Peer-to-Peer Activity: Constitution Drafting
Overview
This activity allows participants to put the concepts learned through discussion to practice by drafting a constitutional provision for a mock constitution. By working together to produce this tangible artifact, participants will practice listening to the perspectives and ideas of others.
Competencies
- Participants will provide a written documentation of the criteria of permissible limitations on manifesting freedom of religion and belief.
- Participants will product documentation of the state's obligations toward the right to freedom of religion or belief in the form of a constitutional provision.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Discussion Questions
Resources
Facilitator Tips
Faith Quotes
Step-by-Step Instructions
INTRODUCTION
- The facilitator may choose to divide participants into smaller groups for this activity.
- Explain that the participants’ task is to draft a constitutional provision for a fictitious state that defines an ideal relationship between religion and the state.
- Participants should assume they are starting from scratch.
- Provide participants with the provided document listing examples of existing constitutional provisions to aid in drafting the fictitious constitutional provision.
- Direct participants to consider the discussion questions from the prior activities as they draft this constitutional provision.
ACTIVITY
- Allow the participants time to research, discuss, and draft a constiutional provision.
CONCLUSION
- Ask a participant from each group to share an element from their constiutional provision and explain its significance.
Discussion Questions
- Should states constitutionally “adopt” a religion?
- What are the benefits and limits of secularism?
- What are the international standards in this area? Are these standards in harmony with religious thinking or there are different perspectives?
- Can religious signs be worn in the public space in their respective countries?
- Does the State fund religious institutions, none of them or only some?
- Should the term “religion” be defined in the constitution?
- What should be the reaction of a religious actors when facing a situation of apparent discrimination on religious grounds against a group or an individual?
- What if the apparent discrimination was committed by a State agent?
Resources
Click the link for an online compilation of excerpts from over 190 constitutions:
https://constituteproject.org/constitutions?key=freerel&lang=en&status=is_draft
Facilitator Tips
- The #Faith4Rights modules are flexible and require adaptation by the facilitators before their use. Case studies related to peer-to-peer exercises in the 18 modules need to be selected by the facilitators from within the environment where the learning takes place. The #Faith4Rights toolkit is a prototype methodology that requires contextualization, based on the text of the 18 commitments, context and additional supporting documents.
- Not all issues raised need to be resolved. This would be an impossible and even a counterproductive target. The aim is rather to enhance critical thinking and communication skills, admitting that some questions could receive many answers, depending on numerous factors.
- Tensions may occur during discussions related to “faith” and “rights”. Most of these tensions are due to human interpretations. Learning sessions are spaces for constructive dialogue in a dynamic process where tensions can be reduced with the help of clear methodologies, including pre-emptive situation analysis and evidence of positive results in areas of intersectionality between faith and rights.
- When preparing the sessions, facilitators need to factor in the profile, age and backgrounds of participants. Focused attention on the learning objectives can transform tensions into constructive exploration of new ideas.
- Meaningful engagement requires democratically pre-established rules. Facilitators should dedicate time with participants to elaborate these rules together at the outset and acting all along the training as their custodians.
- The time frames suggested in this #Faith4Rights toolkit are merely indicative. Facilitators may adapt them freely to suit the needs of their group of participants. The key balance is between respecting the overall timeframe while not cutting short a positive exchange momentum.
- To ensure optimal and sustainable benefit, facilitators may create a “training notebook” for participants during their peer-to-peer learning sessions. It would contain a compilation of templates to help participants keep track of what they have learned throughout the programme and eventually use this notebook as their personalised follow-up tool.
- When technically feasible, facilitators are also advised to project the module under discussion on screen in order to alternate between discussions thereon and showing the audio-visual materials listed in each module or any other items selected by the facilitator themselves.
Faith Quotes
“Then Peter began to speak: ‘I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism.’” (Acts 10:34)