This article appears in the following Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State & Society issue: Special Issue: The Veil: Debating Citizenship, Gender and Religious Diversity [View the issue table of contents]
The British Veil Wars
Correspondence: E-mail: s.kilic{at}lancaster.ac.uk
The British Veil Wars maps the space of the British debates on Islamic women's apparel and identifies the political conditions and structures that direct the non regulation of its practice in public institutions, such as schools. The article argues that despite the poignant political dilemmas caused by the 2006 ‘veil debate’ on the niqab (face veil) statutory regulation against its practice was not foreshadowed and the reasons most succinctly identified against its non - regulation is due to not only Britain's citizenship regime but also because of the church and state establishment as well as Article 9 of the European Commission of Human Rights. The article leads to reflections about the process by which the veil became constructed as a response to the political imperatives and failures of British multiculturalism.