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Since Scouting's inception in the early 1900s, it has sometimes become entangled in social controversies such as the civil rights struggle in the American South and in nationalist resistance movements in India. Scouting was introduced to Africa by British officials as an instrument of colonial authority but became a subversive challenge to the legitimacy of the British Empire as Scouting fostered solidarity amongst African Scouts. Scouting was banned in countries such as Germany, Russia, and Cuba but has been restored in Germany and Russia. There are also controversies and challenges within the Scout Movement itself such as current efforts to turn Scouts Canada into a democratic organization. This article discusses historical and contemporary Scouting controversies and difficulties.

Canada
Since the late 1960s, Scouts Canada has suffered from a continuing membership decline in all sections. This has been caused in part by an increased drop from the percentage of youths participating as Cub Scouts, about 10 - 15 %, to the percentage participating as Boy Scouts, about 2%.

Some members of Scouts Canada are upset with Scouts Canada's restructuring, including a loss of voting rights at the local level. In response, SCOUT eh! was founded in 2004, an organization consisting of "registered Scouts Canada members from across Canada dedicated to transforming Scouts Canada into a democratic association".

In 1998, the Baden-Powell Scouts (BPSA) were established in Canada, rejecting the modernization of the Scout method by WOSM and Scouts Canada. Scouts Canada challenged the association and successfully argued that the word "Scout", in the context of a youth organization, is a trademark held by Scouts Canada.

Cuba
In 1914, the first Scout groups in Cuba were founded. In the following years more local groups emerged, but they were not connected through a national association until 1927 when the Asociación de Scouts de Cuba (ASC) was founded. In the same year the association became a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM). During its first years, Cuban Scouting followed mainly the model of the Boy Scouts of America.

Scouting existed in Cuba itself until the 1960s, when Cuban Scouting ceased operations after the Cuban revolution of 1959. Cuban Scouts rendered service during those times, directing traffic, collecting rations, helping in hospitals and establishing first aid stations. In 1961, the World Scout Conference terminated the WOSM membership of ASC claiming that they had ceased to exist.

Cuba is now one of only six of the world's independent countries that do not have Scouting. Cuba was also a former member of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, with the Asociación de Guías de Cuba last mentioned in 1969.

Eurasian Scout Region
There is some controversy because several members of the Eurasian Scout Region's top hierarchy are former Pioneer leaders. The primary goal of the Pioneers, whose membership was compulsory, was the indoctrination of youth into Communism. To complicate matters, these organizations adopted many of the trappings of the Scout organizations they supplanted. Because of the negative experience with the Communist youth organizations, Scouting in the Eurasian Region is having a slow rebirth. Proponents see the inheritance of Pioneer work and properties in a positive light. Opponents have seen the Eurasian Region as a tool that would allow former Pioneers to keep their influence over postSoviet youth movements, and use their newfound connections outside the region for their own gain. Even the placement of the Regional headquarters at the historic Pioneer Camp Artek at Yalta appears to many to point to this Pioneer dominance. Opponents also question the fact that authoritarian Belarus was a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement, against WOSM's stated guidelines, while democratic neighbor Ukraine is not a WOSM member. In the years following its creation, the Eurasian Region was considered by some to have stagnated in its purpose: among other things, the official website was not updated between 2004 and February 2006.

Alternate solutions proposed at the time of the Soviet breakup, and still considered viable options by the critics of the Eurasian Region, would be to divide the Region into the previously existing European, Asia-Pacific, or Arab Scout Regions, along cultural lines and national preference, to provide Scouts fresh perspective. As the Baltic states-Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia-have joined the European Region, there is precedence for this solution. In addition, there is no corresponding Eurasian Region for the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, the republics are divided geographically between WAGGGS' Europe Region and Asia Pacific Region. Besides their shared tsarist and Soviet past, the 12 members of the Eurasian Region have little in common. Some, like Armenia and Azerbaijan, have waged war on each other, some like Georgia and Ukraine, allow open opposition, while others, like Belarus and Turkmenistan, have turned to authoritarianism reminiscent of Soviet times. Further, as none of the republics have had their Scout movements returned for much more than a decade, it is viewed that they would benefit from the expertise of the neighboring Scout associations in those Regions.

Germany
German Scouting started in 1909. German Scouting later became involved with the German Youth Movement, of which the Wandervogel was a part. German Scouting flourished until 1934-35, when nearly all associations were closed and their members had to join the Hitler Youth. In West Germany and West Berlin, Scouting was reestablished after 1945, but it was banned in East Germany until 1990 in favor of the Thälmann Pioneers and the Free German Youth (FDJ). Today it is present in all parts of the unified Federal Republic of Germany and consists of about 150 different associations and federations with about 260,000 Scouts and Girl Guides.

Iraq
Iraq was one of the first Arab nations to embrace the Scouting movement, launching its program in 1921, just two years after the League of Nations had created the country out of the old Ottoman Empire. Iraq was a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement from 1922 to 1940, and again from 1956 to 1999.

After the Baath party took control in 1968 and especially after Saddam Hussein seized power in 1979, youth groups were retooled to serve the state. One replacement program, Saddam's Cubs, offered "summer camps" where 10 to 15 year-old boys endured 14-hour days filled with hand-to-hand fighting drills. In 1990, during the period when the Iraq Boy Scouts and Girl Guides Council was recognized by WOSM, there were 12,000 Scouts, however by 1999, Iraq had been expelled from the WOSM.

An Iraqi Scouts Initiative committee was formed by Americans in 2004 to formally re-establish a legal, recognized, and fully functioning Scouting program in Iraq. Since then, the movement has been taken over by Iraqis and is now run exclusively by them.

The Scout program is open to boys and girls of all ethnic and cultural backgrounds, and allows for local nuances to shape various regional program options. Iraqi Scouts are involved in community service such as helping police with traffic control, giving first aid, cultivating cotton, planting trees and helping during natural disasters. A National Iraqi Scouting Headquarters is envisioned for Baghdad and five national Scout camps are also planned.

Netherlands
In 1933 some Scout Groups broke away from the national Boy Scout organization De Nederlandse Padvinders (NPV, Netherlands Pathfinders) to form the Padvinders Vereniging Nederland (PVN, Pathfinder Association the Netherlands), because difficulties concerning the Scout Promise arose. The difficulty was that boys who recognised no god still had to promise "To do my duty to God". The Scout Groups found that one grew hypocrites this way. A Roman Catholic organisation was founded in 1938, the Katholieke Verkenners (KV, Catholic Scouts) because the Dutch Roman Catholic bishops decided that the catholic youth cannot stand under control of an association of which the whole governing board wasn't Catholic.

During World War II all Scouting movements were prohibited in the Netherlands, although many continued their activities secretly. After the end of the war, Scouting again became very popular.

All Dutch Scout and Guide organisations merged in 1973 into Scouting Nederland (SN). The Dutch Scout Promise is one of the few in the world where the reference to God is optional as it has been granted an exception under WOSM guidelines.

Russia
In 1908, Baden-Powell's book Scouting for Boys came out in Russia by the order of Tsar Nicholas II. In 1909, the first Russian Scout troop was organized and in 1914, a society called Russian Scout, was established. Scouting spread rapidly across Russia and into Siberia, and by 1916, there were about 50,000 Scouts in Russia.

After the October Revolution of 1917 and during the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1921, most of the Scoutmasters and many Scouts fought in the ranks of the White Army and interventionists against the Red Army. Some Scouts took the Bolsheviks' side, which would lead to the establishment of ideologically-altered Scoutlike organizations, such as ЮК (Юные Коммунисты, or young communists; pronounced as yuk) and others.

Between 1918 and 1920, the second, third, and fourth All-Russian Congresses of the Russian Union of the Communist Youth decided to eradicate the Scout movement and create an organization of the communist type that would take youth under its umbrella. In 1922, the second All-Russian Komsomol Conference decided to create Pioneer units all over the country; these units were united later that year as the Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union.

The Soviet Union (USSR), which included Russia, was established in 1922 and dissolved in 1991. In 1990, the Russian Congress of People's Deputies with Boris Yeltsin as its chairman declared Russia's sovereignty over its territory.

The Young Pioneer organization was broken up in 1990. The same year the Scout Movement began to reemerge when relaxation of government restrictions allowed youth organizations to be formed to fill the void left by the Pioneers, with various factions competing for recognition. Some former Pioneer leaders have formed Scout groups and there is some controversy as to their motivations in doing so (see Eurasian Scout Region).

The Russian Association of Scouts/Navigators is now a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement (WOSM). It is co-educational and has 13,920 members as of 2004.

Membership
The Boy Scouts of America (BSA), the largest youth organization in the United States, has policies which prohibit or restrict certain people from membership and participation. Some of these membership policies are controversial and have resulted in the dismissal of Scouts and adult Scout leaders from the BSA or a Scouting unit for being an atheist, agnostic, or homosexual.

The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission "to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law". Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and discriminatory.

The organization's right to set such policies has been upheld repeatedly by both state and federal courts. Moreover, in 2000, the Supreme Court of the United States affirmed that the Boy Scouts of America is a private organization which can set its own membership standards. In recent years, the policy disputes have led to litigation over the terms under which the BSA can access governmental resources including public lands.

In addition to excluding gays and atheists, the BSA does not allow girls to participate in some Scouting programs, and this too has been a source of controversy.

Racial segregation
Protests over the inclusion of African Americans arose shortly after the inception of the Boy Scouts of America. When William D. Boyce departed, he turned the Boy Scout corporation over to the members of the Executive Board with the stipulation that the Boy Scouts would not discriminate on the basis of race or creed. James West's position was that African Americans should be included, but that local communities should follow the same policies that they followed in their school systems. Thus, much of the American South as well as many major communities in the northern United States had segregated programs with "colored troops" until the late 1940s.