Levels of Government Restrictions

Countries with very high government restrictions have intensive restrictions on many or all of the 20 measures that make up the Government Restrictions Index. In Iran, for example, the constitution states that Islam is the official state religion and the doctrine to be followed is the Twelver school of Shia Islam.¹ The constitution also states that all laws and regulations must be consistent with the teachings of Islam. As a result, the religious clerics who interpret the application of religious law in Iran also are the ultimate arbiters in social and political affairs. Members of religious minorities in Iran – including Sufi Muslims, Baha’is, Christians (particularly evangelical Protestants), and Jews – frequently report harassment by the government, ranging from officially sanctioned discrimination in employment, education and housing to arrest and prolonged detention.

Countries with high government restrictions have intensive restrictions on several of the 20 measures or more moderate restrictions on many of them. According to Indonesian law, for instance, spreading heresy or blasphemy is punishable by up to five years in prison. Some countries in this category have intense government restrictions on religion at the local or province level. For example, six of the 28 states of India have “anti-conversion” laws that are used by local police to arrest people suspected of offering incentives to potential converts from Hinduism.

Countries with moderate government restrictions have intensive restrictions on a few measures, or more moderate restrictions on several of them. The constitution of Sri Lanka, for example, gives members of all faiths the right to freely practice their religion. But the same document also gives Buddhism the “foremost place” in society and says “it shall be the duty of the State to protect and foster” Buddhist values. Because of Buddhism’s favored status, other religious groups sometimes face discrimination and other forms of harassment from the government. During the most recent reporting period, for example, evangelical Christian groups complained that some state schools refused to accept Christian students or forced them to study Buddhism.

Countries with low government restrictions generally have moderate or low restrictions on a few of the measures. In the African nation of Sierra Leone, for instance, there were no reported instances of government interference in religious practices in the period from mid-2007 to mid- 2009. Nevertheless, the country continued to have legal mechanisms that could be interpreted as restricting certain religious activities. For example, although Sierra Leone’s Constitution provides many safeguards for religious freedom, it also stipulates that “for the purposes of protecting the rights and freedoms of other persons,” there should be no “unsolicited intervention of the members of any other religion.” This could be taken to mean that members of one religion should not try to proselytize members of other religious groups.

Footnotes: 

1 This is the largest branch of Shia Islam. It takes its name from the belief that there were 12 divinely ordained imams (leaders) in early Islam, the twelfth of whom disappeared and will return as the Mahdi (guided one) to rid the world of injustice before God’s final judgment of the world. According to the Pew Forum’s January 2011 report The Future of the Global Muslim Population, roughly 93% of Muslims in Iran are Shia. (return to text)