Abstract
This article is devoted to role of religious norms in the legal regulation of freedom of conscience, with a special focus on the institutional interaction in modern democratic societies between religious organizations and the state, particularly in Central and Eastern Europe. The extant scholarly literature has addressed first and foremost the constitutional guarantees of religious freedom and church autonomy. However, less attention has been devoted to the institutional mechanisms through which religious norms operate within public administration. The study utilizes comparative legal analysis, institutional analysis, discourse analysis of official church documents and qualitative analysis of 28 judicial and institutional cases from selected European jurisdictions. The findings prove that in effective implementation of freedom of conscience the principal factors are not only constitutional guarantees but also the extent of institutional recognition of religious norms, as reflected in church autonomy, chaplaincy, institutional cooperation and judicial protection. Drawing upon these findings, the study develops a comparative typology of four models of “church–state” relations and introduces the Institutional Integration of Religious Norms Index (IIRN) as an analytical framework for comparative assessment. The study maintains that freedom of conscience should be understood both as an individual constitutional right and as an institutional process supported by effective interaction between legal norms and religious institutions. The framework proposed in the study makes a contribution to comparative research on church–state relations and provides a foundation for further perspectives of interdisciplinary studies.
Recommended Citation
Lahodych, Mykola
(2026)
"Religious Norms in the Mechanisms of Legal Regulation of Freedom of Conscience in Modern States,"
Occasional Papers on Religion in Eastern Europe: Vol. 46
:
Iss.
10
, Article 3.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.55221/2693-2229.2920
Available at:
https://digitalcommons.georgefox.edu/ree/vol46/iss10/3