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Secular State Ideologies & Negative Identification

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Secular State Ideologies & Negative Identification CHAPTER SIX SECULAR STATE IDEOLOGIES & NEGATIVE IDENTIFICATION 6.1 Introduction Some states offi cially identify with secular ideologies.1 Ninian Smart has dealt extensively with the interesting question of the extent to which we should con- sider the nature of secular world-views ‘religious’.2 He argues that religions have seven diff erent dimensions: the practical or ritual dimension, the experi- ential or emotional dimension, the narrative or mythic dimension, the doctri- nal or philosophical dimension, the ethical or legal dimension, the social or institutional dimension, and the material dimension.3 Applying this model to some secular ideologies he ultimately concludes: Th ough to a greater or lesser extent our seven-dimensional model may apply to secular worldviews, it is not really appropriate to try to call them religions, or even “quasi-religions” (which by implication demotes them below the status of “real” religions). For the adherents of Marxism and humanism wish to be demarcated strictly from those who espouse religions – they conceive them- selves, on the whole, as antireligious. However, we have seen enough of the seven-dimensional character of the secular worldviews (especially nationalism and state Marxism) to emphasize that the various systems of ideas and practices, whether religious or not, are competitors and mutual blenders, and can thus be said to play in the same league. Th ey all help to express the various ways in which human beings conceive of themselves, and act in the world.4 Th us, secular worldviews are not profoundly of a religious (or metaphysical) nature and yet as a rule they are, for the most part, composed of meta-religious ideas: that is, critical ideas about religion, religious doctrine and religious practices. 1 Terminology (the distinction between forms of “positive identifi cation” and “negative iden- tifi cation”) is cf. W. Cole Durham, Perspectives on Religious Liberty: A Comparative Framework, in Religious Human Rights in Global Perspective: Legal Perspectives 1 (J.D. van der Vyver & J. Witte, eds., Th e Hague/Boston/London: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1996), see par- ticularly pp. 15–36; and George R. Ryskamp, Th e Spanish Experience in Church-State Relations: A Comparative Study of the Interrelationship between Church-State Identifi cation and Religious Liberty, 3 Brigham Young University Law Review 616 (1980), discussing forms of Church– State identifi cation (p. 617). 2 Ninian Smart, The World’s Religions (Victoria: Cambridge University Press, 1992), pp. 21–28. 3 Ibid, pp. 10–21. 4 Ibid, p. 25. 140 Chapter Six From this it follows that secular worldviews should not be confused with the legal-political notion of secularism as discussed in the previous Chapter. Although the historical underlying incentives that accompanied the establish- ment of a secular state may have been characterized by criticism of certain religious doctrines or practices, presently a state of secularity in itself does not necessarily refl ect value judgements about religion. In other words, state secu- larism does not come down to an offi cial rejection of religion. State secularism denotes an intention on the part of the state to not affi liate itself with religion, to not consider itself a priori bound by religious principles (unless they are reformulated into secular state laws) and to not seek to justify its actions by invoking religion. Such a state of secularity denotes offi cial impartiality in matters of religion rather than offi cial irreligiosity. By contrast, secularism as a philosophical notion can indeed be construed as an ideological defence of the secular cause, which might include criticism of or scepticism towards religion. Th us, states that are ‘ideologically secular’ and that declare secular world- views the offi cial state doctrine give evidence, explicitly or by implication, of judgements about the value of religion within society. Most versions of state communism, for instance, embrace Marxist criticism of religion. Th ese states must still be distinguished, as will be done in what follows, from an outright negative identifi cation of the state with religion as could be perceived in, for instance, atheist Albania aft er the Albanian Cultural Revolution of the 1960s and as can to some extent still be perceived in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, under the rule of the so-called Juche doctrine. 6.2 Secular State Ideologies Before the end of the Cold War, many Communist States did not shy away from being openly hostile to religion. In most instances, communist ideology translated unperturbedly into state atheism, which, in turn, triggered meas- ures aimed at the eradication of religion. As much was acknowledged by some Communist Constitutions. Th e 1976 Constitution of the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania, for instance, was fi rmly based on a Marxist dismissal of religion as the opiate of the masses. It provided: “Th e state recognizes no reli- gion of any kind and supports and develops the atheist view so as to ingrain in to the people the scientifi c and materialistic world-view.”5 5 Art. 37 of the Constitution of the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania (1976; replaced); see Winfried Brugger, On the Relationship between Structural Norms and Constitutional Rights in Church-State-Relations, in Religion in the Public Sphere: A Comparative Analysis of German, Israeli, American and International Law (Brugger & Karayanni, eds., Berlin: Springer, 2007), p. 31. See Evis Karandrea, Church and State in Albania, in Law and Religion in Post-Communist Europe (Ferrari & Durham, eds., Leuven: Peeters, 2003), pp. 26–27, for a historical account of militant atheism in Albania..
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