Yeah, on a national level, some Scouting organisations do get bogged down with stuff they shouldn't be involved in. The BSA is particularly bad at this, and also by remaining silent when they shouldn't - I was horrified during the last Presidential Election to see Scouts in uniform on a dais behind Dubya. This wasn't a scouting event where Dubya was effectively saying 'I believe in Scouting' but a political event where effectively, the Scouts were saying 'I believe in Dubya'. That the BSA never kicked up a storm about *that* is astounding. These weren't just adult (voting) leaders in uniform (that would have been bad enough), but kids who don't vote, probably didn't have much choice in the matter, and who were manipulated for political gain.

Scouting is supposed to encourage kids to gain religious and political beliefs, without dictating what those are. (Caveat - Some Scout Troops may choose to have a religious affiliation, and it is accepted that by joining such a troop that you will be exposed to and expected to follow that religion.)

I'm sure that there are other national scouting organisations around the World that have similar issues to that of the BSA, probably not by choice though. For example, I would guess that religious and political freedom were not really attained within the Iraqi scouting organisations.

But generally, as an International Movement, Scouting does indeed transcend both politics and religion.

BTW, in case anyone was interested; People's Republic of China, Laos, Myanmar, North Korea, Cuba were the 5 countries. It appears that since I heard that figure ( ~1998) , 2 more have joined the list; Andorra and Afghanistan.