Legal Reform Of Islamic Countries In The Middle East In The 20th Century

The Islamic law, with a long history and a profound tradition, plays a vital role in the world legal system. Ever since the coming of modern times, Islamic law has been strongly challenged by Western law culture, which somewhat led to the transplantation of Western law and subsequent law reform in Islamic countries of the Middle East. What happened in Turkey, Egypt, Iran and Saudi Arabia during the 20th century can be well regarded as the epitome of Law reform in the Middle East. The striking difference between Western law and Islamic law makes it far from being easy to carry out law reform in Islamic countries. The Law reform in these four countries was launched in different ways due to varied situations in which these countries were stuck in the 20th century. The law reform in the Middle East in the 20th Century has far-reaching influence, which reflects the conflict and fusion of two different legal systems. This dissertation is written to summarize the ways of law reform in the above-mentioned four Islamic countries of the Middle East over the span of modern and contemporary times. Aimed at adapting Islamic law to the needs of social development, this dissertation, through the study on law reform of Islamic countries in the Middle East in different periods, is written as an effort to sum up the common and unique characteristics of law reform in these countries, find out the universal rule governing the reform, and explore how to transplant foreign law in countries deeply influenced by traditional culture.The dissertation consists of five chapters besides Introduction and Conclusion.The first chapter is "an overview". This chapter introduces the stages of Islamic law’s development, explains the legal origins of Islamic law including the Qur’an and the Hadith, analyzes several characteristics of the development of the Islamic law and finally reviews the development of Islamic law and the formation of four main schools of Islamic law.The second chapter is "the law reform in the period of Ottoman Empire". This chapter first puts its focus on the interpretation of foreign laws’influence on early Islamic law, including customary law, Jewish law and Roman law. The latter half of this chapter is mainly an analysis of the "Tanzimat" reform of the Ottoman Empire, which is the most important reform in the Islamic world at that time. The Empire for the first time imitated the Western law and formulated the constitution, civil code and commercial code in the legal reform. The reform transplanted the Western law and initiated the codification and modernization of Islamic law in the Middle East.The third chapter is "the law reform of the modern Middle East Islamic countries". In this chapter, the three countries, Turkey, Egypt and Iran, represent the legal reform of the Islamic countries of the Middle East in modern times. This chapter first introduces the law reform in Turkey, including the constitution, commercial law and civil law. Secondly, it introduces the law reform in Egypt, including the constitution, commercial law, law of marriage and family, criminal law and civil law. This chapter also analyzes differences of the causes and paths of legal reform between turkey and Egypt, by comparing the civil code of Turkey and Egypt. This chapter also refers to the reform in Iran, including the constitutional revolution, commercial law, criminal law and civil law.The fourth chapter is "the law reform of the contemporary Middle East Islamic countries". This chapter describes the law reform of the four Islamic countries in the Middle East including Iran, Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and for Iran, the focus is on the great changes of the law reform after the Islamic revolution. Firstly, this paper introduced the law reform in Iran from Pahlavi wholesale westernization of the white revolution to Khomeini radical Islamic revolution, including the reform of commercial law, criminal law and civil law; secondly, Turkey’s legal reform is introduced, including the constitution, civil law, commercial law and criminal law reform; thirdly, this chapter introduces the legal change in Egypt, including the change of constitution, the family law and judicial system; at last, with emphasis on the three Acts, law reform of commercial law, the labor law and the judicial system, the chapter introduces the law reform in Saudi Arabia.The fifth chapter is "the reflection on the legal reform of the Middle East Islamic countries in the twentieth Century". Firstly, this chapter analyzes the characteristics of the four representative countries of the Middle East and the main factors affecting the legal transplantation, and then analyzes the renaissance of Islamic law, including performance, influence and reasons. Finally, the chapter puts forward the reflection of the legal reform in the Middle East, main issues of which include how the Islamic countries in the Middle East, in the context of globalization, can balance tradition and modern times, as well as local culture and foreign culture and how these countries can facilitate well-fitted combination of local law and foreign law.The main conclusions are as follows:first, the law reform of Islamic countries in the Middle East displays both similarities and differences due to the situations they were stuck in. Second, in the twentieth century, most Islamic countries in the Middle East chose to take the middle route after twists and turns. Third, the legal reform of the Middle East Islamic countries in the twentieth Century must deal with the relationship between the traditional and the modern, as well as the foreign legal culture and the local legal resources. Fourth, in the 20th century, the law reform of Islamic countries in the Middle East must reopen the door of "Create" to enable Islamic laws to keep pace with the times.