeweerd (The Hague, 1982; pp 1–4,132). Redeemer University College
• LII Law about... Jurisprudence.
• Filosofiadeldiritto.it "L'Ircocervo. Rivista elettronica italiana di metodologia giuridica, teoria generale del diritto e dottrina dello stato" Lircocervo.it
• The Case of the Speluncean Explorers: Nine New Opinions, by Peter Suber (Routledge, 1998.) Lon Fuller's classic of jurisprudence brought up to date 50 years later.
• The Roman Law Library, incl. Responsa prudentium by Professor Yves Lassard and Alexandr Koptev.
• Evgeny Pashukanis - General Theory of Law and Marxism.
• Internet Encyclopedia: Philosophy of Law.
• The Opticon: Online Repository of Materials covering Spectrum of U.S. Jurisprudence.
• Jurisprudence Revision Notes for Students: - LawTeacher.net - Jurisprudence
• Foundation for Law, Justice and Society
• Bibliography on the Philosophy of Law. Peace Palace Library
• Norwegian Association for Legal Philosophy

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Tariq Ramadan

Born	(1962-08-26) August 26, 1962 (age 49) Geneva, Switzerland
Era	21st-century philosophy
Main interests	Islamic studies Theology Philosophy Politics Interfaith dialogue Literature
Website	www.tariqramadan.com

Tariq Ramadan (Arabic: طارق رمضان‎; born 26 August 1962 in Geneva, Switzerland) is a Swiss academic and writer. He is also a Professor of Contemporary Islamic Studies in the Faculty of Oriental Studies at Oxford University. He advocates the study and re-interpretation of Islamic texts, and emphasizes the heterogeneous nature of Western Muslims.^[1]

Biography[link]

Tariq Ramadan (at table, right) speaking in Oxford.

Tariq Ramadan is the son of Said Ramadan and Wafa Al-Bana, who was the eldest daughter of Hassan al Banna, who in 1928 founded the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Gamal al-Banna, the liberal Muslim reformer is his great-uncle. His father was a prominent figure in the Muslim Brotherhood and was exiled by Gamal Abdul Nasser^[2] from Egypt to Switzerland, where Tariq was born.

Tariq Ramadan studied Philosophy and French literature at the Masters level and holds a PhD in Arabic and Islamic studies from the University of Geneva. He also wrote a PhD dissertation on Friedrich Nietzsche, entitled Nietzsche as a Historian of Philosophy.^[3]

He taught at the College de Saussure, a high school in Geneva, Switzerland, and held a lectureship in Religion and Philosophy at the University of Fribourg from 1996 to 2003. In October 2005 he began teaching at St Antony's College at the University of Oxford on a Visiting Fellowship. In 2005 he was a senior research fellow at the Lokahi Foundation.^[4][5] In 2007 he successfully applied for the professorship in Islamic studies at the University of Leiden, but then declined to take up the position, citing professional reasons.^[6][7] He was also a guest professor of Identity and Citizenship at Erasmus University Rotterdam,^[8][9][10] till August 2009 when the City of Rotterdam and Erasmus University dismissed him from his positions as "integration adviser" and professor, stating that the program he chairs on Iran's Press TV, Islam & Life, was "irreconcilable" with his duties in Rotterdam.^[11][12] Ramadan described this move as Islamophobic and politically charged.^[13] Beginning September 2009, Ramadan, was appointed to the His Highness Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani Chair in Contemporary Islamic Studies at Oxford University.^[14]

Ramadan established the Mouvement des Musulmans Suisses (Movement of Swiss Muslims), which engages in various interfaith seminars. He is an advisor to the EU on religious issues and was sought for advice by the EU on a commission on “Islam and Secularism”.In September 2005 he was invited to join a task force by the government of the United Kingdom.^[2] He is also the President of the Euro-Muslim Network, a Brussels-based think-tank.^[15]

He is widely interviewed and has produced about 100 tapes which sell tens of thousands of copies each year.^[16]

As of 2009, Tariq Ramadan was persona non grata in Tunisia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia,^[17] Libya and Syria because of his "criticism of these undemocratic regimes that deny the most basic human rights".^[18]

U.S. visa revocation and subsequent lifting[link]

In February 2004, Tariq Ramadan accepted the tenured position of Henry R. Luce Professor of Religion, Conflict and Peacebuilding at the Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, United States. He was granted a nonimmigrant visa on May 5, however, on July 28, his H-1B visa was revoked by the State Department.^[19] In August 2004, spokesman for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement cited the "ideological exclusion provision" of the USA PATRIOT Act as the grounds for Ramadan's visa revocation.^[20] In October, the University of Notre Dame filed a H-1B petition on Ramadan's behalf. After hearing no response from the government by December, Ramadan resigned his position from the university.

In September 2005, Ramadan filed an application for a B Visa to allow him to participate at speaking arrangements with various organizations and universities. The government did not issue a decision on Ramadan's visa application, so the American Civil Liberties Union and the New York Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit on January 25, 2006 against the United States government on behalf of the American Academy of Religion, the American Association of University Professors and the PEN American Center – three groups who had planned on meeting with Ramadan in the US – for revoking Ramadan's visa under the "ideological exclusion provision". The ACLU and NYCLU argued that the ideological exclusion provision was in violation of the First Amendment and Fifth Amendment rights of those three groups and that the government's actions violated the Administrative Procedures Act.^[21] After two months had passed without a decision being made, the plaintiffs filed a motion for a preliminary injunction. Pursuant to the injunction, the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York ordered the government on June 23, 2006 to issue its decision on Ramadan's pending B Visa application within 90 days.^[22]

On September 19, 2006, the government formally denied Ramadan's visa application. A State Department statement said: "A U.S. consular officer has denied Dr. Tariq Ramadan's visa application. The consular officer concluded that Dr. Ramadan was inadmissible based solely on his actions, which constituted providing material support to a terrorist organization."^[23][24] Between December 1998 and July 2002, Ramadan had given donations totalling $940 to two charity organizations, the Committee for Charity and Support for the Palestinians (CBSP) or Comité de Bienfaisance et de Secours aux Palestiniens and the Association de Secours Palestinien.^[25] The United States Treasury designated both the CBSP and ASP terrorist fundraising organizations for their alleged links to Hamas on August 22, 2003.^[26] The U.S. Embassy told Ramadan that he "reasonably should have known" that the charities provided money to Hamas. In an article in The Washington Post, Ramadan asked: "How should I reasonably have known of their activities before the U.S. government itself knew?"^{[25][27][28][29]}

On February 2, 2007, the ACLU and NYCLU amended their complaint, arguing that the government's explanation for denying Ramadan's visa application was not "facially legitimate and bona fide" and that the ideological exclusion provision of the PATRIOT Act was in violation of the First and Fifth Amendments. They also argued that Ramadan's denial violated the First Amendment rights of those who wanted to hear him speak. In his decision on December 20, 2007, District Judge Paul A. Crotty ruled that the government's justification for denying Ramadan's visa was "facially legitimate and bona fide" and noted that the Court "has no authority to override the Government's consular decision".^[30]

In January 2008, the ACLU appealed Crotty's ruling. Jameel Jaffer, Director of the ACLU National Security Project and lead attorney in the case, stated:

"The government's shifting positions only underscore why meaningful judicial review – the kind of oversight that the district court failed to provide – is so important. In Professor Ramadan’s case and many others, the government is using immigration laws to stigmatize and exclude its critics and to censor and control the ideas that Americans can hear. Censorship of this kind is completely inconsistent with the most basic principles of an open society."

Ramadan himself remarked:

"The U.S. government's actions in my case seem, at least to me, to have been arbitrary and myopic. But I am encouraged by the unwavering support I have received from ordinary Americans, civic groups and particularly from scholars, academic organizations, and the ACLU. I am heartened by the emerging debate in the U.S. about what has been happening to our countries and ideals in the past six years. And I am hopeful that eventually I will be allowed to enter the country so that I may contribute to the debate and be enriched by dialogue."^[31]

On July 17, 2009, the US federal appeals court reversed the ruling of the lower district court. The three-judge panel on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit – composed of Judges Jon O. Newman, Wilfred Feinberg and Reena Raggi – ruled that the Court had "jurisdiction to consider the claim, despite the doctrine of consular nonreviewability". They stated that government was required by law to "confront Ramadan with the allegation against him and afford him the subsequent opportunity to demonstrate by clear and convincing evidence that he did not know, and reasonably should not have known, that the recipient of his contributions was a terrorist organization." Under the limited review permitted by the 1972 Supreme Court ruling in Kleindienst v. Mandel, the panel concluded that the "record does not establish that the consular officer who denied the visa confronted Ramadan with the allegation that he had knowingly rendered material support to a terrorist organization, thereby precluding an adequate opportunity for Ramadan to attempt to satisfy the provision that exempts a visa applicant from exclusion under the 'material support' subsection if he 'can demonstrate by clear and convincing evidence that [he] did not know, and should not reasonably have known, that the organization was a terrorist organization.'" Additionally, the panel agreed with the plaintiffs' contention that their First Amendment rights had been violated. The panel remanded the case to a lower court to determine if the consular officer had confronted Ramadan with the "allegation that he knew that ASP provided funds to Hamas and then providing him with a reasonable opportunity to demonstrate, by clear and convincing evidence, that he did not know, and should not have reasonably known, of that fact."^[32]

Following the ruling, Ramadan stated, "I am very gratified with the court's decision. I am eager to engage once again with Americans in the kinds of face-to-face discussions that are central to academic exchange and crucial to bridging cultural divides." Melissa Goodman, staff attorney with the ACLU National Security Project, issued a statement saying, "Given today's decision, we hope that the Obama administration will immediately end Professor Ramadan's exclusion. We also encourage the new administration to reconsider the exclusion of other foreign scholars, writers and artists who were barred from the country by the Bush administration on ideological grounds."^[33]

On January 20, 2010, after more than five years of waiting, the American State Department has decided, in a document signed by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, to lift the ban that prohibited Ramadan (as well as Professor Adam Habib from South Africa) from entering the United States. On the lifting of this ban, Ramadan has stated:

Coming after nearly six years of inquiry and investigation, Secretary Clinton’s order confirms what I have affirmed and reaffirmed from day one: the first accusations of terrorist connections (subsequently dropped), then donations to Palestinian solidarity groups, were nothing more than a pretense to prohibit me from speaking critically about American government policy on American soil. The decision brings to an end a dark period in American politics that saw security considerations invoked to block critical debate through a policy of exclusion and baseless allegation.

On April 8, 2010, Ramadan spoke as part of a panel discussion at the Great Hall of Cooper Union in New York City, his first public appearance since the State Department lifted the ban.^[34] The group debated the lengths to which Western nations should go to accommodate their Muslim populations.

Views[link]

Ramadan works primarily on Islamic theology and the position of Muslims in the West and within Muslim majority countries. In general, he believes it necessary to interpret the Qur'an, not simply to read the Arabic text, in order to understand its meaning and to practice Islamic philosophy.^[35] He also emphasizes the difference between religion and culture, which he believes are too often confused, arguing that citizenship and religion are separate concepts which should not be mixed. He claims that there is no conflict between being both a Muslim and a European; a Muslim must accept the laws of his country. But he is opposed to some politicians or people who try to circumvent or to give a new sense of their own laws.

He believes that Western Muslims must create a "Western Islam" just as there is a separate "Asian Islam" and an "African Islam", which take into account cultural differences.^[36] By this he means that European Muslims must re-examine the fundamental texts of Islam (primarily the Qur'an) and interpret them in light of their own cultural background, influenced by European society.

He rejects a binary division of the world into dar al-Islam (the abode of Islam) and dar al-harb (the abode of war), on the grounds that such a division is not mentioned in the Qur'an. He has been also known to cite favourably the Dar al-Da'wa (Abode of Information Dissemination).^[37] However, Ramadan has articulated both the "ideological geography" of the West and the duty of da'wa in an original fashion and one that is starkly more pro-integration than the more conservative "loyal resident alienage" articulated by such jurists as al-Qaradawi. For Ramadan, the West is neither the Abode of War nor the Abode of da'wa but "dar al-shahada," the "Abode of Testimony" [to the Islamic Message]. He argues that Muslims are "witnesses before mankind"; they must continue to review the fundamental principles of Islam and take responsibility for their faith.

Importantly, for him the "Islamic message" to which Muslims are expected to bear witness is not primarily the particularist, socially conservative code of traditionalist jurists, but a commitment to universalism and the welfare of non-Muslims; it is also an injunction not merely to make demands on un-Islamic societies but to express solidarity with them.^[38][39]

"... the European environment is a space of responsibility for Muslims. This is exactly the meaning of the notion of "space of testimony" [dar al-shahada] that we propose here, a notion that totally reverses perspectives: whereas Muslims have, for years, been wondering whether and how they would be accepted, the in-depth study and evaluation of the Western environment entrusts them, in light of their Islamic frame of reference, with a most important mission... Muslims now attain, in the space of testimony, the meaning of an essential duty and of an exacting responsibility: to contribute, wherever they are, to promoting good and equity within and through human brotherhood. Muslims' outlook must now change from the reality of "protection" alone to that of an authentic "contribution."

He emphasizes a Muslim's responsibility to his community, whether it be Islamic or not. He criticizes the 'us vs. them' mentality that some Muslims advocate against the West. He also advocates having Muslim scholars in the West who are versed in Western mores, and not relying on religious studies that come only from the Islamic world. He wants more Islamic philosophy written in European languages. He thinks that European Muslims' reliance on an "external" Islam, leaves them feeling inadequate and impure, which is one of the main causes of alienation from European culture.

He believes that most Muslims in the West are quietly and successfully integrating into society. The main problems for the community come from those who are ignorant of Western society.

He also worries about Western perceptions of Islam. He says the Muslim community has been bad at representing itself, and that this has allowed westerners to confuse Islam with cultural traits, as well as political problems. For example, he believes that many notionally Islamic countries have governments which betray the principles of Islam.

He believes that the Muslim leadership in Europe is partially responsible for the sometimes shaky relations between Muslims and the rest of society. He believes that they have been overly defensive, and have not properly explained the philosophy of Islam, nor have they engaged sufficiently with non-Muslim society.

He stresses that a Muslim's freedom of religion is very extensive in the West, and that permission for "un-Islamic" activities, such as drinking, or pre-marital sex, does not compel Muslims to do anything. Only a few situations warrant the invocation of the "clause of conscience" which allows a Muslim to make it clear that certain actions or behaviours are in contradiction of their faith. These are, participating in a war whose sole desire is for power or control; fighting or killing a fellow Muslim, unless their attitude is unjust or wrong; participating in an unlawful transaction (such as purchasing insurance, burial, incorrect slaughter). He stresses that in such cases the situation should be carefully analysed, and the degree of compulsion considered. Only non-violence and negotiation are acceptable in these cases.^[40]

Ramadan has voiced his opposition to all forms of capital punishment but believes the Muslim world should remove such laws from within, without any Western pressure, as such would only further alienate Muslims, and instead bolster the position of those who support hudud punishments.

He has said "Muslim populations are convincing themselves of the Islamic character of these practices through a rejection of the west, on the basis of a simplistic reasoning that stipulates that 'the less western, the more Islamic'."^[41]

Politically, Ramadan was opposed to the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He believes that jihad against the United States military in Iraq was justified as an act of resistance to oppression.

He has condemned suicide bombing and violence as a tactic.^[42] Perhaps more importantly, he believes that terrorism is never justifiable, even though it is sometimes understandable.^[43]

He was opposed to the French law on secularity and conspicuous religious symbols in schools.

Ramadan wrote that the Muslim response to Pope Benedict XVI's speech on Islam was disproportionate, and was encouraged by reactionary Islamic regimes in order to distract their populations, and that it did not improve the position of Islam in the world.^[44]

Ramadan wrote an article entitled, Les (nouveaux) intellectuels communautaires, which French newspapers Le Monde and Le Figaro refused to publish. Oumma.com did eventually publish it. In the article he criticizes a number of French Jewish intellectuals and figures such as Alexandre Adler, Alain Finkielkraut, Bernard-Henri Lévy, André Glucksmann and Bernard Kouchner, for allegedly abandoning universal human rights, and giving special status to the defence of Israel. Ramadan was accused, in return, of having used inflammatory language.^[45][46]

Debate[link]

In a French television debate in 2003 with Nicolas Sarkozy, Sarkozy accused Ramadan of defending the stoning of adulterers, a punishment stipulated in the section of the Islamic penal code known as hudud, roots being in Mosaic law as mentioned in the Old Testament of the Bible and not having been abrogated by later revelations, consequently Sura 6 verse 89 of the Quran is interpreted in orthodox Islam as sanctioning the death penalty for certain crimes. Ramadan replied that Sarkozy was wrong. He said that he opposed stoning and that he favored “a moratorium” on such practices to have time to discuss the law outright. Many people, including Sarkozy, were outraged. Ramadan later defended his position arguing that, because it involved religious texts, the law would have to be properly understood and contextualised. Ramadan argued that in Muslim countries, the simple act to "condemn" won't change anything, but with a "moratorium", it could open the way for further debate. He thinks that such a debate can only lead to an abolishment of these rules.^[47] He further engaged in similar debates on the issue, notably at the Cambridge Union with Sir Bernard Crick, among others, in 2008.

Critical reception[link]

Some academics have greeted his works with enthusiasm, detecting liberalising and rationalising tendencies.^[48]

Praise[link]

Paul Donnelly^{[disambiguation needed ]} at the liberal^[49] online magazine Salon.com asked rhetorically: "Tariq Ramadan: The Muslim Martin Luther?".^[50] Similarly, an article at the self-described liberal^[51] The American Prospect praised Ramadan and his work in particular as an "entire corpus consists of a steady and unyielding assault on Muslim insularity, self-righteousness, and self-pity."^[52]

Criticism[link]

In a book published by Encounter Books, Caroline Fourest analysed Tariq Ramadan's 15 books, 1,500 pages of interviews, and approximately 100 recordings,^[53][54] and concludes "Ramadan is a war leader," and the "political heir of his grandfather," Hassan al-Banna, stating that his discourse is, "often just a repetition of the discourse that Banna had at the beginning of the 20th century in Egypt," and that he "presents [al-Banna] as a model to be followed."^[16][55] She argues that "Tariq Ramadan is slippery. He says one thing to his faithful Muslim followers and something else entirely to his Western audience. His choice of words, the formulations he uses – even his tone of voice – vary, chameleon-like, according to his audience."^[53] Tariq Ramadan responded that Caroline Fourest's book was filled with inaccuracies and untruths, a few of which she later acknowledged on her blog^[56].

Olivier Guitta, writing in The Weekly Standard, welcomed the U.S. decision to refuse Ramadan a visa, based on Ramadan's supposed links to terrorist organizations and claiming that his father was the likely author of "'The Project'... a roadmap for installing Islamic regimes in the West by propaganda, preaching, and if necessary war." He further claimed that the former head of the French antiracism organization SOS Racisme, "Malek Boutih told Ramadan after talking with him at length: ‘Mr. Ramadan, you are a fascist.’"^[16] In an interview with Europe 1 Boutih likened him to "a small Le Pen^{[disambiguation needed ]}";^[57] in another interview he accused him of having crossed the line of racism and anti-Semitism, thus not genuinely belonging to the alter-globalization movement. Similarly, self-described conservative^[58] Daniel Pipes concurred with the revocation of Ramadan's visa on grounds of Ramadan's alleged ties with Islamic extremism.^[59] After the lifting of the visa revocation, an article in the National Review criticized the double standard of lifting the visa restriction on Ramadan, but not for Issam Abu Issa who was banned by the Bush Administration for being a whistleblower against the Palestinian Authority's corruption.^[60]

Bertrand Delanoë, Socialist mayor of Paris, declared Ramadan unfit to participate at the European Social Forum, as not even "a slight suspicion of anti-Semitism" would be tolerable. Talking to the Paris weekly Marianne, Fadela Amara, president of Ni Putes Ni Soumises (Neither Whores Nor Submissive, a French feminist movement), Aurélie Filippetti, municipal counsellor for The Greens in Paris, Patrick Klugman, leading member of the Conseil Représentatif des Institutions juives de France and Dominique Sopo, head of SOS-Racisme accuse Ramadan of having misused the alter-globalization movement's ingenuousness to advance his "radicalism and anti-Semitism."^[61] Similarly, an article in the online publication of Alliance for Workers' Liberty published 40 reasons why Ramadan was a reactionary, criticizing views on Islamic extremism, women's rights and anti-Semitism.^[62] Egyptian intellectual Tarek Heggy has also charged Ramadan with saying different things to different audiences.^[63] Other criticisms have included claims that that an essay attacking French intellectuals was anti-semitic ^[64] and that he has shown excessive generosity in his rationalization of the motives behind acts of terrorism, such as in the case of [Mohammed Merah].^[65]

Response to some of the criticism[link]

Ramadan vehemently denies contacts with terrorists or other Islamic fundamentalists and the charges of anti-Semitism and double talk, attributing the charges to misinterpretation and an unfamiliarity with his writings.^[66] He stated: "I have often been accused of this 'double discourse', and to those who say it, I say – bring the evidence. I am quite clear in what I say. The problem is that many people don't want to hear it, particularly in the media. Most of the stories about me are completely untrue: journalists simply repeat black propaganda from the internet without any corroboration, and it just confirms what they want to believe. Words are used out of context. There is double-talk, yes, but there is also double-hearing. That is what I want to challenge."^[42] In answer to criticism of his response to September 11th, Ramadan replied that two days after the attacks he had published an open letter, exhorting Muslims to condemn the attacks and the attackers, and not to "hide behind conspiracy theories."^[67] and that less than two weeks after the attacks he had stated that “The probability [of bin Laden's guilt] is large, but some questions remain unanswered ... But whoever they are, Bin Laden or others, it is necessary to find them and that they be judged,” and that the interview had been conducted before any evidence was publicly available.^[68]

Public reception[link]

One of the world's top 100 innovators of the 21st Century (one of the world's top 7th religious leaders) by Time Magazine in 2000

One of the world's top 100 most influential intellectuals in the world by Time Magazine in 2004

An online poll provided by the American Foreign Policy magazine in 2009 and in 2010 placed Ramadan on the 49th spot in a list of the world’s top 100 contemporary intellectuals.^[69]

In 2008, an open online poll, Tariq Ramadan was voted the 8th top most intellectual person in the world on the list of Top 100 Public Intellectuals by Prospect Magazine (UK).

Selected works[link]

• The quest for meaning: developing a philosophy of pluralism, 2010, ISBN 978-0-14-191957-7
• What I Believe, 2009. ISBN 978-0-19-538785-8
• Radical Reform: Islamic Ethics and Liberation, 2009. ISBN 978-0-19-533171-4
• In the Footsteps of the Prophet: Lessons from the Life of Muhammad, 2007. ISBN 978-0-19-530880-8
• Western Muslims and the future of Islam, 2004. ISBN 0-19-517111-X
• Islam, the West, and the Challenge of Modernity, 2001. ISBN 0-86037-311-8
• To Be a European Muslim, 1999. ISBN 0-86037-300-2

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• "Tariq Ramadan and the Oxford Haskalah Attempt (February 18, 2011).
• Berman, Paul, 'Who's Afraid of Tariq Ramadan?', in The New Republic, June 2007.
  • Wie is er bang voor Tariq Ramadan?, Paul Berman, 2007, ISBN 978-90-290-8063-7 Translation from Dutch:'Who is Afraid of Tariq Ramadan?' This is presumably a version of the long essay by Paul Berman in The New Republic of June 2007, which may still be under copyright protection.
• Berman, Paul, The Flight of the Intellectuals; ISBN 978-1-933633-51-0
• Lionel Favrot : Tariq Ramadan dévoilé – hors série de Lyon Mag'.
• Nicholas Tampio, "Constructing the Space of Testimony: Tariq Ramadan’s Copernican Revolution" "Political Theory", Vol 39.5 (2011).
• Irfan Khawaja, Review of Paul Berman's "The Flight of the Intellectuals" and Tariq Ramadan's "What I Believe" [1], "Reason Papers: A Journal of Interdisciplinary Normative Studies," vol. 33 (Fall 2011), pp. 165-89.
• Frère Tariq: Discours, stratégie et méthode de Tariq Ramadan, Caroline Fourest; ISBN 2-246-66791-7
  • Frère Tariq, Extraits exclusifs, Un livre de Caroline Fourest, L'Express, October 18, 2004
  • Translated into English as Brother Tariq: The Doublespeak of Tariq Ramadan. New York: Encounter Books. 2008. pp. 262 pages. ISBN 978-1-59403-215-8. 
• Tariq Ramadan und die Islamisierung Europas, Ralph Ghadban; ISBN 3-89930-150-1
• Le sabre et le coran, Tariq Ramadan et les frères musulmans à la conquéte de l'Europe, Paul Landau, 2005, ISBN 2-268-05317-2
• Jonathan Laurence, "The Prophet of Moderation: Tariq Ramadan's Quest to Reclaim Islam" 'Foreign Affairs, (May/June 2007).
• Jack-Alain Léger, Tartuffe fait Ramadan, Denoël, 2003,
• À contre Coran, livre de Jack-Alain Léger, mars 2004, collection « Hors de moi », éditions HC
• Andrew F. March, "Reading Tariq Ramadan: Political Liberalism, Islam and 'Overlapping Consensus'," Ethics and International Affairs, Volume 21.4 (Winter 2007).
  • "Law as a Vanishing Mediator in the Theological Ethics of Tariq Ramadan," European Journal of Political Theory, (Vol. 10, No. 2, April 2011, pp. 177-201.).
  • "The Post-Legal Ethics of Tariq Ramadan: Persuasion and Performance in 'Radical Reform: Islamic Ethics and Liberation' (A Review Essay)," Middle East Law and Governance, (2010).
• Faut-il faire taire Tariq Ramadan ?, Aziz Zemouri; ISBN 2-84187-647-0
• Tariq Ramadan on the Arab Spring: A Revolution in Suspense