New Report Urges Changes In U.S. International Religious Freedom Policy

Last week, Georgetown's Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs along with the Center on Faith & International Affairs jointly issued a 65-page report titled The Future of U.S. International Religious Freedom Policy: Recommendations for the Obama Administration. The report begins with a critique of past policy:

• U.S. IRF policy to date has focused more on rhetorical denunciations of persecutors and releasing religious prisoners than on facilitating the political and cultural institutions necessary to religious freedom. Accordingly, U.S. policy has had minimal effect on global levels of persecution and even less on the institutions of religious freedom.
• U.S. IRF policy is often viewed abroad as an attack on majority religious communities, as cultural imperialism, and as a front for American missionaries. However inaccurate, these perceptions have dramatically curtailed the policy’s impact.
• U.S. IRF policy has not been integrated into U.S. democracy programs, public diplomacy, counterterrorism, or multilateral diplomacy and international law.

The report then sets out a number of recommendations for the future, under six broad headings: (1) Set a clear policy course; (2) Retool American diplomacy; (3)Reenergize democracy promotion; (4) Make public diplomacy more effective; (5) Employ religious freedom as an element of counterterrorism strategy; and (6) Engage multilateral institutions and international law. Authors of the report are Thomas Farr and Dennis R. Hoover.