Learning Objectives
By the end of this section, you will be able to:
- Define religious identity and related terms, including primordialism and constructivism
- Define religiosity and understand the 4 B’s - believing, belonging, behaving, and bonding
- Explain how religious identity is important in the study of comparative politics
Introduction
As mentioned earlier, individuals can have multiple identities. National identity is closely connected to one’s sense of nationality and/or the nation they reside in. Religious identity is how a person or group of persons think of themselves as belonging to and representing the values of a particular religion and/or religious sect.
Nationalism developed in part due to the printing press, which was introduced in Europe in the 1400s. As more and more people became literate, they began to read newspapers. This ritual of buying and reading newspapers allowed people to feel connected and part of an imagined community. Anderson refers to this idea as print capitalism, and suggests it is the causal mechanism that led to the development of nations around three hundred years ago.
Without the development of a 'nation' in the 18th and 19th centuries, it is unlikely that there would be nationalism. For some scholars, the concept of a nation is considered a priori, or deductively reasoned. In other words, the nation must be formed or conceived beforehand, before a national identity can exist: nation → identity.
When looking at religious identity, the a priori argument is less clear. In order to have a religious identity, or a sense of religiosity, a religion must exist beforehand. Unlike the nation, religion as a concept is far older.
How Does Religious Identity Differ from National Identity?
Emile Durkheim argued that religion is an eminently social thing. Rather than focusing on deities and/or supernatural elements, the formation of a religion centers on the collective consciousness and community. The rituals and practices that people collectively participate in lead to a sense of unity. The development of an identity is what then leads to organized religion. (Wetherell and Mohanty, 2010) When understood in this approach, the arrows are reversed: identity → religion.
Durkheim wrote about pre-modern societies, which were mostly clan or tribe-based. Iif religious identity is indeed ascribed, or collectivity-based, then it can also be free from geographical constraints. As the clan or tribe shifts from one territory to the next, the religious identity should continue as long as the community remains cohesive. This is different from national identity, where lines drawn on a map strongly influence who develops a national identity. If a religious identity can be detached from the land in which it originated, then an argument can be made that religious identity could have more impact. Evidence includes the historical growth of universal religions, such as Christianity and Islam through proselytizing, and the persistence of religious minority groups across the centuries.
Religious Identity: Primordialism v. Constructivism
How then does religious identity affect politics?
- If religious identity is considered to precede religion itself, then it is primordial identity. (Primordialism means that individuals will have only one single religious identity and that this identity is fixed in the present and the future.) Some contend that one’s religious identity is biologically determined, that you are born into it. Others suggest it is acquired through childhood, through socialization and education. Regardless, primordialists believe that once an identity is acquired it becomes immutable (Chandra, 2001). Mass literacy also plays a role in the hardening of an identity. Van Evera (2001) writes that “written identities also have a resilient quality that makes them almost impossible to stamp out” (pg. 20).
- Constructivist identity posits that people have multiple identities and that as people change, so can the importance of a particular identity, or the adoption of a new identity altogether. In most modern societies, individuals choose to join a community, particularly in secular societies. It is not determined by the clan, tribe, or even nation one is born into. Indeed, given the transitory nature of people today through mass migration, there is a greater likelihood that one could acquire multiple religious identities in their lifetime. An example is the Protestant Christians in the United States, who go ‘church shopping’ or visit different congregations before settling down on one church that fits their needs.
Religious Identity and Politics
Primordialism v. constructivism can help us understand how religious identity plays a role in modern politics. When groups see their identity as primordial, as immutable, then they are less willing to compromise politically on issues that they believe violate their belief systems. For these individuals, compromise may be seen as anathema, or something that is vehemently disliked by the community. This reasoning has been used to explain why conflict may erupt between two or more religious groups.
Religious identity is more complex than ethnic identity. Ethnic identity because of primordialism, often assumes a binary sense. Either you are an American or not. Of course, constructivists would strongly disagree. Constructivists would contend that people can have multiple ethnic identities, particularly in a transnational setting, which is more common in a globalized world.
Measuring Religious Identity
When measuring religious identity, we can rely on what has been referred to as the four B’s for understanding religion and politics as they influence how people may vote, view certain policies, and support certain political parties. These four dimensions represent what Hoogendorn and Saroglu refer to as “the social, cognitive, emotional, and moral elements of religion, respectively” (Saroglou, 2011; Hoogendoorn, et. al., 2016)
- Believing is a religious belief or the believing in certain religious propositions. It involves the way people conceptualize their relationship with supernatural forces. Most religions are theistic, which involve belief in a god (monotheism) or gods (polytheism or henotheism), or some omnipresent force. Even among nontheistic traditions, such as Buddhism, adherents often profess a belief in a version of external transcendence, and that “there is some sort of spirit or life force” (Saroglou, 2011).
- Belonging is religious affiliation, or belonging to a religious faith, a religious tradition, or a denomination/sect within a particular religion. The word 'denomination' is associated with Christianity and often refers to a “religious community or (transhistorical) group with a common history and future” (Hoogendoorn, et. al., 2016). This term could be used to identify groups such as Catholics, Southern Baptists, Latter-Day Saints (Mormons), etc.
- Behaving is religious commitment, or behaving according to values privileged by religion. It involves norms and defining what is right and what is wrong. People with high levels of religiosity often act on their religious convictions. Religious values also shape the legal and judicial system of a country. This is true even in largely secular societies, as many of these countries were once religious.
- Bonding is a religious ritual by means of spiritual practices. People go through these experiences either individually or together as a community. It can include prayer, meditation, worship, religious ceremonies, and pilgrimages.
Given this complexity, scholars in religion and politics prefer to use the term religiosity instead of religious identity. Macaluso and Wanat (1979) define religiosity as “the strength of a person’s attachment to organized religion”. In addition, the authors attempt to try and measure religiosity, “ as the frequency of attendance at the place of worship. Individuals who go to church or synagogue every week are high in religiosity, those who rarely go are low in religiosity” (pg. 160). Leege and Kellstedt (1993) contend that using church/ synagogue/mosque attendance as the only measure of religiosity is too simple and may not accurately reflect the other ‘B’s explained above.
Some religions and/or denominations emphasize individual devotion or non-collective traditions. For example, this idea is more relevant as a higher number of people in the United States now identify as non-religious, but still spiritual. A recent Pew Research Center survey indicated that roughly three-in-ten Americans are religiously unaffiliated.
