Book Notes: The Varieties of Religious Repression by Ani Sarkissian

It is sixty-eight years since the UN Declaration of Universal Human Rights was signed. 

The lofty aspirations contained in that document have not been fulfilled, no more so, than those of its eighteenth article, which states: "Everyone shall have the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion." Outright persecutors of believers, such as the North Korean regime, are the obvious perpetrators of such human rights abuses. Less visible is what Ani Sarkissian calls “religious repression”. That is, violation of religious freedom by governments, which while not constituting full persecution, involves ongoing restriction, control and interference with religious people, organisations and activities. Her book, “The Varieties of Religious Repression: Why Governments Repress Religion” is an intelligent, rigorous and highly revealing study of the politics of repression implemented by non-Democratic governments, and is a most welcome addition to our understanding of a neglected field.

Sarkissian’s book uses an innovative typology of regimes which adds sophistication to our understanding of how governments behave. Regimes have traditionally been placed on a scale from fully-democratic, to completely autocratic. Sarkissian notes however, that while there was a tendency for more democratic regimes to repress religion less, “many states with low levels of political-competition… chose not to impose a large number of restrictions on religion, while some…. with relatively higher levels of political competition impose a large variety of restrictive regulations.” (p182). Instead she groups regimes into four categories; those who (i) repress all religion (e.g. China); (ii) those who repress all but one religion (e.g. Russia); (iii) those who repress some religions (e.g. Singapore) and (iv), those who do not repress religion (e.g. Albania). Using this schema, Sarkissian is able to demonstrate that it is not just levels of democratic participation in government which dictate the extent of religious freedom; but it is these in combination with the levels of religious division within the society which provoke governments to repress in the ways they do. 

Non-democratic regimes appear to repress on a basis of their own rational choices in their particular circumstances as follows; “states with very low political-competition that are religiously divided tend to repress all religious groups, while those with higher levels of political competition but less religiously divided societies repress none.” (p183). Then, “States in the middle of the political-competition and religious division scales, repress some religious groups”, while a “subset of states that have higher religious divisions but more competitive political systems target repression at all but one religious group.” (p183). The final conclusion is that some highly  autocratic regimes find it rational to allow genuine freedom of religion. The sixteen national case-studies with which Sarkissian illustrates her thesis are informative, well-crafted and compelling; and form the heart of the book.

The implications of Sarkissian’s work are important. Much western rhetoric and policy seems to assume that democratisation is an automatic route towards the flourishing of a full civil society, apart from the state. If that was true in the Cold War, it certainly does not reflect the complex realities of today’s world. Also, people of all faiths should beware of assuming that they have a monopoly on victimisation too, as state-repression by non-democratic governments affects all. Christians are, I think, provoked to move beyond simply invoking the inevitable enmity of the world to the church, to see that such tensions are mediated through political systems which can be understood and therefore reckoned with more wisely. She also notes that while she has studied non-democratic regimes, her work suggests that a democracy containing major religious divisions, and a single dominant political party, might equally begin to limit religious freedom (p185).

Sarkissian has done a great job in enhancing our understanding of the often fraught relationships between faith-groups and non-democratic regimes. She has done this by adding a vital layer of complexity to the ‘state’ side of the relationship. If the book has a weakness, it is simply that she has not done the same for the ‘religion’ side of the equation. There is a tendency throughout the book to treat ‘religion’ as a single phenomenon. That such a method is overly simplistic, in a world in which ‘religion’ leads some to armed jihad and others to pacifism, is obvious. Sarkissian acknowledges this in her closing remarks in which she both adds an afterword about the current problems in the Islamic world, and suggests that future research might nuance her model perhaps around a classification of religious behaviours. (p187) The reader is left hugely informed about how governments act, but also wondering how differently varying religious systems operate in this arena. Perhaps categorising religious groups according to their understanding of the state-religion relationship, would make a useful next step. Likewise, while this intriguing work of political science explains why regimes repress; it generally avoids the questions of political philosophy, such as what the legitimate limits of freedom are; and when governments are justified in imposing them.

Sarkissian’s “The Varieties of Religious Repression”, is an astute and penetrating analysis of one of the most critical contemporary issues. 

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First published in Solas Magazine. Used with permission.