Rule of Law and Religious Minorities: A Case Study of Jehovah's Witnesses
Pauline Côté Saturday, 1 September 2007
The law can have a powerful influence in shaping minority religions and how they interact with their social and political environment over time. Different countries' legal structures, codes, and practices provide widely varying structural opportunities for minority religions in terms of rights and privileges, fund-raising capabilities, and religious autonomy. For instance, minorities sharing religious affiliation are conferred different legal personalities from one country to another through the operation of association laws. In France, entities of Jehovah's Witnesses are incorporated as associations with the exclusive purpose of worship, with limited tax exemption, while in Canada, comparable entities acquire legal personality as charities, according to common law definition, with tax exemption and the capacity of being active in four areas: "relief of poverty, advancement of education, advancement of religion, and other purposes beneficial to the community."
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