Religious Soft Power as Accountability Mechanism for Power in World Politics

This case study of the InterFaith Leaders’ Summit(s) from 2005 to2010 expands the concept of “soft power” as an accountability mechanism to includereligious soft power. This article explores the theoretical validity of a Faith-BasedAccountability Mechanism (FAM) as a macro-level explanatory unit. The interfaith leadersexercise public reputational and peer accountability among their constituents inrelation to the G8/G20 leaders. The theoretical validity of the dialogue process is notcontingent on political leader responsiveness but is ascertained using a complextheoretical standard for assessing the legitimacy of global governance institutionsagainst which observations are then gauged. The InterFaith Dialogue Mechanism is aspecific illustration of a FAM that shows increasing compliance with the complexstandard between 2005 and 2010. The Dialogue Mechanism FAM is a form of religious softpower that combines soft institution with soft technique. The next stage in the researchis to identify specific characteristics of the FAM ideal type