Scott M. Thomas

The Global Resurgence of Religion and the Transformation of International Relations

The current global resurgence of religion is more wide ranging than a clash of civilizations driven by religious extremism, terrorism, or fundamentalism. This global cultural and religious shift is challenging our interpretation of the modern world - what it means to be modern - as a variety of social and religious groups struggle to find alternative paths to modernity. This book examines what this means for the key concepts and theories of international relations - international conflict and cooperation, diplomacy, the promotion of civil society, democracy, nation-building, and economic development-and how it is transforming them. The book serves as a guide for what it means to take cultural and religious pluralism seriously in the twenty-first century.

Faith, history and Martin Wight: the role of religion in the historical sociology of the English school of International Relations

Martin Wight is responsible for one of the English schools most distinctive features: the historical sociology of different international systems demonstrating the importance of world history for the study of International Relations. Because of Wights influence, the English school was, from the beginning, concerned with the role of religion, culture and civilization in international society. This emphasis, particularly with regard to the role of religion, has been marginalized in the English schools current research programme. This is unfortunate because, despite a renewed interest in the English school, the kind of questions Wight asked about religion, culture and identity have become some of the most important in the study of IR. This article examines the role of religion in Wights international theory, which cannot be separated from the fact that he was a devout Anglican throughout his life. There was a relationship between his personal faith and his understanding of religions role in international relations that previous scholars have not examined. When these two aspects of Wights faith and life are brought together, there is both a better sense of continuity between his early life as a Christian pacifist and his later years as a teacher and scholar of IR, and a better recognition of what his distinctive approach to religion brought to the study of International Relations.

Religion and International Conflict

It is increasingly accepted that religion plays an important role in many conflicts throughout the world. However, it is not clear what conceptual framework should be used to analyse the resurgence of religion, religious ideas and transnational religious movements in international relations. Scholars who are concerned about the global resurgence of religion in international relations have adopted a variety of conceptions of religion, and fit religion into a variety of theoretical conceptions of international relations.

Religion and International Society

The global resurgence of religious ideas and social movements is one of the most unexpected events at the end of the twentieth century. What makes this phenomenon global is that it is taking place at the same time (since the late 1970s), among diverse cultures, in different countries, and in states at different levels of economic development (for surveys, see Christian Science Monitor 1987, Daedalus 1988 and 1991).

Culture, Religion and Violence: René Girard’s Mimetic Theory:

This article introduces René Girard’s mimetic theory to examine the relationship between culture, religion and violence. It challenges the way the problem of religion and violence is narrowly conceptualised as a problem of ‘religious violence’ (i.e. religious terrorism and civil war). When the problem of religion and violence is constructed in this way, purportedly to take religion seriously, it does so by not taking culture or politics seriously. It is a limited conception since religion as a concept is always socially, culturally and politically contested, negotiated and constructed. It is not a neutral descriptor of a reality in the world, which causes violence under certain conditions. Moreover, this limited conception of religion fits what critical theorists call a problem-solving approach to theory. It ignores the fact that how, by whom and in whose interests the problem of religion and violence is constructed is itself a form of power in international relations. Therefore, the way the problem of religion and violence is constructed can be challenged as an example of the scapegoat mechanism in mimetic theory, and how it operates in the West as well as in the religion and violence in countries that are the object of Western foreign policy. This is demonstrated in two case studies: the invention of religious violence, and ethno-religious conflict in the Balkans in the 1990s.

Faith and foreign aid: how the World Bank got religion

Abstract Although prejudice against religious relief organizations persists among American and European elites, there is a growing acknowledgement of the effective role of faith-based organization in development. Culture, religion, and spirituality have become a part of the discourse in international development policy. Consequently, Christians have increased opportunities to develop authentic and holistic responses to poverty around the world.

Taking Religious and Cultural Pluralism Seriously

The Western culture of modernity and the institutions of international society embedded in it are being challenged by the global resurgence of religion and cultural pluralism in international relations. This resurgence is part of the larger crisis of modernity. It reflects a deeper and more widespread disillusionment with a “modernity” that reduces the world to what can be perceived and controlled through reason, science, technology, and bureaucratic rationality, and leaves out considerations of the religious, the spiritual, or the sacred. In the second instance, the global resurgence of religion is the result of the failure of the modernizing, secular state to produce both democracy and development in the Third World. This failure became evident by subsequent “political decay”—the decline of politics into authoritarianism, patrimonialism, and corruption since the late 196os—and by “political collapse”—the disintegration of some states, particularly in Africa, since the late 198os.2 Dissatisfaction with the project of the postcolonial secular state and the conflict between religious nationalism and secular nationalism was one of the most important developments in Third World politics in the 1990s.3

ENCOUNTER, DIALOGUE, AND KNOWLEDGE: ITALY AS A SPECIAL CASE OF RELIGIOUS ENGAGEMENT IN FOREIGN POLICY

The “religious turn” in the study of international relations has started to break through and inform concrete policy discussions. The first part of this article briefly explains that breakthrough a...

Living Critically and 'Living Faithfully' in a Global Age: Justice, Emancipation and the Political Theology of International Relations

This article asks is there a place for religion and spirituality in a critical theory of international relations (IR)? The usual answer is ‘no’ because of critical theory’s generally negative assessment of religion in domestic and international politics. However, while many of these criticisms can be acknowledged, a critical theory of IR still has to grapple with the more complex understanding of religion that already exists in critical theory, and the global resurgence of religion how Eurocentric its concept of religion actually is and how rooted it is in the European experience of modernisation. For the people of the global South — which comprises most of the people in the world — the struggle to ‘live faithfully’ amid the problems of world poverty, climate change, conflict and development can not be separated from their struggle for justice and emancipation. Therefore, a greater dialogue between critical theory and theology is necessary if critical theory is to more fully and creatively contribute to our understanding of some of the most important global issues in the study of IR in the 21st century.

Rethinking religious violence: towards a mimetic approach to violence in international relations

The purpose of this article is to use René Girard’s mimetic theory in order to rethink the thorny relationship between religion, culture and violence and to relate it to some of the key issues in international relations theory. In doing this, I will examine the concept of the ‘ambivalence of the sacred’, which underlies much scholarly research on religion and international relations – what factors, under which conditions, does religion contribute to peace or to violence. As I will show, mimetic theory questions, or at least reconfigures, the mainstream construction of the problem of religion and violence – the violent eruptions that disturb social peace and social cohesion – to critically examine the sources of the unveiled, hidden, violence and the scapegoat ideology that operates in domestic society and in foreign policy to maintain any society’s cultural and political order.