E/CN.4/1998/6/Add.2 page 12 50. Internationally, particularly in Europe and above all in Germany, the debate focuses on sects, mainly because of a number of factors: (i) Competition in the area of religion and belief between traditional religions on the decline and a multitude of new groups and communities claiming the status of religions, but often described as sects, or psycho-groups or commercial enterprises; (ii) Changes in society, which mean that established values are yielding other values, including a money-centred materialism which sometimes tends to treat religion rather like a product; (iii) (iv) Public opinion alarmed by sometimes crude popular reporting of abusive exploitation of their followers by these sects or psycho-groups and by extraordinary events, such as collective suicides; State intervention, particularly through the establishment of parliamentary commissions of inquiry (cf. Germany, Belgium, France, etc.) in response to public opinion. 51. The question is often raised of how to deal with the sect problem at a time when beliefs seem to be more and more exposed to deregulation and when the certainties of yesteryear seem to be giving way to a multiplicity of creeds with a shifting pattern of membership, in which relativism is often held up as an absolute value. The problem is made still more complex by the fact that their capacity for action and reaction seems to be inexhaustible, whether in terms of their faith, the law or their finances. 52. In general however, we find that there is confusion about the groups and communities mentioned above, which are often labelled as dangerous sects or commercial enterprises. Furthermore, although originally, from the standpoint of the history of religion and the social sciences, the concept of a sect was a neutral one and referred to a community of persons forming a minority within a religion who broke away from it, today it has pejorative connotations and the term “sect” is often associated with danger. The confusion is even greater in the case of the Church of Scientology, often described as a sect and a commercial enterprise, although those two ideas are contradictory, inasmuch as the term “sect” initially has a religious dimension, unlike “commercial enterprise”, and that whatever happens a religion is not a business. 53. In order to clarify the situation and avoid any confusion, the Special Rapporteur wishes to stress that a distinction should be made between a “sect”, on the one hand, and a “psycho-group”, on the other, and to point out that among the groups described as sects, some are the propagators of a religion while others are less so, or not at all, so that one has to be very cautious and attentive in this field in order to avoid both intolerance based on religion or belief and the exploitation of freedom of religion and belief for purposes alien to it. The Special Rapporteur would therefore like to report on the information and explanations he obtained from the Bundestag Study Commission and the government authorities, from victims' associations