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My study is about the Islamic reservations to the Convention on the Elimination of All forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and their compatibility under the regime of the Vienna Convention on the Law of the Treaties (VCLT). It is focused in the substantive reservations invoking Shari’a Laws entered by some Muslim countries to the central articles of the Convention which are, therefore, impermissible as incompatible whit the object and purpose of the Convention. I highlight the paradox of maximizing the Convention’s universal application at the cost of compromising its integrity and how substantive reservations to the CEDAW provisions, tolerating discrepancy between states’ laws and practice and the obligations of the Convention, pose a risk to the achievement of the Convention’s goals. I also question if the compatibility criterion of the VCLT is effective in view of acceptance of some substantive reservations of a derogatory nature I consider that the “object and purpose” test is subjective, the practice by the objecting states is not uniform and that looking at those which are (or are not) the objecting states in respect of a particular reservation, it is evident how political or extralegal considerations intervene when states evaluate the compatibility of reservations. I especially focus on the paradox of the objections to a reservation which have the same effect as an acceptance when the objecting and reserving states are still maintaining treaty relation. Therefore, there is no difference in the legal effects of a reservation accepted and one objected without opposing the entry into force of the treaty between itself and the reserving state. I further analyze how reservations invoking Shari’a Law entail conflicting norms (freedom of religion and equality rules). Recalling the view of the “balancing of interest” I argue that it could be a reasonable approach, but in practice it is difficult to find some sort of equilibrium not prejudiced against women. I then analyze if these reservations are suggestive of a wider ideological conflict between women’s rights enunciated in Islam and the ones formulated under the human rights treaties, and how they are representative of the women’s situation in the reserving states. I question what are the motivating factors behind the decision to reserve and if the reservations should be seen in the broader political and socio-economic perspective of domestic and international context? I then ask if the States ratify the Convention affording its objectives as a real commitment or if they only do so at political opportune moments? I consider that is not Islamic religious beliefs, but evolving political situations which are the determinant factors in making these kinds of reservations. I finally analyze the work of the CEDAW Committee considering its efforts disappointing as many of the new Muslim states parties did not pay attention to the criteria set out by the Committee, continuing  to enter either very general reservations or reservations to specific substantive articles. The new states parties with a predominantly Muslim population referred to the Islamic Shari’a Law as prevailing over the Convention without mentioning any specific articles, clearly not following the Committee’s recommendations in the formulation of impermissible reservations.

This paper is an attempt to fill the gap in the literature by presenting a language policy formulated according to the idea of constitutional patriotism that overcomes the charge of ineffectiveness. I will argue that the procedural character of constitutional patriotism and its emphasis on the practice of law-making is best suited to allow for a pragmatic answer to the questions of language policy-making in multicultural societies. Unlike the instrumental and intrinsic arguments, the pragmatic approach views language as the matrix of communication where the goal of engaged citizens is mutual understanding. The pragmatic approach is also more effective because unlike the principled approaches, which tend to homogenize the composition of diverse societies, it constrained by (1) values of political culture of the society; (2.a) historical contingencies such as the founding role of national minorities; and (2.b) practical feasibilities such as size, vitality and concentration of linguistic populations. <br />In recent years the normative status of minority rights as a species of human rights has been widely discussed by political theorists. In this context, the issue of minority language rights is one of the most hotly contested topics in the prevailing debate over the claims of culture. Mainstream political theories approach this topic differently, depending on their view of an appropriate model of political association. Liberal egalitarians emphasize the significance of the liberal ideals of neutrality and autonomy in deciding appropriate language policy, while liberal culturalists focus on the constitutive role of language and culture for the individual’s exercise of rights and liberties that translate into a language policy that ranges from recognitions and accommodation to maintenance and protection of group identity and language.

War’s historical relationship to the creation of territorial nation-states is well known, but what empirical and normative role does war play in creating the citizen in a modern democracy? Although contemporary theories of citizenship and human rights do not readily acknowledge a legitimate, generative function for war – as evidenced by restrictions on aggression, annexation of occupied territory, expulsions, denationalization, or derogation of fundamental rights – an empirical assessment of state practice, including the interpretation of international legal obligations, suggests that war plays a powerfully transformative role in the construction of citizenship, and that international law and norms implicitly accept this. <br />Dominant discourses on citizenship in the liberal and cosmopolitan traditions focus on the individual as the unit of analysis and normative concern, and on his rights against the state. At the same time, the choice of how to construct citizenship – to whom to grant it or from whom to withhold it, and what content to give citizenship – is closely linked to questions of security and identity: citizenship either presupposes or purports to create some measure of common identity among citizens, and implies obligations as well as rights. This chapter argues that, in assessing legal and moral positions, this role – if not necessarily approved – must be accounted for to achieve a fuller understanding of how peace, war and rights are related. <br />Human rights may be conceptualized as universal, but their application and specific content are often mediated through the state, and therefore understanding how states retain the ability to define the contours of citizenship, including through the effects of war, is critical to an understanding of the actual scope of human rights as a legal enterprise and a lived experience. <br />The article will examine the formal limits placed on war as an instrument that could affect citizenship; then it will examine the evidence for war’s continued effect (through means such as differentiation between citizens and alien residents, expulsion of aliens, assimilation of refugee flows, and border changes); then it will advance an argument about how the factual effects of war interact with legal doctrine (such as through selective definition and interpretation of wars, perfection of wartime changes in peace treaties, and novel demographic changes introduced by peace treaties). <br />The article considers the concepts of participation, loyalty, and treason; the evidence and implications of wartime propaganda; the rules and practice governing transfer of populated territory between sovereigns; the incentives that the laws of war create for individuals’ identification with the state; and the accommodation in peace plans of demographic change wrought by war. <br />Principal reference is made to changes in citizenship status following the wars of the former Yugoslavia, the Algerian decolonization, the postwar settlement of Europe, and to the debates about the contours of citizenship in Israel and the Palestinian territories.

Freedom of religion in the sense of freedom of belief and of religious manifestations; in teaching, practice, worship and observance is one of the basic human rights laid down in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, art. 18. Freedom of religion in this sense is considered to be an important right and to play an important role in keeping up social peace in society. Germany, being a secular state with a historical connection to Christian religion, has anchored this right of religious freedom in is constitution in Article 4.According to Art. 7/3 religious education in state- run schools is accomplished in accordance with the religious communities. This religious education is normally provided for by the Catholic and Protestant Churches, but also by the Jewish community.  There are 3,2 Mio Muslims in Germany , especially from Turkey, but also from the Arab countries and Iran. Most of these Muslims do not plan to return to their native countries and will remain in Germany.They do enjoy freedom of religion in the above-mentioned sense. In my paper I will deal with the question of how religious manifestations of the Muslims in Germany “in teaching, practice, worship and observance “is accomplished. <br />I shall focus on their religious education and endeavor to answer the following questions: What does Islamic education mean in Germany, in a secular state? Who provides for it and how? How does it differ from religious education in Islamic countries? How is it seen by the German society? I will deal with these questions on two levels (1) on the national level and (2) on the local level. On the national level a clear effort of the German state can be seen to integrate the Muslim minority as a religious group into the German state. <br />For this reason the German Minister Wolfgang Schäuble convened in 2006 the so called “Islamkonferenz inviting jurists, scholars of Islamic studies and representatives of the different Muslim communities as well as independent persons to talk about the situation of Muslims in Germany. The unsolved question still is: how the different Islamic groups comprising Muslims from different social, political and religious backgrounds and from different countries as Turkey, Arab states, Iran, Afghanistan with different national Islamic traditions could find a common platform of religious Islamic belief in a secular state. By establishing the Coordinating Council (Koordinierungsrat) of Muslims in Germany in April 2007, some larger Islamic organizations tried to create a common structure for the representation of all Muslims. So far this organization has not been recognized by the German state as the official representative of all Muslims, but the discussions at the “Islamkonferenz” are not yet finished and are still going on. <br />One of the main aims of the Muslim Organizations is to gain the right to give Islamic religious lessons at German state-run schools. Whereas on the national level the integration of Islam as a religion within the secular system is discussed, on the local level religious teaching is currently taking place within different projects in many selected state schools in Germany as well as in local mosques. Religious teaching at mosques will be discussed by taking the example of mosques in Goettingen, a small university town in Central Germany. There are two main mosques in Goettingen: one belonging to the Turkish community (Ditib) and the other being an Arab mosque. <br />I shall sketch the concept of religious education given in this Arab mosque with regard to its content and the way it is taught to the children, whether it corresponds to the classical Islamic education and which concepts, beliefs, rituals and cultic acts are being considered important for children growing up in a completely secular context? <br />Finally, I shall compare this approach at the local level with the efforts made on the national level and discuss how these different efforts are judged by the German society. 

The key problem addressed in the paper is that of the legal pluralism, more specifically the pluralism of legal systems within one state that pursues the accommodation of religious freedom claims. In its controversial Refah decisions the Strasbourg Court held that the prohibition of the Turkish Welfare Party was “necessary in a democratic society” because its plan to set up a plurality of legal systems was not “compatible with fundamental democratic principles”[1]. This paper tries to inquire into the notion of legal pluralism, tries to test normative assumptions made by the Court in its regard and argues that a “no plurality” approach would be overly simplistic and that a liberal approach would require different degrees of pluralization (some of which already exist to accommodate differences and diversity within a society) to be extended to religion, without however endangering constitutional democracy. <br />It is necessary to point out at least two major theoretical contexts in which this problem should be considered. One is undoubtedly the issue of ‘militant’ democracy: once we assume that constitutional democracy and legal pluralism are incompatible, we give a (part of) definition of democracy, which entitles us to reject any changes proposed to it while retaining the claim to be democratic. If we know what is democracy in a substantive sense, which values it is designed to protect (e.g. secularism or fundamental rights) we can legitimately reject any changes to that vision as a measure protective of such values[2]. <br />Another context that is relevant is the issue of universality and cultural relativism. It first appears when we attempt to define democracy as a substantive notion, which necessarily assumes a value judgement. It also becomes relevant if we mind that the rationale of legal pluralism is the necessity to recognize, respect and tolerate different views and visions of ‘happiness’. In its pure form the idea of relativism and legal pluralism is represented in the classical version of state-centered international law system, where states posses equal and unlimited internal sovereignty[3]. However even within the State any kind and instance of legal pluralism is about the respect and tolerance of the different normative values and views. Only straightforward consensus on all the rules and values as universal can justify total rejection of legal pluralism. <br />The paper will start by an attempt to clarify the understandings of legal pluralism in social sciences and law. The second part will try to construe a liberal argument in favor of advancing legal pluralism to a certain degree, basing on the individual right to freedom of religion and conscience. Instead of relying on the ‘collective rights’ argument, it rather believes that individual rights provide a sufficient basis for this claim, as far as religious life and consciousness are deemed an important part of individual personality and self-determination. The third part tries to balance the claims of legal pluralism by considering arguments against such a model of society. <br /><br clear="all" /> <br /> <br />[1] Case Of Refah Partisi (The Welfare Party) And Others v. Turkey, <em>(Applications nos. 41340/98, 41342/98, 41343/98 and 41344/98) </em>Judgment, 31 July 2001 [hereinafter <em>Refah (1)</em>] paras 70-71;<em>See also </em>Case of Refah Partisi (the Welfare Party) and Others v. Turkey <em>(Applications nos. 41340/98, 41342/98, 41343/98 and 41344/98), </em>judgment, 13 February 2003, [hereinafter <em>Refah(2)</em>] paras 98 and 119. <br /> <br /> <br />[2] See <em>infra</em>, text accompanying notes 35-39. <br /> <br /> <br />[3] See <em>infra</em>, note 8, text for the note 25 and page 14.