Equality Body Strategies:
The Equinet Perspective on the
Ground of Religion and Belief
By
Niall Crowley
Context
• The place of religion in society
• One single dominant religion
• More than one major religion
• Secular perspective
• The situation of religion in society
• Growing religious diversity in contexts of immigration
• Decreasing practice of religion.
• Challenge to the position of a single dominant church
Context
• The experience of religion
• Religion as a source of conflict
• Religion as a focus for security issues and anti-terrorism action
• Disadvantage for and discrimination against minority religions
• Equality bodies and the ground of religion and belief
• A growing agenda
• Backlash and media framing
Issues @ Religion
• Dominant Issues:
• Hostile public and internet discourse – Islamophobia and antiSemitism
• The accommodaton of religious practices and the wearing and use
of religious symbols.
• Key settings:
• Education - Access to schools, teaching and practice of religion in
schools, religion and school ceremonies, opting out of activities on
ground of religion, and faith schools
• Employment – Job refusal, promotion and dismissal and job
requirements in conflict with religious beliefs.
Issues @ Belief
• Issues:
• Home births
• Vegetarianism
• Veganism
• Compulsory vaccinations
• Membership of a political party
• Settings:
• Education, health care and service settings, and political
appointments
Strategies
• Priority
• High – growing casework, growing hostility, lack of understanding
by employers and service providers
• Middle – no hierarchy between grounds
• Low – limited casework, limited religious diversity, limited public
discourse
• Ambition
• Non-discrimination
• Reasonable accommodation
• Equality
Strategies
• Push Factors
• Increasing demand from claimants and from employers and
service providers
• Changing composition of societies
• Increasing public hostility
• Putting in place a strategy on the ground of religion or belief
• Positive duties in equal treatment legislation
Strategies
• Limiting Factors
• Low levels of reporting
• Lack of Court decisions on the ground of religion or belief
• Limited scientific debate and work on this ground
• Lack of consensus and networking around shared issues among
stakeholders
• Limited interest and understanding from employers and service
providers
• Sensitivity of the ground of religion or belief
Actions
• Legal
• Principal intervention
• Growing levels of casework
• Under-reporting & Low level of concluded case law
• Promotion
• Guidance material
• Employer training
• Seminars
• Stakeholders seeing little benefit in taking action
Actions
• Communication
•
•
•
•
Highlighting casework
Calls for evidence
Dialogue
Limited engagement between equality bodies and religious communities
• Research
• Employment: Reasonable accommodation, religious tolerance, discrimination
against Muslims
• Education: Education and religious affiliation, provision of education for
minority religions
• Lack of data
Actions
• Policy
• Education
• Right to wear religious symbols in educational establishments;
• Obligatory attendance at religion classes and provision of ethics
classes;
• Religious ethos exemptions for schools; and
• Integrated education
• Position and rights of minority religions in society
Conclusions
• Equality bodies
• A horizontal approach that allows for significant specific action on
the ground of religion or belief and on the intersection between
this ground and other grounds.
• Further develop work on and share experiences around the
ground of belief
• Raise the ambition to pursue equality, reasonable accommodation
and non-discrimination and explore these different elements
• Equinet
• Support equality bodies in pursuing this growing agenda
Conclusions
• Member States
• Develop equal treatment legislation to:
Define religion and belief
Require employers and service providers to make reasonable
accommodations
Review and amend religious ethos exemptions
• European Commission
• Implement the horizontal Directive
• Develop standards for equality bodies
• Sustain the focus and build on the October Colloquium