Gender, intersectionality, and religious manifestation before the European Court of Human Rights

Abstract

Decisions on Article 9(2) of the European Convention on Human Rights—the right to religious manifestation—evidence the importance of intersectional considerations of gender, religion, and even nationality. This article uses qualitative comparative analysis in order to find patterns of litigation victory and defeat by intersectional groups in their claims of violation of this provision. Our analyses show that intersectionalization, operating through a methodology particularly well suited to do so, was essential to render visible important patterns in the judicial arena. These patterns show the different outcomes of litigation by intersectional groups. In particular, Muslim women, whose cases frequently had a clear dimension of “claim intersectionality” related to religious clothing, systematically were defeated before the European Court of Human Rights. This contrasts with cases brought by male Muslims, a successful category of litigants, therefore emphasizing the importance of gender dimension when understanding cases on religious manifestation.

Notes

Acknowledgments

An earlier version of this article was presented at the 2016 European Consortium for Political Research General Conference. We thank all participants of the panel, as well as Matthew Hall, José Vázquez García-Peñuela, and Silvio Ferrari, for valuable comments and assistance. This article presents only the views of the authors, who are responsible for all possible errors, omissions, and mistakes.

Notes

1 Campbell and Cosans v. UK, App No 7511/76 and 7743/76 (ECtHR, 25 February 1982), paragraph 36.

2 Eweida and others v. the United Kingdom, App No 48420/10, 59842/10, 51671/10 and 36516/10 (ECtHR, 15 January 2013), paragraph 82.

3 Ibid.

4 Europe’s religious demographics are 36.7% Roman Catholic, 30% Orthodox, 15% Muslim, 14.5% Protestant, 2.3% other, .6% free church/nonconformist/evangelical, .2% Jewish, .1% Hindu, and .1% Buddhist.

5 Eweida and others v. the United Kingdom, App No 48420/10, 59842/10, 51671/10 and 36516/10 (ECtHR, 15 January 2013).

6 Ibid., page 18.

7 Dimitrova v. Bulgaria, App No 15452/07 (ECtHR, 10 February 2015); L.L. v. France, App No 7508/02 (ECtHR, 10 October 2006); Sener v. Turkey, App No 26680/95 (ECtHR, 21 October 1997).

8 For the most recent case at the time of preparation of this manuscript (Association for Solidarity with Jehovah’s Witnesses and others v. Turkey, App No 36915/10 and 8606/13 (ECtHR, 24 May 2016)), the text of the ruling was not yet available online, so it was not included in the database.

9 Kokkinakis v. Greece, App No 3/1992/348/421(ECtHR, 19 April 1993).

10 Kalac v. Turkey, App No 20704/91 (ECtHR, 1 July 1997).

11 Dahlab v. Switzerland, App No 2346/02 (ECtHR, 29 April 2002).

12 Ibid., at 463.

13 Ibid.

14 Dahlab v. Switzerland, App No 42393/98 (ECtHR 15 February 2001), page 15.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Pablo Castillo-Ortiz

Pablo Castillo-Ortiz is a lecturer in Law at the University of Sheffield. He develops an interdisciplinary research in law and politics, with an emphasis on configurational research. His work has been published, inter alia, in European Law Journal, Comparative European Politics, and Social & Legal Studies.

Amal Ali

Amal Ali is a Senior Lecturer in Law at the University of Lincoln. She researches and publishes in the areas of human rights and intersectionality.

Navajyoti Samanta

Navajyoti Samanta is a lecturer in commercial law at University of Sheffield, his research interests are in quantitative methods relating to macro-legal impacts.