Bøger af Helge Årsheim

This volume explores the interaction between law and religion in the Nordic region and Germany in the post-World War II period. It examines how religion has been conceptualized and managed within secular law and pays particular attention to the growing influence of international law on the regulation of majority and minorty religion. The volume investigates different ways of understanding the secularity of law, and it analyzes the relationship between conceptions of secularity within law and theology in the region. Finally, it also discusses renegotiations of theological positions with regard to the law of the land and tendencies towards re-confessionalization of law governing religion.

This volume examines the different and sometimes contradictory approaches of four UN human rights committees to the concept of religion. Drawing on critical perspectives from religious studies, the book combines a genealogical assessment of the role of religion in international law with a detailed textual study of the reporting practice of the committees monitoring racial discrimination, civil and political rights, women's rights, and children's rights. Arsheim argues that the role of religion within the rights traditions monitored by the committees varies to the extent that their recommendations risk contradicting one another, thereby undermining their credibility and potential to bring about real change on the ground: Where some committees view religion singularly as a core individual right, others see religion partly as an inherent threat to the realization of other rights, but also as a potent social force to be reckoned with. In order to remedy this situation, Arsheim proposes the publication of a joint general comment by all the committees, spelling out their approach to the role of religion in the implementation of human rights.