ABSTRACT
This chapter describes three major concepts and provides its central structure: power as a negotiation, law as a process, and state and subject as mutually dependent. It argues that "Islamic law," needs to be problematized and explores that the political contexts of its formation at various historical junctures are crucial for understanding what Islamic law is, what actors and institutions are involved in it, and how it functions within the modern state. Law and legal codes are not treated here simply as written documents, but as performances of values and authority. The chapter suggests that the scope of Islamic law was progressively limited in scope to the sphere of "private" religious practice and family law, and its authority allied to, and eventually co-opted by, state institutions and actors. The Perak chiefs were granted state incomes through the Treaty of Perak, which were to replace their main source of revenue—taxes they collected on goods and trade, mainly along the river courses.
