Reconceptualizing the nation-state: Religion, personal law, and ethnic conflict in India, 1920-1986

The dissertation examines the effect of personal laws on ethnic conflict in India. Traditional conceptions of the nation-state assume that a nation must apply uniform laws to all its citizens. However, many countries apply different laws to different groups. In this system of personal laws, laws pertaining to marriage and property rights are governed by an individual's religion, tribe, ethnicity or custom. The personal laws were first institutionalized by the British in India in 1772, and subsequently in most African, Asian, and Caribbean colonies, as well as parts of the Muslim world. When these countries attained independence, most (including India) retained the personal laws as a way to preserve ethnic harmony and cultural autonomy among different ethnic groups. This seemed to work well until 1984, when ethnic conflict over the personal laws developed between India's majority Hindu and minority Muslim communities. How did personal laws--institutionalized as a way to prevent ethnic conflict--become a source of ethnic conflict in India in the last decade?;The dissertation examines three periods in India (1860-1947; 1948-1957; and 1984-1986) to determine the conditions under which ethnic conflict over the personal laws developed. Ethnic conflict over the personal laws was caused by Hindu interference in Muslim personal law after 1984. Prior to 1984, different communities refrained from interfering in each other's personal laws. In 1984, however, parts of the Hindu community began mobilizing to reform Muslim personal law or even abolish the personal laws and establish one, uniform law (as in the traditional conception of the nation-state). This mobilization led to Hindu-Muslim conflict over the personal laws.;India's experience indicates that we must re-think the assumption of legal uniformity underlying the traditional conception of the nation-state. In India, ethnic harmony prevailed when the personal laws of different communities were not threatened. Ethnic conflict over the personal laws erupted only when one community began calling for a uniform law to replace the personal laws. Thus a new conception of the nation-state, that accommodates legal diversity, may be more relevant for many of today's multi-ethnic states than the traditional "one nation, one law" conception.