Transnational Understandings of Secularisms and Their Impact on the Right to Religious Freedom—Exploring Religious Symbols Cases at the UN and ECHR

Abstract

Drawing on a theoretical approach that understands secularism to be an authoritative discourse that shapes the boundaries of the religiously acceptable in a modern nation-state, this article explores the usage by international human rights bodies (United Nations bodies and European Court of Human Rights) of secularism in religious freedom cases. More specifically, the article investigates how, while both those bodies ground their rulings and opinions on religious symbols in secularism, they propose alternative readings of the term, which in turn affects the boundaries of the right to religious freedom and therefore the politics enabled by this right. This finding has theoretical implications, as it does not only highlight how secularism and religious freedom are deeply interrelated but also points to the fact that the meaning of the “universal” right to religious freedom is unstable and a source of debate between transnational human rights spaces. Moreover, this has repercussions at the praxis level, where the hegemony of secularism accompanied by a shift in meaning affects both the discourse and strategies of plaintiffs.

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