29 August 2011

Religion and Nationalism

Several years ago I argued here that it was the nascent modern nation-state that reaped the benefits of the increased personal discipline that characterized the post-Reformation Christian West. In brief and indirectly, the competition among the leading Christian traditions of the 17th century--Catholic, Lutheran, and Reformed (Calvinists)--spurred the adherents of each to internalize the devotional and vocational teachings of their respective branches of the Church far more deeply than had the members of the undifferentiated Catholic Church of the preceding centuries. Rather than demonstrating which Christian tradition was "better" in the marketplace of religion, however, the increased discipline of Christians quickly inured to the benefit of the new and centralizing States in the form of increasing economic productivity (read: increased tax revenue) and increasing personal self-control (read: more better soldiers).

Put another way and more directly, since the Papal Revolution of the 11th century, the Church had been one of the factors limiting state power. After its splintering, the Churches were far less able to able to limit States and in fact allied themselves with States for protection against militant ecclesial competitors. Yet again  States seized the upper hand by promptly utilizing nationalism to co-opt residual trans-national religious identity.

But what about today? What are the contemporary contours of the relationship between religious traditions and States, not merely in Western Europe but across the globe? If J. Christopher Soper and Joel S. Fetzer are correct, not much has changed.

In their piece, The Last Refuge of the Scoundrel: Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective (link to abstract here), they "explore the theological, historical, and empirical connections between religion and nationalism." They begin with the assumption that the trans-national claims of many world religions conflict with the territorial loyalty that characterizes nationalism. Using data from the 57 countries of the 2005-2008 wave of the World Values Survey, they test three specific hypotheses: the degree to which religiosity explains nationalism, whether there is a relationship between religious traditions and nationalism, and whether there is a relationship between nationalism and the status of adherence to a nation's majority religion.

Soper and Fetzer do some serious statistical analysis and reach several conclusions. First, that trans-national religious doctrines and presumptive loyalties do not undermine narrower, nationalistic identities. In their words, "all religions appear to have come to terms with the narrower confines of nationalism." Second, and more surprising to me: "at the aggregate level, religiosity and nationalism are strongly correlated in democratic states, but not in authoritarian ones." In other words, the efforts of authoritarian government to co-opt religion backfire and democratic governments are more adept at utilizing their citizens' religious sentiments for political purposes. Pragmatically, "a calculating political leader should understand that jailing religious people is a less effective strategy in promoting a national agenda than is stumping for their vote."

What does this mean for serious adherents of a religious tradition? As the authors conclude,
Political leaders in democracies seem to be more effective in getting religious adherents to abandon the transnational doctrines of their faith. To the degree to which the core of religious traditions promotes cross-national solidarity, in short, democracy runs the danger of distorting the religion. Religious believers in authoritarian regimes might be more likely to find themselves in jail, but less likely to have ignored what the essence of their faith.
The old adage that the Christian Church was built on the blood of martyrs seems still to be true, if by the Church we include a commitment to doctrine and community that transcend the nation-state. de Tocqueville was correct: "when a religion contracts an alliance like this, I do not fear to say that it acts as a man would: it sacrifices the future with a view to the present, and in obtaining a power that is not due to it, it risks its legitimate power. . . Religion, therefore, cannot share the material force of those who govern without being burdened with a part of the hatreds to which they give rise."

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