and Balkan Europe
by IECOB & AIS Università di Bologna
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Secularism
by: Andrew Copson
published by: Oxford University Press
pp: 176
ISBN: 9780198809135
price: Hardback £12.99
Published: 28 September 2017
Until the modern period the integration of church (or other religion) and state (or political life) had been taken for granted. The political order was always tied to an official religion in Christian Europe, pre-Christian Europe, and in the Arabic world. But from the eighteenth century onwards, some European states began to set up their political order on a different basis. Not religion, but the rule of law through non-religious values embedded in constitutions became the foundation of some states - a movement we now call secularism. In others, a de facto secularism emerged as political values and civil and criminal law altered their professed foundation from a shared religion to a non-religious basis.
Today secularism is an increasingly hot topic in public, political, and religious debate across the globe. It is embodied in the conflict between secular republics - from the US to India - and the challenges they face from resurgent religious identity politics; in the challenges faced by religious states like those of the Arab world from insurgent secularists; and in states like China where calls for freedom of belief are challenging a state imposed non-religious worldview. In this short introduction Andrew Copson tells the story of secularism, taking in momentous episodes in world history, such as the great transition of Europe from religious orthodoxy to pluralism, the global struggle for human rights and democracy, and the origins of modernity. He also considers the role of secularism when engaging with some of the most contentious political and legal issues of our time: 'blasphemy', 'apostasy', religious persecution, religious discrimination, religious schools, and freedom of belief and thought in a divided world.
Table of contents
1: What is Secularism?
2: Secularism in Western Societies
3: Secularism Diversifies
4: The Case for Secularism
5: The Case against Secularism
6: Conceptions of Secularism
7: Hard Questions and New Conflicts
Afterword: The Future of Secularism
References and Further Reading
Index
About the Author
Andrew Copson, Chief Executive of Humanists UK, President of the International Humanist and Ethical Union
Andrew Copson is the Chief Executive of Humanists UK (formerly the British Humanist Association), where he was previously Director of Education and Public Affairs; President of the International Humanist and Ethical Union; and a former Director of the European Humanist Federation. In these capacities he is one of the most experienced and prolific advocates of secularism, its study, and its implementation. For over a decade he has carried out a range of national and international practical secularist policy work and spoken internationally on secularism. He has been an associate of the Centre for Law and Religion and the University of Cardiff since 2008 and represented the secularist point of view on public or other bodies such as the Foreign Office's Advisory Panel on Freedom of Religion or Belief and the Woolf Institute's Commission on Religion and Belief in British Public Life. He co-edited The Wiley-Blackwell Handbook on Humanism (Wiley-Blackwell, 2015), with A C Grayling.
Reviews and Awards
"This is an exceptionally careful, fair-minded and positive introduction to the many meanings of a word often carelessly used. It will be an enormous help to all who want to understand better the current controversies about religious belief and modern society."
- Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury
"Secularism is of growing importance all over the world, yet it is also an approach with deep roots reaching far back into our history. Andrew Copson elegantly explores this history as well as secularism's importance today, showing how it evolved and how it is the key to de-escalating so many of the modern world's points of conflict."
- Dan Snow
"Andrew Copson is one of the most thoughtful people in the world on secularism. We have never needed a sane, intelligent, persuasive guide to secularism more than now - so I'd say thank God for this excellent book, if that wasn't too obviously ironic."
- Johann Hari
"A timely tour de force and indispensable analysis for anyone seeking to get to grips with the roots, philosophy, and current controversies surrounding secularism which are challenging our vexed world."
- Professor Francesca Klug, author of Magna Carta For All Humanity: Homing in on Human Rights
"A secular state embraces freedom of religion or belief, the equal treatment of persons regardless of faith, and the separation of religious and state authorities. In this wide-ranging and timely study Andrew Copson describes the virtues of secularism as the guarantor of equal dignity, freedom, and security for all, but also the various platforms from which it is opposed, and its fragile and increasingly beleaguered state across the world. Scrupulously fair, his book brings much-needed clarity into a confused and embittered area of dispute."
- Simon Blackburn, author of Ethics: A Very Short Introduction and Plato's Republic: A Biography
PECOB: Portal on Central Eastern and Balkan Europe - University of Bologna - 117, c.so della Repubblica - Italy
