Comments on: Does international law adequately protect freedom of religion?

By: Stephanie Jones

Stephanie Jones — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 01:00:46 +0000

As you point out, religious freedom does not have its own convention. As you also point out, religion (together with race, nationality, political opinion, and membership in a particular social group) is one of the grounds for refugee protection, perhaps one of international law’s strongest forms of protection. UNHCR’s Religion Guidelines (http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/4090f9794.html) “define ‘religion’” to include freedom of thought, conscience, and belief, and explore religion as belief, identity, and way of life. The UN also has a Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief (http://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/religion/index.htm) who, I see, issued a joint statement with the Special Rapporteurs on racism and freedom of expression at the Durban Review Conference. So it would seem that the international community is not entirely oblivious … .

By: Daniel Haboucha

Daniel Haboucha — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 17:35:33 +0000

I don’t think that, when it comes to religion, ideas and attributes can be seen as entirely dichotomous. In my view, due to the unparalleled social implications of religion, it is overly simplistic to qualify it as “merely” a set of ideas. While you are right that its inclusion in s.2 of the charter (along with freedom of conscience and expression) can lead to such an interpretation, the inclusion of religion in s.15 suggests that religion may be at the same time a “constituting attribute” of individuals’ identities, similar to race, sex, etc. I think these issues arise precisely because religion is unique among human rights in that it bears some elements of expressing ideas (what we think) and some elements of expressing identity (who we are). I think it is essential to recognize both components, and this sort of recognition is what I hope can be achieved by striving for a universal definition of religion.

By: Andrew Cleland

Andrew Cleland — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 12:18:12 +0000

I support the distinction between ideas and attributes. When we are dealing with discrimination, we definitely have to distinguish between discrimination founded upon ideas (constituted by individuals) and attributes (constituting individuals). I would imagine that if we looked for it, we could find that such a distinction operates in Canada’s Charter jurisprudence. I also think that the fact that most bills of rights generally associate freedom of religion with freedom of conscience also supports the notion that religion is based in ideas (again, constituted by individuals).

But a part of me thinks that we cannot achieve a universal definition of religion and should not aspire to it. Since it is constituted by individuals, religion is almost impossible to define. Thus, I think that we should instead focus on establishing a framework for assessing when an individual has a genuine belief to which they ascribe great importance.