Religious Equality and Freedom of Religion or Belief: International Development’s Blindspot

Abstract

The relationship between freedom of religion or belief and international development continues to be severely under-explored in the literature, despite the copious body of scholarship that distinctively deals with each separately. The relevance of exploring this nexus is particularly significant in view of the increasing visibility of multilateral, bilateral, and non-governmental action aimed towards advancing freedom of religion or belief through development or humanitarian aid. Western development thinking, policy, and practice has always struggled with how to engage with religion. This article analyses the sources of confusion between religion and freedom of religion and belief, and the challenges of addressing religious inequalities in theory, policy, and praxis.

Keywords:

• FoRB
• religion and development
• religious inequality-blind development
• FoRB-sensitive development
• religious inequalities

Notes

1 This article is based on the 2020 report Inclusive Development: Beyond Need, not Creed, co-authored with Rachel Sabates-Wheeler. The report was originally published by the Coalition for Religious Equality and Inclusive Development (CREID) and the Institute of Development Studies (IDS). The report can be accessed here: https://www.ids.ac.uk/publications/inclusive-development-beyond-need-not-creed/. Permission to reproduce parts of the report in the present journal article has kindly been given by CREID/IDS.

2 Interestingly, human rights organisations, whose raison d’être is to advance rights more broadly, have not engaged with FoRB violations in the same way as they have with violations based on political belief, gender or other identifiers (Petersen and Marshall 2018). Petersen and Marshall (2018, 13) argue that “this does not mean that mainstream human rights organisations did not care about religiously based discrimination and conflict, but that they tended to see the topic as being ‘really’ about something other than religion—whether ethnic or racial discrimination, gender inequality, or political oppression—and as such, something tackled more usefully within e.g. frameworks on minority rights, non-discrimination, women’s rights, or freedom of expression than within a FoRB framework.”

3 It is important to note here that there are other country-level initiatives that are specifically committed to supporting religious minorities of other faiths (for example Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and increasingly Qatar are earmarking resources and technical support to supporting persecuted Muslims, however there is often very little information publicly available on their programmes or activities, see for example a report by Barzegar and El Karhili (2017) as an example of one scoping of the sector.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mariz Tadros

Mariz Tadros is Professor of Politics and Development at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), University of Sussex. She is Director of the Coalition for Religious Equality and Inclusive Development (CREID), launched in November 2018, and funded by the UK’s FCDO. She is also the PI for a British Academy grant on intangible heritage, social cohesion, and development. She has authored three books, two edited volumes, and several volumes, and has written for the Guardian, Opendemocracy, Middle East Report and others.