Abstract
ABSTRACT Against the international backdrop of rising religious tensions, this article explores contemporary civil society views on religious freedom in Bangladesh. It uses critical frame analysis of the corpus of civil society organizations’ (CSOs) submissions to the United Nations’ third cycle Universal Periodic Review (UPR), 2013–18. It provides a timely assessment of Bangladesh’s fulfilment of international obligations on religious freedom, and shows how the politicization of religion and the resultant conflict between ‘secularism’ and ‘extremism’ have been fuelling inter-communal tensions and religious intolerance. In particular, CSOs’ UPR submissions present powerful accounts of the principal human rights pathology affecting the country today, religious-based violence. This is accompanied by a narrative of police malpractice, judicial failings, discrimination, oppression and incitement. A further key finding is ‘situated knowledge’ or first-hand accounts of legal restrictions and government repression of civil society organizations. Consonant with the classical work of liberal theorists, we argue that unprecedented importance now attaches to safeguarding civil society criticality in order to defend religious freedom and uphold human rights in the Republic.
Highlights
Bangladesh is a country with marked faith-based tensions
As the following analysis reveals, such factors underpin a series of contemporary pathologies such as restrictions on civil society, corruption in public administration and government failure to respond to earlier Universal Periodic Review (UPR) recommendations
The first relates to governmentality – not least, periods of authoritarian rule, patronage and the exercise of executive power. The pathologies in this group include: restrictions on civil society, corruption in public administration and government failure to respond to earlier UPR recommendations
Summary
Bangladesh is a country with marked faith-based tensions. These have been recently thrown into stark relief following the Fifteenth Amendment to the Constitution in 2011 that confirmed Islam as the State religion of the Republic. This rise of radical Islam has threatened constitutional values such as democracy and secularism.1 It has violated the country’s obligations under a raft of UN human rights treaties that uphold the principle of religious freedom. In order to provide an in-depth understanding of inherent meanings, lived experiences and sentiments around contemporary religious freedom issues, it uses textual analysis to examine CSOs’ use of language – or, ‘framing’ in the discourse Such a methodology emerges from – and, at the same time helps to inform us of – the challenges posed by seeking to apply the universalist norms underpinning UN rights agreements in specific governance contexts with their own cultures, histories and governing traditions. The part (‘Current Challenges’) discusses the political turmoil, the rise of extremism and challenges facing civil society
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