TY - JOUR
T1 - Spatializing Religious Freedom
T2 - Inhabiting the Legal Frontier Between Ethnic and National Rights
AU - Bocarejo, Diana
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was in part funded by the Wenner Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research.
Copyright:
Copyright 2014 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 2014/3
Y1 - 2014/3
N2 - This article addresses the complex legal endeavour to shape the frontiers between two of the most fundamental liberal rights in multicultural nation states: the right to cultural difference and the right to religious freedom in Colombia. I follow one dispute, between members of the indigenous Arhuaco group who are Evangelical Christians and their indigenous local authorities. This example illuminates longstanding debates surrounding the relationship between religion and politics within legally plural states. I put together different scales of analysis for understanding: (i) the legal definition of the right to religious freedom and the right to ethnic cultural difference as private or public and individual or collective; (ii) the debate about the political meaning of religious practice by studying, for example, how it relates to claims over inequality and land access; and (iii) the importance of understanding the meaning of conversion for addressing the legal difficulty of creating a sustainable boundary between these two rights.
AB - This article addresses the complex legal endeavour to shape the frontiers between two of the most fundamental liberal rights in multicultural nation states: the right to cultural difference and the right to religious freedom in Colombia. I follow one dispute, between members of the indigenous Arhuaco group who are Evangelical Christians and their indigenous local authorities. This example illuminates longstanding debates surrounding the relationship between religion and politics within legally plural states. I put together different scales of analysis for understanding: (i) the legal definition of the right to religious freedom and the right to ethnic cultural difference as private or public and individual or collective; (ii) the debate about the political meaning of religious practice by studying, for example, how it relates to claims over inequality and land access; and (iii) the importance of understanding the meaning of conversion for addressing the legal difficulty of creating a sustainable boundary between these two rights.
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U2 - 10.1177/0964663913487094
DO - 10.1177/0964663913487094
M3 - Research Article
AN - SCOPUS:84893945748
SN - 0964-6639
VL - 23
SP - 31
EP - 53
JO - Social and Legal Studies
JF - Social and Legal Studies
IS - 1
ER -