Lunch seminar with Inês Granja
The Portuguese case law regarding the right of religious freedom. The national judicial practice in face of the challenges of religious diversity
Contentious public religious issues in Europe increase as the cultural diversity expands. New legal challenges emerge, mainly at the national level. The religious diversity related case law of Portuguese courts is our research topic. We propose a close up on the case law related to the rights of adherents of minority religions, in light of the international legal framework at the regional level. Since those rights appear to be an outstanding issue related to the right to freedom of religion or belief, we aim to better understand the way Portuguese courts deal with concepts such as religion, identity and culture but also the way they balance equality and respect for cultural difference. The developing Portuguese case law involves a wide range of legal areas (such as Family Law, Labour Law and Criminal Law) and a broad variety of themes like recognition and registration of religious organisations, parental responsibilities, work time, medical exams, religious symbols, among others. For its part, the ECtHR case law concerning the right to freedom of religion or belief is broadly diverse, notably in result of its large variety of religious minorities, national realities, themes and arguments applied.
How do Portuguese courts dialogue with the ECtHR? Do they quote it? How do Portuguese courts reflect ECtHR’s orientation? Do they go beyond on its argumentation? Or do they disagree and diverge? Those questions are the ones that we have been asked.
Speaker bio
Inês Granja is a PhD candidate at Catholic University of Portugal (Oporto). Her PhD research titled “The right of freedom of religion or belief. The judicial practice in face of the challenges of religious diversity” is focused on the ECtHR’s case-law related to religious minorities and the right to religious freedom and seeks to shed light on the the interaction between the european human rights system and portuguese legal sphere on this topic.
She holds an LLB degree (2014) and an LLM in Public, European and Public International Law (2016). Her master thesis was titled “The ECtHR and religious symbols – the use of muslim veil in 21st century Europe” and it was awarded with an Honourable Mention in 2017 by Portuguese Commission for Religious Freedom and was published in 2018 thanks to the Portugal’s High Commissioner of Migration of Portugal.
During part of her PhD, she was a research assistant with the JusGov-Research Centre for Justice and Governance, on an interdisciplinary research project called Inclusive Courts, funded by the Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation, which gathers lawyers, anthropologists and sociologists focused on the practice of the courts, which seeks to contribute to a better understanding of the legal challenges raised by cultural diversity in Europe. Her previous experience includes working as a Lawyer in Portugal.
The main areas of her research are human rights and multicultural jurisprudence.
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