Religious Fundamentalism in the Middle East A Cross-National, Inter-Faith, and Inter-Ethnic Analysis
Mansoor Moaddel, Eastern Michigan University and Stuart A. Karabenick, University of Michigan
Brill – July 2013
In Religious Fundamentalism in the Middle East, Moaddel and Karabenick analyze fundamentalist beliefs and attitudes across nations (Egypt, Iran, Lebanon, and Saudi Arabia), faith (Christianity and Islam), and ethnicity (Azari-Turks, Kurds, and Persians among Iranians), using comparative survey data. For them, fundamentalism is not just a set of religious beliefs. It is rather a set of beliefs about and attitudes toward whatever religious beliefs one has. In this analysis, the authors show that fundamentalist beliefs and attitudes vary across national contexts and individual characteristics, and predict people’s orientation toward the same set of historical issues that were the concerns of fundamentalist intellectual leaders and activists. The authors’ analysis reveals a “cycle of spirituality” that reinforces the critical importance of taking historical and cultural contexts into consideration to understand the role of religious fundamentalism in contemporary Middle Eastern societies.
The Religious and the Political:
A Comparative Sociology of Religion
Bryan S. Turner
Cambridge University Press, 2013
Description
While the relationships between ethics and religion, and violence and politics, are of enduring interest, the interface between religion and violence is one of the most problematic features of the contemporary world. Following in the tradition of Max Weber’s historical and comparative study of religions, this book explores the many ways in which religion and politics are both combined and separated across different world religions and societies. Through a variety of case studies including the monarchy, marriage, law and conversion, Bryan S. Turner explores different manifestations of secularization, and how the separation of church and state is either compromised or abandoned. He considers how different states manage religion in culturally and religiously diverse societies and concludes with a discussion of the contemporary problems facing the liberal theory of freedom of religion. The underlying theoretical issue is the conditions for legitimacy of rule in modern societies experiencing global changes.
Religion and Civil Society in Europe
J. de Hart, The Netherl. Inst. for Soc. Res. (SCP), The Hague, Netherlands; P. Dekker, Tilburg
University, Tilburg, Netherlands; L. Halman, Tilburg University, Tilburg, Netherlands (Eds.)
Religion is back again in Europe after never having been gone. It is manifest in the
revival of religious institutions and traditions in former communist countries, in political
controversies about the relationship between the church(es) and the state and about
the freedom of religion and the freedom to criticize religion, and in public unease about
religious minorities. This book is about religion and civil society in Europe. It moves from
general theoretical and normative approaches of this relationship, via the examination of
national patterns of religion-state relations, to in-depth analyses of the impact of religion
and secularization on the values, pro-social attitudes and civic engagement of individuals.
It covers Europe from the Lutheran North to the Catholic South, and from the secularized
West to the Orthodox East and Islamic South-East with comparative analyses and country
studies, concluding with an overall Europe-USA comparison.
http://www.springer.com/social+sciences/book/978-94-007-6814-7
Announcing a New Series “Religion in Modern Africa”
Published by Ashgate
Ashgate Publications announces the launching of a new series entitled ?Religion in Modern Africa?. Series editors are James L. Cox, Emeritus Professor of Religious Studies in the University of Edinburgh, and Gerrie ter Haar, Emeritus Professor of Religion and Development in the International Institute of Social Studies of Erasmus University Rotterdam.
The editors invite proposals containing innovative research relevant to the diverse and changing religious situation in contemporary Africa. One of the principal aims of the series is to facilitate the dissemination of research by young African scholars. “Religion in Modern Africa” is fully interdisciplinary and will include books from a range of disciplines, such as: the academic study of religions, anthropology, sociology and related disciplines in the human and social sciences.
In the first instance, authors should send a one-page proposal outlining the main content of their manuscript to the editors, with a copy to Sarah Lloyd (the Ashgate Religion Editor) at the emails noted below. If the editors consider the proposal appropriate to the aims of the series, they will invite the author to complete a full proposal, which will be reviewed and submitted to Ashgate for final approval.
Please direct initial proposals or questions regarding the series to:
James L. Cox (J.Cox@ed.ac.uk)
Gerrie ter Haar (terhaar@iss.nl)
Sarah Lloyd (SLloyd@ashgatepublishing.com)