36 Asia The EconomistNovember 2nd 2019
2Banyan A boost for believers
T
he lordworks in mysterious ways.
For Christian leaders of a conserva-
tive bent, recent decades in Australia
have seen what the Anglican Archbishop
of Sydney, Glenn Davies, calls a “militant
secularism” deal repeated blows to the
devout. The most notable is the legal-
isation two years ago of same-sex mar-
riage, after a postal survey showed Aus-
tralians to be overwhelmingly in favour.
The passage of a bill on October 2nd
making it easier to get an abortion in
New South Wales is another. A cause
célèbrefor religious conservatives is
Israel Folau, a rugby star and staunch
Christian who was sacked from his club
for saying that God’s plan for homosex-
uals was “hell”. Mr Folau’s case against
unfair dismissal is making its way
through the courts. But his treatment,
the archbishop says, “smacks of a new
and ugly Australia” in which believers
are unable to express their faith.
There are more general instances of
discrimination, Christian leaders say. In
the name of tolerance, diversity and
inclusion, many companies expect their
employees to leave their faith at home.
But, says Michael Stead, Anglican bishop
of South Sydney, faith is integral to a
Christian’s identity: “It’s not just some-
thing you can switch off.”
Yet just when all around is darkness
comes a ray of light. The right-wing
government of Scott Morrison, the prime
minister, has thrown its weight behind a
package of bills designed to provide
enforceable anti-discrimination protec-
tions for people with religious beliefs.
The legislation is expected to come to
parliament before the end of the year.
Many of the provisions work in just
the same way as laws against discrim-
ination on the grounds of sex, race,
disability and so on. But as well as serv-ing as a shield, the proposed legislation
also acts, as Luke Beck of Monash Univer-
sity puts it, as a “sword”. People could take
actions on the basis of their beliefs that
would clearly fall foul of other anti-dis-
crimination legislation, without conse-
quences. An upper-caste Hindu doctor, Mr
Beck suggests, could turn away a lower-
caste patient he considered untouchable.
A devout pharmacist could refuse to pro-
vide contraception to an unmarried teen-
ager. And although it would still be illegal
to deny women promotions, say, on the
basis of their sex, the sort of evidence used
to prove such abuses—sexist statements
by a boss, for example—would be protect-
ed by the proposed legislation if they had a
religious underpinning.
Cases like Mr Folau’s are tackled in the
bills, too. Large firms (ie, with a turnover of
A$50m ($34m) or more) may restrict em-
ployees from making statements of belief
only if that is to avoid “unjustifiable fi-
nancial hardship” to the firm. In other
words, firms could not sack an employee
like Mr Folau for denouncing the conduct
of their colleagues if he did so based onreligious convictions—unless a lucrative
deal hinged on it. Not only are the rights
of individuals protected, but also those
of religious entities, including schools
and charities. They are exempt from
rules against discrimination if the dis-
crimination is done “in good faith”. That
could be a licence to expel gay pupils, for
instance. And on top of such distasteful
scenarios, it seems odd to give certain
people legal privileges—the right to act
in a way that would otherwise be un-
lawful—simply because they identify
themselves as religious.
The Australian Human Rights Com-
mission, while approving of the protec-
tive provisions in the legislation, is
concerned about the assertive ones.
Others have joined it. Such provisions
may well be watered down. But the fact
that the bill has made it this far is strik-
ing, given Australia’s growing godless-
ness. In the most recent census, in 2016,
30% said they had no religion, compared
with 22% five years earlier.
Yet no previous prime minister has
been so “out and proud” as a Christian, as
John Warhurst of the Australian National
University puts it. Mr Morrison de-
scribed his surprise election victory in
May as “a miracle”, which Archbishop
Davies says is “about right”. Mr Morrison
holds a weekly prayer session in his
office in Canberra.
Marion Maddox of Macquarie Univer-
sity points out that most Australian
Christians hold moderate beliefs, in-
cluding accepting abortion, at least in
some circumstances. For the most part,
the anti-discrimination bill is a useful bit
of virtue-signalling by the political right.
Secularists are hardly on the back foot. It
is more a consolation prize to religious
leaders than the harbinger of a new
God-fearing era.Australia’s government wants to allow religious people to discriminatehelp that the Fergana Valley is Central
Asia’s most densely populated region, and
that ethnic violence can quickly intensify.
In the city of Osh in southern Kyrgyzstan,
clashes between the Kyrgyz and Uzbek
communities in 2010 left 470 people dead.
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan dispute half
of their 1,000-kilometre frontier, using dif-
ferent historical maps to support conflict-
ing claims. Until recently Uzbekistan, too,
was quick to bicker about borders, threat-
ening to go to war over water-sharing and
even mining its frontier with Tajikistan. As
Central Asia’s most populous country andthe only one that borders all the others, Uz-
bekistan was ideally placed to impede re-
gional integration.
But after Uzbekistan’s dictator of almost
30 years died in 2016, his successor, Shav-
kat Mirziyoyev, abandoned prickly isola-
tionism in favour of engagement. He has
ordered the opening of more frontier posts
and pledged co-operation over hydro-
power. He has also signed border agree-
ments with both Tajikistan and Kyrgyz-
stan. A separate treaty with Kyrgyzstan will
soon wipe one of the region’s exclaves, Ba-
rak, off the map, as part of a land swap. Theresults of Uzbekistan’s overtures are tangi-
ble: trade with its neighbours shot up by
54% last year.
But the re-sealed border between Rish-
ton and Sokh shows that travel around the
Fergana Valley remains far from friction-
less. “What can we do?” shrugged one Sokh
resident. He was boarding a bus in Fergana,
the provincial capital in Uzbekistan proper
that oversees exclaves like Sokh. His jour-
ney home entails a long detour because of
the closed crossing-point at Rishton. “We
haven’t been able to travel freely since Sovi-
et times,” he says philosophically. 7