Islam, Religious Liberty and Constitutionalism in Europe

The rise of populism and extreme right in Europe and the US in the past two decades has brought to the fore serious social and legal complexities. While claiming to uphold the so-called European values of liberty, religious freedom, right to privacy, tolerance and multiculturalism, the ongoing discrimination against non-Europeans particularly the Muslim community has reached such an extent as to call for an early dispassionate examination and amicable solution of this social and legal dilemma.

One of the most common claims of European nation states is that they are secular, liberal, democratic, and multi-cultural. The presence of Muslims in Europe, the US and Australia is not a recent phenomenon. Muslims have been in these regions for over a century, even though it took them a while to be visible, distinguished by their dress code and proliferation of their Islamic centres and mosques. After World War II, especially, Muslims in the West became more visible. Europe, and the West in general, is often presumed to be totally secular, materialistic and hedonistic, even by the westerners themselves. However, such a sweeping generalization seems rather superficial. The authors of the papers of this book, with their diverse academic backgrounds, attempt to trace the roots of the apparently secular civil and legal practices and conventions of Europe and also shed some light on the historic link between the present secular system and the historic separation of state and religion in the Christian West.