The principle of secularity as a neutral approach and the indirect religious discriminations in the employment relationship

The firs part of the paper aims to illustrate the reasons for those an authentic interpretation of the Constitutional Charter imposes to read the principle of laicism in a ‘strong', 'pluralist' and 'proactive' sense. The State, besides ensuring - formally - every individual the right to manifest their faith, should also strive to make this right effective, promoting the adoption of suitable means to remove the conditions of greatest disadvantage that could derive from the exercise of some cults. This should happen, in particular, in the places where the personality of the people is most frequently expressed, such as at work. In this perspective, the prohibition of indirect discrimination, according to national (Article 3, paragraph 3, Legislative Decree n. 216/2003) and European regulation (Article 2, paragraph 2, letter b), Directive n. 2000/78 / EC), could constitute the tool for the full implementation of the principle of secularism, understood in a positive and promotional sense. The limitations of neutral conception of the principle in question will emerge from the analysis of national and European jurisprudence in relation to the prohibition of wearing religious symbols in the workplace: this inhibition, in fact, doesn't determines any direct discrimination (as it imposes on everyone, without distinction, the same rule), but indeed discriminates workers whose religion requires wearing distinctive signs, harms their freedom of expression and, at last, makes their social and economic integration more difficult (furthermore, this could cause forms of 'multiple discrimination'). In the second part, the authors propose to strenghten the role of collective bargaining in order to achieve a fair balance between the needs of companies and the freedom to express one's faith in the workplace: more than the law, by its general and abstract nature, collective agreements could be the most suitable tools to find, thanks to their flexibility, the most appropriate solutions to the different company contexts and to the diversified needs of workers and employers.