Is religion the enemy of human rights?

Abstract

Governments supply different levels of protection for different human rights, in part, because the members of their societies demand protection of some rights, but not all rights for all members of society. The authors argue that societal religiosity is an important factor reducing the level of societal demand for many human rights. Using quantitative indicators of societal religiosity and respect for human rights, the findings of this study show that (a) most human rights practices are worse in societies where citizens are more religious and (b) Muslim majority nations provide less respect for almost all human rights.