Impact of counter-terrorism measures on muslim community organizations : a comparative US and UK analysis
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- After 9/11, counter-terrorism law and policy rapidly evolved, with the charitable sector being caught up in much of the discourse. Governments regarded charities—particularly Muslim ones—as at risk of being misused by terrorists, and therefore increased regulatory scrutiny. The US and UK have broadly similar legal systems and counter-terrorism goals, but the strategies towards charities are prima facie different. The US approach has been described as a "sledgehammer, " favoring adversarial and prosecutorial modes. On the other hand, the UK model has been described as a "scalpel, " where regulators like the Charity Commission appear to be more collaborative and nurturing of the sector. While previous research has focused on cases and legal analysis, it has not thoroughly investigated the broader impact on the Muslim community organization sector. This dissertation has two broad aims. Firstly, it takes an empirical approach to understanding the impact in the US and the UK by using semi-structured interviews with Muslim community organizations. Secondly, it examines whether or not the different charity regulatory framework mediates the differential impact on Muslim community organizations. The results are somewhat counter-intuitive: despite the differences in the regulatory framework, there were some impacts from counter-terrorism scrutiny that were common to both countries. In both the US and the UK, organizations' financial management, funding sources, and relationships with law enforcement and their local communities have been affected, and mosques and Muslim student groups appear to have shifted away from political or controversial topics to provide space only for spiritual or religious discussions. Despite the absence of a regulator such as the Charity Commission, and no legal or regulatory requirement to do so, US Muslim organizations also emphasized the importance of professionalization and improved transparency and accountability. Furthermore, the "scalpel versus sledgehammer" characterization seems inadequate. By separately looking at functions of charity regulation, I show more precisely the nuances in experience and argue that the Charity Commission's approach is not as scalpel-like as is described in the literature. Instead, organizations in both countries appeared to be operating under a form of self-regulation in the shadow of the state. It is not the formal law, or the form of regulation which dictated action, but rather, it was the perceived threat of state action that motivated behavioral change.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2015 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Chong, Agnes Hoi-Shan |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, School of Law JSD. |
| Primary advisor | Friedman, Lawrence |
| Thesis advisor | Friedman, Lawrence |
| Thesis advisor | Martinez, Jenny S |
| Thesis advisor | Sinnar, Shirin |
| Advisor | Martinez, Jenny S |
| Advisor | Sinnar, Shirin |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Agnes Hoi-Shan Chong. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the School of Law JSD. |
| Thesis | Thesis (JSD)--Stanford University, 2015. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2015 by Agnes Hoi-Shan Chong
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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