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Religion and Political Decision Making
Author(s) -
Evans Michael S.
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
journal for the scientific study of religion
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.941
H-Index - 71
eISSN - 1468-5906
pISSN - 0021-8294
DOI - 10.1111/jssr.12088
Subject(s) - politics , proposition , democracy , subject (documents) , sociology , variety (cybernetics) , process (computing) , political process , outcome (game theory) , american political science , positive economics , political economy , voting behavior , social psychology , political science , law , economics , epistemology , psychology , voting , microeconomics , computer science , artificial intelligence , library science , philosophy , operating system
Influential political theorists suggest that religious differences in political life may be overcome through shared commitment to political processes. In this article, I subject the underlying assumptions of this proposition to empirical inquiry. When faced with substantive conflict over policy outcomes, do religious persons defer to a political process for resolution? And if so, to which political process do they defer? Through a novel interview exercise with 61 respondents from a variety of religious backgrounds, I find a general willingness to defer to a legitimate political process, even if it results in an undesirable outcome that violates religious (or other) political preferences. However, I also find that a political process need not be democratic to be seen as legitimate, and that process preferences do not map onto religious differences.