Stumbling Blocks to the Secularization of Personal Status Laws in the Lebanese Republic (1926-2013)

2015 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Farha
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political System ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Personal Status ◽  
Kinship Ties ◽  
Status Code ◽  
Inheritance Laws

Despite recurrent efforts to introduce a civil personal status code since 1926, personal status laws in Lebanon remain regulated by the confessional codices of the country’s eighteen denominations. This article examines how efforts at secularization were repeatedly thwarted due to veto rights accorded to sectarian heads in the Lebanese Constitution. The codification of sectarian marriage and inheritance laws is related to Lebanon’s confessional political system and to the attendant perpetuation of kinship ties and fluctuating confessional attitudes. The latter are measured and compared diachronically with a series of surveys. Paradoxically, the chronic weakness of the Lebanese state would render top-down reform measures an exceedingly difficult task even as it opened the space for increasingly effective civil society activism aimed at dismantling the juridical hegemony of the sects.

The Reform of the Moudawana: The Role of Women's Civil Society Organizations in Changing the Personal Status Code in Morocco

Hawwa ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 309-333 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oriana Wuerth
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Constant Pressure ◽  
Civil Society Organizations ◽  
Law And Society ◽  
Women’S Rights ◽  
Personal Status ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Status Code

AbstractThe relationship between society and law is dynamic and complex, as laws are both the reflection of the society that creates them and the sculptor of the society over which they rule. These two forces exert constant pressure on one another, and if law and society do not adequately mirror each other, tension is likely to result. Law is not a static entity, but rather must adapt itself to society as changes occur within that society; similarly, as law changes, society too will evolve. This process can be seen in Morocco, where the Moudawana, or Personal Status Code, viewed by many as an inherently discriminatory text, has been undergoing a process of reform. The reforms in January of 2004 were both an attempt to increase women's rights and participation in society and a result of women's increased economic and political participation.

OBJECTIVES AND FUNCTIONS OF LOBISTRY ACTIVITY IN UKRAINE: REALITIES TODAY AND EVOLUTIONARY FORECAST

2018 ◽  
Vol 1 (12) ◽  
pp. 329-339
Author(s):  
Tikhon Sergeyevich Yarovoy
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Political System ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Public Interests ◽  
The Public ◽  
Political Events ◽  
The Developed Countries ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Industrial Groups

The article is devoted to the research of goals and functions of lobbying activity. The author has processed the ideas of domestic and foreign scientists, proposed his own approaches to the definition of goals and functions of lobbying activities through the prism of public administration. As a result, a generalized vision of the goals and functions of lobbying activities as interrelated elements of the lobbying system was proposed, and a forecast for further evolution of the goals and functions of domestic lobbying was provided. The analysis of lobbying functions allowed us to notice the tendencies in shifting the goals of this activity. If the objectives were fully covered by functions such as mediation between citizens and the state, the information function and the function of organizing plurality of public interests, then the role of strengthening the self-organization of civil society and the function of compromise become increasingly important in the process of formation in the developed countries of civil society and the development of telecommunication technologies. Ukrainian lobbyism will not be left to the side of this process. Already, politicians of the highest level, leaders of financial and industrial groups have to act, adjust their goals (even if they are — declared), taking into account the reaction of the public. In the future, this trend will only increase. The analysis of current research and political events provides all grounds for believing that, while proper regulatory legislation is being formed in Ukraine, the goals and functions of domestic lobbying will essentially shift towards a compromise with the public. It is noted that in spite of the existence of a basic direction of action, lobbying may have several ramified goals. Guided by the goals set, lobbyism can manifest itself in various spheres of the political system of society, combining the closely intertwined interests of various actors in the lobbying process, or even — contrasting them.

Legislating for a Market Economy in China

2007 ◽  
Vol 191 ◽  
pp. 567-585 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donald C. Clarke
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Market Economy ◽  
Law Reform ◽  
Business Organizations ◽  
Top Down ◽  
National Legislation ◽  
Chinese Law ◽  
Legal Structure ◽  
Secured Transactions ◽  
Do So

AbstractSince the early 1990s, China has come a long way in legislating the foundational rules for its reformed economy. Virtually all of the important areas – contracts, business organizations, securities, bankruptcy and secured transactions, to name a few – are now covered by national legislation as well as lower-level regulations. Yet an important feature of a legal structure suited to a market economy is missing: the ability of the system to generate from below solutions to problems not adequately dealt with by existing legislation. The top-down model that has dominated Chinese law reform efforts to date can only do so much. What is needed now is a more welcoming attitude to market-generated solutions to the gaps and other problems that will invariably exist in legislation. The state's distrust of civil-society institutions and other bottom-up initiatives suggests, however, that this different approach will not come easily.

scholarly journals A Pandemia Covid-19 e o Estado de Emergência em Portugal: Breves Considerações Sobre Políticas Públicas

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 ◽  
pp. 33-45
Author(s):  
Leandro Berenguer ◽  
◽  
Keyword(s):  
Civil Society ◽  
Public Policies ◽  
Third Republic ◽  
Theoretical Framework ◽  
The State ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Top Down ◽  
State Of Emergency ◽  
The Third ◽  
First Time

The COVID-19 pandemic prompted States to adopt exceptional measures to contain their spreads rates and therefore mitigate their effects. In Portugal there was a need to resort to the figure of the state of emergency, being used for the first time since the foundation of the third Republic. To respond to a situation of public calamity, the suspension, albeit partial, of fundamental rights, freedoms and guarantees was used, adopting measures with repercussions in the most varied areas of civil society. Based on the security context of a State, this article intends to analyse the declarations of the state of emergency in Portugal in the light of the theoretical framework of public policies, reflecting on the process of implementing the state of emergency. To this end, the top-down and bottom-up approaches are placed in confrontation as the main theories of public policies implementation in the analysis of the unprecedented political context in Portugal.

The Psychology of the Main Social Groups

2020 ◽  
pp. 102-138
Author(s):  
Jon Elster
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Social Hierarchy ◽  
Top Down ◽  
Old Regime ◽  
Local Authorities ◽  
Bottom Up ◽  
Royal Court ◽  
The Social

This chapter refers to the beliefs of individuals that occupied various positions in the structures of the old regime. For histoire des mentalités, the chapter tries to determine popular beliefs, elite beliefs, and beliefs about beliefs in accordance with reasons given in the Madisonian caveats. It also analyzes the behavior of the main agents in the economic and political system, which includes the peasantry, local authorities, several urban groupings, the parlements, provincial estates, the royal administration, the royal court, and the king himself. It includes the top-down beliefs of the authorities about their subjects and the bottom-up beliefs of the subjects about the authorities. This chapter also describes beliefs of the members of any group in the social hierarchy about other members of the same group.

Women, Islam, and the Moroccan State: The Struggle over the Personal Status Law

2005 ◽  
Vol 59 (3) ◽  
pp. 393-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bruce Maddy-Weitzman
Keyword(s):  
Family Law ◽  
Women's Groups ◽  
New Family ◽  
Women’S Groups ◽  
Political Forces ◽  
Personal Status ◽  
The Status ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Status Code ◽  
Status Of Women

Since 1991, the status of women in Morocco has been the subject of widespread debate. Efforts by women's groups and liberal political forces to change the Shari'a-based Personal Status Code (moudawwana), were vigorously opposed by conservative and Islamist forces. For both sides, the issue was central to their overall orientations towards “tradition” and “modernity”. King Muhammad VI ultimately tipped the balance in favor of change. The resulting new Family Law may well mark a milestone in Moroccan society's evolution.

Civil Society, Social Movements and the Irish State

2010 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peadar Kirby
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Civil Society ◽  
Political System ◽  
Free Market ◽  
The State ◽  
The Political ◽  
Social Partnership ◽  
Corporate Profit ◽  
Fianna Fail

This article develops a theoretical framework to consider the symbiotic relationship between civil society, social movements and the Irish state. Civil society, largely through social movements, laid the foundations for an independent Irish state in the half-century before independence. Following independence, the nature of the civil society–state relationship changed; civil society became much more dependent on the state. The article empirically traces the nature of society's relationship to the state since the 1920s, and examines the nature of the political system and its major political party, Fianna Fáil, the structure of the economy, and the dominance of particular understandings of the role of civil society and the nature of society itself. The period since the advent of social partnership in 1987 is examined; this period marks a new attempt by the state to co-opt organised civil society making it subservient to its project of the imposition on society of the requirements of global corporate profit-making. The more forceful implementation of a global free-market project by the Irish state since the 1980s, and the co-option of organised civil society into this project, has left huge space for an alternative to emerge, the potential of which was indicated by the success of the ‘No’ campaign in the 2008 Lisbon referendum campaign.

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