Fighting Religious Intolerance and Discrimination: The un Account

Abstract

The main United Nations (UN) global policy framework for combating religious intolerance, stigmatisation, discrimination, incitement to violence and violence against persons based on religion or belief is set down in UN Human Rights Council resolution 16/18. Adopted in March 2011, this resolution was hailed by stakeholders from all regions as a turning point in international efforts to confront religious intolerance. After more than five decades, UN member states had, it was hoped, at last come together to agree a common, consensus-based approach and practical plan of action. Some four years on, and against the backdrop of heightened religious hostility, UN consensus around the ‘16/18 framework’ continues to be contested. Rather than working together to implement the 16/18 action plan, states have returned to pre-2011 arguments over the nature of the problem. These divisions have re-emerged in large part because of conceptual confusion among policymakers about what implementation of resolution 16/18 means and what it entails. Linked to (and indeed flowing from) this conceptual opacity, states—especially states from the Western Group (WEOG) and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC)—contend over whether resolution 16/18 is being effectively implemented or not and, if not, why this is so. This article offers an assessment of levels of implementation of resolution 16/18 as well as recommendations for strengthened compliance in the future.