This article examines a recent Court of Appeal judgment upholding the government’s prohibition of a Catholic publication from using the word “Allah” against the backdrop of Malaysia’s public discourse on Islam and its role in Malaysian state and society. I argue that one can situate and comprehend the judgment as appealing to and realizing a conception of Islam as ethnic identity, which departs from the conception of Islam as a universalist religion. I show how this conception has been gradually constructed in Malaysia’s public discourse, by identifying a (until now) marginal line of judicial precedents that foreshadowed the Court of Appeal’s judgment. Lastly, I highlight the ways in which the judgment affects minority rights and prospects for integration in Malaysia, even as it raises critical questions about Malaysia’s proclaimed status as a moderate and modern Islamic society.

This article examines the role of regulation in advancing a robust or “covenantal” pluralism in Singapore. I argue that a commitment to pluralism requires a regulated space where law provides a critical expressive role in setting out the boundaries of appropriate conduct as well as in modifying social norms. This is crucial to ensure that the dominant values of the religious majority do not hegemonize the common spaces to the exclusion of religious minorities. I examine the use of religious harmony laws in Singapore and its potential for framing the top-down aspect of the concept of covenantal pluralism.

This article examines the legal framework regulating unskilled and low-skilled migrant workers in Singapore. It argues that the current legal framework discriminates against these migrant workers and conceptualizes them as undesirable for inclusion in the wider society. This, it is contended, is premised on the assumption that migrant workers could be sequestered from the local population to some extent. This article provides some challenges to this assumption, highlighting instead some of the broader social and political consequences of this exclusionary legal framework. Consequently, it is argued that a more inclusive and integrationist approach is needed, and some positive developments are highlighted.

Religious harmony is an idea more commonly invoked in Asian countries, many of which are closely associated with non-individualistic or non-liberal approaches to law, ethics, and politics, than in Europe. As a constitutional norm, religious harmony not only directs state action involving the management of religious diversity but also has the potential to legitimate state action. As a result, harmony, including its subspecies of religious harmony, could be and has been criticized for imposing and legitimating an ideology of control over society, particularly over marginalized groups. While this is the case, I argue in this Article that religious harmony can mean many things and can be used in a myriad of ways that go beyond simply as a tool for state control. Religious harmony is not only a legal/constitutional principle, but has also become internalized as a social norm. Its regulating function extends to inter group relations and further grounds group demands on the state, thus imposing state obligations. To draw out the multiple and complex dimensions of religious harmony as a constitutional principle and social norm, I use Singapore, a self-avowed non-liberal communitarian state, as the primary case study in this Article.

This article takes a contextual approach to analyzing judicial engagement with the doctrine of unconstitutional constitutional amendments. It argues that in assessing judicial reception of the basic structure doctrine, and the content of the constitutional identity that such a doctrine seeks to preserve, a normative universalist or even functionalist approach is not sufficient. Instead, such a doctrine should be justified and understood contextually. It is necessary to contextualize constitutional identity in order to give it a robust character, rather than assuming a set of characteristics most often associated with liberal democratic constitutionalism and without understanding the political, social, and economic conditions in which the constitution operates. This article thus uses the example of Malaysia and how the courts have engaged with the basic structure doctrine to show how a contextual approach could have greater explanatory effect, including on why certain issues are more strongly contested in some countries than in others.

This article examines the intersection of religious freedom and minority protection within the Asian context. It argues that, to the extent that a focus on minority protection draws greater attention to the collective and communitarian dimensions of religious practice, it has the potential to enrich the discourse on religious freedom protection. I identify three areas of possible convergence—first, where a minority-focused regime leads to a richer understanding of the intersections between culture, language, and religion; secondly, where a focus on minority protection leads to positive measures by the state to protect religious minorities; and thirdly, where a minority regime founds a right of religious minorities to political participation. Nonetheless, I will also point out that there are limits to minority protection. It may even be a double-edged sword, as it serves to reify differences with the rest of society and risks permanently marginalizing the group as a minority. This could be the case even if there are institutional designs, formal or informal, to provide for religious minorities’ political participation.