Governance Of Religious Diversity Research Articles

Governing the (in)visible: religious diversity, gender equality and LGBTQI+ rights in Catalonia

ABSTRACT The governance of religious diversity in contemporary Europe has had a long and complex history, one further complicated by the more recent crystallisation of progressive values such as gender equality and LGBTQI+ rights. In Catalonia, the political recognition and public visibility of religious diversity is marked by various tensions and negotiations amongst key local actors, especially where gender equality and LGBTQI+ rights are concerned. This contribution delves into the nuanced political dynamics surrounding the governance of religious plurality in three understudied cities of Catalonia: Santa Coloma de Gramenet, Vic, and Lleida. Our aim is twofold: firstly, to identify local-level mechanisms and protocols addressing the intersection of religious diversity, gender equality and LGBTQI+ rights. Secondly, to examine the challenges municipal actors face when engaging with the politics of these intersectional identities. Drawing on evidence from interviews with local stakeholders, observations of public events, and analysis of municipal plans and policies, we contend that while there are visible political efforts to promote diversity, equality, and coexistence, there remains a lack of cohesive strategies at the municipal level. Despite these challenges, stakeholders recognise the imperative and potential advantages of developing intersectional approaches.

Governance of religious diversity in Central Europe: A religious nationalism inspired illiberal turn in Hungary and Slovakia?

Central European countries with a historically dominant Roman Catholic heritage belong to a particular cluster in respect to the governance of religion. This paper focuses on Hungary and Slovakia and addresses the effect of religious nationalism on the regimes of governance of religion in the two countries. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, there was a brief period of neutral stance towards religion, which was characterized by liberal values. With the introduction of the bilateral Concordat agreements with the Holy See, both countries started to treat traditional Christian Churches preferentially. By the 2010s legislation in both countries created restrictive entry barriers for “new” religions. This created two or multi-tiered systems for “old” and “new” religions, in which the former enjoyed closer relationship with the state. As a result, the separation of church and state has become blurred. Preferentially treated churches reappeared in the public space as providers of certain educational and social services. Preferentially treated churches and the state developed asymmetrically interdependent relationships, the state having the upper hand. Meanwhile, increasingly populist and nationalist parties instrumentalized religion by involving Christianity in their nationalistic political discourse. This helped create a normative space, in which the state is able to give further preferential treatment to certain religious groups over others. The emphasis on Christian national identity underpinned these governments’ narratives that conflates migration with security and Islam, which pushed those religious groups on the margins, which do not fit in the religious nationalist narrative of the increasingly right- and populism-leaning governing elite.

Introduction: All quiet on the Eastern front? Recent dynamics in the governance of religion in post-communist Europe

Although decades have passed since the constituent republics of what used to be the USSR and the member-states of its satellite Warsaw Pact dropped off the communist rule, in many regards, the countries of Eastern Europe continue to be in transition. One of the areas where this transition is clearly observable in these countries is the governance of religious diversity. In the aftermath of the collapse of communism, most of the states in the region adopted liberal regimes of the governance of religion as well as pro-diversity tendencies, which allowed for the burgeoning and thriving of various religious collectivities. Recently, however, there has been an observable purported turn away from a generally positive attitude in regards to religious diversity in different parts of the region from alleged freedom towards greater control of religious collectivities and their activities. To account for such processes, this special issue takes on the theoretical perspective of religious nationalism to analyse some of the underlying dynamics of such processes. In this the special issue addresses a number of questions, the major of which is: whether religious nationalism influences the governance of religion in post-communist Europe, and if so, how? This introductory piece outlines the research agenda of this special issue and briefly presents the major argument of each case study.

Religious nationalism and religious governance: Overlaps and divergences. The case of Croatia

In this article, we argue that the religious governance in Croatia was shaped by the specific position that was given to the Catholic Church in Croatia as the historical and moral guardian of the Croatian people. We describe how the fusion of religious and national identity occurred and how it was connected to the relationship between the Catholic Church and the political party that governed Croatia in the 1990s, as well as the relationship between the state and minority religious communities. The article also deals with the issue of whether religious nationalism, which is very strong at the levels of society and national self-consciousness, played any role in the governance of religious diversity and how it has influenced social movements that have reconfigured mutual recognition of different religious communities in Croatia.

The Governance of Religious Diversity

Routledge Handbook on the Governance of Religious Diversity. Edited by Anna Triandafyllidou and Tina Magazzini, London and New York: Routledge, 2021, xix+327pp, $ 52.95, ISBN: 978-0-367-53826-2
 The Routledge Handbook on the Governance of Religious Diversity examines state-religion relations in more than 20 countries across the world. It particularly looks at how these states manage religious diversity. This book discusses that, in ancient times, empires and kingdoms, which were the embodiment of the states, used religion as a tool to control people. In modern times, many countries have become more secularized, hence the role of religion as a tool of control has diminished. States increasingly neglect the role of religion and religious people in society. This book argues that states with secularist ideology still need to pay attention to the role of religion in society.

Western Europe and Australia: negotiating freedoms of religion

ABSTRACT Newly established religious minorities in Western European countries and Australia have sparked fresh questions about the public place of religion. The current situation in the region reflects a certain agonism over the place of public religion and its relation to liberal secular order. This has especially been the case for the region’s Muslims in a context marked by fears of radicalisation and extremism. This contribution considers these responses in relation to Belgium, France, Germany, and the UK; and Australia. The contribution explores the norm of freedom of religion that forms the region’s core similarity but also the ground on which divergences in norms of state-religion connections can be found. It identifies key norms that operate in the region in order to draw out similarities as well as important differences between the countries. Exploring how the governance of religious diversity comes to reflect diversity-enhancing or diversity-limiting features, it assesses the ways and extent to which the region can be characterised under ‘moderate secularism’.

Negotiating Germany’s first Muslim–Christian kindergarten: Temporalities, multiplicities, and processes in interreligious dialogue

Drawing on fieldwork in the Northern German town of Gifhorn, the article analyses the negotiation process of Germany’s first Muslim–Christian kindergarten during its inception and consolidation phase between 2007 and 2020. Through the reconstruction of the kindergarten case, the study informs the literature on interreligious dialogue and governance of religious diversity from a local perspective. A temporal analysis is used for the study of dialogue to capture changing views and positions of different stakeholders during shifting opportunity structures, including the rise of far-right populism and deteriorating political relations between Germany and Turkey. Hence, the kindergarten, which mirrors Germanys’ national policy framework of institutionalizing Islam through treaties and dialogue cooperation, can be seen as a stage on which local negotiations and interreligious dynamics play out, uncovering complex intersections within the local, national, and international arena of politics.

Freedom of Religion and the Accommodation of Religious Diversity: Multiculturalising Secularism

The classical liberal concern for freedom of religion today intersects with concerns of equality and respect for minorities, of what might be loosely termed ‘multiculturalism’. When these minorities were primarily understood in terms of ethno-racial identities, multiculturalism and freedom of religion were seen at that time as quite separate policy and legal fields. As ethno-religious identities have become central to multiculturalism (and to rejections of multiculturalism), specifically in Western Europe in relation to its growing Muslim settlements, not only have the two fields intersected, new approaches to religion and equality have emerged. We consider the relationship between freedom of religion and ethno-religious equality, or alternatively, religion as faith or conscience and religion as group identity. We argue that the normative challenges raised by multicultural equality and integration cannot be met by individualist understandings of religion and freedom, by the idea of state neutrality, nor by laicist understandings of citizenship and equality. Hence, a re-thinking of the place of religion in public life and of religion as a public good and a re-configuring of political secularism in the context of religious diversity is necessary. We explore a number of pro-diversity approaches that suggest what a respectful and inclusive egalitarian governance of religious diversity might look like, and consider what might be usefully learnt from other countries, as Europe struggles with a deeper diversity than it has known for a long time. The moderate secularism that has historically evolved in Western Europe is potentially accommodative of religious diversity, just as it came to be of Christian churches, but it has to be ‘multiculturalised’.

Legitimising Religion in Public

Abstract The English context for interreligious dialogue is shaped by the presence of an established church which is inclusive, geographically spread, and engages with the state. This article will trace the ways in which the presence of an established church, and the particular model of church-state settlement, provide a context to legitimise particular types of interreligious activity. The social role of religion, the representative function of religion, and religion as an inclusive category, will be highlighted as key elements in the role of religion in English public life and in how interreligious organisations have developed. This observation is analytically useful as it assists an understanding of how and why interreligious dialogue and other activity has at various points become significant for the state’s governance of religious diversity, how success is understood and managed, and what non-engagement with interreligious activity might indicate.

The difference a wire makes: planning law, public Orthodox Judaism and urban space in Australia

AbstractThis paper considers a planning dispute that surrounded the construction of a Jewish religious installation (called an eruv) in the public urban space of an Australian suburb. The aim of this case-study is to examine the role of law in regulating Jewish difference – a topic that has to date received little attention in the socio-legal literature concerned with the governance of religious diversity. In analysing residents’ objections to the eruv, the paper explores long-standing anxieties about Jewish particularity in Australia and beyond as they surfaced in opposition to the eruv. It shows how the law continues to exclude certain forms of Jewish difference that are perceived as transgressing dominant religious and racial norms. Moreover, the paper highlights the particular ways in which planning law assigned value to these anxieties and legitimised the marginalisation of Orthodox Jews, emphasising the significance of local law as a site for exclusion and inequality.

The City as a Continuous Laboratory for Diversity: The Case of Geneva

After a long period of interest of religious plurality in the nation-state, the sociology of religion, with the impulse of the sociology of migration, has turned its attention to the city. This local level allows us to understand the issues of diversity governance. This article takes advantage of the literature on the governance of migration to apply it to the governance of religious diversity. Using data from the National Congregations Study and available data on Geneva, this article will first show how past responses to the emergence of diversity determine the path for future decisions. To this top-down regulation of religion responds one or more bottom-up strategies of religious communities to find legitimacy in a constraining environment. Based on the unit of the religious community, this study on Geneva provides a historical case of the evolution of diversity. This historical perspective provides the consistency of the current governance of religious diversity, illuminating the struggle for recognition of the minority groups.

Contract governance of religious diversity in a German city-state and its ambivalences

ABSTRACTThis contribution discusses whether specific German policy instruments developed to govern relations between the state and religious communities are a decisive step towards legal equality or of limited impact when extended to non-Christian religious minorities. I research the effects of the 2012 ‘contracts’ concluded between the city’s government and the Muslim and Alevi communities in the German city (state) of Hamburg by drawing on academic research, analysing official documents and interviewing city officials and local politicians. I find that the contracts are a decisive step towards legal equality but bring with them shortcomings that show the limited impact of contract governance measured against the complex reality of (non-)religious life in contemporary societies.

Governance of religious diversity in Western Europe

“Governance of religious diversity” appears to be the latest term to address the relationship between the state and (immigrant) religious groups in Western Europe. Conventional/established arrangements and frameworks of state-church relations (i.e. secularism) need to be revisited to include new religions and religious groups to the equation. It is suggested that contemporary multicultural societies require a broader perspective and a sophisticated framework than established understandings of secularism, and receiving states’ governmental policies. Today, the main concern of Western European states is not the relationship between the state and church, but how to deal with Islam and accommodate distinctive religious practices in public spaces. This review article examines the current debates on governance of religious diversity through elaborating on the six books reviewed.

The Politics of Secular Federalism and the Federal Governance of Religious Diversity in Asia

A secular approach has dominated federal studies, perhaps because there seems a natural fit between federalism and secularism. However, the federal systems or practices of Asia bring that close association into question, and the federal accommodation of religious demands has not been examined fully. This article focuses on how religion has been approached, accommodated or resisted in federal and quasi-federal states in Asia. We select India, Malaysia, Pakistan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Nepal as cases. We first explore the relationship between federalism, secularism and religion, and find that secular values at the point of federalisation played an important role in federalism's establishment, but that they were later modified in the practice of federal accommodation of religion. We also identify and examine the federal governance of religious diversity, which features three types of accommodation—centrally-based, unit-based and group-based accommodation—with accommodative practices sometimes being for the benefit of a majority religion, and sometimes for a minority one.

Routes and relations in Scandinavian interfaith forums: Governance of religious diversity by states and majority churches

In the Scandinavian countries of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, as elsewhere in Europe, governance of religious diversity has become a matter of renewed concern. A unique aspect of the Scandinavian situation is the hegemonic status of the respective Lutheran Protestant majority churches, usually referred to as ‘folk churches’, with which the majority of the population associates, alongside a prevalence of high degrees of regional secularism. As such, the majority churches have played a key role as both instigators and organisers of several interfaith initiatives, and have thereby come to interact with the public sphere as providers of diversity governance. Based on country-level studies of policy documents on majority-church/interreligious relations and field studies, this article sets out to explore the prompting and configuration of majority-church-related interfaith initiatives concerning church–state relations and the governance of religious diversity.

Surveillance and prayer \u2013 comparing Muslim prison chaplaincy in Germany\u2019s federal states

Moving beyond approaches that emphasise the influence of national ideologies and transnational frameworks on the governance of religious diversity in Western Europe, recent scholarship has underlined the importance of analysing the impact of concrete institutional settings such as hospitals, schools and prisons on the public incorporation of religious minorities. Building on this approach, the present article analyses the emergence of Muslim prison chaplaincies in three German federal states by focussing on how framing strategies of state- and religious actors accommodate the national state-church framework and prison-related norms. The article thus shows how national ideologies of diversity regulation and prison norms are mutually shaped in the process of the local governance of Islam. The comparative perspective of the article highlights subnational variations regarding actor constellations and strategies and thereby emphasises a multidimensional process of negotiating the national regime of diversity governance.

The governance of religious diversity in stateless nations: the case of Catalonia

ABSTRACTAcademic literature dealing with the governance of religious diversity in Europe has gained saliency in recent years. However, most existing research is based on state-level policies, while the role of regional government is receiving far less attention. To address this lacuna, this article focuses attention on the role of the regional government in the regulation of religious diversity in Catalonia. The article reflects on the increasing relevance of religious affairs in the Catalan policy agenda and examines the emergence and configuration of a specific, distinct and prominent regional policy programme on religious diversity. The case of Catalonia is especially relevant since its ongoing nation-building project bestows additional complexity and strategic relevance on the policy approach towards religious issues.

Secularism as Proto-Multiculturalism: The Case of Australia

Institutionally and culturally, Australia bridges Britain and the United States, the Old and New Worlds. Its federal parliamentary democracy borrowed aspects from both Westminster and Washington. Yet, Australia rejected both England’s established church and the US’s ‘high wall of separation’ between church and state. Australia is often compared with the US and Canada as one of the great immigrant democracies. Like Canada, it adopted multiculturalism as state policy in the 1970s. Yet, it more closely resembles many European countries and perhaps even Quebec in the precedence it grants to the established (Anglo-Australian) majority culture. Australia thus combines Old and New World patterns and concerns, offering a unique vantage point on the governance of religious diversity in relation to secularism. We are accustomed to thinking that political secularism and multiculturalism – arguably, the two greatest liberal responses to religious and cultural diversity – press in opposite directions. Whereas secularism separates state and religion, multiculturalism involves the state affirmation of cultural identity. Australia presents a case where these two models genuinely complement and indeed begin to merge into each other. Indeed, I argue that Australian multiculturalism extended the approach to diversity already established by Australia’s version of secularism. However, secularism and multiculturalism in Australia face a common challenge from attempts to reassert national identity. Perhaps unexpectedly for the twenty-first century, religion has become the favored vehicle for this reassertion. The paper begins with some remarks on the constitutional context and the operative political culture. The second section discusses the place of religion in multicultural Australia. The third section canvasses how religion has been reasserted in recent years as a trope for reinforcing Anglo-Australian institutions and culture as the core of Australian national identity. The paper concludes by identifying some of the key challenges these dynamics pose for Australians.

International Migration and the Governance of Religious Diversity, Paul Bramadat and Matthias Koenig, eds., Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press and School of Policy Studies, Queen's University in partnership with Metropolis, 2009, pp ix, 340.

International Migration and the Governance of Religious Diversity, Paul Bramadat and Matthias Koenig, eds., Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen's University Press and School of Policy Studies, Queen's University in partnership with Metropolis, 2009, pp ix, 340. - Volume 44 Issue 1

Veit Bader, Secularism or Democracy? Associational Governance of Religious Diversity

Veit Bader, Secularism or Democracy? Associational Governance of Religious Diversity