Ground-breaking Report on Intercultural Trends argues that religion must be taken into account in sharing values and filling the gap in mutual perceptions between people across the two shores of the Mediterranean

Brussels, 15 September 2010– One of the key findings of the Anna Lindh Report 2010, the ground-breaking study on intercultural and values being launched today under the Belgian Presidency of the European Union, relates to the centrality of religion in the Euro-Mediterranean region and the various perceptions towards religious values shown by different societies. 

According to the Report’s Survey, which was carried out by Gallup with 13,000 people in thirteen countries, the most pronounced difference in values between European countries and those on the southern and eastern shores of the Mediterranean is the importance placed on faith. A majority of residents of countries in the South East Mediterranean regard religion as the single most or second most important value to pass on to their children, more so than any other proposed value. In sharp contrast, Europeans place religion as the least important value to pass on to their children of any of those presented.

Dalia Mogahed, Anna Lindh Report Expert and Executive Director of the Gallup Center for Muslims Studies, says: “No-one has ever before explored the readiness of people across Europe, North Africa and the Middle East to a unified entity and a shared project around the Mediterranean,” adding that, “The striking difference on the value of religion likely presents the greatest challenge facing this group of countries. If one group regards religion as central, while the other regards it as unimportant or even harmful, the relationship is at risk of misunderstandings or mutual offence.”

The thirteen Euro-Mediterranean countries involved in the Anna Lindh/Gallup Poll 2010 were: Bosnia and Herzegovina, France, Egypt, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Lebanon, Morocco, Spain, Sweden, Syria, Turkey and the United Kingdom.

The Anna Lindh Report proposes that it is important to proactively recognise this challenge in the context of building a common project around the countries of the Region.  Since Europeans, according to the Anna Lindh/Gallup Survey 2010, value respect for other cultures, leaders should, the Report argues, leverage this value to help them understand the importance residents in the countries on southern and eastern shores of the Mediterranean place on religion even if it is very different from the European point of view.

At the same time, the Report analysis underlines, residents in the countries in the southern and eastern shore of the Mediterranean should understand that while Europeans may not value religion per se, they do value some of the central teachings of religions, most notably ‘family solidarity’, which the majority of Europeans in the Survey placed as their most important value.    

Proposals for Action

The Anna Lindh Report 2010 aims to act as a tool of action in the hands of institutions, civil society, governments, media and individuals committed to improving cross-cultural relations. Building on the Survey findings and Report analysis, a number of guidelines and proposals have been set out including:

• Fostering Dialogue between People with Different Religious Beliefs.  In search of common ground, an effort must be reinforced to facilitate an open dialogue and an understanding of basic human values and aspirations of people with their different views on religious practices and beliefs. Concrete actions proposed by the Anna Lindh Report include promoting spaces of debates at the local and international level, and investing in research programmes which are focussed on the historic evolution and development of the religions as well as the current religious and spiritual trends to create a scientific basis for region-wide debates  

• Investing in Education for Intercultural Learning.Supporting the design of innovative intercultural approaches within the school curriculum and through non-formal educational programmes, with the purpose of developing and stimulating critical thinking, empathy and curiosity, and taking into full consideration the results of the family value approach provided in the Report. Specific measures are also proposed to raise children’s awareness of the contemporary ‘Euro-Mediterranean value map’ and the importance of religions within the Region as revealed through the Survey

• Developing Tools for an Improved Quality of Interaction.  Ensuring the quality, more than the quantity of intercultural exchanges and investing more in innovative tools to improve the intercultural skills of people. The Report sets out a number of existing programmes and tool-kits which can be maximised for the purposes of dialogue work. The importance of these intercultural skills should be conveyed to the large majority of inhabitants of the Region, and the organisation of a yearly main intercultural dialogue event across the Euro-Mediterranean region could help raise awareness