WPES: January 29, 2010
Introduction
Professor Carl Wellman is an institution unto himself in the Washington University Philosophy Department and a longtime member of the workshop community, so it was a true pleasure to have him present a paper at last Friday's workshop. Wellman originally presented the paper at an international conference at Mofid University in Qom, Iran, a city well known as one of the leading intellectual centers of the Middle East. Both the leading conservative and leading liberal Imams in Iran are schooled there. Wellman that one of the most notable details of his trip was discovering that the Muslim participants in the conference are typically well versed in western political theory (e.g. Rawls). By contrast, westerners typically had no familiarity whatsoever with work by the Muslim political theorists and philosophers. Hopefully that disparity will be lessened as international conferences like the one in Qom become more popular.
Discussant Summary and Commentary
The respondent for Wellman's paper was Professor Gregory Magarian of WUSTL Law. He broke the paper down into three central component:
(1) providing moral justifications for the core rights and attendant implications of religious liberty as outlined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (e.g. Mill's experiments in living argument),
(2) discussing problematic limitations of the religious component International Covenant (e.g. religious incitements to violence),
(3) describing the causal relationship between religious rights and peace.
The International covenant enshrines two components to religious rights - the right to freely adopt a religion and the right to outwardly manifest religious traditions and practices. Magarian summarized the paper as mostly concerned with the manifestation of religion, but this is justified since manifestation has the most notable social effects and moral consequences.
Magarian's comments on the paper reflected his legal background in providential ways. For instance, he brought up the attendant risks resulting from the way that the International Covenant eschews the separation of church and state in favor of having the state protect the church. He also noted that the Covenant included "morality" on the Covenant's list of "important countervailing interests" that could justify restricting religious liberty. Magarian pointed out that many cultures imply deep ties between the concepts of religion and morality. This seems to leave open the chance for states to mask persecution of religious minorities because the minority's religious practices conflict with the majority religion's moral doctrines. Magarian also encouraged Wellman to acknowledge that paper's arguments about the connection between religious rights and peace ultimately require an empirical evaluation.
General Discussion
Chad Flanders of SLU law opened the general discussion by questioning whether or not the religious protections in the International Covenant were necessary at all. In his thinking, the document already enshrines protections for "association and conscience" which would seem to imply religious protection. Professor Wellman conceded that Flanders' interpretation was a plausible one, but Wellman argued that there were strong pragmatic and historical reasons to give religion special consideration. WPES director Frank Lovett followed up on Flanders' point by offering the counterexample of conscientious objectors to military conscription. Since secular humanists are not allowed to avoid the draft, Lovett argued that such practices imply there is something distinct about religion beyond mere pragmatic concerns. Professor Wellman agreed the case was problematic but said that the actual problem was that the reasons why religion should be considered a special case was "overdetermined" but that it is difficult for courts to choose one of these explanations in practice.
Building upon a question from Ian MacMullen - who asked about the relationship between religious tolerance and the promotion of peace - I asked professor Wellman about whether his account was only that religious intolerance caused conflict or whether he also believed that religious tolerance promote peace. Wellman conceded that he hadn't considered the point and that it was worth looking into further, but lightheartedly stated that he "wouldn't bet on it."
Zach Hoskins raised the interesting point of why Wellman's paper made a distinction between the freedom to adopt a religion and the freedom to change religions since the former seems to imply the latter. Wellman responded that many cultures do not actually equate these two. He provided the example of Muslim cultures which often are willing to protect the right to adopt a religion, but still ban the possibility renouncing Islam.
Conclusion
The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights is a legal document that assumes preexisting human rights. Professor Wellman's paper goes a long way to elucidating the justifications and implications of those rights both as they actually are and as they exist in the covenant. We look forward to seeing the paper in its final form in his forthcoming book.
-Greg Allen
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