One-third of the World’s Population Experiences an Increase
The kinds of social hostilities that recently erupted in violence in Norway have been rising across Europe, a new report by the Pew Forum shows. Social hostilities involving religion have risen substantially in a number of European countries, including Sweden, Denmark and the U.K. The report also looks at government restrictions on religious beliefs and practices around the world.
The report, Rising Restrictions on Religion, by the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion and Public Life, finds that restrictions on religious beliefs and practices rose between mid-2006 and mid-2009 in 23 of the world’s 198 countries (12%), decreased in 12 countries (6%) and remained essentially unchanged in 163 countries (82%).
Because several countries with increasing restrictions on religion are very populous, however, the increases affect a much larger share of people than of states. More than 2.2 billion people – nearly a third (32%) of the world’s total population of 6.9 billion – live in countries where either government restrictions on religion or social hostilities involving religion rose substantially over the three-year period studied.
While Europe had the largest proportion of countries in which social hostilities related to religion were on the rise from mid-2006 to mid-2009, the study also found that social hostilities involving religion have been rising in Asia, particularly in China, Thailand and Vietnam.
Read the full report and an explanation of the methodology at pewforum.org.
http://pewresearch.org/pubs/2080/-religious-restrictions-social-hostilities-europe-asia
