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Global Religious Recognition Reports

DOCUMENTING RECOGNITION AND REGISTRATION CONDITIONS AROUND THE WORLD

The Global Religious Recognition Report is an annual report published to reflect the work of The Religious Recognition Project in its attempt to identify and measure the severity of the actions of nation states and territories when it comes to how belief systems, communities, denominations, institutions, and local belief-based organisations are recognised and registered. The Report provides an overview of each country along the metrics of state-religion relations, the mandatoriness of registration, registration system structure, registration policy, key tools of restriction imposed and whether "basic religious activities" are able to be freely conducted. These constitute the main determiners of a country's categorisation in the Spectrum of Religious Recognition (SRR). The Global Religious Recognition Report perceives religious freedom through the lens of how religions and beliefs are recognised and legally registered and seeks to reiterate parameters for what is and is not permissible action by the state in these matters in accordance with the latest version of RoRB standards.

2024 Global Religious Recognition Report

 

The theme of the 2024 Global Religious Recognition Report was the criminalisation of unregistered religious activity which remains widespread, particularly across Asia and Africa and in small pockets in the Americas.

The 2024 Global Religious Recognition Report is a compilation of the most recent available data on recognition and registration impacting conditions of religious freedom throughout the world. Each page of the 259-page report is dedicated to each sovereign state and dependent or disputed territory, including an overview of the constitutional structure, secularity and recognition and registration policies and practices.

 

Detailed explanations of registration policy have been gathered from the Office of International Religious Freedom's International Religious Freedom Report in addition to other credible sources. The RoRB classification for each country and territory has been updated in accordance with the criteria set out in the Spectrum of Religious Recognition (SRR) which was included towards the front of this year's report.

 

This year's report includes an abridged version of Dr Monica Gyimah's article (the full article can be found in Journal of Astronist Studies Volume 1 Issue 1) that highlights recognition and registration issues specifically impacting indigenous religious communities.

Click here or the cover below to read the Full 2024 Global Religious Recognition Report

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Official Cover of the 2024 Global Religious Recognition Report published 15th August 2024.

2023 Global Religious Recognition Report

 

The Global Religious Recognition Report (GRR Report) returns for its second edition, this year including more detail on each country and territory's registration policies and on their practices of states extending privileges to some religions and beliefs and not others. The special theme for the 2023 Global Religious Recognition Report is mandatory registration orders imposed by states on religious or belief organisations which remain widespread across Asia and Africa and in small pockets in Europe and the Americas.

 

Recognition and registration issues continue to impact conditions of freedom of religion or belief throughout the world and it is the purpose of the GRR Report to highlight the extent of these issues nation by nation as part of the report's country-specific approach to the subject.

 

Detailed explanations of registration policy have been gathered from the Office of International Religious Freedom's International Religious Freedom Report in addition to other credible sources.

 

The RoRB classification for each country and territory has been updated in accordance with the criteria set out in the Spectrum of Religious Recognition (SRR) which was included towards the front of this year's report. With more detail provided this year on registration policy in each nation, this report has revealed the complexity of registration issues and the drastic impacts they have on religious freedom.

Click here or the cover below to read the Full 2023 Global Religious Recognition Report

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Official Cover of the 2023 Global Religious Recognition Report published 26th July 2023.

2022 Global Religious Recognition Report

 

Conditions for recognition of religion or belief (RoRB) continued to deteriorate around the world from June 2021 to June 2022. Authoritarian regimes bent on controlling religious activity maintained a foothold in Africa, Asia and parts of Central and South America. The liberties enshrined in the European Convention on Human Rights are at serious threat by the Russian Federation's invasion of Ukraine. While in Afghanistan, the Taliban's reclamation of power after twenty years of being kept at bay likely signals a new generation of Afghan boys and girls who will not see their fundamental human rights upheld by the very institutions that are supposed to protect them.

The Religious Recognition Project considers the topic of how countries register religious groups and activities is one of the foremost issues in the modern world when it comes to respecting and protecting freedom of religion or belief (FoRB). The majority of countries and territories (58% or 137 out of 235 studied) either continue to make government registration mandatory for religious groups or provide no registration procedures at all.

 

An even greater majority of countries have established onerous registration procedures, the consequences of which, whether by intention or not, include the disenfranchisement of belief communities, the deregistration or denial of registered status for minority or "untraditional" religious groups, and the state's maintenance of control over the religious and philosophical lives of citizens. In essence, issues of registration remain a harbinger of worse violations of FoRB to come so if a focus is placed on dismantling these misused recognition and registration systems, it is possible that we could see a brighter future for FoRB conditions in countries worst effected by this issue.

Click here or the cover below to read the Full 2022 Global Religious Recognition Report

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Official Cover of the 2022 Global Religious Recognition Report published 14th June 2022.

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