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The essays in Part III of the book, on liberal constraints and traditionalist education, argue for a more regulatory conception of liberal education and emphasize the need for some controls over cultural and religious educational authority. Susan Okin, in her essay on group rights, gender, and realistic rights of exit, is mostly concerned, not with the oppression of traditional groups by the liberal state, but with the oppression of individuals, and especially of girls and women, by the traditional community. She is critical of those liberal theorists who argue that a right of exit is sufficient to qualify a cultural or religious group for special recognition in liberal societies, and to counter these views, she notes that the unequal treatment of girls and women can mean that even though they may have a formal right to exit a group, their actual opportunities for doing so are far less adequate than those of their male counterparts. She holds, then, that the right of exit is not sufficient and that the liberal state should have a higher requirement, namely, that girls and women should be treated fairly within the group and thus should be able to take advantage of any formal right of exit. The chapter is arranged in three sections: Section 12.1, Gender and Other Forms of Inequality in Group Rights Theories, shows, by looking at three examples of liberal defenders (as exemplified by Joseph Raz, William Galston, and Chandran Kukathas) of group rights, that they tend not to take gender inequality seriously when considering group rights and limitations; Section 12.2, Cultural Factors Affecting Women’s Realistic Rights of Exit, specifies and discusses a number of reasons that contribute to women being significantly less able than men, in many cultural contexts, to chart their own courses of life outside their community of origin; and Section 12.3. Rights of Exit and Realistic Rights of Exit for Women, concludes that the theories examined contain several problematic elements concerning rights of exit for women.

This is the third of the four essays in Part II of the book on liberalism and traditionalist education; all four are by authors who would like to find ways for the liberal state to honour the self-definitions of traditional cultures and to find ways of avoiding a confrontation with differences. David Blacker’s essay on civic friendship and democratic education develops a Rawlsian conception of civic friendship, the scaffolding of which is necessarily provided by the wide range of comprehensive conceptions of the good that characterize democratic societies. Thus, Blacker argues, a democratic civic education ‘allows citizens to embrace democracy on their own terms, drawing support for democracy’s requisite political conceptions from the perspectives of citizens’ many different secular and/or religious comprehensive doctrines’. For Blacker, a conception of civic friendship that is friendly to citizens’ multiple comprehensive doctrines also entails a substantial lowering of the ‘wall of separation’ between church and state so that courts might be more willing than they currently are to allow the use of state funds to support religious groups, in particular where these groups perform functions within public (common) schools that converge with public interests. The essay concludes by proposing and defending two American educational policy initiatives that are consistent with Blacker’s politically liberal ideal of civic friendship – the revival of a ‘school stamps’ plan first proposed in the 1970s, and a modified version of a ‘clergy in the schools’ programme recently struck down by a federal circuit court in Texas.

This chapter discusses the case study of India (1947–present). In India, decentralization is neither an unabashed success, as in Spain, nor a resounding failure, as in Czechoslovakia. India has experienced intermittent bouts of conflict in some regions and periods of its history more than in others. This chapter attributes India's mixed track record to the behavior of regional parties in the country and the failure of statewide parties to fully incorporate regional interests into their agenda. In India, regional parties have prompted conflict and secessionism by adopting legislation harmful to regional minorities and mobilizing groups to engage in ethnic conflict and secessionism. Regional parties have been confined to the regional level, however, until the 1990s. Statewide parties, and the Congress Party in particular, have not fully or always reduced ethnic conflict and secessionism in India because of certain conditions in the country that reduce their incentive to incorporate the interests of particular regions into their agenda (i.e. the pivotalness — or lack thereof — of certain regions and/or groups within India, the distribution of ethnolinguistic and religious groups throughout the country, the internal organization of statewide parties, as well as the leadership style of particular political leaders in the country). This chapter attributes the shape of India's party system to specific features of decentralization in the country (i.e. the proportion of national legislative seats India's many regions hold individually, the extension of decision‐making autonomy to some regions of India and not others, and the election of the upper house entirely by the country's regional legislatures).

This is the first of the four essays in Part II of the book on liberalism and traditionalist education; all four are by authors who would like to find ways for the liberal state to honour the self-definitions of traditional cultures and to find ways of avoiding a confrontation with differences. For example, Shelley Burtt argues that the liberal state has good reason to be far more accommodating of traditional groups than liberals commonly recognize. She contends that liberal autonomy, properly understood, is not threatened in any special way by traditional religious or cultural groups, and that traditional cultures are as capable of fostering autonomy as their more cosmopolitan counterparts. Most strikingly, she maintains that it is a good thing, from the perspective of liberal autonomy, to be encumbered by unchosen attachments and loyalties such as those that we might expect to be most fully developed within religious communities. The essay is in two main parts: Part One takes up the challenge of the notion that liberal theorists have missed the chance to describe in detail the possibilities for autonomous thought from within a comprehensive education to a particular way of life or understanding of the good, offering several reasons why the central demand of autonomy – to think and know for oneself – is well within the reach of individuals who receive this sort of ‘grounded’ education; Part Two looks more closely at liberal theories of autonomy, particularly aspects of those accounts that encourage the idea that comprehensive educations are at odds with the development of autonomy, arguing that such characterizations overstate the difficulties that exist, and concluding by reaffirming the possibility of combining an education for autonomy with education toward a comprehensive vision of the good life.

Issues of social group autarky are addressed, with particular reference to their economic costs. The different sections of the chapter address the social interests of such groups, give some American examples (the Lubavitch Jewish community of Brooklyn, and American farmers—the need for which has declined as agricultural productivity has risen dramatically), individual versus group economic benefits, special status for social groups, conflict between special‐status social groups (exemplified by professional, religious, status, linguistic, and ethnic groups), and conflict within special‐status groups.

This chapter examines the decline in Liberal Protestant denominations in recent decades. This is one of the best known religious trends of the last several decades, but it often is misunderstood. Contrary to what many believe, this decline has not occurred because droves of people have been leaving more liberal denominations to join more conservative religious groups. Nor does the decline of liberal denominations mean that liberal religious ideas are waning. Indeed, as a set of ideas, religious liberalism steadily has gained ground in the United States, whatever the fate of the denominations most closely associated with it. Indeed, Americans' increasing endorsement of theological liberalism's core tenets—appreciating other religions, adjusting traditional belief and practice to modern circumstances, rejecting biblical literalism—shows that religious liberalism is a more potent cultural presence than many realize.

In some of the more colorful groups on the American religious spectrum, the religious faith of believers involves a willingness to take substantial physical risks — risks to health, physical functioning, and even the risk of death. This chapter takes a closer look at the influence of religion on high-risk decision making that can result in death. In addressing these issues, it casts a morally inquiring eye on the way in which religious institutions engender these sincere, devout beliefs. This chapter discusses informed consent in faith healing, serpent handling, and refusing medical treatment, along with risk budget and risk style. It also examines three religious groups that participate in practices that impose varying degrees of indirect risk of death by refusal of medical treatment or some component of it: Christian Science, Jehovah's Witnesses, and the Faith Assembly. The practices of a fourth group impose, in addition, a direct threat of death — the various serpent-handling, strychnine-drinking pentecostal groups within the Holiness churches.

This chapter begins with a brief review of research on the psychology of violence and the connection between violent media, particularly video games, and violent behavior. It also briefly reviews some of the psychological themes found in violent religious groups across religious traditions. This will be followed by a description of some of the violent imagery found in the Left Behind novels and the video game “Left Behind: Eternal Forces”, based on the series. This will underscore the thematic similarities between these examples of Christian media and the texts of violence found in violent and terroristic religious groups.

This chapter examines religious group autonomy which comprises the right of religious communities to determine and administer their own internal religious affairs without interference from the state. The importance of religious group autonomy (or church autonomy, to use the traditional label) to any overall scheme of religious liberty has rightly been described as ‘critical’ and ‘exceptionally high’. This chapter begins with a brief survey of the law’s recognition of religious group autonomy and religious freedom, then contrasts a liberal understanding of religious autonomy with that of the religious communities themselves. Three illustrative matters of concern in this area are considered: the right of religious groups to select their own religious leaders and ministers, the right of groups to assemble for worship in buildings and locations of their choosing, and the right of religious communities to determine for themselves who they will marry within the rites of their communities.

This chapter discusses how religious groups were drawn into the social, political, and cultural conflicts of the 1970s, often reluctantly just as they had been in the 1960s. Only now, however, it was becoming clearer that two sides were taking shape and that what could and could not be said on each side was better understood. On the one hand, groups were organizing around particular social and political issues, energized by the urgency of effecting change in an environment that offered opportunities for empowerment and at the same time created uncertainty about what could be achieved. On the other hand, groups distrustful of those activist organizations were hardly resting quietly on the sidelines. They too were taking advantage of new opportunities, focusing on evangelism, church growth, and inventive ministry styles. While the more politically engaged activist groups made headlines, the broader landscape could not be understood without paying attention to these quieter developments as well.

Introduces the book by discussing the symbolic destruction of churches, monasteries and other monuments and sacred places of the Serbian Orthodox Church, the Catholic Church in Croatia and Bosnia‐Herzegovina, and the Yugoslav Muslim Religious Organization (Islamic community), and also in Albania that occurred during the various wars in the Yugoslav region in the 1990s. It then discusses myth in relation to the nation‐state. The last and main part of the chapter gives accounts of the four mainstream Yugoslav religious institutions (the Serbian Orthodox Church, Croatian Catholicism, the Muslim Religious Organization (Islamic community), and the Church and Nation of Macedonia), and also discusses the religious minority groups of the region (there are around 40, of which 14 are listed), and interfaith relations.

The field of new religious movements has been accepted by the religious studies mainstream as a legitimate field of study. However, the controversy over new religions is a complex social issue that has polarized observers into such extreme positions that it has been difficult to find a middle ground from which to approach the issue. The stories of two different religious groups are described to highlight some of the dilemmas associated with the controversy. The Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God, the Ugandan group massacred by its own leaders in 2000, is used to exemplify the concerns of “anticultists.” The Alamo Christian Foundation, an American ministry that has been the target of legal action, is used to exemplify the concerns of religious libertarians.

The vast majority of the population in Hungary belongs to four “historical” denominations—Roman Catholic, Reform, Lutheran, and Jewish—but other groups are free to worship. The courts can register religious groups, a status that allows them to provide religion classes in public schools and qualify for state funding. All registered religious denominations are equal before the law, regardless of their membership or the time period during which they have been present in the country. The country's religious life is no longer monitored by the state, as it was until 1989. Instead, a governmental “liaison office” for churches facilitates church-state relations and disburses budget subsidies to denominations. Several political parties have used religious symbols to gain additional electoral support, and some of the most important religious groups have openly endorsed mostly right-wing political parties and organizations.

The most Catholic of the three Baltic republics, Lithuania has resembled Poland in its conservatism and relatively high levels of religiosity. Religious activity was liberalized after the country declared its independence in 1991. The republic has maintained a four-tier registration system that is by far the most complicated and detailed European system, which distinguishes between four types of religious groups (state-recognized “traditional” communities, state-supported religious groups, other religious communities and associations, and unregistered religions). “Traditional” religious communities enjoy privileges denied to other denominations, but all groups present in the country can worship freely. Given its numbers and historical importance, the Roman Catholic Church has been de facto treated as the state, national church and has been wooed by the country's major political formations, which include Eastern Europe's largest Christian Democrat Party.

Religion plays an important role in post-communist Slovakia, and the dominant Roman Catholic Church behaves and is treated as the de facto national church. While formally the government cannot interfere in the affairs of religious groups, in practice it does so, by upholding prohibitive registration requirements, granting a range of benefits granted to recognized denominations, and raising manifold obstacles against unrecognized religious groups. As in predominantly Catholic Poland and Lithuania or Orthodox Romania, in Slovakia the majority Catholic Church enjoys an important political influence, a considerable presence in public schools, privileged governmental funding, and a repertoire of rights larger than that recognized to other denominations. Its traditional views on homosexuality and abortion have informed national legislation and public positions on these topics.

Although legislation expressly separates church and state, the Latvian authorities have unofficially distinguished new religions from the “traditional” Lutheran, Roman Catholic, Orthodox Christian, Old Believers, Baptist, and Jewish denominations, which have permanent seats on the Ministry of Justice's Advisory Committee for Religious Affairs, and the right to offer religion classes in public schools. Latvia is the only Baltic country that institutionalized relations between religious groups and the government, which seeks the opinion of the Advisory Council of Traditional Confessions, the New Religions Consultative Council, and the Ecclesiastical Council. Religion instruction in pre-university public schools was reintroduced as an elective subject immediately after the country declared its independence, but proposals to teach religion in an ecumenical, all-inclusive manner have been rejected in favor of allowing denominations the freedom to decide the content of religion classes.

With respect to genocide, Article 4 of the statute of the ad hoc tribunal for the former Yugoslavia and Article 2 of the statute of the tribunal for Rwanda are identical in both form and substance. One element that must be met before a genocidal offence may be said to have been committed is that an individual possessed the required genocidal mens rea or, according to the appeals chamber and a number of trial chambers, where he knew of the principal’s genocidal intent. This chapter discusses the elements of the genocidal mens rea (including the intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, religious, or racial group, as such) and the factors which may be relevant to the determination that the accused possessed the necessary genocidal intent.

This is the first of five chapters on the Old Testament and the reader, and addresses the question of the reader and the text. The first section looks at the social context of reading. The second outlines the three major groups of Bible readers: Jewish groups, Christian groups, and all other groups who read the Bible without commitment to either of these original/foundational groups—such as members of other religions and secularists. The third section discusses Enlightenment and post‐Enlightenment approaches taken to the Bible in the Western world in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and after, and also looks at postmodern critics of this approach. The fourth section, New Reading Strategies, discusses ideological criticism, the postmodern Bible, feminist readings, ethnicity, and fundamentalism.

This chapter is in some ways an elaboration of the previous chapter, which summarized the marijuana-related positions of the nation's leading religious denominations and other groups. It gives detailed analyses of these religious groups' positions, including representative comments on their reasons for taking these positions.