Challenges of implementing restorative justice for intimate partner violence: An Islamic perspective

ABSTRACT

Intimate partner violence (IPV) is currently recognized as a critical public health concern and a human rights issue. Not surprisingly, Muslims – a religiously and socio-culturally diverse faith-based populace – are not an exception. To address this complex area of criminal justice and social policy, some scholars advocate implementing restorative justice (RJ) approaches. While RJ approaches have been traditionally used in Islamic cultures for conflict resolutions, to date, few studies have investigated how RJ operates in dealing with IPV in Muslim countries and communities. This article explores how RJ approaches towards IPV operate in some Muslim countries/communities, and offers insights into developing culturally and religiously appropriate ways of implementing RJ in IPV situations among Muslims. Given the prevalence of IPV among Muslims, the question is particularly important and timely. Taking exclusively limited examples of RJ approaches that have been used to mediate IPV cases in Muslim countries and communities, this paper found one significant challenge in the RJ approaches among Muslims: community acceptance of IPV. To reduce IPV in Muslim society, it is necessary to develop treatment models and techniques that meet cultural and religious needs. This paper found that since RJ is not alien to Islamic teachings, RJ approaches can be implemented effectively in dealing with IPV among Muslims by ensuring justice and equity of the abused woman. The findings of this paper will assist policymakers, practitioners, and service providers in providing religiously and culturally appropriate care when addressing IPV issues among Muslims.     

Abused Women in Taiwan Who Seek Religious Support

ABSTRACT

This research explores the types of religious healing that abused women use and surveys their experiences with these practices in Taiwan. Fifteen semi-structured interviews were conducted with a sample of abused women, who had been recruited from 12 agencies. The findings show that participants sought religious healing for a variety of reasons, and that they had both positive experiences (e.g., useful religious support) and negative experiences (e.g., encountering deceptive jitongs and spending a large amount of money on services) regardingr the support provided by different religions. This study also found that women who believed in traditional Eastern religions had more negative experiences than women who believed in Western religions.     

Issues in the integration of religious education and worldviews education in an intercultural context

ABSTRACT

The Council of Europe’s 2008 ‘Recommendation’ advocates the study of ‘non-religious convictions’ in schools in addition to religions. In 2018, there is evidence of growing academic interest in the inclusion of non-religious worldviews in the school curriculum, but few European countries include such a study within religious education. The guidance document, Signposts, recognises that the integration of religions and non-religious worldviews is problematic for policy makers, teacher trainers and schools and that there is a need for further research. Norway and England are at significant but different stages in the process of integration. This article presents a comparative study which draws on the findings of research in both countries which has investigated the process at classroom and policy levels, and issues raised by this. Four issues are explored: practical challenges; differing understandings of the concept of worldviews; the inclusion of non-religious worldviews as a political issue and influences on the selection of worldviews. The article concludes with a discussion of issues and findings within a supranational context and makes recommendations which highlight the value of integration and the need for both contextual studies and further comparative research.     

East European assimilation and (re)integration: the interwar legacies of transatlantic migration and “Russian” Orthodox conversion (1918–1939)

In the 1920s and 30s, mass conversion movements to “Russian” Orthodoxy emerged among Greek Catholics in Czechoslovakia and Poland, comprising a new chapter in a continuing saga of conversion which began in the late nineteenth century, in what was then Austria–Hungary. Pre-1914 conversion movements arose in large part due to transatlantic migration – especially return migration – between Austria–Hungary and the Americas. Americanists have generally treated the 1920s and 30s as the era when transnational migration’s impact waned owing to US immigration restrictions, while East Europeanists have minimized or ignored the impact of transnational migration upon East European regions. Interwar Catholic-to-Orthodox conversions, however, are not merely attributable to historical legacy: transatlantic migration continued to influence the dynamics of conversion as an active, contemporary force. As had been true prior to World War I, returning migrants and their families comprised the most significant constituency of the movements after the war; migrants remaining in the Americas supported the East European movements with economic and social remittances, and activists on either side of the Orthodox/Catholic divide treated the conversions as transnational phenomena. This essay analyzes the impact of transnational migration upon shifting ethnoreligious identifications, in the context of shifting social, national, and geopolitical circumstances, 1918–1939.     

人口流动对基督教全球传播的影响

基督教流动人口是基督教在全球传播过程中的关键因素。在基督教存在的前五个世纪,广泛的人口流动将基督教变成了全球化的信仰。广泛的人口流动在其它主要的世界宗教在世界各地的传播过程中也发挥了重要作用,但是,就基督教来说,流动可能是这种信仰固有的因素。基督教超越罗马帝国成为全球性信仰是个非常复杂的过程,包含许多不同类型的人口流动。跨国界的领袖们、俘虏、难民和流浪者、商人是人口流动的四种主要类型。虽然,东部教会传教的成功是短暂的,但是东部教会在第一个千年形成的移民传教模式无疑为21世纪的基督教提供了典范。基督教在过去的两三个世纪里再次全球化,基督信仰作为新的中心在非洲、拉丁美洲和亚洲的某些地区出现,表明"人口流动"在基督教全球传播过程中的作用比以前更加明显。当代基督教的全球化与早期基督教的全球化在发展道路上有很大不同,但有一点是不变的,即基督教的全球化仍将主要依靠流动者的行动和决策。     

试论城市化进程中的民族关系--以对临夏市的调查为视点

临夏市作为西北民族地区的一个小城市,在城市化进程中,其民族关系也会受到影响.针对临夏市的实际情况及学术界的研究现状,我们选取临夏市城市化进程中变化较大的几个变量,即民族居住格局的变迁、人口流动的影响、民族通婚的增减以及宗教因素,作为研究重点来衡量城市化进程中的民族关系.在此基础上得出临夏市各民族之间的关系总体上是平等、团结、互助、合作的社会主义新型民族关系,和谐平等的民族关系占据了主导地位的结论,并归纳出城市化进程中临夏市的民族关系具有主从性、敏感性、易发性、历史性、隐蔽性、复杂性等特点,最后提出临夏市各族群众必须解决自身的定位问题,建立临夏市和谐民族关系的良性运转机制.     

宗教信仰与族群边界--以保安族为例

“回回”原为一个以宗教来认同的族群集体。建国以后 ,国家承认了“回回”的民族身份 ,定名为回族 ,并依据斯大林民族定义进一步将原一律包含进“回回人”中的别具自身文化特点的一些群体识别为单独的少数民族 ,如保安族、东乡族和撒拉族。这样 ,在甘青宁地区穆斯林社会中又出现了一道新的社会边界———民族。那么 ,在当代社会生活中 ,在这个由宗教提供最主要的社会互动关联体系的社会中 ,人们如何区分群体 ?怎样确定群体之间的互动规则 ?基于宗教信仰差异的社会边界和国家认定的民族边界分别发挥着什么样的作用 ?社会生活中真实的族群边界是什么 ?本文试图以保安族为例回答上述问题。     

和谐社会视阈下云南宗教文化融合摭谈

宗教文化和谐是建设社会主义和谐文化的要义之一。作为全国宗教和谐的典型代表省份之一,云南宗教文化融合的本土民族化、民俗化与世俗化,诠释着多元宗教兼容并蓄的"宗教生态平衡",对于构建社会主义和谐社会大有裨益。     

From a ‘sort of Muslim’ to ‘proud to be Alevi’: the Alevi religion and identity project combatting the negative identity among second-generation Alevis in the UK

ABSTRACT

This article explains how the negative identity of second-generation Alevi-Kurds in the UK has been transmitted intergenerationally, linked to their history of persecuted exclusion in Turkey and to the transnational settlement of Alevi migrants in the UK, and how this sense of marginalization and invisibility in the receiving country can be addressed. Education is identified as a starting point for the underachievement and disaffection of Alevi pupils, which can lead them into more serious trouble and descent into the rainbow underclass. In the quest to tackle this identity issue, a unique collaborative action research project was set up between an Alevi community centre, local schools and a university to develop the world’s first Alevi lessons as part of the compulsory Religious Education curriculum in British schools. The Alevi Religion and Identity Project is described and evaluated in terms of its outcomes, especially its contribution towards a more positive Alevi identity as a reflection of a vibrant community.     

宗教应对:少数民族压力应对研究的新视角

宗教与应对密切相关,当宗教的行为和思想用于压力应对时,这样的应对便称为宗教应对。文中对宗教应对的内涵、宗教对我国少数民族压力应对的影响进行了阐述,指出宗教应对是少数民族压力应对的一种特殊方式,包括宗教行为应对和宗教思想应对。研究少数民族宗教应对具有重要的现实意义。