Zubair Abbasi is an Associate Professor at the Shaikh Ahmad Hassan School of Law, Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS). His work focuses on the relationship between sharī‘a and state law in South Asia, Middle East, and Western Europe; Islamic law and jurisprudence (uṣūl al-fiqh) in contemporary world; and comparative law, family law and constitutional law.
He completed his DPhil in Law at Oxford University. In his doctoral thesis titled “Sharī‘a under the English Legal System in British India: Awqāf (Endowments) in the Making of Anglo-Muhammadan Law,” he explored the formation of Muslim Personal Law in British India. His current research project explores the process of judicial Islamization of laws in Pakistan by examining the judgments of the Federal Shariat Court—a special court mandated to exercise Islamic judicial review. This project analyses the sources, methodologies, and methodological tools used by the judges of the Federal Shariat Court and evaluates the impact of Islamization of laws upon the legal system in Pakistan.
His recent publications include a co-authored book, Family Laws in Pakistan (Oxford University Press 2018). He has also published numerous articles in Islamic Law and Society, Journal of Islamic Studies, and Journal of Law, Religion and State. He is the Chief Editor of the LUMS Law Journal and an Editor for the Harvard Law School’s SHARIAsource. He held research fellowships at Oxford University.
At LUMS, he teaches Islamic Jurisprudence, Muslim Personal Law, Contract Law, and Comparative Corporate Law & Governance. He taught Comparative Law, and Islamic Law Reform as a visiting Professor at the American University in Cairo during Spring 2017. He has also been providing legal training to judges at the Punjab Judicial Academy for the past several years.
Post History
Authored Works
- Conjoined Twins: Human Rights and Islam in the Constitutional System of Pakistan
- Islamic Judicial Review in Practice (3): Sharia and State Law
- Islamic Judicial Review in Practice (2): Strategic Islamization of Laws
- Islamic Judicial Review in Practice (1): Decolonization through Islamization of Laws
- The Impact of Islamic Judicial Review in Pakistan
- Islamic Constitutionalism in Pakistan: Is it Theocratic?
- Islamic Constitutionalism in Pakistan: Does it Matter?
- Marriage as Children’s Play: Unregistered Islamic Marriages under English Law
- Commentary :: Criminalization of Triple Ṭalāq in India: A Dilemma for Religiously Divorced but Legally Married Muslim Women
- Reasserting the Authority of State: Comment on Asia Bibi v The State
- Commentary: The Judicial Committee of the Privy Council and Islamic Endowments (Awqāf)
- In Response to the Indian Supreme Court’s Recent Decision on Triple Ṭalāq: A Legislative Proposal
- Federal Shariat Court of Pakistan on Surrogacy: From Judicial Islamization of Laws to Judicial Legislation
- Women’s Right to Divorce under Islamic Law in Pakistan and India
- The Long Shadow of England’s Privy Council Cast on the Islamic Law of Trusts in British India
Other Scholarship
- Islamic Law Scholars’ Round-Up: Apr 8
- Recent Scholarship: Abbasi on Islamic Divorce Law
- In the News: Triple Ṭalāq Criminalized in India
- FEATURE :: Roundtable on Pakistan’s Landmark Blasphemy Case: Asia Bibi v. The State (2018)
- Recent Scholarship: Cheema and Abbasi on Islamic Family Law in Pakistan
- Round-up on Triple Ṭalāq