Religion and the rise of mass democracy in Britain

Abstract

ABSTRACT Modernity and the rise of mass democracy are intertwined. This contribution to this special issue on Christian modernities therefore focuses on how the churches responded to this key aspect of modernity. This paper addresses this through exploring the framing of ideas about democracy expressed by leading figures in the British churches, particularly Nonconformity, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. In the process claims about the religious roots of democracy and their role in preserving Britain from the slide to totalitarianism experienced elsewhere in Europe in the early twentieth century are critically examined.