Secularist Suspicion and Legal Pluralism at the United Nations

Abstract

Drawing on a secularist view of religion as primarily a private matter for individuals, the international discourse on human rights has historically considered alternative bodies of law and legal reasoning to be inherently suspect. This ‘secularist suspicion’ has been particularly pronounced towards religious and customary forms of law, which are commonly seen as challenges to the sovereignty and hegemony of human rights law. Through a close reading of the practice of United Nations committees monitoring racism and women’s rights from 1993 to 2010, the development of a gradual divergence in their views of legal pluralism is explored. It is suggested that these views stem from different understandings of what religion is and should be in law, politics and society. Left unattended, this divergence may threaten the conceptual unity and holism of the human rights enterprise.

The costs of recognition: global politics, religion, and the colonial history of South Asia

“… 1 Connolly 1999; Thomas 2000; Luoma-Aho 2009; Barbato 2010; Gorski 2011; Sandal 2012; Hurd 2015; Hussin 2016; Pasha 2017; Wilson 2017; Årsheim 2018; Lynch 2020; Birnbaum 2022.…”

“… 4 Hurd 2015; Sullivan et al 2015; Mahmood 2016; Årsheim 2018; Hussin 2018; Hartikainen 2019; Birnbaum 2020.…”

“… 9 Religion in international security (Fox and Sandler 2005; Mavelli 2012, 2013; Sandal and James 2011; Sheikh 2012; Hassner 2016, 2003); politics of religious freedom (Hurd 2015; Sullivan et al 2015; Philpott 2019) in IR theory and history (Thomas 2005; Snyder 2011; Shani and Behera 2022); international ethics (Lynch 2020); in international organizations (Haynes 2014; Årsheim 2018) religion and the nation state (Cesari 2021); postsecular global politics (Barbato 2010; Mavelli and Petito 2012; Wilson 2014). …”