Editorial 

With this issue of AJISS, we bring this volume to a close. This year has 
brought many changes to AJISS, not only in the scope of Islamic issues 
highlighted within the articles, but also in the range of opinions articulated 
by their authors. As a fourm for intellectual debates on issues relating to 
Islam, MISS strives to “push the intellectual envelope” of Islamic thought. 
No subject matter better reflects this attempt than the issue of women, 
which many articles in this issue analyze. 

In her article “Oikoslpolis Conflict: Perspectives of Gender Feminists 
and Islamic Revivalists,” Zeenath Kausar examines the continuing debate 
on women’s political participation in order to demonstrate “how gender 
feminists prefer women’s political participation at the cost of deconstruct- 
ing gender and family, whereas contemporary Islamic revivalists “support 
and encourage women’s political participation-but not at the expense of 
family and the distinct identity of women.” After a brief survey of feminist 
philosophy and Muslim revivalist discourse, Kausar concludes that gender 
feminists create an atmosphere of conflict between men and women, while 
Muslim revivalists look at men and women as copartners in constructing 
civilization. 

In questioning exactly this notion of copartnership between men and 
women, Hibba Abugideiri undertakes, in her “Allegorical Gender: The 
Figure of Eve Revisited,” a discourse analysis of classical Islamic texts in 
order to uncover how gender categories were constructed by classical 
exegetes. By focusing on the figure of Eve, which “has not only defined 
the identity of Muslim woman: it has also set the parameters for how that 
identity has been forged,” she questions the authoritative value and rele- 
vance of the classical view of Eve for contemporary social demands. 
Underlying her Qur’anic rereading of Eve’s role in the parable of creation 
lies the goal of forging a new methodological approach to Islamic issues 
that need to be redressed, particularly in light of the current wave of 
Islamic revivalism. 

Finally, in her review essay “Muslim Women’s Studies: Two Contri- 
butions,” Mohja Kahf engages in a critical analysis of two gender histories 
that interface nicely with Abugideiri’s study. Here, Kahf reviews two for- 
ays into the field of Muslim women’s studies that uncover the place of 



Muslim women in the textual heritage of the community by comparing and 
contrasting their points of convergence and divergence. 

For a change of pace, in “Administrative Responsibility: An Islamic 
Perspective,”Abdel Rahman A. Abdel Rahman provides an Islamic solu- 
tion to the issue of how to make public bureaucracy behave responsibly or 
in the public interest. “The principal contention of this paper is that success 
in making bureaucrats responsible or responsive depends on whether or not 
they have sufficiently strong motivation to serve the public . . . . This paper 
contends that Islamic values and institutions can be used to provide this 
motivation.” 

In a similar vein, TZa J. al-‘Alw&ii, in his “Authority: Divine or 
Qur’anic,” undertakes a critical analysis of the origin of authority in Islam 
in order to clarify and correct the mistaken notions, misunderstandings, 
ambiguities, and confusion that have grown up around this notion. After a 
brief discussion of the lexical aspects of divine authority, he locates previ- 
ous legal and political systems that have influenced our present-day 
(mis)understanding of this critical concept, particularly in light of its cen- 
trality for contemporary Islamic reform movements. 

As a reflection, we bring you “Islam and the West: Yesterday and 
Today” by Seyyed Hossein Nasr. In casting greater light on the issue of 
relations between Islam and “the West,” he shows, quite rightly, how these 
two neat categories are not always so neat or homogeneous: “Which Islam 
and which West are we considering?” In delineating the elements con- 
tributing to this relationship, ‘‘we address mostly the Western rather than 
Islamic components of this confrontation, which one hopes will become 
more and more a dialogue.” The reason for this conflict, says Nasr, “is the 
very reality of another civilization that wishes to follow its own principles 
and develop according to its own inner life and dynamic rather than on the 
basis of externally imposed norms that, according to many voices, now 
threaten the West itself.” The author concludes on a hopeful note, but high- 
lights a few obstacles that need hurdling before “genuine dialogue” can 

All of the feature articles, for all intents and purposes, approach their 
subject matter in a similar fashion: deconstruct one thought in order to 
derive a more Islamic alternative thought that is more in tune with contem- 
porary demands. None propose definitive solutions to any one issue, 
though all “open the door” to further critical examination, inquiry, and dia- 
logue. We leave it to you to decide their effectiveness. 

OCCW. 

Hibba Abugideir-i