Revisiting Religious Freedom as a National Security Lens: The Case of China

Abstract

The distressing state of global democracy and religious liberty provides scholars and foreign policy practitioners an opportunity to rethink national security analysis by considering religious freedom as a national security lens. This article reprises the primary author’s framework, published ten years ago in The Review of Faith & International Affairs, assessing “what they say and do” on religious freedom as a means to understand threats and challenges to global peace and U.S. national security. This article analyzes a specific case—how China treats religion at home, among its neighbors, on the international stage, and in its political ideology.

Keywords:

• China
• International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA)
• forced labor camps
• national security analysis
• religious freedom
• Sinicization of religion
• Uyghurs/Uighurs

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Eric Patterson

Eric Patterson serves as President of the Religious Freedom Institute in Washington, DC, and is a Scholar-at-Large at Regent University (USA).

Piper Smith

Piper Smith served as an intern at the Religious Freedom Institute and is a student at George Washington University.

Linda Kamau

Linda Kamau earned graduate degrees in Government, Law, and Public Administration from Regent University and serves as a research assistant with Religious Freedom Institute.