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Results for tag:secularism

Maria statue at Rennes-le-Chateaux

Is the French State Really ‘Secular’? Some Reflections on Municipal Laïcité

Date:18 June 2018
Author:Dr. Julia Martínez-Ariño
How is laïcité – official state secularism – practiced in contemporary France? In this post, the Centre for Religion, Conflict and Globalisation’s Dr. Julia Martínez-Ariño discusses recent research in the cities of Rennes, Bordeaux and Toulouse to suggest that laïcité takes many forms in French municipalities – including the recognition and support of ‘religious’ actors and institutions.
The Lottery of Indecency – @LaSauvageJaune

The scandal of women’s bodies in secular Europe

Date:25 August 2016
Author:Religion Factor
On Tuesday this week, images of a woman on a beach in Nice being forced by armed police to remove portions of her swimwear began circulating on the internet. The so-called ‘burkini ban’ has sparked outrage and controversy, not least because it is yet another variation of an age-old problem – the control over women’s bodies in public. In today’s post, Kim Knibbe vents her frustrations and reflects on the complex array of factors that contribute to women’s bodies continuing to be objects for the exercise of power. 

The secular dead body: feeling awkward about organ donorship

Date:17 July 2016
Author:Religion Factor
Organ donorship is a sensitive and at times controversial topic in numerous political contexts. In today’s post, Ton Groeneweg picks up recent failed efforts to introduce Active Donor Registration in The Netherlands to explore the relationship between these debates and evolving dynamics around religion and secularism.
A street memorial in Paris following the November attacks. Source: Wikimedia. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

Inviting our future: liberal de-culturalization and the Paris attacks – Part two

Date:16 February 2016
Author:Religion Factor
In today’s post Ton Groeneweg continues his analysis of liberal de-culturalization as a deeper trend exposed by the responses to the attacks in Paris. In this second part of his blog, he focuses on how this process of de-culturalization has sincere consequences for our existence in liberal societies, and how the experienced threats to our liberal existence might offer some opportunities as well.
A soldier from the RAF Regiment on patrol near Basrah Air Base, Iraq. Photo: Harland Quarrington, MOD. Licensed under the Open Government Licence v1.0

It’s not all about Islam: misreading secular politics in the Middle East

Date:07 May 2015
Author:Religion Factor
Western policymakers once understood the dynamics of secular politics in the Middle East, but this knowledge has been subsumed under a fixation on Islam’s supposed threat to western security interests, writes today´s guest contributor Dr Stacey Gutkowski.
All religions are equal

‘All religions are equal, but some religions are more equal than others’ Part Two

Date:11 February 2015
Author:Religion Factor
In the first part of this blog, Ton Groeneweg sketched out three existing problems with the notion of Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB), and how it is being used and promoted in the context of international platforms arising in its defence.
Freedom of Religion or Belief

‘All religions are equal, but some religions are more equal than others’ Part One

Date:09 February 2015
Author:Religion Factor
This phrase catches a key problem with the concept of ‘Freedom of Religion or Belief’, and how it is practiced and promoted in the world today. Just as in Animal Farm, George Orwell’s famous animal utopia, it suggests that power may cloak itself in the language of equality, and create, in fact, entirely the opposite.

Living together well: secularism, liberal democracy and uncertainty in the wake of Charlie Hebdo

Date:20 January 2015
Author:Religion Factor
The Charlie Hebdo attacks in Paris have raised many questions about free speech, liberal democracy, freedom of religion and how to live together in multicultural, multi faith, multi political societies. In today’s post, Erin Wilson explores some of these questions and encourages us, rather than seeking for definitive answers, to see the conversation and debate these questions inspire as an answer in themselves.

Is there a secular humanitarian faith?

Date:24 September 2014
Author:Religion Factor
There’s been much discussion recently about faith-based and secular responses to humanitarian emergencies that has attempted to highlight the normative assumptions present in both.

Secularism, Security and the Limits of the State: The Displacement Crisis and the Role of Religion Part Two

Date:03 September 2014
Author:Religion Factor
Rethinking “security”, the role of the state, the secularist biases that exist in policy and practice around displacement and religion’s potential to address these problems are crucial issues to consider in terms of religion’s intersection with the global crisis of displacement.