Laos is traditionally seen as a Buddhist country. At the last census in 1995, three
million out of the then population of 4.6 million, or two thirds, described themselves
as Buddhist, 60,000 as Christian and 5000 as belonging to other religions. The
remaining 1.5 million, who did not identify their confession, should be classed as
animists or spirit-worshippers. However, it is apparent that these figures on the
number of people who profess a religion not native to Laos do not reflect the true
situation in the country: their number is in all probability significantly larger than
that given. A proportion of Christians and adherents of other religions, finding themselves
amongst a Buddhist majority, simply considered it prudent not to disclose
their true religious affiliation and declined to respond. According to an unpublished
paper compiled by the Department of Religious Affairs of the National Construction
Front (NCF), which regulates state relations with religious groups, in 1999 there
were approximately 150,000 Christians, or 3 per cent of the 5 million-strong population.
2 The number of adherents of other religions is also higher than that indicated in
surveys.
The last decade of the twentieth century was for Laos a period of significant
change in various spheres of national life. In the second half of the 1980s the Lao
leadership decided to alter the course of the country's development and presented a
new policy of 'renewal' (kanpianpeng mai) to the nation. Initially these reforms
affected only the economy, but then gradually extended to all other spheres of
national life, including the spiritual. This change of direction in the country's social
and economic development involved the transition from a socialist to a market
economy; the opening up of the country to the outside world and the resulting influx
of new lifestyles and western mass culture had a devastating effect on traditional
ways of life and on Lao national culture in general. In the spiritual realm if not a
spiritual vacuum then certainly a more 'open' ideological space developed. Lao
society was faced with the question of the preservation not only of its culture, but
also of its very national identity. Buddhism and its teachings provided one of the
most important means available, with the values of patriotism and independence, to
help the Lao nation withstand the influence of foreign ideologies and mass culture.
Buddhism was enlisted in the defence of national culture, life and identity as a matter
of course. In 1991 a Buddhist stupa replaced the red star and the hammer and sickle
on the insignia of the Lao People's Revolutionary Party, and the word 'socialism'
was removed from the motto of the state, symbolising this shift in spiritual values.
Grant Evans speaks of the mid-1980s in Laos as a period which saw the gradual