Laicism and Liberalism as Paradigms in the Interpretation of Human Rights. Reflections on the Configuration of the Religious Freedom in the Context of French Debate About the Islamic Veil

Abstract

The use of Islamic veil for girls in public schools of France has aroused animportant discussion about laicism, multiculturalism and religious freedom.This debate was under the scrutiny of the European Court of HumanRights, which issued several judgments about the problem. The requirementof neutrality, the fundamental principle of laicism, allows that theState, supposing to protect the freedom of conscience of no religious people,confines the exercise of religious freedom to the strict boundaries ofprivate life. At the same time, while requiring neutrality, the State is tryingto impose in the public arena a sort of civil religion, depriving of the rightof expression in religion matters. These two elements could be found notonly in the fathers and current thinkers of laicism, but in authors that,without this enrollment, are finally supporting the same conclusions. Theprincipal mistake that is under that is a conception of freedom derived fromthe Illustrated liberalism, an error that in the end is derived of a limitedconception of the man. The pretensions of these doctrines are impossibleto perform, because the religion cannot be relegated to the interior of manwithout to force the freedom itself. If some States continue following theseideas, will be no limits in the violation of the individual freedoms. Therefore,instead to see the religion as a “toxic” element in the social sphere,the relationship between State and religion should be marked for a positivelaicism. That implies a legitimate autonomy between them and to recognizethe positive value of religion for the individual and social life, an elementthat is so valuable to the point that is consecrated as a human right.