Asia Pacific Journal of Education

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One size does not fit all: complexity, religion,

secularism and education

Lynn Davies

To cite this article: Lynn Davies (2014) One size does not fit all: complexity, religion,
secularism and education, Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 34:2, 184-199, DOI:
10.1080/02188791.2013.875647

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Asia Pacific Journal of Education, 2014
Vol. 34, No. 2, 184–199, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02188791.2013.875647

One size does not fit all: complexity, religion, secularism and education
Lynn Davies*

School of Education, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK

(Received 16 July 2013; final version received 9 December 2013)

The continuing incidence of extremist acts committed in the name of religion

underscores the need to examine the interplay between religion and learning. This
article argues for a secular foundation in society and school to protect against religion
contributing to conflict and extremism. However, this is not a hard version of
secularism, but a dynamic secularism which adapts to different contexts in time and
space. A number of myths about secularism are exposed. The article draws on
complexity theory to show how religion amplifies conflict, but also to show how a
complex adaptive society can accommodate diverse faiths. A comparative perspective
across a range of countries and continents reveals highly diverse patterns of religious
education, and shows their links to power and nation-building. There are clear dangers
of the politicization of religion and of segregation in a plural society. Yet, a complexity
approach also warns of blanket global recommendations about the intersection between
faith and schooling. Only two basics are posited: first, that there should be transparency
and consistency in government policies on religion or secularism, and second, that
schooling should promote the critical thinking which enables religious messages to be
critiqued and the rights of all upheld.
Keywords: religion; secularization; dynamic secularism; complexity; critical thinking

Introduction
Extremist movements and acts all over the world do not appear to be in the decline.
Decapitating their leaders, such as bin Laden, means simply that extremist networks
regroup and reshape. The internet and global communications assist both counter-terror
and extremist organizations alike. I begin with this reality because it points up the
interconnected nature of events in our global world. A country’s foreign policy,
international religious influences and the speed of networks combine to mean that
extremist occurrences are never purely local. Comparative education can be vital in
helping us understand the learning that goes on in different arenas to produce actors and
those that influence them.
Whenever there are violent extremist acts where the perpetrators are identified or
caught, newspapers and social analysts pore over the backgrounds of extremists to find
clues to their actions. Whether far-right violent activists or religious radicals, it becomes
clear that their formal education had provided no protection against extremism, its logics
and its heroics. Nor, significantly, had their religious upbringing – whether in Christianity
or Islam, or in some cases, conversion from one to the other. What characterizes the
religious extremists is their threefold certainty: of their ideological position, of the
absolute requirement for extreme violence and of a subsequent reward in heaven.
Subsequently, an Islamic extremist act such as a bombing or murder can evince an equally

*Email: [email protected]

q 2014 National Institute of Education, Singapore

 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 185

certain far right response, ranging from racist comments on Facebook to Islamophobic
insults to women, then to attacks on mosques and Islamic schools.
All this leads to an argument for a critical, secular education which can protect against
such actions and reactions. One key task of a secular education is to instil habits of doubt,
to question the definitive messages from ideological leaders, spoken or written. This does
not mean simply replacing such messages with a new definitive version or concrete
identity. It means skills in discourse analysis and also political analysis of what will be
achieved by action. History, social science and religious education have to work in concert
to enable students to examine how spirals of revenge and retribution occur, and how they
can be interrupted. This article develops such arguments.
In a recently completed book called Unsafe Gods: Security, secularism and schooling
(Davies, 2014), I examine how religion makes conflict more intractable. Opposing sides
which are of different religions are not necessarily more problematic: it is when religion is
held to be the cause of the conflict that positions become entrenched. It is difficult to
bargain over religion, as beliefs are not to be carved up and exchanged. In Syria it is clear
that it was when the opposition to the government started to take on Sunni/Shia aspects,
when the Islamists lined up with opposition, that the West had extreme difficulty knowing
whom and how to support.
I work with complexity theory to enable insights into these phenomena and to explore
implications for education. One obvious area is that of amplification, particularly
amplification of conflict. Religious belief is particularly risky. The amplification spiral can
be portrayed as follows:

Exclusivity
#
Superiority
#
Intolerance
#
God is on our side
#
Expansionism for God

Briefly, religions are by definition exclusive, not able to be intertwined, with adherents
seeing their beliefs as part of a special identity and community. This then inexorably leads
to seeing one’s religion as superior to others, otherwise why not change? Once one’s
religion is superior, then so are its adherents, and this may lead to intolerance of others.
The fourth link in the chain with regard to conflict is when such intolerance means hatred
and a desire to attack others or even exterminate them. The intractability comes from the
belief that God is on your side in such battles – and this has been the case from the
Crusades to the Iraq war, with both George Bush and Tony Blair holding that God had
given them a message to invade. The final loop is the idea that one’s religion is so superior
that it must be promulgated globally, whether in Christian missionary work or in the
Islamic call for global nation; or Muslim community throughout the world.
186 L. Davies

Secularism and its myths

There is then urgency in finding a form of governance which does not let religion get the
upper hand in conflict. I make the argument for dynamic secular governance. Secularism
is, at its simplest, the separation of church and state, so that a religion does not interfere in
the workings and institutions of governance: law, judiciary, police, health, transport and,
by extrapolation, education. Many versions of secularism abound: soft secularism, as in
accommodation of all religions and even incorporation into aspects of governance; and
hard secularism as in bans on religious expression in public life such as the headscarf or
the Christian cross. Except in the extreme hard versions (which are not secularism at all,
but imposed atheism, as in the great Soviet experiment), secularism is not antithetical to
religion, but in contrast can be a friend to religion, acting as an umbrella for all faiths and
ensuring that none is privileged. A functioning secular government will have laws based in
cross-cutting human rights which will outlaw religious discrimination, allow freedom of
worship, freedom of religious expression and freedom to leave a religion if wanted.
There are many myths about secularism: that it is the same as atheism (which is about
belief, not governance), that it is an enemy of religion, that it has no values, that it has no
spirituality. But it is possible, and indeed necessary, for a secular government to have an
ethical system to protect its citizens, and this is usually based in some system of human
rights. In turn, rights underpin the legal system which accords the same rights to all
regardless of their ethnicity, gender, class and of course religion, or absence of religion.
Another myth about secularism is that it is the same as secularization – the idea that
the world is becoming less religious, or that a secular political system means a decline in
religion. This is not true; quite the converse. Bhargava (2009) argues that it is secularism
that is “under siege” (p. 82), with an increasing number of theocracies or states with
theocratic or Islamist tendencies. Movements that challenge the “undisputed” reign of
secularism have however not been restricted to Muslim societies: there are ever stronger
Sinhalese Buddhists in Sri Lanka, Hindu nationalists in India, religious ultra-orthodoxy in
Israel, and Sikh nationalists claiming that Sikhism does not recognize a separation of
religion and state. Christian movements are emerging more strongly in countries as far
apart as Kenya, Guatemala and the Philippines. Christian fundamentalism is an
increasingly visible force in American politics.
Even if not overtly, there are few signs that states are shedding previous religious
trappings. In the UK, the Queen is leader of the Anglican Church, with the coronation a
religious act. The Upper House of the UK legislature, the House of Lords, still has 26 seats
reserved for Church of England Bishops. The Church of England has vigorously opposed
relaxing the UK law on assisted suicide, despite 70% of the British population being in
favour of it. This is also despite the fact that regular Church of England attendees make up
currently fewer than 3% of the population, with an average age of over 50. The Bishops
have worked indefatigably in defeating every Private Members Bill on this, yet they are
supposed to be an independent voice. In Germany, it has been shown that the banning of
the headscarf is less a sign of secularization or of maintenance of neutrality and more to do
with the reassertion of a national German identity, of Germanness. The Leitkultur (guiding
culture) into which immigrants should assimilate has deep Christian roots (Sandford-
Gaebel, 2013). This has had considerable implications for citizenship and exclusion.
A major problem is that what are held to be secular states are pseudo-secular ones in
terms of a less than transparent participation of religions in governance, so that religion is
actually alive and well. Nepal declared itself as a secular nation but the official religion is
Hinduism. Burma is now supposedly secular but the Buddhist government is persecuting
 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 187

the Muslim minority, using violence and destroying villages. Froese (2008) shows how
Orthodoxy in Russia currently acts as a “pseudo-state” church. This threatens religious
freedom for other religions. In Central Asia, all the “Stans” returned to strict religious laws
that favour Islamic groups with current links to power. Froese notes how many Communist
mainliners have claimed a faith in Islam to legitimize their grip on power. One Uzbek
official imprisoned Jehovah’s Witnesses for nothing more than proselytizing. In general,
the major religious groups, Islam and Eastern Orthodoxy, suffer fewer problems as long as
they do not criticize the government.
On the other side of the world, Modood (2009) analyses how the US is a deeply
religious society. Churches, mainly White and mainly in the south and mid-west,
campaign openly for candidates and parties, raise large sums of money for politicians and
introduce religion-based issues into politics, such as abortion, HIV/AIDS, homosexuality,
stem-cell research, prayer at school, and so on. It has been said that no openly avowed
atheist has ever been a candidate for the White House. The US contains over 21,000
distinct religious groups from myriad world religious traditions. Yet, whatever the
religion, many Americans reference what they believe God wants as the rationale for their
specific political attitudes (Froese, 2008). Froese reveals how the “Republicanization” of
American Protestantism is a fairly recent phenomenon, marking the successful courting of
dominant Evangelical religious groups by the Republican Party. It is interesting that nearly
all individuals who believe that God favours their political party are Republicans. In
education too, Apple has disturbingly catalogued the increasing influence of the
conservative evangelical right (2006, 2013). Thus although the US is a country that forbids
institutional collaboration of its church and state, religious sentiments play a powerful role
in setting the political agenda and determining election outcomes. And as we know, Bush
had God on his side.
Hence, while the first fundamental of a truly secular state would be that equal value is
accorded to all religions and to all belief or ethical systems, in reality this is rarely the case.
For Malaysia, for example, Noor (2011) argues that pluralism is one of the greatest assets
that Malaysia possesses, and should not be pathologized as a problem. But what the state
has to do is act as “honest broker” and create vital common public domains where
interaction, cooperation, respect and recognition can develop. Noor examined all the
religious lobbying and communal demands that went on at the time of the election. Some
were arguing for freedom of religion, but a coalition of Muslim Non-governmental
Organizations (NGOs) and lobby groups issued their demands, calling on the political
parties to address their sectarian concerns, which include the rejection of the idea that
Malaysia is a secular state and rejection of religious pluralism if it implies that all faith and
belief systems are equal. Noor sees the space of secular civil society shrinking with the rise
of religious-based consumer groups. Issues such as workers’ rights, gender equality or
environmentalism, that were once neutral issues in a secular public domain, have now
been “claimed” by exclusive religious groups. He worries that the endpoint will be an
absurd situation of having Muslim-based, Christian-based, Hindu-based and Buddhist-
based sectarian environmental groups instead of a universal (and secular) lobby on
environmental concerns. While only a secular state that treats all religions equally can
stem the tide of divisive religious sectarianism, the UMNO (United Malays National
Organization) government caves in time and again to the demands of the conservative
Islamists who call for the state to reject any claims of being neutral and secular. This also
means that non-Malay and non-Muslim communities are losing faith in the Malaysian
project itself, and likewise replicating the communalist race and religion-based politics of
the majority. Noor (2011) asks whether the notion of a Malaysian Malaysia that is truly
188 L. Davies

plural, democratic and secular still holds, or whether it has passed that invisible line and
people are now living in a divided and sectarian society.
Any attack on the very idea of secularism is therefore an attack on the value of universal
equality itself, and those who condemn secularism as being “unGodly” or corrupt are really
the ones who wish to destroy the basis of a free and equal society where every citizen is
accorded the respect that she or he is due . . . .For all its weaknesses, secularism remains the
only safeguard to keep our country on a democratic track. (Noor, 2011, p. 3)
A different problem for equality exists in Lebanon. It is officially a secular country,
with no state religion. Yet, there are 18 religious groups and each of them has supported
one of the country’s two major political parties. There is a highly diverse education
system, not just between French, American and British traditions, and between public and
private, but between different religious private schools: Western clerical, Presbyterian,
Catholic and Islamic. Madaad (2013) argues that by 1975, the diversity of educational
institutions in Lebanon was well entrenched, a situation that contributed to the divisions
and barriers that erupted into the civil war. More recently, a study conducted by
Abouchedid, Nasser, and Blommestein (2002) contended that prototypes of political
socialization strongly influence the religious agenda in Lebanon, including that of schools.
This relates to the teaching of history as well as, in private schools, political propaganda.
While I argue for a dynamic secularism, this does not mean internal inconsistency.
China’s policies towards the Uyghur can be cited at this point. Clarke (2010) reveals how
two aspects of Uyghur culture – religion and language – have been closely managed by
the state. The state’s approach has been characterized by alternating periods of “soft” and
“hard” policies toward religious and cultural expression. The “soft” approach saw a
relative tolerance and even encouragement of institutionalized Islam when it was
perceived as necessary to gain the acquiescence of the Uyghur population. The “hard”
policies, in contrast, have been characterized by campaigns against religious education
outside of state-sanctioned institutions, “illegal” mosque construction, the institution of
bans on mosque attendance by persons under 18 years of age and the “re-education” and
“reform” of religious leaders when the state perceives Islam to be a threat to security. The
close link between Islam and Uyghur identity has meant that any attempt by the state to
regulate religious practice and expression is a cause of resentment for the Uyghurs.

The role of the state in the provision of faith-based schooling

So the first problem is not religious pluralism as such, but whether there is coherence
between a government’s avowed policy of treating all faiths equally, or of being secular in
its decision-making and institutional processes, and the reality of religious bias and
influence. How does this play out in the provision of schooling?
A key debate in countries such as the UK is whether the state should fund faith-based
schools. Historically, England has funded Church of England and Roman Catholic
schools, but in the interests of equity has been forced to start to fund Islamic schools.
It would have been better to withdraw funding from all religious schools, but this would be
electoral suicide. A dynamic secular state would (unlike the great Soviet experiment)
permit religious schools, but insist that they are funded privately. Once some principle of
equity is used, then the State should in theory fund all sorts of faith interests – whether 7th
Day Adventists, creationists or Wiccan groups. Not only does this mean the anomaly of a
tax payer of one belief funding the promotion belief system of another, but has grave
consequences in a plural society. As remarked earlier, exclusivity amplifies into
intolerance. Countries that have segregated systems (Northern Ireland, Sri Lanka, Bosnia
 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 189

& Herzegovina) find it difficult to maintain social cohesion, when identities become
hardened through sectarian schooling. In the UK, schools in some areas may have
predominantly Muslim students, depending on the locality; but the important distinction is
that they are not branded as Islamic schools, or as somehow different from (or better than)
schools with predominantly non-Muslim students. In a religiously plural society, it is
crucial that schools remain secular in their nomenclature and affiliations, to avoid
amplifying tensions and locked-in identities.
However, if a country is virtually mono-religious, questions of funding or state support
take a different shape. In Afghanistan, as in many Arab countries, state education is
religious education in the sense that Islamic values and teaching underpin the schools,
whether they are officially madrassas or not. Here the responsibility of the state would be
to protect religious minorities and ensure they do not suffer discrimination or exclusion, in
and out of education. In countries such as Afghanistan and Pakistan, the key task is to keep
schools open, particularly girls’ schools. In negotiations with the Taliban, the government
or community strategy is to make schools look more religious rather than less, to prevent
attacks on schools as being Western. If this means calling the teachers mullahs and the
schools madrassas, this is worth it for the cause of promoting education. Ensuring
the school curriculum is properly Islamic is another way to gain acceptance, whether by
the Taliban or local conservative religious leaders. Dynamism does mean accommodation.
It is worth querying some suspicions of madrassas at this point. For Indonesia,
Woodward, Rohmaniyah, Amin, and Coleman (2010) hold that rather than being a causal
agent for extremism, Muslim education operates as a protective mechanism, with Islamic
boarding school “immunizing” against extremism. They claim that most Islamic boarding
schools graduates are not ignorant of “secular” subjects, and for many young people from
pious but poor families, Islamic boarding schools are the gateways to higher education
in a range of subjects (Woodward et al., 2010). Similarly, while Islamic educational
institutions in Afghanistan provide free education and in some cases free board and
lodging, contrary to common perception poverty and a lack of alternative opportunities are
not the only reasons for families to send their children there. Many prosperous families
also opt for a madrassas because they seek a religious education and madrassas represent a
value in themselves (Borchgrevink, 2010). Religious education generally is held in high
esteem, reflecting a desire for morality in public life and a just and fair government. People
are suspicious if they think that education reform is just about curbing radical and militant
extremism. Blumör (2012) discusses how this creates a problem for development
cooperation, which is hesitant (as I would have been) about the idea that religion should
play such a dominant role in education.
For from our own historic experience the dominance of religious education belongs to a stage
of social development now considered obsolete. Presumably for these reasons, religious
education – if observed at all – has been marginalized by organizations involved in
promoting education. Such organizations, both in Afghanistan and elsewhere, will have to
grapple more intensively with religious education if they are to achieve sustainable outcomes.
So will education promotion perhaps be forced to depart from the familiar model of
secularization? The new model of reformed Islamism could embrace secular education and at
the same time offer an alternative to the radical fundamentalist theology of the Taliban.
(Blumör, 2012, p. 13)
This is a key point, and the notion of a reformed Islamism “embracing” secular
education and challenging fundamentalism is indeed a way forward.
In such contexts, then, religion is a way in, not always a barrier. Save the Children
Afghanistan produced a booklet in Farsi and Pashtun showing how children’s rights were
190 L. Davies

present in the Quran, and this booklet helped persuade parents to send their girls to school.
Similarly in Somaliland a campaign on girls’ rights to education was carried out in IDP
(Internally Displaced Person) communities, with the support of community and religious
leaders. The campaign partly rested on the teachings of the Quran, which are supportive of
girls’ education (Skeie, 2013).
A different context again is a system that is segregated primarily by ethnicity or
language, but where this also means segregation by religion. This adds to the complexity
and fragility. Instances here would include Bosnia & Herzegovina (BiH) and Sri Lanka.
In BiH, the governing structure and internal boundaries that were formalized in the peace
accords post-conflict were based on political imperative and the effects of ethnic cleansing
rather than administration logic (Bowder & Perry, 2013). Curricula in schools are still
fragmented, with distinct Bosniak, Croat and Serb curricula for those three different
“nations”. In each are “national” groups of subjects, including history, geography,
language and religion. They seem to be entrenched, rather than interim. The Religious
Studies curriculum has improved in terms of a slightly more modern appearance and tone,
but for Serb schools retains not only a devout, exclusive focus on Serbia and Serbs, but
also a considerable sense of national victimhood. Religious (orthodox) instruction appears,
albeit briefly, in the early grades of scientific instruction. In Serb and Croat books,
religious content is drawn on heavily for both literature and history textbooks, and
specially associated with national (i.e., divisive) loyalty. Moreover, the system not only
fails to promote integration, but fails to provide students with the skills of an independent
critical approach, the balance of opposing views. Bowder and Perry (2013) are pessimistic
about the possibility of reformed curricula, but advocate an approach to teaching students
that is based less on exclusive ideological training and more on critical thinking and
analytical skills, which could at least begin to equip students to partake in democratic
processes, to live in a country governed by human rights and the rule of law and to live in a
diverse Europe and a globalized society that is increasingly heterogeneous. Integrated
schools in the autonomous district of Brčko offered returnees and internally displaced
persons a secular programme on “the culture of religions”, as opposed to religious
instruction. This provided an alternative to exclusionary religious denomination schools
and, some argued, eventually helped to facilitate social reintegration in the area (INEE/
Davies, 2011). However, it would seem the expansion of this programme is some way off:
as we shall see, reform towards religious bias may be less about structural or even
curriculum change, and more about pedagogical approaches.
In Sri Lanka, the education system is divided into Sinhalese, Tamil and Muslim – an
uneasy mixture of ethnic and religious categorizations. The majority Sinhalese are
predominantly Buddhist, the Tamils predominantly Hindu but with a minority Christian
population. The remainder of the population is mainly Muslim. It is the language divide
between Sinhala and Tamil which mostly prevents the integration of schools, but cultural
and religious aspects are also seen to contribute. The history of the conflict included
ethnic/religious cleansing by the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam). The Muslims
were a minority in the Northern Province, but had coexisted well with the majority Tamils,
with similarities in language and culture. Yet there were differences in political views and
the emergence of an exclusive political party for the Muslims in the Eastern Province
reflected this. There was forced eviction, with Muslims arriving at predominantly Muslim
divisions, but in 200 different locations. Initially, they maintained distinctions between
local and IDP Muslim and constructed identities around their place of origin. There were
different interpretations of Islamic culture: in some areas of the North, Muslim women had
more freedom in that they could move freely and pursue education. This interestingly
 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 191

served to create some cultural adaptation in the host community. (Davies, 2013). But
“return” in a context of Sri Lanka is very different from “return” in BiH in terms of what
future society is envisaged after ethnic or religious conflict. As in religiously divided
Northern Ireland, attempts at integrated schools have been patchy. The task in both
contexts is to find ways to bring young people together in common encounters which make
the boundaries less important, where students forget their religion.

The teaching of religion

After complex issues of state policy on school provision comes the question of how to
tackle religion within schools. A dynamic secular state would have to accommodate
private faith-based schools, and it has to be conceded that the raison d’être of these schools
would be to have religious instruction in that faith. Banning religious schools or religious
teaching is bound to fail, as in the great Soviet experiment (Froese, 2008). Banning
religious expression also creates a backlash, as in France or Turkey. But in a dynamic
secular system, not only is there a place for learning about religion in schools, but such
learning is essential to an understanding of the society. However, religious education in a
dynamic secular school takes the form of critical exploration of religions. This is not just
about the peculiarities of different faiths, but about the role of religion in society. Simply
hearing about different patterns of worship, marriage, death and festivals can act to cement
stereotypes of “the other”. More important is learning about when adherence to a religion
presents a problem for adherents or for others. There are excellent programmes to counter
Islamophobia for example, which tackle questions of prejudice, fear, history of migration
patterns and gender issues (Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe/ODIHR,
2011). There are also innovative programmes to prevent extremism, where through drama,
film and documents, students learn to decode messages and critically examine the claims
of religious and other extremists (Davies, 2013). The Guidance for Religious Education
(RE) in English schools is actually quite clear on the need for this. RE is to provoke
challenging questions about the meaning and purpose of beliefs; to encourage pupils to
explore their own beliefs (whether religious or non-religious) and to explore “how these
[issues] impact on personal, institutional and social ethics; and to express their responses.
This also builds resilience to anti-democratic or extremist narratives” (DCSF, 2010, p. 1).
The Guidance does talk of fostering pupils’ knowledge of Christianity and “other principal
religions”, which is still Christian-centric, but gives teachers scope for the “challenging
questions”.
Shala (2011), writing on Albania, talks of how the lack of communication and
interreligious dialogue has often resulted in ethnic and religious hatred, in crimes against
humanity, terrorist acts and genocide. I would say that it is more than just communication
and dialogue, but I concur with his conclusion that religious education does not violate the
secularism of the state and of the education system. Shala rightly points to exclusivism as a
key danger – particularly if translated into state policy – as in the Middle East. Not
accepting other faiths as legitimate leads to excusing systematic violations of human rights
and freedoms. Shala argues that Albanian harmony in contrast, was founded on a national
identity founded on language, tradition and culture, and not on religious affiliations.
Amongst other characteristics of such harmony was “the fact that economic and social
conflicts have never become religious ones” (Shala, 2011, p. 142). This underscores my
comments at the start of the paper about not letting religion take centre stage in conflict.
But Shala (2011) sees dangers ahead: the arrival in an uncontrolled manner of NGOs of
a religious spectrum of different sects and movements, providing illegal or semi-legal
192 L. Davies

religious education, as well as the absence of efficient state structures that would manage
legal relations and reciprocal obligations between the state and religious communities.
He argues that Albanian legislators should enable the Albanian state to move away from
the position of passive neutrality to pursue a policy of “active secularism”, (p. 143). This
chimes well with my promotion of dynamic secularism. This activity entails the State
protecting religious beliefs from interventions that aim at promoting distortions, extremist
trends or radicalization. This does not undermine the principle of separation of state and
church, or the right of private beliefs. Introducing religious education into public schools,
as in other countries, would respect the secularism of the state while enabling information
about religions and critical thinking.

The politicization of religion in school

Yet how religion and religious education should be introduced in school reveals a site of
immense variation. An interesting comparative article by Mawdsley, Cumming, and De
waal (2008) compared attempts at a shared culture in the US, Australia and South Africa.
The authors maintain that creating a shared culture can be difficult where rules are simply
propagated without underlying religious beliefs. But the challenge has been when or how
to permit the infusion of religious values into public education. Australia is more
accommodationist, permitting support of religious and religious incursions into public
schools that would not be allowed under the US constitution. South Africa is evolving its
own approach from a neutrality and impartiality perspective, but one that has as its core in
the political agenda of nation-building. The legal issues are fascinating: there were claims
in South Africa that cannabis represented a fundamental religious practice for
Rastafarians, yet the nation’s compelling interest is fighting drug abuse. Excluding
Rastafarians from drug laws would be financially and administratively impossible. While
a state should avoid putting believers to painful choices, a society can cohere only if all
participants accept that certain basic norms and standards are binding. Similarly the law
prohibiting corporal punishment in all public and private schools in South Africa rejected
claims of 196 independent schools that the blanket prohibition of its use in its schools
invaded their individual, parental and community rights to practise freely their [Christian]
religion. The ruling was that “the State’s interest in protecting pupils from degradation and
indignity . . . [implicates] the core value of human dignity in our Bill of Rights” (cited in
Mawdsley et al., 2008, p. 98). But there remain tensions in the US and Australia between
separationists and accommodationists over such issues as the distribution of religious
literature, schools’ recognition of student religious clubs and access by community
religious groups to hold their meetings on public school premises.
It is interesting that in the US there was a ruling that an evangelical Christian
opposing homosexuality could wear a T-shirt with a message “Be Happy, Be Straight”,
but not one saying “Be Happy, Not Gay”, as the latter may be injurious, acting against a
student’s right to be secure and let alone. But they permitted a student to wear a T shirt
saying “Homosexuality is a sin! Islam is a lie! Abortion is murder!”, as this did not
disrupt individuals. Free speech with regard to religion and its edicts is clearly a
tightrope for policy makers. Correctly, the interpretation, as in international law, is that
religions do not have rights, people do. Yet Australians do not even have a right to free
speech, creating a tension. The government is active in promoting “Australian” values
and general moral and civic behaviour, but then has a “chaplaincy” initiative to promote
the “spiritual and emotional well-being of school communities”. Mawdsley et al.’s
 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 193

(2008) article sees an “increasing undertone of mainstream and Christian beliefs” (as in
the term “chaplain”).
An apparently secular state can therefore also be manipulated by religious
organizations. In a revealing article on The Republic of Korea, Gu (2001) shows how
the constitutional separation of church and state, specifying freedom of religion as a
fundamental human right, has become used illiberally by powerful religious organizations.
They are able to push through their agenda regardless of governmental or social
restraints by using freedom of religion as a shield. The bargain was that they would not
interfere in politics as long as the state allowed them to proselytize and expand. Internally
they restrict their member’s freedom of religion by constructing an authoritarian structure.
For Gu, freedom of religious institutions is repressing the individual’s freedom of
conscience.
Another interesting comparative paper comes from Matemba (2013), who compares
the micro-politics of religious education reform in Scotland and Malawi. In Scotland,
surveys have found that over 27% of Scots have no religion and that Christianity is no
longer the basis of people’s moral and spiritual life. Secularization now characterizes
contemporary Scottish thought and practice. In Malawi, in contrast nearly 83% of people
are Christian, with 13% Muslim. What happens in both countries however is a highly
politicized arena for RE. Malawi had replaced Bible Knowledge (BK) with a multi-faith
subject called Religious and Moral Education (RME), which had an Islamic component.
The old approach to RE in Scotland was thoroughly confessional, but the new one became
neo-confessional in both denominational and non-denominational schools – pupils were
to have a knowledge of Christianity. There is therefore continued privileging of
Christianity in Scotland, the outcome of successful “hand twisting” by the powerful
Christian fraternity, even if it employs “heritage” as its primary justification. In Malawi
too, orthodox Christians were successful at “manning the gates” in RE, because in spite of
the parallel syllabus arrangement, it is BK and not RME which dominates. Much depends
on interpretation by schools and teachers. Churches in Malawi see religious pluralism
more of a challenge than an opportunity. Significantly, no evidence was found in this
research supporting the Christian respondents’ view that teaching other religions in RE
would work against Christianity. In contrast, it was found that in some Church-controlled
schools, overzealous BK teachers had begun to say unkind things about Islam. It was seen
as an anathema for church schools to teach Islam or Gule Wankuk (occultist performances
associated with African religions). In Scotland too, religious communities such as Jewish
and Muslim groups argued that by describing them as “other”, their particular identity was
marginalized to the periphery of the “more” important Scottish identity – an outcome they
deeply resented.
One intriguing aspect of consultation about RE in Malawi resonated with our study of
decentralization there (Harber & Davies, 2003) where we identified the “allowance
culture” whereby district officials would seek out activities only if there was an allowance
attached. Some respondents in Matemba’s (2013) study said Church officials had been
left out because money had been allocated to facilitate the reform process and that
government officials chose their friends and acquaintances to sit on the RE panels so
that they could benefit from the honorarium given from being involved. RE decisions are
cultural and economic in a very broad sense. But overall the study found the influence of
faith communities remains strong against any modernist or secularist agenda from the
state, and in Malawi in particular, Christian dominance perpetuates historical inequalities
for Muslims and educational privilege for Christians. While the state attempted to address
194 L. Davies

the general question of citizenship and the recognition of minority rights within RE from
an essentially liberal-democratic perspective, this has been less than successful.

Critical thinking
The scientist Gregory S. Paul produced a detailed study in 2005 to find out if rates
of murder and rape went up as levels of religion went down. He found the exact opposite.
On detailed international comparisons, the more religious a country is, the more likely
you are to be stabbed or raped there (cited in Hari, 2009). As Hari points out, this is not a
causal relationship, but it certainly challenges the idea we should have compulsory
worship in schools. It supports the idea of critical-thinking skills, looking for evidence,
enabling young people to make up their own minds, when they wish, beyond the
school gates.
While one size certainly does not fit all, whether with regard to the provision of
schools, to the relationship of religion to nationalism and nation building nor to how
religion maps on to security, there is one overriding feature which seems to emerge and re-
emerge in the challenge to extremism, idolatry and religious domination, and that is
critical thinking. Like secularism, there is confusion about what this means. It is not just
problem-solving in mathematics, or the relativist acceptance of any old idea in philosophy.
It includes a search for evidence, a sense of historical sources as well as a facility to
analyse the basis of one’s own and others’ judgements. Critical thinking cannot operate in
a vacuum, and needs some sort of value base. A secular education has a value system such
as rights which cut across all religions. There are arguments about whether rights derive
from long-standing religious precepts, but the point is that once enshrined as “man-made”
laws, they can be critiqued and updated in ways more difficult for critiques of religions and
their sacred texts. A secular-based education then enables knowledge of such rights as well
as skills in critiquing them, knowing the difference between absolute rights (life, freedom
from torture) and contingent rights (freedom of expression).
As an important champion of critical thinking, a secular education would include
religious education, but not religious indoctrination or doctrinal instruction. Temperman
(2010) argues that compulsory religious doctrinal teaching is contrary to the rights of both
parents and children (i.e., freedom of religion or belief and access to adequate education).
Just as Saudi Arabia has constitutionally stipulated that education must aim at “instilling
the Islamic faith in the younger generation”, the Maldives educational system is framed so
as to “inculcate obedience to Islam” and “instil love for Islam”. Yet, as he points out, state-
run compulsory instruction – or indoctrination – in secular ideologies, such as the North
Korean Juche ideology, is similarly at odds with the prohibition of coercion (Temperman,
2010). A dynamic secularism in education would in contrast not impose ideology but
present alternatives for discussion.
For protection against the extremism that started this article, it is crucial that young
people learn to get into the habit of critically analysing messages, whether from religious
or political leaders or from the internet. It cannot be denied that this does lead to problems
for believers. A recent collection Gender, religion and education in a chaotic postmodern
world (Gross, Davies, & Diab, 2013) has many articles from religious women who were
questioning the patriarchal nature of their religious texts – whether the Quran, the Bible or
the Torah. The problem is that once one starts to say that certain sections of sacred texts are
man-made, or are cultural expressions of the time, then who is to say that the whole lot is
not just a cultural expression of an elite powerful group, rather than a divine word?
A contribution from Japan showed how male religious scholars discriminated against their
 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 195

female counterparts and blocked the inclusion of a gender or feminist perspective in

religious studies. Yet, the critical view of religion such as that taken by feminists is
essential in the development of the field (Kawahashi, Kayoko, & Kuroki, 2013).
Critical thinking with regard to secularism has the feature of being able to stand
outside religion to achieve a distance, as in the broader distance between church and state.
But standing outside religion and examining its impact is not without risks and
controversy. I argue, however, that it is crucial if we are to challenge the extremism and
fundamentalism that spirals into violence and negative conflict. The right to freedom of
expression, which would include the right to criticize a religion – one’s own or someone
else’s – is a key plank in an education which aims to foster not just critical thinking but
how to express critical thoughts. The role of a dynamic secular state is to be watchful about
how freedom of religion is interpreted – and whether it genuinely includes freedom of
speech and freedom to leave a religion. A secular state does not ignore religions, or tread
softly around them, but as with any social organization, acts to provide the legal and
educational framework for citizens to know and pursue their rights. Religions are not
exempt, even if they claim a majority of citizens as believers.
It is instructive to find support for a critical approach to religion from those within a
religion – as seen in the critiques of patriarchy mentioned earlier. Ahmed (2009), formerly
rector of the International Islamic University in Pakistan, has some stern things to say
about Islamic scholarship:
Unfortunately, unlike communism which is based on a well worked out philosophy of history
and social theory, amenable to intellectual refutation or amendment, “Islamic ideology” is a
pseudo concept, having no intellectual sound basis and, since it is divine, it is not amenable to
argumentation. (Ahmed, 2009, pp. 13 – 14)
This suits feudalists and religionists, both having inbuilt antagonism for education.
The politicization of religion in the twentieth century in reaction to the colonization of
Muslim lands by Western powers, generated slogans like “Islam is not a religion but a way
of life”, and ideas like Islamic political, economic and social systems were floated.
Religion became understood as an ideology, changing the classical conservative
interpretation of Islam with a de facto separation of state and religion. Ahmed in fact
argues that cosmetic changes to the madrassas curriculum or introducing religious courses
in primary and secondary schools would make a person neither Islamic nor modern.
Instead, he wants a shift in the authoritarian framework on which the social, legal,
educational and religious life is structured. “The social mindset is feudal, the legal is
authoritarian, the educational is regimentational and the religious is totally deductive and
formal” (Ahmed, 2009, p. 20). Ahmed wants a fresh “thinking process” to move on from
certain major premises accepted and approved by a society which existed more than a
thousand years ago, and yet where it is now accepted that it requires no change or
improvement.
Ahmar (2011) compares Pakistan – unfavourably – with Singapore in terms of the
challenge of extremism. He claims that with its secular constitution, Singapore is one of
the few Southeast Asian countries where the state promotes harmony and inter-faith
dialogue. Tan (2008) had proposed that this stability was jealously guarded by the state,
especially since rapid modernization had neither resulted in the decline of religious belief
nor the downgrading of importance of religious institutions among Singaporeans. There
are continuing issues of freedom of speech and the stifling of dissent, but Ahmar argues
that the use of soft power and “egalitarian capitalism” (p. 60) together with a multicultural
education has enabled an equitable quality of life which fosters integration. Within the
196 L. Davies

Islamic community in Singapore, there is strong rejection of extremism and militancy, and
there is little space for hardline groups to permeate the mainstream Islamic community.
Singapore’s counter-ideological efforts have been able to identify targets and there is
important collaboration between Muslim scholars and the security agency. Education is
not segregated by religion or ethnicity, other than a handful of madrassas whose annual
intake of students is capped at 400. It is apparent that Singapore has not fallen into the traps
that the UK has in terms of religious particularism in education policy.
Fandy (2007) would argue then not that the West grafts its own educational system on
the Muslim world, but that there is reform from within. In the Arab world, even in its most
“secular” states, the broad environment in which a student lives is currently saturated by
religious discourse.
What is needed is not the banishment of religious teachings from school, but rather a different
way of teaching religion. This would help not only make students more “tolerant” of people of
other faiths, as American advocates of textbook reform would have, but it would also arm
these students with the knowledge necessary for alternative conceptions of Islam. (Fandy,
2007, p. 94)
He warns that Muslims are much less likely to be responsive to calls for reform if
initiatives are perceived as dictates coming from abroad. It takes only one demagogue to
accuse the West of wanting to undermine Islam for the whole project to collapse. They
should not be given this opportunity by too much emphasis being put on the place of
religion in or outside schools.
It was not religion in schoolbooks that created the present situation, but rather a lack of free
debate and serious engagement with those responsible for creating modern educational
systems founded on ideals of intellectual excellence, administrative accountability and critical
thinking. (Fandy, 2007, p. 95)
The bedrock for this is teacher education. Fandy quotes the Egyptian scholar Mouna Abu
Sinna who said in a 2003 interview with him that “the battleground for terrorism is the
classroom” (Fandy, 2007, p. 83). Teachers themselves are a vital element of the
fundamentalist threat. People trained in teaching colleges are not sufficiently able to think
critically themselves, much less teach their students to do so. The curricula of the teachers
colleges comprised locally produced workbooks put together in haste by the professors and
containing little more than 40 to 50 pages of questions and answers that students must simply
memorize for the final exams. Abu Sinna sees a direct link between this poor pedagogy and
Islamist violence: “This process that stifles the critical faculty is at the very centre of the issue
of extremism” (Fandy, 2007, p. 83). In Saudi Arabia, Fandy sees the problem as failing to
instil the notion of citizenship and the responsibilities that come with it, producing a Muslim
jihadist rather than a Saudi citizen who recognizes his obligations to the state. Until the
schools begin recognizing and teaching the meaning of citizenship, Saudis will never
recognize national boundaries and will continue a border-hopping nomadic way of thinking,
exemplified by Al Qaeda, the ultimate enemy of national boundaries. In officially secular
public schools such as in Pakistan, fundamentalists have infiltrated, not just to teach but to
recruit. Fandy holds that a teacher’s comments on texts, their modes of practice and discussion
with students, parents and others in the community outside the classroom could have a big
impact, especially in small towns where teachers are looked up to as notable social figures.

Conclusion
As has been pointed out, religious pluralism is not a problem in itself, unless people make
it so, either through using religion as a base for conflict, or by attempting religious
 Asia Pacific Journal of Education 197

domination and expansionism, hence challenging freedom of religion for others. The only
way to prevent religion getting the upper hand in conflict or politics is some form of
secular state. I have however argued for a dynamic secularism, including one within
education, adapting to context while having over-arching insistence on basic rights. What
sorts of schools are provided, their religious base or infusion, cannot be legislated for or
even argued for internationally. Even if there were accepted global norms, people – and
religious organizations – will bypass them and subvert them. Religion is a power and
lobbying interest, just as politics is. It is not just about ideology.
The reason why I talk about a dynamic secularism is that it does not take the same shape
in every country, and that it is open to change. A complex adaptive society needs to prevent
“lock-in” – of old ideas, old ways of doing things, old superstitions, and old politics. The
reason why our book on gender and religion mentioned above (Gross et al., 2013) referred
to a postmodern world was because of the postmodern challenge to orthodoxy, to the notion
that there is one truth out there. It would be the height of arrogance (and would imply an
expansionism akin to religious expansionism) to call for a global form of secularism and
secular education. Hard secularism (as we saw in North Korea or China) can be as
oppressive as theocracy. A glance at the Asia-Pacific region demonstrates that the
challenge to conflict and extremism lies not just within education, but the overall political
context with regard to equality and treatment of minorities, as we saw with the contrast
between Singapore and Pakistan. Whether there is a Muslim majority or minority may
make a difference, but even within Muslim majority countries in the region there are
divergences in terms of the approach to multiculturalism and religious accommodation. It
is clear that the more a country moves in the direction of religious fundamentalism, the
more likely there is to be unrest from minorities, unless there is a police state to enforce
domination. Strategies for nation building have far-reaching consequences.
Hence only two fundamentals can be mooted. First, transparency: that if a state claims
that it accords equal value to all religions – and none – this should be reflected in its
educational policies. There will always be religious lobbying, either for representation of
its leaders, or for a policy position – on abortion, FGM (female genital mutilation),
suicide, homosexuality, women priests and, of course, on religion in schools, including the
teaching of evolution. Debates must be public, and governments should not shy away from
permitting critique of religious dogma and fundamentalism. Religions are not to be
privileged in public debate.
The underpinning to transparency, accountability and public debate is the fostering of
critical thinking. This article has shown support for such pedagogy from a range of very
diverse contexts – Egypt, BiH, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Albania, Sri Lanka – with this
seen as having more impact than curriculum change or structural reform. Comparative
education can demonstrate how different countries arrive at the same point from different
sources, but also how policy and pedagogy then diverge and become localized. It has to be
acknowledged that critical thinking would take very different shapes in different contexts,
and in some, any critique of religion and its texts, or of government and its policies, would
probably not be included. The comparative studies in this article have shown how religious
education is highly politicized. Yet it is possible to start in small ways, perhaps through a
more critical teacher education, to foster basic skills of weighing up evidence, seeing
opposing points of view or recognizing that there can be alternative truths. I ended my
book (Davies, 2014) and will end this article with the words of Mahatma Gandhi, the great
secularist: “I want all the cultures of all lands to be blown about my house as freely as
possible. But I refuse to be blown off my feet by any.”
198 L. Davies

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