Parliamentary Commission on Cults in France
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The French National Assembly set up a Parliamentary Commission on Cults in France (Commission parlementaire sur les sectes en France) on 11 July 1995 following the events involving the members of the Order of the Solar Temple in late 1994 in the French region of Vercors, in Switzerland and in Canada. Chaired by deputy Alain Gest, a member of the Union for French Democracy conservative party, the Commission had to determine what constitutes a cult (compared to (for example) legitimate new religious movements (NRMs)). It came to categorize various groups according to their supposed threat or innocuity (towards members themselves or towards society and the state). The Commission reported back in December 1995.
Subsequent French Parliamentary Commissions on cults reported in 1999 and in 2006.
In 2005 the then Prime Minister of France, in a circulaire which stressed on-going vigilance in the fight against cults, suggested that due to changes in cult behavior and organization the list of specific cults appended to the 1995 report had become less pertinent. The Prime Minister asked his civil servants in certain cases to avoid depending on generic lists of cult groups but instead to apply criteria set in consultation with the Interministerial Commission for Monitoring and Combatting Cultic Deviances (MIVILUDES).
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[edit] Commission of 1995
The published report of the Parliamentary Commission of 1995 (also known as the Rapport Gest-Guyard), appeared on 22 December 1995. It remains to this day one of the very few official attempts in the world to categorize various movements according to the potential threat they may present. Some non-French-citizens and certain organizations criticized its categorization-methodology as such. Critics included the Church of Scientology, which did not want to see itself classified as a cult (which nevertheless occurred in the end). The Parliamentary Commission always bore in mind the difficulties of establishing any objective classification, although it never called into question the actual ethical and political imperatives of doing so, especially in the wake of the Order of the Solar Temple "mass suicides" and other dangerous cult activities occurring around the world (such as, for example, the 1995 poison-gas attack in Tokyo's subway by the Aum Shinrikyo cult). The Commission held various hearings of persons involved in new-religious-movement activities or in anti-cult movements, and had the French secret service Renseignements Généraux give it lists of NRM activities and memberships.
For an expurgated, alphabeticized list of entities (with name-translations) included in the 1995 report, see List of groups referred to as cults.
[edit] Commission of 1999
A further French parliamentary commission reported in 1999 on cults in connection with money and the economy.
[edit] United States interference in internal affairs
The Clinton administration has criticized the Parliamentary commission. Paris reacted in turn by criticizing this interference concerning internal matters, and noting the importance of political funds from new religious movements given to parties in the US.
The 2000 annual report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, released by the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor of the U.S. Department of State, stated:
The ensuing publicity [by the release of a parliamentary report against "sectes"] contributed to an atmosphere of intolerance and bias against minority religions. Some religious groups reported that their members suffered increased intolerance after having been identified on the list.
In its 2004 annual report, the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom stated:
[...] official government initiatives and activities that targets "sects" or "cults" have fueled an atmosphere of intolerance toward members of minority religions in France. [...] These initiatives [the publication of reports characterizing specific groups as dangerous and the creating of agencies to monitor and fight these groups] are particularly troubling because they are serving as models for countries in Eastern Europe where the rule of law and other human rights are much weaker than in France.
The 2004 report concluded with an assessment that the restructuring of the main French agency concerned with this issue (referring to the new MIVILUDES replacing its predecessor, the Mission Interministérielle pour la Lutte contre les Sectes [Interministerial Commission to Combat the Cults] (MILS), had reportedly improved religious freedoms in France. [1] Paris did not comment again on this renewed interference on internal affairs.
[edit] Vigilance in the struggle against cults: 2005
On 27 May 2005 (just before he left office), the then Prime Minister of France, Jean-Pierre Raffarin, issued a circulaire which stressed that the government must exercise vigilance in taking account of the evolution of the cult-phenomenon, which (he wrote) made the list of movements attached to the Parliamentary Report of 1995 less and less pertinent, based on the observation that small groups form in a scattered, more mobile and less-easily identifiable manner, making use in particular of the possibilities of spreading offered by the Internet.
The Prime Minister asked his civil servants to update a number of ministerial instructions issued by previous commissions, to apply criteria set in consultation with the Interministerial Commission for Monitoring and Combating Cultic Deviances (MIVILUDES), and to avoid falling back on lists of groups for the identification of cultic deviances. [2]
[edit] Commission of 2006
In a press-release dated 28 June 2006, the Parliamentary spokespersons in the National Assembly stated that "certain people had believed that they could celebrate a so-called turning-point in the French policy of defending individual and collective liebrties against the dangerous conduct of cults and a renewed questioning of the parliamentary reports of 1995 and 1999, as a result of the appearance of the Prime Minister's circulaire." [3] In reality, the spokespersons continued, the issue addressed by the Prime Minister related to the data collected in 1995 and 1999 becoming stale. [4] They added that setting up a new Commission of Enquiry would permit a "coming to grips with the new state of play in the cultic movement". [5]
On 28 June 2006, in response to a unanimous resolution of the Law Commission (commission des lois), the French National Assembly unanimously passed a resolution to set up a Parliamentary Commission of Enquiry into the influence of cultic movements and the consequences of their practices on the physical and mental health of minors. The 30 members of the Commission included Georges Fenech (President), Philippe Vuilque (rapporteur), Martine David and Alain Gest (Vice-Presidents) and Jean-Pierre Brard and Rudy Salles (Secretaries).
The Commission presented its report to the Assembly on 19 December 2006. The report contained 50 recommendations which aimed to protect endangered children. The President of the Commission of Enquiry, George Fenech, accused public officials (and especially the bureau des cultes of the Ministry of the Interior, of "negiligence, even complaisance". He expressed his astonishment at the lack of a good definition of the profession of psychotherapeutics, which he described as a "mine for cults" where gurus flourish.[citation needed]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ United States Commission on International Religious Freedom
- ^ Circulaire du 27 mai 2005 relative à la lutte contre les dérives sectaires (Circulaire of 27 May 2005 concerning the struggle against cultic manifestations). The Prime Minister wrote:
Cette vigilance doit s'exercer en tenant compte de l'évolution du phénomène sectaire, qui rend la liste de mouvements annexée au rapport parlementaire de 1995 de moins en moins pertinente. On constate en effet la formation de petites structures, diffuses, mouvantes et moins aisément identifiables, qui tirent en particulier parti des possibilités de diffusion offertes par l'internet. [Translation: We must exercise this vigilance in taking account of the evolution of the cult-phenomenon, which makes the list of movements attached to the Parliamentary Report of 1995 less and less pertinent. Indeed, one can observe the formation of small groups, scattered, mobile and less-easily identifiable, and which make use in particular of the possibilities of spreading offered by the Internet.].
And:
[U]n certain nombre d'instructions ministérielles données par vos prédécesseurs doivent être actualisées en fonction des orientations définies par la présente circulaire. Je vous demande de procéder à cet examen en lien avec la MIVILUDES. En tout état de cause, les références aux organismes comme l'Observatoire des sectes ou la Mission interministérielle de lutte contre les sectes (MILS) devront être remplacées par des références au décret instituant la MIVILUDES, et le recours à des listes de groupements sera évité au profit de l'utilisation de faisceaux de critères. Je vous demande de procéder à cette mise à jour au plus tard pour le 31 décembre 2005. [Translation: A certain number of ministerial instructions issued by your predecessors should be brought up-to-date in the light of the approaches defined in the current circulaire. I ask you to carry out this scrutiny in consultation with MIVILUDES. In each case of justification, references to bodies such as the Cult Monitor or to the Interministerial Commission for Struggle against Cults (MILS) should be replaced with references to the decree setting up MIVILUDES, and falling back on lists of groups should be avoided in favor of using bands of criteria. I ask that you perform this update by 31 December 2005 at the latest.
- ^ A cette occasion, certains ont cru pouvoir se réjouir d’un soi-disant tournant dans la politique française de défense des libertés individuelles et collectives contre les menées dangereuses des sectes et d’une remise en cause des rapports parlementaires de 1995 et en 1999. - "La République, c'est la liberté, de penser et de croire", press-release of 28 June 2006. http://www.depute-brard.org/documents/1315-005.doc Page 1. Retrieved 2006-12-22.
- ^ En réalité, la question posée par le Premier ministre était celle du vieillissement des informations collectées en 1995 et 1999. - "La République, c'est la liberté, de penser et de croire", press-release of 28 June 2006. http://www.depute-brard.org/documents/1315-005.doc Page 1. Retrieved 2006-12-22.
- ^ A cette occasion le vœu formulé par le groupe d’études sur les sectes donne écho aux propositions de commissions d'enquête déposées par les députés de la majorité comme de l’opposition depuis le début de la législature ... L’adoption de la proposition de résolution, à l’unanimité par la Commission puis aujourd’hui, en séance publique confirme l’engagement commun des membres de l’Assemblée, au-delà des clivages partisans, pour engager un nouvel état des lieux de la mouvance sectaire tout particulièrement dans le domaine de la santé et de la protection des mineurs. Press-release of 28 June 2006. http://www.depute-brard.org/documents/1315-005.doc Page 1. Retrieved 2006-12-22.
