‘Human Rights’, ‘Religion’ and the ‘Secular’: Variant Configurations of Religion(s), State(s) and Society(ies) Paul Weller* Abstract Discussions about the relationship between ‘religion’ and ‘human rights’ often focus on the problems that arise from ‘religion’. Within a European historical perspective this is understandable since one of the most important aspects of the historical development of the ‘human rights’ tradition in the Europe has been the struggle for the right not to believe. However, the concept of the ‘secular’ is also not unproblematic. Thus this article explores the con- tested relationship between ‘human rights’ and ‘religion’ by bringing into focus also the relatively hidden factor of the ‘secular’. This is done by exploring the forms of secularity exemplifed in the traditions and approaches that are found in the USA, France, Turkey, the Netherlands and India. Finally, reference is made to traditional Islamic models for integrating cultural and religious plural- ity, before concluding with some discussion of the thought of Marc Luyckx in relation to the future of Europe. ‘Human Rights’ and ‘Religion’: Terms and Relationships The relationship between ‘human rights’ and ‘religion’ is a multi-faceted one that can be considered in relation to a number of dimensions—including the histori- cal, philosophical, legal and theological, to name but a few. 1 * Paul Weller is Professor of Inter-Religious Relations at the University of Derby, where he is Senior Research Fellow and Commercial Research Manager in the Faculty of Education, Health and Sciences. He is editor of Religions in the UK: Directory 2001–3 (Multi-Faith Centre at the University of Derby, Derby, 2001) and of its two previous editions (1997, 1993). Between 1999–2001 he directed a UK Government Home Offce commissioned research project on religious discrimination, published as P. Weller, A. Feldman and K. Purdam, et al., Religious Discrimination in England and Wales, Home Offce Research Study 220 (Research Development Statistics Directorate, The Home Offce, London, 2001). He is author of Time for a Change: Reconfguring Religion, State and Society (London: T & T Clark, 2005) which draws on resources from the Baptist tradition of Christianity to argue that the continuation of the establishment of the Church of England is theologically and politically inappropriate for the future of the ‘three dimensional’ (Christian, secular and religiously plural) reli- gious landscape of the contemporary UK arguing, instead, for the development of ‘parallel worked alternatives’ that are neither a defence of a ‘one dimensional’ Christendom inheritance nor the adop- tion of a secularist disestablishment. 1 For discussions of some of this, see: W. Janis and C. Evans (eds.) Religion and International Law © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2006 Religion and Human Rights, 1:17–39. RHRS 1,1_f2_16-39 5/9/06 11:43 AM Page 17