religion and POLITICS
Religion shapes some of the most controversial decisions that governments need to make: access to abortion, same-sex marriage, the death penalty and the legal status of sex work.
Indeed, it is likely that most voters across the world consider religion to be essential to their lives.
Yet research on religion and political parties remains surprisingly inexact.
Much of the research to date has been waylaid by the wrong question: is a political party fundamentally religious or secular?
Yet the “essence” of a party resists definition. Is it its manifesto, rhetoric, membership or leadership? What if these contradict each other? What would it mean if religion was integral to officially secular parties?
The difficulty
