Religion, Rational Political Theory, and the 2008 Presidential Election

Abstract

AbstractStates of the United States differ significantly in terms of politically salient religious culture. But prior to the 2008 presidential election several studies inspired by rational political theory that found that during war time voting districts with high rates of military fatalities were more likely to vote against incumbent candidates and for anti-war candidates failed to control for variation in religious culture. In the present study, multivariate analyses that controlled for local differences in religious culture found that Iraq War military fatalities had an overall positive effect on the difference in the percent of the vote received in the 50 states and the District of Columbia by the anti-war Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama in the 2008 election and the pre-war Democratic presidential candidate Al Gore in the 2000 election. Tests for interaction, however, also found that the magnitude and ultimately the direction of this effect were conditioned by religious culture. In states with very high percentages of evangelical Protestants, the military fatality rate actually appeared to have a negative effect.