Globalization, Contact, and Religious Identity: A Cross‐National Analysis of Interreligious Favorability*

Abstract

ObjectivesThis article examines cross‐national variation in interreligious favorability across the globe. We develop and test several hypotheses linking globalization to attitudes toward the religious other through mechanisms of religious belonging and contact.MethodsUtilizing cross‐national data in 20 countries from the Pew Global Attitudes Surveys (2011), we run a series of multilevel and logistic regression estimations to test our hypotheses about global contact, religious identity, and interreligious favorability.ResultsWe find that global contact has a positive effect on interreligious favorability, whereas holding religious identity increases negative sentiments toward religious outgroups. We also find that increased levels of globalization inhibit the negative impact of religious belonging and threat perceptions on favorable views of the religious other.ConclusionAlthough globalization increases the salience of religion as an exclusive identity category at the expense of decreased interreligious favorability, individuals become more conducive to interreligious tolerance thanks to frequent social contact at higher levels of globalization.