Secular states and their underlying ideology, political secularism, appear to be under siege everywhere. They were severely jolted with the establishment of the first modern theocracy in 1979 in Iran. By the late 1980s, Islamic political movements had emerged in Egypt, Sudan, Algeria, Tunisia, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Chad, Senegal, Turkey, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and even in Bangladesh. Movements challenging secular states were hardly restricted to Muslim societies. Protestant movements decrying secularism emerged in Kenya, Guatemala and the Philippines. Protestant fundamentalism became a force in American politics. Singhalese Buddhist nationalists in Sri Lanka, Hindu nationalists in India, religious ultra-orthodoxy in Israel and Sikh nationalists in the state of Punjab in India, as well as among diasporic communities in Canada and Britain, began to question the separation of state and religion. Even the largely secular-humanist ethos of Western Europe did not remain untouched by this public challenge. The migration from former colonies and an intensified globalisation has thrown together on western public spaces pre-Christian faiths, Christianity and Islam . The cumulative result is unprecedented religious diversity, the weakening of public monopoly of single religions, and the generation of mutual suspicion, distrust, hostility and conflict. This is evident in Germany and Britain but was dramatically highlighted by the headscarf issue in France and the murder of film-maker Theo Van Gogh in the Netherlands shortly after the release of his controversial film about Islamic culture.

But what precisely is the conception that is in crisis? The dominant self-understanding of secularism is that it is a universal doctrine requiring the strict separation (exclusion) of church/religion and state for the sake of individualistically conceived moral or ethical values. This self-understanding takes two forms, one inspired by an idealized version of the American model of separation and the other of the equally idealized French mode. I argue that both these available mainstream conceptions of western secularism are likely to meet neither the challenge of the vibrant public presence of religion nor of increasing religious diversity. In order to deal with this emergent diversity, the West must modify its conception either by going back in time and looking for resources in its own past or turning attention to other conceptions of secularism and patterns of religion State relationship developed outside the West. The model developed in the sub continent, especially in India, provides one such alternative conception. Without taking it as a blue print, the West must examine the Indian conception and possibly learn from it.

1. Barbier, Maurice. “Towards a Definition of French Secularism.” Le Débat 134 (2005). http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/fr/IMG/pdf/0205-Barbier-GB.pdf).
2. Fox, Jonathan. “World Separation of Religion and State Into the 21st Century.” Comparative Political Studies 39, no. 5 (2006): 537-569.
3. Haynes, Jeff. “Religion, Secularisation and Politics: A Postmodern Conspectus.” Third World Quarterly 18, no. 4 (1997): 709-728.
4. Kettell, Steve. “On the Public Discourse of Religion: An Analysis of Christianity in the United Kingdom.” Politics and Religion 2, no. 3 (2009): 420-443.
5. Minkenberg, Michael. “Church-State Regimes and Democracy in the West: Convergence vs. Divergence”. Reykjavik, 2011. http://www.ecprnet.eu/MyECPR/proposals/reykjavik/uploads/papers/872.pd.

In this session we focus on the gendered dimension in theorizing religion in relation to cultural and ethnic diversity in contemporary Europe. Erstwhile neglected or marginalized in gender and feminist social and political theory, religion has returned to centre stage in the wake of what feminist philosopher Rosi Braidotti had called the ‘postsecular turn’ in feminism. Formerly seen by many as antithetical to both liberal and more postmodern approaches regarding the question of women’s emancipation, recent work focuses on the agentic potentialities religious praxis and identity politics may hold for many women (and men) and as such, is challenging the idea that secular modernity automatically promises or is aligned with gender equality. Against this background, and from a comparative perspective, we take a closer look at the different ways in which the relationship between gender, religion and secularism is politically and ideologically being played out in contemporary culturally, religiously and ethnically diverse European nation-states. In particular we will focus on religious and secular body politics and sexuality (including veiling/hijab; honour-related violence and homonationalism).

Readings

Western discourses on secularization seem to be grounded in dichotomies between: “world” and “religion”, “reason” and “emotion”, “developed” and non-developed worlds”. One of the most important contributions of feminisms to the debate on these dichotomies has been and still is in its critical approach to the impact of these visions of reality upon the representations of women in culture, philosophy, politics and political science and theology. However, these critical approaches have not always taken into account the possibility of a critical reading of religion and of secularism both from within a religious and a secular-democratic perspective. In so doing, feminist criticism has sometimes repeated the same dichotomies it intended to deconstruct and to avoid. One of the objectives of feminist theologies is to contribute to overcoming the dichotomies emphasized in modern (also feminist) discourses on secularity and religion by reinterpreting the relevance of religion for the secular emancipation of women. In this session we will look into and discuss some texts both from Christian and Islamic feminists in order to understand their contributions to overcome dichotomies between religion and secular experiences and struggles for emancipation.

Readings

1. Fiorenza, Elisabeth Schussler. “Method in Women’s Studies in Religion: A Critical Feminist Hermeneutics.” In Methodology in Religious Studies: The Interface with Women’s Studies, edited by Arvind Sharma, 207-241. McGill Studies in the History of Religions. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002.
2. ———. “Public Discourse, Religion, and Wo/men’s Struggles for Justice.” DePaul Law Review 51 (2002): 1077-1101.
3. Pui-Lan, Kwok. “Feminist Theology, Southern.” In The Blackwell Companion to Political Theology, edited by Peter Scott and William T. Cavanaugh, 194-209. Blackwell Companions to Religion. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004.