European Court of Human Rights’ judgements and compulsory religious education in Turkey

Abstract

ABSTRACT Turkey is the only country that has twice lost cases concerning the violation of parents’ freedom to ensure their children an education in conformity with their own religious and philosophical convictions at the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR). This article firstly seeks to present these court cases. It then moves to the official responses to these cases, especially the curriculum and textbook reforms. The article then discusses some possible ways of reforming compulsory religious education course in Turkey, taking into account the ECtHR judgements and the Turkish laws, as well as the arguments of the government and the applicants in the ECtHR cases, as we believe, a balance needs to be found to achieve a workable solution