Iain Benson

rdf:langString Iain Benson

rdf:langString Iain Benson

rdf:langString Iain Benson

rdf:langString Edinburgh, Scotland

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rdf:langString An Associational Framework for the Reconciliation of Competing Rights Claims Involving the Freedom of Religion

rdf:langString Iain Tyrrell Benson

rdf:langString Law

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rdf:langString philosophy

rdf:langString Developer of intellectual frameworks for understanding pluralism, secularism, the secular and human rights as pertaining to faith and religious rights and freedoms and legal ethics

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rdf:langString Canadian

rdf:langString Scottish

rdf:langString Iain Tyrrell Benson (born 1955) is a legal philosopher and practising legal consultant. The main focus of his work in relation to law and society has been to examine some of the various meanings that underlie terms of common but confused usage. His work towards an understanding of secular and secularism has been cited by the Supreme Court of Canada and the Constitutional Court of South Africa. He has also given critical study to the terms pluralism, faith, believer, unbeliever, liberalism and accommodation and examined the implications for various legal and non-legal usages. Benson was a member of the draft committee for the South African Charter of Religious Rights and Freedoms, a document which sets out core aspects of citizenship and the rights and freedoms of religion and conscience in a constitutional democracy. He has also made significant contributions to the understanding of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and religious freedom under Canadian law. He was retained by the Government of Canada to author material concerning Religion and Public Policy as an aspect of Federal Multi-Culturalism Policy and is an ongoing expert advisor to the South African Council for the Promotion of Religious Freedoms. An advocate that the public sphere should be open and inclusive of all citizens and their groups, whether their faith and belief commitments are based on non-religious or religious beliefs, Iain Benson was the first Executive Director of the Centre for Cultural Renewal, a non-partisan, non-denominational charitable foundation with status in both Canada and the United States, dedicated to examining the nature of pluralism with particular reference to the associational rights dimension of religion and expression. In 2010 he was appointed one of ten inaugural directors of the Global Centre for Pluralism along with Kofi Annan and Adrienne Clarkson and chaired the Aga Khan IV. He was also the invited rapporteur on Law and Religious Diversity in Canada and South Africa to the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences at the Vatican City in May 2011 and was appointed as expert adviser to the South African Council for the Protection and Promotion of Religious Rights and Freedoms in September that same year. In his capacity as a constitutional and human rights lawyer, Benson has written and lectured extensively in the area of ethics, virtues and pluralism, and acted as an advisor in the fields of medical ethics and bioethics across Canada, Saudi Arabia, Eastern Europe, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Some of Benson's writings have appeared or been translated in French, Italian, German, Afrikaans, Flemish and Spanish.

rdf:langString Iain Currie