Chains of Persuasion

Abstract

Democratic citizens around the world appeal to religious arguments, ideals, identities, and institutions in their political activism. And yet predominant theoretical accounts of liberal democracy provide precious little applicable guidance to citizens who must make judgments about religion’s proper role in their politics. Chains of Persuasion: A Framework for Religion in Democracy provides a new moral framework to guide citizens’ evaluations of religious politics. Rejecting claims that religion must be relegated to the private sphere or that all attempts to evaluate its political roles are oppressive, the book argues that democratic ideals are robust enough to assess the full range of ways religion influences democratic political life. The analysis weaves together insights from critical theories of religion, philosophical debates about public reason, deliberative and instrumental justifications of democracy, and democratic virtue theory to argue that citizens must understand democracy as a way of life—with crucial implications for civic society beyond formal political institutions—in order to properly evaluate the ways in which religion can both enhance and undermine democracy. The analysis concludes by criticizing American public discussions of two prominent religious minorities: Mormons and Muslims. If citizens are to make judgments consistent with democratic norms, they must pay more attention to the nature of religions’ authority claims instead of merely evaluating the values religions proclaim.