rethinking secularism rajeevbhargava

7/28/2019 Rethinking Secularism RajeevBhargava

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Rethinking secularism,World affairs:

Beyond moderate secularism

posted byRajeev Bhargava

In his piece Is there a crisis of secularism in Western Europe?, Tariq Modood reprimands me for

enunciating a misleading view of what is happening in Europe. By speaking of a crisis of secularism, I

exaggerate the problem, he says.

Tariq Modood and I have been in dialogue on secularism for over a decade now. He was among the few who

very early on recognized the main point of my1998 book: that we need not an alternative to but an alternative

conception of secularism, one that is different from mainstream conceptions shaped by French lacitand the

American wall of separation variant. Since we agree on much, I begin with stating where and how much we

agree.

I agree with him (1) that most European states follow neither the French nor the American model. Virtually all

European states have a stable regime of individual rights that includes the right to religious liberty. None couldhave managed to install such a regime without in the past attacking the power and privilege of their churches, a

stridency which could not have been possible without some degree of state-church separation. Yet, unlike the

French, there is no lingering hostility towards religion in other European state-structures.

The case in America is different. Although American churches had a legacy of enormous power and privilege,

they left it behind in Europe. This is part of what Americanization means. So, American self-understanding has

rarely exhibited hostility to religion. Yet, denominational conflict compelled the state to withdraw substantial

support of religion, forming another key ingredient of American self-understanding. In Europe, however,

hostility was followed by active support. Virtually all of Europe developed an institutional arrangement that

grants some privilege or public recognition to a given church. Indeed, some states still have an established

church, a privileged arrangement that goes well beyond recognition. Like me, Modood finds the combination of

separation of church and state and support for a given church compatible with secularism. He calls it moderate

secularism. I am indifferent to the term, but I agree (2) that this is a form of secularism. States that run in

accordance with such a regime are secular states. Modood is also quite right that (3) there is no effective

challenge from the church or radical secularists to this moderate political secularism. This may not be the best of

all possible worlds from their points of view, and currently it might even be tilted in favour of secularists, but it

is an acceptable compromise.
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Such is the context in which non-Christian migrants, the majority of which are Muslims, have been arriving,

settling, and making claims that relate to the place of religious identity in the public sphere. Modood says and

adds (4) that it is here, if anywhere, that a sense of crisis of secularism can be found. Our fourth straight

agreement. Elsewhere I have written: It is clear that secularism has a precarious life in non-western societies.

What is not always obvious is that the secular states underpinned by secularism are coming under strain even

in Europe where only some time back they were believed to be firmly entrenched and secure. I added: It is

true that substantive secularization of European societies has also brought in its wake extensive secularization of

European states. Regardless of their religious affiliation, citizens have a large basket of civil and political rights

unheard of in religion-centered states, past or present. But still, problems remain. The migration from former

colonies and an intensified globalization hasthrown together in western public spacespre-Christian

faiths, Christianity, and Islam. The cumulative result is unprecedented religious diversity, the weakening of the

public monopoly of single religions, and the generation of mutual suspicion, distrust, hostility, and conflict. This

is evidentin Germany, probably even inModoods Britain, but was dramatically highlighted bythe

headscarf issue in Franceandthe murder of filmmaker Theo Van Goghin the Netherlands shortly

after the release of his controversial film about Islamic culture.

So we both agree that the crisis of secularism is directly related to the arrival, predominantly, of Muslim

immigrants in Europe. He says:

Political secularism has been destabilized, and in particular the historical flow from a moderate to radical

secularism and the expectation of its continuation has been jolted. This is not because of any Christian

desecularization or a return of the repressed. Rather, the jolt is created by the triple contingency of the arrival

and settlement of a significant number of Muslims.

Note the language here. Political secularism, Modood says, was destablized and jolted, words hardly any

different from crisis, for crisis too refers only to a critical turning point, one that can go either way, to

recovery or mortality. It does not mean imminent death, an impression falsely given by Modoods essay.

But let me not quibble over words. For we have another, fifth agreement to report. It lies in our joint hope that

European secularism will respond to these changes. Europe cant just go on with the same moderate

secularism and jettison the problem. As Modood puts it, this secularism needs to be multiculturalized. I take

this to mean that the historical compromises between church and state have to be extended to other religions,

particularly to Islam. (I dont disagree on this point, our sixth agreement) So, for him, Moderate secularism is a

perfect ideal. Conceptually and normatively, all is well. It simply needs to be extended to other religions, a feat

that can be accomplished by comparatively easy institutional adjustments. So, I must stand corrected. For

Modood, moderate secularism can and should go on more or less as it is, but, in order to accommodate Muslims,

must undergo some institutional adjustments. How then can we speak ofthat horrible terma crisis of

secularism in Europe? Surely, this is hyperbolic, a gross exaggeration!

Here is where we profoundly disagree. Moderate secularism, for me, is irretrievably flawed. The

multiculturalization of this secularism is neither easy nor sufficient. It is not easy because it presupposes
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massive change in cultural background. Institutional adjustment is bound to be difficult because an internal link

exists between the collective, secular self-understanding of European societies and deeply problematic

institutional arrangements. Quite plainly, current European institutions are deeply biased. They have

accommodated Christians but will not be able to accommodate Muslims. They are not sufficient because simple

accommodation without some accompanying hostility may not work for all Muslim citizens.

Why are institutional adjustments difficult to achieve? Here we must take recourse to something missing in

Modoods account, namely, history. Using a broad brush, we might say that European secularisms arose in

predominantly single-religion societies. Issues of radical individual freedom and citizenship equality arose in

European societies afterreligious homogenization. The birth of confessional states was accompanied by

massive expulsion of subject-communities whose faith differed from the religion of the ruler. Such states

eventually found some place for toleration in their moral space, but as is well known, toleration was consistent

with deep inequalities and with humiliating, marginalized, and virtually invisible existence. For instance, churchbuildings of minority religious groups could not look like churches and had to be tucked away in bylanes far

from the High Street where the church of the dominant group stood.

The liberal-democratization and the consequent secularization of many European states has helped citizens with

non-Christian faiths acquire most formal rights. But such a scheme of rights neither embodies a regime of

interreligious equality nor effectively prevents religion-based discrimination and exclusion. Indeed, it masks

majoritarian, ethno-religious biases.

Thenew reality of deepening religious diversityhas brought the religious biases of European states into

increasingly sharper relief. Despite all changes, European states have continued to privilege Christianity in one

form or another. They have publicly funded Christian schools, maintained church real estate and clerical

salaries, facilitated the control by churches of cemeteries, and trained the clergy. In short, there has been no

impartiality within the domain of religion, and despite formal equality, this continues to have a far -reaching

impact on the rest of society.

Thus, these biases are evident in different kinds of difficulties faced by Muslims. For example, in Britain a third

of all primary school children are educated by religious communities, yet applications for state funding by

Muslims are frequently turned down. Currently there are,Veit Bader informs us, only five Muslim schools,

compared to 2,000 run by Roman Catholics and 4,700 by the Church of England. Similar problems persist in

other European countries. In both France and Germany, not a single school run by Muslims is subsidized by the

state. This is also manifest in the failure of many Western European states to deal with the issue of headscarves

(France), in demands by Muslims to build mosques and therefore to properly practice their own faith (Germany,

Italy), in discrimination against ritual slaughter (Germany), or against the right to have proper Muslim burial

grounds (Denmark, to take just one example). In recent times, as Islamophobia grips the imagination of several

Western societies (exemplified by the cartoon controversy in Denmark and the Minarets issue in Switzerland), it

is very likely that their Muslim citizens will continue to face disadvantages only on account of membership in

their religious community.
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Removing these biases will not be easy because of resistance from the Right, institutional resilience and

differences in the nature of Islam and Christianity, not to speak of non-Semitic religions such as Hinduism.

Moderate secularism will be severely tested. Indeed, that test has already begun, which is why talk of strain or

even crisis is justified.

I have so far been talking as if the initiative lies squarely with only one agent, the European state (and its

supporters), and Muslims will respond enthusiastically to any initiative from this reformed (multiculturalized)

state. But this is being too sanguine about the self-understanding of Muslims or their current condition in

Europe. It underestimates their alienation and ghettoization. Only after we attain a better, deeper understanding

of Muslims in different parts of Europe, can we learn about what should and should not be and what currently

can and cannot be accommodated. Indeed, only in a more relaxed atmosphere can a plurality of voicesthe

more vulnerable voices includedemerge and be better heard, a change that will have a huge bearing on our

collective judgment on what should and should not be accommodated. (As of now we hear two dominantvoicesthe ultra-orthodox and the lapsed Muslim, the latter a convert to radical secularism.) Indeed, a hearing

of these diverse voices may necessitate not just accommodation but more active fostering of some hitherto

unnoticed Muslim beliefs and practices or more negative state-intervention in others; it is entirely possible that

the state may not only have to support some religious practices but also inhibit others. Now, European states

may be only too happy to abort some Muslim practices, but such intervention will entail a massive shift in their

conception of secularismfrom that of separation followed by support of religion to one of separation followed

sometimes by support and sometimes by an inhibition of religion, what I callprincipled distance. In short, the

state may have to set aside its moderate (accommodative, not hostile to religion) stance. Currently, the practice

of most European states towards Muslims is: offer little official support, no accommodation, and, with few

exceptions, stay indifferent to massive societal intolerance. What might be required is more support to some

Muslim practices, less to others, and active interference in societal intolerancein short, an attempt by the state

to tackle both inter- and intra-religious domination.

In sum, extending moderate (accommodative) secularism to Muslims, under existing conditions, will be very

difficult, for it presupposes massive shifts in background cultural conditions for which Europe may not yet be

prepared. Europe has not seen deep religious diversity for a very long time. It would not be too off the mark to

say that not appreciating deep religious and cultural diversity is one of the central failures of modern Europe. To

my knowledge, overcoming this is a bigger challenge than any other issue. By now, even the conceptual

resources for such a change appear to be missing. In any case, moderate secularisms accommodation will not

be sufficient because the modern (democratic) state must have the legitimacy to also negatively intervene in

some socio-religious practices, if only to protect the interests of vulnerable internal minorities. This in part

entails abandoning moderate secularism. To respond to the challenge of deep diversity, Europe might be better

off with an altogether different conception of secularism.

What I have said above needs some qualification, for it ignores two facts. First, it neglects the informal politics

of state and non-state actors, where interesting changes might be occurring. Second, it does not take into accountthe existence of the European Constitution, which is very different from the constitutions of individual European


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states. I acknowledge the importance of both. These factors could make a substantial difference. But difficulties

block progress in these sites too. First, nothing prevents individual states from ignoring the European

Constitution. Will France, Belgium, or Italy listen to the EU if it declared the banning of the burqa to be

unconstitutional? The second point is particularly noteworthy. To make it, we need to make distinctions

between (a) norms of secularism embedded in the informal politics of states (and non-state actors); (b) norms

embedded in formal, institutional politics and articulated in representations and reflections found in laws

enacted by legislatures, executive decisions, judicial pronouncements, and constitutional articles; and finally, (c)

normative ideals governing the relationship between the state and religion expressed in doctrines, ideologies,

and political theories.

I believe that the doctrinal, ideological, and theoretical formulations of Western secularism are by now highly

restricted and inadequate as are the formal politics and laws inspired by these doctrines and ideologies. The

rehabilitation of secularism is virtually impossible unless we reduce our reliance on these formal practices andformulations. These doctrines and theories have become part of the problem, hurdles to properly examining the

issues at stake. They include French laicite and the American wall of separation model, as well as the formal,

institutional political practices of most European states. If we continue to remain in the grip of these

formulations and practices, we would simply not notice other conceptions that have probably been pushed into

the background. Once we have shifted away from these and start to focus on the normative, informal practices

of a broader range of Western and non-Western states, we shall see that better forms of secular states and much

more defensible versions of secularisms are available. This requires an anthropology of secular practices of

Western and non-Western political actors, from which Modoods moderate secularism is galaxies removed.

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rethinking secularism rajeevbhargava

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