Institutions and Morality Policy in Western Democracies

This article investigates whether different political institutions such as executives, legislatures, parties, party systems, judiciaries, decentralization, constitutionalism, and referendums across 24 Western democracies are venues for debate across five individual morality policies. Using data since 1945, the article compares three theories of morality policy—(1) Policy Type leading to different institutional venues; (2) Two Worlds of religious/secular party systems; and (3) U.S./European exceptionalism. In order, the most frequently debated issues are abortion, same sex marriage, euthanasia, stem cells/assisted reproductive technology (ART), and capital punishment. There is considerable variation in the institutions and country groups that debate them although fewer differences in the Two Worlds model. Abortion, euthanasia, and same sex marriage are the most convergent issues across institutions, party systems, and country groupings while capital punishment and stem cells/ART show the most diverse patterns of deliberation. The general Policy Type model of morality policy is upheld, but varies institutionally by specific issues. The Two Worlds model is of some importance, but only on three issues. There also are regional differences between the United States, Europe, and non‐European democracies.     

Religious tides: The time‐variant effect of religion on morality policies

Morality policies evince a much closer relationship to religious doctrines than is the case in other policy areas and hence constitute a most likely case for the observation of religious effects on policymaking and regulatory change. Yet we still lack generally accepted answers to the questions of whether and how religion matters to morality policy. In this paper, we present a theoretical argument that helps to overcome the seemingly contradictory expectations derived from the secularization and religion matters hypotheses. We postulate a bottleneck effect of religious opposition: while religious influence matters most during early stages of the policy process when the problem definition of a moral issue is still in flux, it diminishes during later stages when the issue has made it onto the political agenda. We find evidence of the bottleneck effect in a dataset of policy permissiveness covering 26 countries and spanning 50 years for five morality policies (abortion, euthanasia, homosexuality, pornography, and same‐sex marriage). The data is analyzed via a multilevel model and using Bayesian inference.     

The Influence of Religious–Political Sophistication on U.S. Public Opinion

Scholarly accounts of elite–mass communication often suggest that political sophistication is a necessary condition for adopting the attitudes of partisan elites. Some have also suggested that political knowledge promotes religious–political issue constraint among religious identifiers. This paper contributes to the political sophistication literature by piloting and testing a new measure, religious–political sophistication (RPS), assessing knowledge of church teaching on particular political issues. Using original measures launched on the 2014 Cooperative Congressional Election Study, I show that for evangelical Protestants and Roman Catholics, RPS (in conjunction with frequent church attendance) depresses support for abortion rights and same-sex marriage. Moreover, I argue that assessing RPS this way is not fatally contaminated by unsophisticated respondents interpolating that their clergy must share their political positions. Results suggest religion-and-politics scholars should adopt RPS measures to gain a greater understanding of the unique sources of political communication upon which religious identifiers draw.     

Cultural resistance and religious legitimacy in colonial Algeria ∗

Starting from a specific historical example, that of colonial Algeria, the paper seeks to examine religious movements which play a political role. Too often such movements have been viewed either as being only political or as utilising religion simply as a mask. It is argued here that religious movements having apparent political functions benefit (to the extent that they are religious) from being studied in contrast to other non-religious movements having similar or comparable functions in the same society at the same time (or in other societies with which comparison would appear justified). It is only in this way that one can see how the relation between the political and religious fields function. It is also in this way alone that we are able to see at what price (that of the relative autonomy of the religious field) the objective domination and manipulation of the religious by the political comes about. In studying societies which claim to be Islamic, it is particularly important to break with orientalist notion of the indivisibility of the religious and political, which obscures the real relationship between the two spheres.     

Same-Sex Marriage,Korean Christians,and the Challenge of Democratic Engagement

The contest over gay rights (e.g., same-sex marriage) dramatizes the clash between increasingly nonwhite (“majority-world”), religious conservatives and mostly white, progressives. It renews longstanding debate about the compatibility of religious conservatism and liberal, pluralistic democracy. A study of one influential group, Korean Christians, shows that the younger, western-educated generation generally combines religious conservatism and political liberalism; they are much more likely to espouse liberal-democratic principles and to participate in the larger, plural society than the older, immigrant generation. However, the polarizing politics of gay rights partly reverses the generational pattern: the historically insular, first generation participate more in mainstream politics, while some western-educated, second-generation Korean Christians become intolerant and isolated from elite-educated circles. Ideological minorities self-segregate themselves in the face of hostile, energized majorities, whether progressives in Korean Christian circles or conservatives in secular, educated ones. Public deliberation on same-sex marriage depends on whether it becomes viewed like the clear-cut issue of interracial marriage or the more ambiguous one of abortion.     

Revisiting the Income Tax Effects of Legalizing Same‐Sex Marriages

In this paper we estimate the impacts on income tax collections of legalizing same‐sex marriage. We utilize new individual‐level data sources to estimate the federal income tax consequences of legalizing same‐sex marriages. These data sources also allow us to estimate the impact of legalization on state income tax collections. We find that 23 states would realize a net fiscal benefit from legalization, while 21 states would experience a decline in revenue. The potential (annual) changes in state tax revenue range from negative $29 million in California to positive $16 million in New York. At the federal level, our estimates suggest an overall reduction in revenues, ranging from a potential loss of $187 million to $580 million. Overall, we find that the federal and state impacts are quite modest. We also find that our estimates are only marginally affected by alternative assumptions about how many same‐sex couples will choose to marry and which partner will claim any children for tax deduction purposes.     

(Re)Drawing the Lines on Marriage and Sexuality

The campaign for same‐sex marriage is animated by two, contradictory impulses: a libertarian‐egalitarian strain that continually expands the boundaries of what is publicly legitimate; and a conservative one that seeks to reinforce traditional boundaries. Democratic polities would benefit from public discussion on whether to retain normative, sexual boundaries, and if so, what they should reasonably be. I outline a moderately conservative agenda that would limit public legitimacy to sexually exclusive monogamy (heterosexual or homosexual), but informally tolerate most, consenting, nonconventional sexual practices. A spirit of humility, empathy and tragedy will help us to exercise reasonable judgement as we redraw the lines on marriage and sexuality.     

Reconsidering the Role of Politics in Leaving Religion: The Importance of Affiliation

Studies have pointed to politics as an important force driving people away from religion—the argument is that the dogmatic politics of the Christian Right have alienated liberals and moderates, effectively threatening organized religion in America. We argue that existing explanations are incomplete; a proper reconsideration necessitates distinguishing processes of affiliation (with specific congregations) from identification (with religious traditions). Using three data sets, we find evidence that qualifies and complements existing narratives of religious exit. Evaluations of congregational political fit drive retention decisions. At the same time, opposition to the Christian Right only bears on retention decisions when it is salient in a congregational context, affecting primarily evangelicals and Republicans. These results help us understand the dynamics of the oft‐observed relationship between the Christian Right and deidentification and urge us to adopt a broader, more pluralistic view of the politicization of American religion.     

Are Catholics still different? Catholicism,political attitudes and party attachments in Switzerland, 1970–95

This article is concerned with the political attitudes and the party attachments of Swiss Catholics between 1970 and 1995. Do Catholics still have distinct political orientations or have the differences between Catholics and non‐Catholics withered away in the process of secularisation? A re‐analysis of several surveys indicates that Catholics are indeed still different politically from the overall Swiss population. But these differences between Catholics and non‐Catholics are relatively small and have almost disappeared in the last 30 years. However, the data also suggests that while the confessional cleavage has lost most of its significance, it is increasingly superseded by a religious one.     

The tie that divides: Cross‐national evidence of the primacy of partyism

Using evidence from Great Britain, the United States, Belgium and Spain, it is demonstrated in this article that in integrated and divided nations alike, citizens are more strongly attached to political parties than to the social groups that the parties represent. In all four nations, partisans discriminate against their opponents to a degree that exceeds discrimination against members of religious, linguistic, ethnic or regional out‐groups. This pattern holds even when social cleavages are intense and the basis for prolonged political conflict. Partisan animus is conditioned by ideological proximity; partisans are more distrusting of parties furthest from them in the ideological space. The effects of partisanship on trust are eroded when partisan and social ties collide. In closing, the article considers the reasons that give rise to the strength of ‘partyism’ in modern democracies.     

Partisan effects in morality policy making

Current comparative policy research gives no clear answer to the question of whether partisan politics in general or the partisan composition of governments in particular matter for different morality policy outputs across countries and over time. This article addresses this desideratum by employing a new encompassing dataset that captures the regulatory permissiveness in six morality policies that are homosexuality, same‐sex partnership, prostitution, pornography, abortion and euthanasia in 16 European countries over five decades from 1960 to 2010. Given the prevalent scepticism about a role for political parties for morality policies in existing research, this is a ‘hard’ test case for the ‘parties do matter’ argument. Starting from the basic theoretical assumption that different party families, if represented in national governments to varying degrees, ought to leave differing imprints on morality policy making, this research demonstrates that parties matter when accounting for the variation in morality policy outputs. This general statement needs to be qualified in three important ways. First, the nature of morality policy implies that party positions or preferences cannot be fully understood by merely focusing on one single cleavage alone. Instead, morality policy is located at the interface of different cleavages, including not only left‐right and secular‐religious dimensions, but also the conflicts between materialism and postmaterialism, green‐alternative‐libertarian and traditional‐authoritarian‐nationalist (GAL‐TAN) parties, and integration and demarcation. Second, it is argued in this article that the relevance of different cleavages for morality issues varies over time. Third, partisan effects can be found only if individual cabinets, rather than country‐years, are used as the unit of analysis in the research design. In particular, party families that tend to prioritise individual freedom over collective interests (i.e., left and liberal parties) are associated with significantly more liberal morality policies than party families that stress societal values and order (i.e., conservative/right and religious parties). While the latter are unlikely to overturn previous moves towards permissiveness, these results suggest that they might preserve the status quo at least. Curiously, no systematic effects of green parties are found, which may be because they have been represented in European governments at later periods when morality policy outputs were already quite permissive.     

Jewish Religiosity and Political Attitudes in the United States and Israel

Does religious commitment have a common political impact across national frontiers? To date, that question has been explored empirically only for Roman Catholics, who might be expected to behave similarly because of centralizing resources in their tradition. This article explores the extent of transnational political attitudes among Jews in the United States and Israel, two groups with less centralized authority structures and radically different religious situations. Parallel surveys of Jews in the United States and Israel, analyzed by OLS regression with the slope dummy approach, indicate that Jewish religiosity has a common influence on most political issues but often has much sharper effects in one society than the other. Given our expectation that Jews would exhibit lower levels of transnational similarity than Roman Catholics, the findings reinforce scholars who perceive religion as a potent transnational political factor.     

The city and its ‘other’ in Islamic political ideas and movements

Historically, the city has been the natural habitat for innovations in political and religious ideas and the locus of politico-religious organization and associations. But the proximity to the centers of military power and of religious orthodoxy have rendered the social movements based on these ideas ineffective. The movements which led to political transformations come from marginal settlements and tribal organizations. Ideas and actions relating to location and habitat are examined briefly. Moving on to the modern period it isnoted that almost without exception Islamic political ideas related implicitly to an urban setting. In particular, we examine some of the political ideas of Sayyid Qutb which have been influential among more recent radical Islamic groups in Egypt. These relate to theformation of an Islamic vanguard, separating itself from the prevalent jahiliyya (state of error and ignorance) and, following the example of the early Muslims, fortified with faith, wage a jihad (holy war) to conquer this jahiliyya. Some implications of these ideas for urban social relations and for location and space are examined.     

Who Governs in God’s City?

After clearing away some misconceptions about the power of the religious right in Colorado Springs, this article will examine three areas, education, medical marijuana, and gay rights, where the city’s religious conservatives have tried to influence public policy. With each area their efforts have only been partially successful. While the reasons for this uneven success are often particular to each policy dispute, taken together these issues point to discernible changes in the political behavior and ambitions of the city’s religious conservatives. Most importantly, religious conservatives have become far less confrontational and have turned away, to a significant degree, from direct political action and are focusing much more on community outreach programs. The paper will conclude by discussing some of the reasons for those changes and how they might have national implications for religious and social conservatives.     

Jürgen Habermas on public reason and religion: do religious citizens suffer an asymmetrical cognitive burden,and should they be compensated?

In his recent writings, Jürgen Habermas asks how the liberal constitutional principle of separation between church and state, religion and politics, should be understood. The problem, he holds, is that a liberal state guarantees equal freedom for religious communities to practise their faith, while at the same time shielding the political bodies that take collectively binding decisions from religious influences. This means that religious citizens are asked to justify their political statements independently of their religious views, resulting in a burden that secular citizens do not experience. To compensate, Habermas demands from secular citizens that they open their minds to the possible truth content of religion, enter into dialog and contribute to the translation of religious reasons into generally acceptable reasons. This article focuses on Habermas’s assumption that religious citizens suffer an asymmetrical cognitive burden that should be compensated, and his claim that his approach to religion in the public sphere is less restrictive than that of John Rawls.     

Vote with your rabbi: The electoral effects of religious institutions in Israel

How do religious parties mobilize local support and what impact does different political strategies have on neighborhoods? Previous literature focuses on the social welfare benefits distributed by religious parties. In this paper, I analyze how religious political parties in Israel generate grassroots support among voters by allying with Jewish religious institutions. Using original data, I examine the association between the timing of entry of religious institutions into neighborhoods and local voting patterns for Israeli national elections. I find that religious institutions are associated with a 4-percentage point increase in the local vote share for religious parties, where this effect is larger for religious institutions with connections to political parties. My results suggest that the primary mechanism driving these results are that these institutions influence the vote choice of existing residents by distributing tangible goods. In contrast, changes to the composition of the neighborhood through in-migration has a more limited effect on voting patterns. These findings highlight the impact of religious institutions on the social and political fabric of local communities.     

Shades of Faith: Religious Foundations of Political Attitudes among African Americans,Latinos, and Whites

Although there is considerable evidence that religion influences political opinions, it is unclear how this story plays out across different segments of the U.S. population. Utilizing the 2000 Religion and Politics Survey, we examine the effects of religious beliefs, behaviors, and affiliations on citizens’ attitudes relating to issues of egalitarianism. Our study is one of the few to comparatively analyze the link between religious measures and political outlooks for the nation's three largest ethno‐racial groups. The findings show that conservative Christianity is consistently associated with less tolerant and less egalitarian views among whites. Religious African Americans and Latinos, however, hold more equitable opinions about disadvantaged individuals. To further strengthen our arguments, we also replicate these results using the 2008 American National Election Study. Overall, we demonstrate that a single perspective on religion and public opinion does not apply to all groups.     

Public Managers' Religiosity: Impacts on Work Attitudes and Perceptions of Co-Workers

ABSTRACT

Do public managers' religious beliefs and behaviors affect their work and their work-related attitudes? Perhaps due to the sensitive nature of this question, there is almost no empirical work on the topic. Our study uses questionnaire data (n = 765) from the National Administrative Studies Project-III to test hypotheses about the impacts of U.S. public managers' religiosity, as well as their political activity, on work attitudes. Religiosity is defined by public managers' responses about attending religious services. Political behavior is defined in terms of membership in political organizations and election groups. An application of ordinary least squares regression shows that religious public managers tend to have a stronger orientation toward job security and a more favorable view of their organization and fellow employees. Public managers are no more or less oriented to security than other respondents in the sample, but they have more negative views about their organization and fellow employees. These findings do not change when obvious controls are introduced into the model.     

Local,National and Global Islam: Religious Guidance and European Muslim Public Opinion on Political Radicalism and Social Conservatism

The attacks on the Charlie Hebdo magazine and Kosher supermarket in Paris in January 2015, as well as the announcement of a ‘Caliphate’ by radical Islamists of the so-called ‘Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’ (ISIS) in 2014, reignited political and academic interest in the possible appeal of radical Islamism among young Muslims living in Western Europe. This analysis expands existing knowledge by adding a large-n, cross-national comparison to the small-n or single-case-study approaches dominating research on European Muslims over the last two decades. Moving beyond examination of the interaction between European governments and groups claiming to represent European Muslims, this analysis takes into account the individualisation of Muslim religious discourses, practices and identities. Binary logistic regression analyses challenge conventional wisdom which emphasises discrimination and rejection of Western foreign policies in the explanation of political radicalism. Instead, religious guidance and socio-economic status emerge as consistent correlates of political and social attitudes among West European Muslims. These findings not only add to a growing body of literature providing empirical evidence for the political impact of religious elites, they also have crucial policy implications for West European governments working to maintain national security and social cohesion.