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Confessionalism is asystem of government that is ade jure mix ofreligion and politics. It typically entails distributing political and institutional power proportionally amongconfessional communities.
Some countries' political system distribute power across major religions in the country. This can be required by theconstitution or through unwritten tradition.
In thepolitics of Iraq, following theinvasion of Iraq in 2003, the occupying administration introduced a system where power was shared between the three mainethno-religious groups: Shia Muslim Arabs, Sunni Muslim Arabs and Kurds. The constitution of Iraq encouraged such power-sharing, due to the parliamentary system and the initial requirement for a super-majority to elect the President. Although not explicitly required in theconstitution, political tradition has continued to date for thePresident to be a Kurd, theSpeaker of Parliament a Sunni Muslim Arab and thePrime Minister a Shi'ite Muslim Arab.[1]
The repartition of assembly seats on a confessional basis in the Middle East was invented by theOttoman Empire (e.g. in theOttoman Parliament) and continued in several post-Ottoman countries withreserved seats for non-Muslim, namely Christian, minorities (Syria,Jordan,Iraq), or for all religious communities including Muslim subgroups and Christian churches (Lebanon). Asimilar system prevails in Iran for the Armenian, Assyrian, Jewish and Zoroastrian minorities.
InLebanon, the concept of confessionalism holds an important political meaning, since political power and governmental bureaucracy are organized according to religious confessions (as it happened in Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and other countries before). For example, theNational Pact (an unwritten covenant) and later theTaif Agreement provide for aMaronite Christian president, aSunni Muslim prime minister, and aShia Muslim speaker of parliament.
Although the system was meant to be a temporary solution "until such time as the Chamber enacts new electoral laws on a non-confessional basis",[2] more than 80 years later, it remains the system of government. All posts in government and seats in thelegislature are apportioned amongst different religious groups according to a political agreement, as the relativedemographic weight of those groups is unknown.[3] The constitution of 1926, amended after theTaif Agreement of 1990 and theDoha agreement of 2008 specified that there should be54 Christian deputies and 54 Muslim deputies, even though in practice there are 64 deputies each.[4] In addition, within those two groups, seats should be shared according to the demographic weight of each community.[5]
The Lebanese constitution also guarantees segmental autonomy to 18 recognized communities in the country in domains such as education.[6] Lebanon also presents other characteristics of confessionalism. Since 2005 Lebanese politics has been polarized around two trans-religious coalitions[7] with the majority never able to govern alone. There is, however, another section of the constitution that addresses the development of outside parties not represented by popular support.
In some countries there are political parties whose main ideology is based on a religion, such asChristian democratic parties andIslamic political parties.
In thepolitics of the Netherlands the term "confessionalism" refers to any political ideology based on religion. A traditional norm in society, extending to many facets of cultural life, termedpillarisation. Dutch parties usually labelled as confessionalist are theChristian Union and theReformed Political Party, both exclusively Protestant.
Political parties with religious ideology are sometimes banned on the grounds of promoting violence and hatred (e.g.Vlaams Blok andBatasuna), altering the national character, or having outside support.[8]
In some cases bans are written into the constitution.Bulgaria’sConstitution prohibits religiouspolitical parties.[9] TheConstitution ofTurkey statesthe country is secular, and theconstitutional court ruled that the IslamistVirtue Party was unconstitutional. Thepolitical parties in Portugal are forbidden from using a name that has religious connotation, although the parties are still allowed to adopt a religious ideology, thus allowing the formation ofCDS – People's Party.[10]
Multiconfessional countries have apower sharing arrangement between people of different faiths, usually three or more significant confessional groups within the same jurisdiction. Examples of modern countries deemed multiconfessional areLebanon,[11][12]Bosnia and Herzegovina andAlbania.[13]
The "National Pact" inLebanon is a formal agreement altering the1926 Constitution, which laid the foundation of Lebanon as a confessionalist state. Instead of aminority wielding the most power, political power became morerepresentative.[14]
The 3 dominant religions ofBosnia and Herzegovina (Islam,Eastern Orthodox Church,Roman Catholic Church) are practiced by the three native ethnic groups of the country:Bosniaks,Bosnian Serbs andBosnian Croats respectively. Religious nationalism that emerged as part of the breakup of Yugoslavia would later cause theBosnian War.
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