Religion and Democracy: A Worldwide Comparison

233 Pages·2021·15.968 MB·English

by  Carsten Anckar

RELIGION AND DEMOCRACY
This fully updated new edition empirically assesses the relationship between religion
and democracy, looking at global, regional, and individual countries’ perspectives.
Using a wide range of quantitative data, the author tests the validity of Huntington’s
claim that democracy and religion are tightly connected, and that Western Christianity
is the only religion capable of supporting democratic institutions. He evaluates both
the broader assumptions that the introduction and the stability of a democratic
form of government is dependent on the dominating religion in the country at the
macro level, and the suggestion that, at the individual level, religious adherence is
related to pro- democratic values. Examining religions including Christianity, Islam,
Buddhism, Hinduism, Chinese folk religion, and Judaism, this book demonstrates
that geographical and political contexts are more important than religious affiliation
for explaining levels of, and attitudes towards, democracy.
As well as offering a broad empirical picture of the relationship between religion
and democracy, this new edition delves deeper into the religion–s tate nexus,
focusing particularly on events that have taken place during the last decade. The
author explores how religion is used instrumentally by political leaders in different
parts of the world. He also discusses the extent to which religious minorities are
under increasing pressure in secularized environments; prospects for democracy
in the MENA region a decade after the Arab Spring; the growing influence of
evangelical Christianity in Latin America; and how increasing levels of religious
conflict in Asia and the Pacific as well as in Sub-S aharan Africa pose a threat to the
emergence and survival of democracy.
This book will be of great interest to students, academics, and researchers within the
field of comparative politics, as well as journalists and various theological associations.
Carsten Anckar is Professor of Political Science at Åbo Akademi University,
Finland. He has published widely in the field of comparative politics and is the
author of Determinants of the Death Penalty: A Comparative Study of the World (2004).
Routledge Studies in Religion and Politics
Edited by Jeffrey Haynes, London Metropolitan University, UK
This series aims to publish high- quality works on the topic of the resurgence of
political forms of religion in both national and international contexts. This trend
has been especially noticeable in the post- cold war era (that is, since the late 1980s).
It has affected all the ‘world religions’ (including Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism,
Islam, and Judaism) in various parts of the world (such as the Americas, Europe, the
Middle East and North Africa, South and Southeast Asia, and sub- Saharan Africa).
The series welcomes books that use a variety of approaches to the subject,
drawing on scholarship from political science, international relations, security
studies, and contemporary history.
Books in the series explore these religions, regions and topics both within
and beyond the conventional domain of ‘church–s tate’ relations to include the
impact of religion on politics, conflict and development, including the late Samuel
Huntington’s controversial – yet influential – thesis about ‘clashing civilisations’.
In sum, the overall purpose of the book series is to provide a comprehensive
survey of what is currently happening in relation to the interaction of religion and
politics, both domestically and internationally, in relation to a variety of issues.
A Quarter Century of the “Clash of Civilizations”
Edited by Jeffrey Haynes
Religion and Democracy (2nd edition)
A Worldwide Comparison
Carsten Anckar
For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/
Routledge- Studies- in- Religion- and- Politics/ book- series/ RSRP
RELIGION AND
DEMOCRACY
A Worldwide Comparison
Second Edition
Carsten Anckar
Second edition published 2022
by Routledge
2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2022 Carsten Anckar
The right of Carsten Anckar to be identified as author of this work has been
asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
First edition published by Routledge 2011
British Library Cataloguing- in- Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Anckar, Carsten, 1969– author.
Title: Religion and democracy: a worldwide comparison / Carsten Anckar.
Description: 2nd edition. | Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, 2022. |
Series: Routledge studies in religion and politics |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021024229 (print) | LCCN 2021024230 (ebook) |
ISBN 9780367714611 (hardback) | ISBN 9780367721343 (paperback) |
ISBN 9781003153566 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Democracy–Religious aspects.
Classification: LCC BL65.P7 A49 2022 (print) |
LCC BL65.P7 (ebook) | DDC 201/.72–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021024229
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021024230
ISBN: 978- 0- 367- 71461- 1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978- 0- 367- 72134- 3 (pbk)
ISBN: 978- 1- 003- 15356- 6 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/ 9781003153566
Typeset in Bembo
by Newgen Publishing UK
For Oxana, Nadine, Beatrice, and Richard

CONTENTS
List of tables ix
Preface to the first edition xiii
Preface to the second edition xv
1 The research design 1
Introduction 1
Defining and measuring religious dominance 3
Defining and measuring democracy 9
Controlling extraneous variance 14
Religious affiliation and democratic values 20
2 Relating religion to democracy 25
Introduction: Religion and politics 25
Christianity 26
Judaism 45
Islam 50
Buddhism 60
Hinduism 68
Chinese folk religions 77
Ethnoreligions 82
Knitting the threads together 85
Secularism and religious constellations 88
viii Contents
3 Macrolevel findings 98
Bivariate patterns 98
Multivariate patterns 105
Regional patterns 120
Conclusion 134
4 Microlevel findings 141
Introduction 141
Global patterns 142
Regional patterns 154
Conclusion 162
5 Religion and democracy 167
What have we learnt? 167
How much do numbers tell us? 169
What numbers do not tell us: Religion and democracy 2010– 2020 174
Conclusion 190
Appendix 193
References 196
Index 210
TABLES
1.1 Theoretical contextual settings for survey analyses of the impact of
religious affiliation on democratic values 23
3.1 Religion and degree of democracy in 1972 and 1985. Arithmetic
means and median values 99
3.2 Religion, degree of democracy in 2009, and level of democratic
stability, 1972– 2019. Arithmetic means and median values 100
3.3 Associations between proportions of adherents of various religions
and degree of democracy/ democratic stability. Pearson’s correlation
coefficients 103
3.4 Associations between secularism and democracy. Pearson’s
correlation coefficients 104
3.5 Share of adherents of different religions, GDP/ cap., insularity,
British colonial heritage, linguistic fragmentation, and democracy 106
3.6 Religion, GDP/ cap., insularity, British colonial heritage, and
linguistic fragmentation as determinants of the degree of
democracy in 1972 and 1985, applying four criteria of religious
dominance 107
3.7 Religion, GDP/ cap., insularity, British colonial heritage, and
linguistic fragmentation as determinants of democracy in 2009 and
democratic stability, 1972– 2019, applying four criteria of religious
dominance 108
3.8 Religion, secularism, GDP/ cap., insularity, colonial heritage,
and linguistic fragmentation as determinants of the degree of
democracy in 2009 and democratic stability, 1972– 2019 111
3.9 Religious fragmentation, degree of democracy, and democratic
stability. Pearson’s correlation coefficients 112