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Introduction
Jonathan Fox
Bar Ilan University
[pre-print version from Jonathan Fox, ed. Religion, Politics, Society and the State]
The purpose of this volume is to examine the influence of religion on politics from a
broad perspective. Most books on religion and politics tend to have a narrow focus—usually on a
single country or region or, alternatively, on a limited aspect of religion's influence on politics
such as secularism (Kuru 2009; Hurd 2007), conflict (Fox 2004; Juergensmeyer 2008), terror
(Stern 2003; Juergensmeyer 2000; Lincoln 2003), or state policy (Fox 2008). In contrast, this
book takes a wider perspective on two fronts.
First, and perhaps most importantly, this volume recognizes and emphasizes that religion
interacts with politics on multiple levels. Accordingly, I divide these influences into the
influence of the state and the influence of society on politics. However, within each category,
there are multiple potential types and levels of influences. While it is not possible to examine all
possible influences of social and state religion on politics in a single book, this volume attempts
to present a broad view of the many potential interactions between religion and politics. Second,
this volume covers multiple countries in multiple world regions. The studies examine the US,
Israel, Turkey, North Africa, and Western Europe. In addition two of them include information
from the entire world.
Necessarily, the authors in this volume focus on their own particular topics. Yet, to one
degree or another they also speak to the larger question of how religion intersects with politics.
The purpose of this introduction is to provide an overview of the book as well as a general
perspective which can help to integrate these diverse chapters into a more coherent body of
theory.
I proceed in two stages. The first examines religion's interaction with politics on the
societal and state levels and how the specific contributions to this volume fit into this format.
The second, examines four ways in which religion can influence politics and how the findings of
the chapters in this volume contribute to our understanding within this context.
Religion, Society and Politics
Religion is, among other things, a social institution. Very few societies are religion-free
and, accordingly, religion can be found in nearly every society. According to the World Values
Survey, even among the most secular Western European countries, at least a third of the
population reports believing in God. Among the former Communist states which experienced
anti-religious propaganda and education, in1995, not too long after the fall of the communist
regimes in the former Soviet bloc, Estonia reported the lowest percentage of people who believe
in God at 21% while in many former Soviet bloc states a clear majority reported believing in
God. No state in the world other than extremely repressive communist states such as North
Korea lack active religious institutions and clergy representing both majority and at least some
minority religions (Fox 2008).
Thus it is fair to generalize that at both the individual and collective levels, religion is a
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significant element of society in nearly every corner of the world, though, of course, this element
of society is stronger in some places relative to others. As religious precepts overlap with issues
of political importance, the interaction between religion at the societal level and politics is all but
inevitable. Religion influences people's political beliefs and opinions. In Chapter 2 Marie
Eisenstein examines one manifestation of this nexus—the influence of religion on political
tolerance in the US. She examines whether the extent to which people are religious influences
their levels of political tolerance and whether this relationship differs across religious traditions.
She finds no direct relationship between religion and tolerance or intolerance but religious belief
and commitment do lead to lower levels of psychological security. As psychological insecurity is
associated with intolerance, this shows an indirect relationship between religion and intolerance
in the US.
Also, religious institutions and leaders can potentially become involved in politics in
multiple manners. In Chapter 4, Faydra Shapiro looks at the influence of religious leaders and
institutions on US foreign policy. She determines that these religious actors engage actively in
the political sphere to influence foreign policy, often with some success. In Chapter 3 Nukhet
Sandal examines similar influences focusing on how religious elites can informally but
significantly influence politics in the context of the Northern Ireland conflict.
Other chapters look at more complex relationships between religion at the societal level
and politics. In Chapter 6 Stuart Cohen examines the intersection between Orthodox Jewish
society and the Israeli army. This involves the role of religious institutions in preparing future
religious soldiers for their military service as well as how the Army copes with the co-mingling,
or sometimes the lack thereof, of religious and secular soldiers. In Chapter 5 Yehidit Ronen
examines how the interactions between religion politics and society influence the growth of
radical Islam in Northeast Africa.
These five studies look at a representative cross-section of the potential societal religious
interactions with politics in various regional/country settings. They include examinations of
societal influences on government, the formation of social-religious political groups, the
influence of religion on individual social-political behavior, interactions between secular and
religious populations, and how religious populations cope with government policy. Thus, while
the specific examples are limited to several countries, the topic-based coverage deals with a wide
range of society's potential interactions with politics.
Religion, the State, and Politics
Governments can not avoid having a religion policy of one kind or another. Such policies
can support religion, restrict it, regulate it, or, most commonly engage in policies which do all
three. Even separating religion from state is a religion policy, one that is considerably rarer than
many realize. In 2002, among the 175 states examined by Fox (2008), 46 (26.2%) had official
religions, another 71 (40.6%) supported some religions more than others, three (1.7%) supported
all religions equally, and 14 (8%) were hostile to religion. Also in 2002, 131 (74.9%) states
restricted the institutions or practices of minority religions, 94 (53.7%) somehow regulated the
majority religion, and all of them, other than the US, passed at least some religious legislation—
laws which finance or otherwise support religion or laws which legislate religious precepts as the
law of the land. More interestingly, 60.9% of the states with official religions and 50.7% of the
states which support some religions more than others also regulate the majority religion. Thus,
few states have religion policies which are fully neutral to religion and most states have
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complicated policies which both support and restrict different aspects of religion.
While it is likely impossible to deal in detail with all potential manifestations of
government religion policy in a single book, this collection of studies attempts to cover some of
the most important aspects of the intersection between government and religion. In Chapter 7
Neuberger examines three classic models for state religion policy in Western democracies, state
religion, separation of religion and state, and cooperation between religion and state that falls
short of support for an official religion. He argues that currently the West is evolving toward the
cooperation model. In Chapter 8 Fox & Flores examine state support for religious freedom in
166 constitutions as compared to the actual level of religious freedom supported by government
policy. This chapter, more than any other in this volume, reveals the complexities and self-
contradictions that can be found in many state religion policies. It shows that constitutional
guarantees of religious freedom are often not realized in practice and that this occurs to the
extent that there is no statistical connection between these clauses and the level of religious
freedom that exists for religious minorities.
In Chapter 9, Finke and Harris take a different perspective on religion freedom. The
previous two studies examine the nature of government religion policy. Finke and Harris take
government religion policy as a given and examine its impact on politics using a multi-country
quantitative approach. They begin with the level of religious freedom in a country—both as
manifested in state policy and in society—and examine how this impacts on religious violence.
In Chapter 10 Jeff Haynes provides a classic country case study which he uses to
examine one of the seminal questions of religion and state. He examines the case of Turkey
asking the question of to what extent religion and democracy are compatible. Turkey is a
particularly relevant case for this question as it currently sits at a political crossroads where these
questions are central to its current politics.
These four studies address some of the most pressing issues in state religion policy. What
is the nature of state religion policy and how is it changing over time? What influences these
policies? Are stated policies the policies actually followed? How do these policies impact on
political behavior? Can democracy and religion, especially in its more radical forms, co-exist?
Four Ways Religion can Influence Politics
Religion is a notoriously difficult term to define. In practice many use some form of the
definition that US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart once applied to pornography: I may not
be able to define it but I know it when I see it. This approach has little practical value to any
organized study of the topic of religion and politics. Only a more precise understanding of
religion can properly facilitate the scholarly examination of religion and politics. This
understanding must recognize that religion is multi-faceted and intersects with politics on
multiple levels. The issue of levels is discussed in detail above. This section focuses on the types
of influences religion can have on politics.
While these four types of influence do not strictly constitute a definition of religion, they
do constitute a definition of religion's role in politics and society. As the topic of this volume is
this political and social role of religion, this approach has the advantage of focusing on the
relevant aspects of religion while avoiding a number of complex theological issues which have
little impact on the studies presented in this volume.
While each of this volume's contributors focuses on different issues in different contexts,
four potential influences of religion on politics can be identified which cover all of the
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intersections between religion and politics are examined in this volume. At the outset it is
important to acknowledge that these four facets of religion often overlap and represent different
aspects of a complex whole. Nevertheless, identifying them individually helps to better
understand the many ways the concept of religion can be approached by social scientists.
Religious Identity
Religion can be among the bases for identity. The argument that identity issues influence
politics is widely accepted. For instance, Samuel Huntington (1993; 1996) argues that identity-
based civilizations will be the basis for world politics in the post-Cold War era. Even most of
those who dispute his theory acknowledge that identity is important. They rather argue that
Huntington's religious identity based civilizations will not be the primary basis for identity
(Halliday 1997; Walt 1997). Studies of conflict often focus on the difference between inter-
religious and intra-religious conflict (Roeder 2003; Pearce 2005). Religious identity is also
linked to important political issues such as democracy (Fish 2002; Midlarsky 1998), voting,
lobbying elected officials, engaging in collective communal action, and participating in protest
(Beyerlein & Chaves 2003, 229).
Religious identity's impact on the political is a matter of controversy in the literature. The
three quantitative contributions to this volume all take the perspective that while religious
identity influence political factors, it is not the most important influence. In Chapter 9, Finke and
Harris explicitly argue that while religious identity may have an impact, other factors such as
restrictions placed on religious freedom are far more important. Their findings support this,
showing that religious identity has an indirect impact on religious persecution that is not nearly
as significant as other factors. In chapter 8, Fox & Flores use religious identity as a control
which proves to be significant, but place the focus of their efforts on other factors. In Chapter 2,
Eisenstein examines the impact of religious identity on tolerance, finding that different religious
traditions have different patterns of religious tolerance but religious identity's influence is minor
compared to other factors.
In Chapter 7, Neuberger implicitly addresses the importance of religious identity in that
many European countries make it an issue by overtly identifying with a single religious
denomination and often identify Christianity in general as essential to European identity. Many
of these states also explicitly deal with specific religious minorities as religious-identity groups,
that is, they structure their religion policy based on religious identity groupings. This
identification of Europe with Christianity is recognized outside of Europe. As Haynes notes in
Chapter 10, this European Christian identity is one of the major reasons that many Turks oppose
joining the European Union. He also cites a number of studies which show that many Christians
in Europe feel Islam is incompatible with Europe's identity, are uneasy with the increasing
political prominence of Islam within Europe and, consequently, are against Turkish membership
in the European Union.
This theme of tension between Islam and Christianity appears in other chapters. In
Chapter 4, Shapiro documents the distrust of Islam by US Evangelical Christians who often
claim that Muslims and Christians do not believe in the same God. It also results in a desire "to
liberate people from the 'shackles' of Islam and bring them to faith in the true God." Such efforts,
which generally involve missionary work are among the major sources of hostility of many
Muslim states toward Christians (Fox 2008). In Chapter 5, Ronen documents the often violent
tensions between Muslims and Christians in Nigeria and Sudan.
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However identity-based tensions do not need to be between major religious traditions.
While, as Sandal documents in Chapter 3, the conflict in Northern Ireland is not driven by
religious beliefs, it is between groupings that have distinct religious identities within the larger
Christian tradition. These religious identity-based divisions likely contribute to the increased
prominence of religious actors in this conflict. This includes both religious actors who seek to
mitigate the conflict and those who actively participate in the conflict.
Religious Beliefs and Doctrines
Religions invariably include a belief system which influences behavior. The proposition
that beliefs influence behavior is uncontroversial and few would deny that religion is among the
sources of many people's beliefs. Leaders are often religious and influenced by religious
precepts. Even if they are not, they must often give weight to widely held beliefs and prejudices
within the populations they govern (Fox 2002; Fox & Sandler 2004).
While in some ways religious doctrine is a concept that is distinct from beliefs, the two
are so intertwined that in practice they are difficult to separate. Most religions have within them
complex and often contradicting doctrines and concepts. These vast bodies of doctrine can
provide a resource for those who wish to justify their actions. They also can be the source of
guidance for the proper way to deal with a given situation. Clear aspects of doctrine can also
restrict the options of policy makers. Appleby (2000) calls this ability to support contradicting
political goals, especially peace and tolerance vs. violence and intolerance, the ambivalence of
the sacred.
This manifestation of religion runs through nearly all of the chapters in this volume. In
Chapter 4, Shapiro discusses the role of Christian Zionism in support for Israel and in US policy
toward Iran. She notes that in these cases Christian beliefs lead directly to positions on foreign
policy taken by many religious individuals and social groupings. The beliefs involved include
core Christian beliefs such as "eschatology," or what will happen at the anticipated "end times."
These beliefs include those surrounding Christ's second coming, the war between good and evil,
and the establishment of God's kingdom on Earth.
In Chapter 3, Sandal shows how shared Christian norms and beliefs formed a bridge
across four major Christian Churches to create a shared political position among many religious
leaders in Northern Ireland. Despite being divided by political conflict, these leaders' shared
tradition including "respect for life, equality, a belief in a transcendent being and the need for a
just economic system sensitive to the environment" led to a process which has made significant
steps toward ending an enduring and persistent ethnic conflict. Though, to be clear, not all
religious leaders in Northern Ireland have accepted this shared set of religious and political
beliefs. Be that as it may, this demonstrates that even though—as Church leaders insist—
religious beliefs and doctrines are not a cause of the Northern Ireland conflict, they did have a
significant influence on the evolution of that conflict. The dual promotion of violence and
toleration by different religious leaders also illustrates Appleby's (2000) concept of the
ambivalence of the sacred.
In Chapter 10, Haynes discusses the clash between secular and religious belief systems in
Turkey. On one hand the government was founded on a strongly secular ideology. Yet many
Turks feel that Islamic beliefs and doctrines should play a role in public life and state policy.
Cohen, in Chapter 6, discusses how The Israeli military as well as Israeli religious institutions
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deal with tensions between religious and secular soldiers. These policies include "outreach"
programs intended to teach religious values to secular soldiers which have backfired in that it led
to criticism and resentment by secular elements in Israel.
Ronen, in chapter 5, discusses how this desire manifests among Muslims in North
African countries and the often violent clashes over precisely this issue. This desire for religion
to guide policy and perhaps provide the foundational basis for government is a theme that, while
not explicit in most of the chapters, still heavily influences many of them. Without this type of
desire, the support for religion in Western democracies discussed by Neuberger in Chapter 7
would be unlikely to manifest. It likely influences the restrictions placed on religious minorities
documented in Chapters 8 and 9. It is also clearly related to the influence of religious groups on
policy discussed in chapters 3 and 4.
In some of the contributions this theme is implicit. For example, in Chapter 9 Finke &
Harris focus on the role of government and society in causing religious violence. While they do
not directly address religious beliefs or doctrines, the argument that restrictions on religion lead
to grievances and political action is inescapably linked to religious belief and doctrines. As Fox
(2002) argues, restrictions placed on religious practices and institutions—which is essentially
what Harris and Finke measure in their religious freedom variable—inevitably result in what are
perceived as attacks on one's religious beliefs and often invoke religious doctrines that require
active defense of one's religion. In addition, religions—which by their nature often include
exclusive truth claims—are often intolerant of those who do not accept these truth claims. This is
an essential element in any causal link between religion and intolerance. As they also address
religious discrimination and tolerance, these links to religious beliefs and doctrines are also
relevant to Chapters 2 and 8.
Religious Legitimacy
Religion is a source of legitimacy. It can be used to justify nearly any policy or action,
even those that may otherwise be considered unjustifiable. For instance, it is commonly used to
justify both the continued reign of governments as well as their overthrow. Despite the fact that
religious legitimacy often supports state governments, it is important to remember that it is a
source of legitimacy that is separate from and often in competition with the more secular bases
for a state’s legitimacy (Juergensmeyer 1993).
In Chapter 7, Neuberger discusses a classic relationship between religion and state which
includes religious legitimacy as an essential element. The state supports religion and, in return,
the supported religion provides the state with legitimacy. This relationship is a common theme
throughout the literature on the topic (Stark and Finke 2000; Lincoln 2003).
The importance of religious legitimacy in the contributions to this volume is
paradoxically most prominent in the absence of direct discussion of the issue. That it, this
concept is present in many of the chapters but essentially taken for granted as an obvious point
that requires little discussion. For example, while not central to their model, in Chapter 9 Finke
& Harris acknowledge religion's role in legitimating social change in the opening paragraphs of
their study. Haynes, in Chapter 10, demonstrates the implicit legitimacy of religion in the
support for religious political parties in Turkey as alternatives to the corruption of many of the
secular parties. Ronen, in Chapter 5, similarly demonstrates that when regimes lack legitimacy,
religious opposition using religion's inherent legitimacy can gain strength. Sandal and Shapiro in
Chapters 3 and 4 demonstrate the implicit political legitimacy of religion in the acceptance of
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religious leaders and institutions as significant participants in the political process. In fact the
inherent legitimacy granted by religion likely enhances the influence of these actors and
institutions.
Religious Leaders and Institutions
Religion is generally associated with religious institutions and nearly always produces
religious elites, most often but not necessarily formal clergy. These institutions and elites can
influence politics in a number of ways. To the extent that they are accepted by a population, their
moral authority and prominence give their opinion weight. They are authoritative arbiters of
religious legitimacy. Also, religious institutions, like many other institutions, can provide the
logistical basis for mass mobilization. This is because these organizations have all the tools
necessary to mobilize people for political action. These include experienced leaders, a place to
meet and organize, membership lists, contacts with the media, and often members with useful
skills including logistics and public relations (Fox 2002; Wald et. al. 2005).
Shapiro, in Chapter 4, examines the role of Evangelical Christian leaders and institutions
in influencing US foreign policy toward Iran. This group's support for Israel goes beyond
lobbying the US government. It also involves social policy, including support for Jewish
emigration to Israel and charity work in Israel. This movement is part of a larger world-wide
movement. "Christian organizations that enthusiastically support the state of Israel and the return
of the Jews to their ancestral homeland are active in many countries around the globe, including
South Africa, Nigeria, Brazil, South Korea and throughout Europe and North America." Thus,
the implications of Shapiro's case study are relevant well beyond the borders of the US.
Sandal, in chapter 3, examines the role of religious leaders in conflict transformation in
Northern Ireland. She argues that religious leaders from Northern Ireland's four major Christian
Churches (Presbyterian, Methodist, Church of Ireland, and Roman Catholic) as a group in
practice collectively constituted an informal but potent political force that significantly altered
the course of the conflict.
Cohen, in Chapter 6, describes a particularly interesting and complex interaction between
religious and state institutions. In response to a universal draft, elements of Israel's religious
society developed religious institutions designed specifically to prepare religious conscripts for
military service, instilling the religious values to maintain religiosity in the context of the
military as well as nationalistic and civic values which the military finds valuable.
The theme of religious leaders and institutions also appears in many of the chapters
which do not focus on these issues. For instance, in Chapter 9, Finke & Harris draw directly on
the social mobilization literature to argue that religious institutions provide an ideal logistical
basis for mobilization. They also document that the state can often enlist religious leaders and
institutions to maintain social mores. In this case they refer to the contribution of Saudi Arabia's
religious leaders in monitoring internet content. Similarly, in Chapter 7, Neuberger shows that in
Europe, the state and religious institutions "cooperate on a massive scale" in providing social
welfare, religious leaders sit regularly on the boards of civic organizations, and religious
institutions often run state cemeteries. In some states, such as France the government has gone as
far as to establish quasi-state religious institutions which are intended to both support and
regulate the social and political activities of religious groups.
In Chapter 7, Neuberger documents that the relationship between religious institutions
and the state is not unidirectional. Many states directly support religious institutions both
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financially and in other manners. This often includes collecting taxes on behalf of religions.
Overall the contributions to this volume, while each remaining true to their particular
topics, cover a significant range of religion's interactions with politics on both the social and
state levels. Collectively, they arguably constitute a representative core-section of the influence
of politics on religion. This broad coverage among nine contributions demonstrates the complex
and inter-related nature of religion's relationship with politics. Nothing is simple and everything
is connected, at least indirectly, to everything else. Yet these distinct perspectives, each looking
at a more finite and graspable segment of the larger religious economy, stands well as an
individual study. As such, the contributions to this volume provide rigorous academic studies of
specific issues in religion and politics as well as a broad overview of the general topic.
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