Religion in World Politics: Why the Resurgence?

Abstract

Religion in International Relations: The Return from Exile. Edited by Fabio Petito, Pavlos Hatzopoulos. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003. 296 pp., $79.95 cloth (ISBN: 1-4039-6206-5), $26.95 paper (ISBN: 1-4039-6207-3). Politics and Religion. By Steve Bruce. Cambridge: Polity, 2003. 304 pp., $61.95 cloth (ISBN: 0-7456-2819-2), $26.95 paper (ISBN: 0-7456-2820-6). During the Cold War, the role of religion was virtually ignored by scholars of international relations and, in particular, by those who studied international conflict. In fact, Western academic circles considered religion to be a declining force in politics in general (Mills 1958:150). No one could have predicted that religion in its many forms would, during the 1990s, become an alternative to the competing ideologies that dominated world politics in the 1950s and 1960s: communism, socialism, liberalism, and capitalism. In the aftermath of World War II, the process of decolonization created a large number of new states that on the whole were culturally fragmented, were frequently unstable, had rapidly growing populations, and were struggling to deal with many complex problems simultaneously. These new states had no particular affinity for the international status quo. Nonetheless, they had no choice but to accept it upon achieving independence. Ordinary people in these new states found themselves caught up in their governments' efforts to modernize their societies along Western lines while attempting to retain their long-held cultural and religious beliefs. Yet, this effort failed for the most part. In the modern world, as they soon learned, secularism abounds—at the expense of cultural pluralism and the human need for sacred authenticity (Sivan 1992). As a result, in many of these developing states, religious institutions became exclusively indigenous, and politics became largely a local affair. Secular ideologies—including nationalism, socialism, state-building, and so on—were tolerated if the central government was seen as authoritative and legitimate. So long as regimes were viewed in these ways, they were accepted by their citizens, even if rarely loved. Beginning in the 1970s, however, government legitimacy in the developing world declined in the wake of corruption, economic failure, and political repression. People turned to other leaders and institutions to champion their …