- All
- Political Theory
- Geopolitics & International Relations
- Society & Civilization
- Islamic Norms
The Ummatics Institute publishes original research papers on a range of ummatic issues for the benefit of scholars, students, and enthusiasts alike.
Our papers serve to develop, engage, and enhance, both scholarly and popular discourses on ummatic thought and practice by interrogating the various social, political, economic, religious, and historical questions most pertinent to the life and future of the Muslim Umma.
Criminalizing the Caliphate: Transforming Remembrance into Resistance
Contention One: Ummatic Exceptionalism and the Prospect of Double Humiliation
Secular Integration Models and Global Governance Schemes: Lessons for Ummatic Integration
Irredeemable Failure: The Modern Nation-State as a Nullifier of Ummatic Unity
The “Constitution” of Medina: Translation, Commentary, and Meaning Today
Our approach to political theory focuses on the Umma as a central conceptual space in the study of descriptive/empirical questions in political science as well as prescriptive/normative questions in political philosophy.
Ummatic political theory covers broad issues pertaining to siyasa shar’iyya, iqamat al-din, and the nature of the Quranic mission, as well as human rights, questions of collective existence and action, and more. All of this is undertaken with and through an engagement of relevant scholarship from the Islamic and human sciences.
Do Not Remove
- Political theory of the caliphate and its institutions
- Classical Islamic political theory (major thinkers, models, development, genealogy, critiques), with a particular focus on the theoretical aspects of the siyasa shar’iyya and ahkam sultaniyya literature
- Modern Islamic political theory (major thinkers, movements, models, development, genealogy, critiques), with a particular emphasis on their engagements with contemporary problems
- Analysis and critical evaluation of governance practices in historical caliphates
- Analysis and critical evaluation of authoritarianism, dysfunction, and disunity in the post-colonial and contemporary Muslim world
- Analysis and critical evaluation of liberal political theory and its foundational concepts (freedom, democracy, secularism)
- Consideration and critique of non-liberal theories (including communitarian, agonistic, Christian, Marxist, feminist, and decolonial theories)
Our approach to geopolitics and international relations surveys the geographic, diplomatic, legal, and organizational factors which influence the relationship between contemporary Muslim polities and various international actors.
The ummatic study of geopolitics and international relations is also a study of the Muslim Umma from a global perspective. It serves as a crucible for new and inventive ways of thinking about these disciplines with the ummatic discourse at its core.
- How the Muslim world can navigate the current era of power transition and vacuum
- What trends in global politics geopolitical thinkers must know in order to address the immediate challenges facing Muslim societies
- How Muslims can promote and build forums to create a new generation of scholars that look beyond nationalism and think ummaticly about international politics
- How to revive the classical siyar literature to theorize about contemporary international relations
- What material and conceptual challenges Muslim societies face that hinder ummatic unity and how they can be addressed
Secular Integration Models and Global Governance Schemes: Lessons for Ummatic Integration
Our study of society and civilization connects theory to practice in exploring the numerous opportunities and obstacles for unity across Muslim regions.
This discipline focuses on the ways ummatic solidarity can and already does animate Muslim life, as well as how the Umma is theorized, conceptualized, and informs Muslims’ lived experiences. In addition, concepts and strategies for societal transformation are considered through engagements with classical and contemporary Islamic thinkers who have deliberated on patterns of historic, cultural, and social change, as well as modern social theories, concepts, and disciplines such as future studies, cultural studies, and systems thinking. Our goal is to provide multi-dimensional and multi-layered micro, meso, and macro meta-analyses of the issues affecting Muslim societies in majority and minority contexts.
- What the global social, cultural, and civilizational trends Muslim thinkers and change makers need to be aware of
- What the immediate and long term social challenges facing individual Muslim states are
- What we can learn from influential non-Muslim thinkers and social movements in the recent past and present
- How we can build, sustain, and promote networks that nurture new generations of Muslim scholars, activists, entrepreneurs, and influencers that think in an ummatic way
- What the most impactful ways of working collectively are for addressing the social and civilisational challenges that we face in our separate countries, as an Umma, and as human beings
The study of Islamic Norms tackles questions and problems pertaining to the discourses of Islamic tradition by situating them within the Qur’an and Prophetic model.
This area covers a number of issues pertaining to usul al-fiqh, usul al-din, and fiqh with attention given to those components that are relevant to ummatic thought and practice. This is undertaken with and through an engagement primarily of traditional Islamic scholarship, as well as of worthy contributions from Islamic and religious studies from the academy.
The Ummatics Institute is committed to the Islamic normative tradition, grounded in the Qur’an and Prophetic model. It is thus focused on the study and discourse of Islamic norms. These sharia norms circumscribe and orient the social and political aspirations and actions of the Umma.
While some of these norms are clear, foundational matters of consensus, many more are subject to difference and scholarly reflection, debate, and discourse. It is this latter that we seek to facilitate and further.
Delineating and elaborating on the sharia foundations of ummatics
What is the line between definite (qat’i) and preponderant (dhanni) norms, how is it determined, and what is the methodological scope of valid difference in the latter?
Discussions of sharia norms in terms of specific relevant areas such as political, economic, and social models and transformations
What is the role of shar’i maqasid and modern realities in the determination of applicable shar’i norms in relevant areas?