Constituting Religion: From South Asia to Malaysia

Nelson, Matthew J.

Abstract

At the start of his outstanding new book, Constituting Religion: Islam, Liberal Rights, and the Malaysian State, Tamir Moustafa explains that initially his ambition extended beyond Malaysia to a comparison of Malaysia, Pakistan, and Egypt. As one with an interest in both Malaysia and Pakistan, I read his book with that ambition in mind. Specifically, I read Moustafa’s new book as an account of the ways in which a particular country’s constitutional tension between “individual” and “group-based” religious freedoms has been legally and politically operationalized. In my reading, Moustafa’s account is not limited to Malaysia; the experience of Malaysia is also tied to the constitutional experience of South Asia.

Citation

Nelson, M. J. (2019). Constituting Religion: From South Asia to Malaysia

• Digital Artefact Type: Blog Post
• Acceptance Date: May 14, 2019
• Publication Date: Jun 27, 2019
• Deposit Date: May 29, 2019
• Publicly Available Date: May 29, 2019
• External URL: http://tif.ssrc.org/2019/06/27/constituting-religion-from-south-asia-to-malaysia/