In this fascinating new study, Aneeda Jan examines an enduring problem prevailing on an international scale. In the absence of any comprehensive approach, the phenomenon of honor killings is mainly viewed as a social menace than a criminal act demanding global solutions. Why is the menace of honor killing so rampant? How can we analyze or focus on social and legal measures adopted by different countries to prevent honor killings? To what extent have judicial bodies provided guidance to set standards regarding the prevention and control of honor killings? How much have social, moral, religious, and ethical values contributed towards the prevalence or prevention of honor killings? Honor Killings studies variations of the phenomenon and attempts to answer the questions posed above. Examining honor killings in India, Pakistan, and Jordan, Honor Killings is both doctrinal and non-doctrinal in its approach. Perpetrators of honor killings, which are not restricted to any one country or segment of society, demand absolute exemption from punishment. In certain states honor killing is neither recognized nor identified as a crime. It is only recently in certain states, including India, that this crime now falls within the rarest of rare cases deserving harsher punishments as interpreted by the judiciary. Honor killings are rarely reported, and thus the magnitude and extent of the crime cannot be correctly and accurately ascertained. Honor Killings gathers results from qualitative research. The non-doctorial part of the research is based on the data and information collected by questionnaires and interviews. The qualitative approach utilized in this research is uniquely suited to access the actual socio-legal perspective of honor killings. It was only by speaking to the people in their native environments and asking open-ended questions on the topic in the course of interaction that a sense of how honor killings are perceived and maintained in social, legal, moral and religious spheres.
