Conference Programme
Religion and the State:
Regional and Global Perspectives
University of Western Sydney
Parramatta Campus
17-18th July 2009
The conference organisers would like to thank the College of Arts, University of
Western Sydney and the Academy of the Social Sciences in Australia for their
financial support.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CONFERENCE VENUE ______________________________________________4
REFRESHMENT & MEALS ___________________________________________4
CONFERENCE DINNER______________________________________________4
ACCOMMODATION DURING THE CONFERENCE ______________________5
ACCOMMODATION IN SYDNEY BEFORE AND/OR AFTER THE
CONFERENCE ______________________________________________________5
TRANSPORT TO THE AIRPORT _______________________________________6
CONFERENCE CONTACT DETAILS ___________________________________6
INSTRUCTION FOR PRESENTERS ____________________________________6
EQUIPMENT PROVIDED_____________________________________________6
EMERGENCIES _____________________________________________________6
TRANSPORT ________________________________________________________6
MAP OF UWS, PARRAMATTA CAMPUS ________________________________8
PARAMMATTA CAMPUS TRANSPORT ACCESS GUIDE __________________9
CITYRAIL NETWORK _______________________________________________10
BUS MAP __________________________________________________________11
LAUNCH OF THE CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF CONTEMPORARY
MUSLIM SOCIETIES _______________________________________________12
RELIGION AND THE STATE: REGIONAL AND GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES _12
CONFERENCE SCHEDULE__________________________________________13
CONFERENCE ABSTRACTS _________________________________________15
3
CONFERENCE VENUE
The conference events will take place at the Female Orphan School, Building
EZ on the Parramatta Campus of the University of Western Sydney. A map of
the campus is on Page 8 below.
The Female Orphan School has a varied institutional history. Until 1850 it was
known as the Protestant Orphan School with the closure of the Male Orphan
School at Cabramatta. In 1888 Sir Henry Parkes authorised that the building
be used as a hospital for the mentally ill. From 1893-1904 expansions to the
wings were added by Liberty Vernon. In 1975 the school was listed by the
National Trust and in the mid 1980s it was vacated when the Rydalmere
Psychiatric Hospital was closed. In 1993 the University of Western Sydney
acquired the site and work began developing the Parramatta campus. The
campus opened to students in 1998.
The Female Orphan School was formally re-opened on 21 October 2003. The
restored building is used as a venue for meetings, conferences and
exhibitions. It is the oldest three-storey brick building in Australia, and the
nation's oldest public building.
The Female Orphan School is a heritage building and must be treated with all
due care. Nothing is to be attached or hung from the walls. Audio visual
equipment, chairs, tables and furniture should be used extremely carefully to
avoid damage to the timber floors.
SMOKING is not permitted in any buildings or rooms of the University of
Western Sydney.
REFRESHMENT & MEALS
Morning, afternoon tea and lunch are provided for all participants.
CONFERENCE DINNER
The conference dinner on the 17th of July will take place around the Opera
House at 7pm (venue T.B.A.). At the end of the first day, delegates requiring
transport will be driven to the Parramatta Wharf (end of Charles Street) via a
brief stop to the Crowne Plaza Hotel. The trip will take an hour on the river,
and people will have the opportunity to walk around the Opera House until
dinner time. Transport back to the Crowne Plaza Hotel will be also be
provided.
4
ACCOMMODATION DURING THE CONFERENCE
Overseas and interstate participants will be accommodated at:
The Crowne Plaza Hotel in Parramatta
30 Phillip Street
Parramatta, NSW 2150
1800 899 960
www.crowneplaza.com
Breakfast will be provided to participants at the hotel.
Participants staying at the Crowne Plaza Hotel will be driven from the Hotel
lobby to the conference venue at 8:30 on both mornings.
ACCOMMODATION IN SYDNEY BEFORE AND/OR AFTER THE
CONFERENCE
Participants who arrive in Sydney before the conference and who remain after
it will need to make their own hotel bookings and transport arrangements.
Accommodation in Sydney is available from the following venues:
Youth Hostels Association (YHA)
 Sydney Central YHA, Pitt St (Cnr Rawson Pl) Ph: 9281 9111
 Glebe Point YHA, 262 Glebe Point Rd, Ph: 9692 8418
Budget CBD accommodation
 Southern Cross Hotel-Sydney, Goulburn St Ph: 9282 0987; Freecall: 1800
221 141
 Country Comfort Hotel, Sydney Central, George St Ph: 9212 2544
 Hotel UniLodge Sydney, Bay St, Broadway Ph: 9338 5000, Reservations:
1800 500 658
Five Star Hotels in Sydney
 Hotel Inter-Continental, 177 Macquarie Street, Sydney Ph: (+612) 9253
9000, Freecall: 1800 221 828; Email: [email protected]
 The Regent Sydney Hotel, 199 George St Ph: 9238 0000; Freecall: 1800
222 200
 ANA Hotel Sydney, 176 Cumberland St, The Rocks Ph: 9250 6000;
Freecall: 1800 801 080
 Sydney Hilton Hotel, 259 Pitt St. Sydney Ph: 9266 2000
 Novotel Sydney on Darling Harbour, 100 Murray St, Pyrmont Ph: 9934
0000
 Hotel Ibis, Darling Harbour, 70 Murray St, Pyrmont Ph: 9563 0888
 Four Points Sheraton Darling Harbour, 161 Sussex St Ph: 9299 1231;
Freecall: 1800 222 700
 Holiday Inn, Potts Point Ph: 9368 4000
 The Sebel of Sydney, 23 Elizabeth Bay Rd, Elizabeth Bay Ph: 9358 3244
5
TRANSPORT TO THE AIRPORT
By Train
The most economical and efficient way to travel between the airport and UWS
(or the Crowne Plaza Hotel) is by train to the domestic or international
terminals of Sydney Airport. Cost of an adult fair (single) is $16.10.
By Taxi
Premier Cabs: 13 10 17
Taxis Combined: 133 300
Legion Cabs: 13 14 51
A taxi trip from Parramatta to the Airport costs around $A100.
CONFERENCE CONTACT DETAILS
The conference telephone number is 0420303842 which will put you in direct
contact with Adam Possamai.
INSTRUCTION FOR PRESENTERS
Speakers should ensure that their equipment needs are met before the start
of the session in which their paper appears. Time taken to set up and
troubleshoot technical problems cannot encroach on presentation time. Each
presenter will have 30 minutes in which to deliver a verbal presentation. Ten
minutes will be allocated for questions after each presentation.
EQUIPMENT PROVIDED
The conference room is equipped with an overhead projector and with
PowerPoint facilities. Please let Adam Possamai know before your session if
you need to use these facilities.
EMERGENCIES
Police, Ambulance, Fire: Dial 000
UWS Security: Dial 9685 9058
TRANSPORT
Parramatta campus is in Rydalmere between Ryde and Parramatta in
Western Sydney. To reach the campus from the Sydney Central Business
District (CBD) or airport typically takes around 40 minutes by car. Note that
traffic conditions and the time of day you are travelling may have an impact on
travel time.
Bus
See information on pages 9 and 11.
6
Trains
A good train service operates from Parramatta to the centre of Sydney (e.g.
Town Hall, Circular Quay, Central). Cost of an adult fare (single) is $4.80 and
(return) $9.60. See information on pages 9 and 10.
There are eight stations in the city centre: Central, Town Hall, Wynyard,
Circular Quay, St. James, Museum, Martin Place and Kings Cross. If you ask
for a ticket to the city, your ticket will allow you to get off at any one of them.
You can also return from any station in the city with a return ticket. For
example, if your day starts at the Pitt Street Mall but finishes at the Opera
House, you can get off the train at St James and back on again at Circular
Quay station. Town Hall is a perfect station to access the heart of the CBD
whereas Circular Quay is close to the Opera House.
Taxis
Premier Cabs: 13 10 17
Taxis Combined: 133 300
Legion Cabs: 13 14 51
Suggested pick-up-point, bus stop outside UWS, Victoria Road.
Car
From Sydney CBD, take the M4 Western Motorway and take the exit at the
James Ruse Drive interchange. Note that the M4 is a tollway. Turn right onto
James Ruse Drive. Take the Victoria Road exit and turn right at the traffic
lights. Turn right again from Victoria Road to enter the campus.
On-campus parking is available, and a valid daily or annual parking permit
must be displayed at all times. There is a car park in front of building EZ. For
a free daily permit, please get in touch with Adam Possamai
([email protected]) before the conference.
7
MAP OF UWS, PARRAMATTA CAMPUS
PARAMMATTA CAMPUS TRANSPORT ACCESS GUIDE
9
CITYRAIL NETWORK
BUS MAP
LAUNCH OF THE CENTER FOR THE
STUDY OF CONTEMPORARY MUSLIM SOCIETIES
On the 16th of July, a new research centre, the Centre for the Study of Contemporary
Muslim Societies, will be launched at the Bankstown campus of UWS. This campus
is 30-40 minutes away by car from Parramatta. All conference attendees are invited to
attend this event.
Centre for the Study of Contemporary Muslim Societies
16 July 2009 University of Western Sydney Bankstown Campus
Launch Schedule
10.00
Arrival and registration
10.15
VC Opening Remarks
10.30
Professor Bryan Turner (UWS) ‘Setting the Agenda for the New
Centre’
11.00
Associate Professor Gabriele Marranci (UWS) ‘Re-thinking Studies of
Contemporary Muslim Societies’
12.00
Discussion
12. 30 - 2.00 Lunch
2.00
Professor James Beckford (Warwick UK) ‘The Importance of
Comparative Studies of Muslims in Prisons’
3.00
Professor Fethi Mansouri (Deakin) ‘Research on Muslims in Australia’
4.00
Professor Riaz Hassan (Flinders) ‘Social and Political Issues in the
Muslim World’
5.00
Discussion
RELIGION AND THE STATE:
REGIONAL AND GLOBAL PERSPECTIVES
CONFERENCE SCHEDULE
DAY 1
9:00 – 9:15
Opening by Prof. Wayne McKenna, Dear of the College of Arts
9:15 – 9:30
Introduction to Conference and Day
9:30-10:50
State Management and Control of Religion
9:30 – 10:10
Bryan Turner
Managing Religions: states, citizens and consumerism
10:10 – 10:50
Jim Beckford
State, religion and prison
10:50 – 11:10
Morning Tea
11:10 – 12:30
State and Religion in Asia
11:10 – 11:50
Jack Barbalet
The Movement Of Dao: Family And Religion In Chinese
Capitalism
11:50 – 12:30
Michael Hill
State of Unease: Singapore’s Ambivalence Towards
Religion
12:30 – 13:30
Lunch
13:30 – 14:50
State and Religion in Australia and Israel
13:30 – 14:10
Steve Chavura
The Search for Australian Separationism
Gal Levy
Judaism and the Israeli citizenship: A mutual relationship?
14:50 – 15:10
Afternoon Tea
15:10 - 15: 50
State and Religion in North America
15:10 – 15:50
Doug Porpora
The tension between State and religion in American foreign
policy
15:50 – 16:00
Concluding comments for the day
17:00 – 18:07
River Boat trip from Parramatta to Circular Quay (Opera House)
18:07 – 19:00
Walk around the Opera House
19:00
Workshop Dinner, Venue T.B.A.
13
DAY 2
9:00 – 9:15
Introduction to Day 2
9:15 – 10:35
Past and Present (re)composition of religion and politics
9:15 – 9:55
Graham Maddox
The Religious Background to Modern Political Opposition
9:55 – 10:35
Patrick Michel
Concerning the current recompositions of religion and of
politics
10:35 – 10:50
Morning Tea
10:50 – 12:10
State and Religion in Europe
10:50 – 11:30 Marion Maddox
Blair to Brown: Colours of Christian Politics
11:30 – 12:10 Sinisa Zrinscak
Hand Of History And Human Rights Perspective: Challenges
For Religion And State In Post-Communist Europe
12:10 – 13:00
Lunch
13:00 – 14:20
State and Religion in Muslim Countries
13:00 – 13:40 Riaz Hassan
Religion and Governance: A Study of Muslim Countries
13:40 : 14:20
Kevin McDonald
Jihad, grammars of public life, and the ‘theologico-political’
14:20 – 14:40
Afternoon Tea
14:40 – 16:00
New
Religious
Movements,
Popular
Religion
and
State
Intervention/Opposition
14:40 – 15:20 Adam Possamai
Gramsci, the Standardisation of Popular Religion and the State
15:20 – 16:00 Brian Salter
The International Society for Krishna Consciousness: Religion
and Politics in West Bengal.
16:00 – 16:20
Afternoon Tea
16:20 – 17:00
Secular Religion
16:20 – 17:00 Peter Baehr
What is “Secular Religion”? The Dispute between Hannah
Arendt and Jules Monnerot
17:15 – 18:00
Plenary Discussion and Close
14
CONFERENCE ABSTRACTS
The Movement of Dao: Family and Religion in Chinese Capitalism
Jack Barbalet
University of Western Sydney, Australia
In The Religion of China Max Weber famously argued that their family structure and
religion prevented the development of capitalism among the Chinese. During the
twentieth century, however, financial and commercial success among overseas
Chinese populations was arguably based on familial and religious foundations. Since
the Deng Xiaoping reforms of the early 1980s capitalism within the PRC has grown
at an unprecedented rate. This has coincided with a new religious liberalisation which
has, among other things, served as a conduit for overseas Chinese investment in the
PRC. The role of Chinese religion and family structure in pursuit of capitalist
enterprise is explored in the paper and a new model of the relationship between
family, religion and capitalist market activity developed.
What is “Secular Religion”?
The Dispute between Hannah Arendt and Jules Monnerot
Peter Baehr
Lingnan University, Hong Kong
Ever since the founding of sociology in the mid-nineteenth century, a concern with
religion has been at the heart of the discipline. Comte sought to establish a religion of
humanity, while Marx, aspiring to save humanity, debunked religion as an ideological
opiate. Durkheim reinvented the concept of religion by locating its source in
collective effervescence. Weber charted religion’s putative decline in the West as a
corollary of rationalization’s relentless advance. Today, religion continues to be
debated in multiple contexts, including the growth of evangelical Protestantism, the
rise of jihadi radicalism, and, a hardy perennial if ever there were one, secularization.
This paper explores so-called secular religions. The concept of secular (or “political”)
religion, as distinct from “civil religion,” is associated with the emergence and
consolidation of totalitarian movements. It describes an apparent sacralization of
politics evident in such phenomena as leader worship, dogmatic fanaticism and an
eschatological view of history. Examining the meaning and significance of
“secular/political religion,” in the context of National Socialism and especially
Communism, the paper focuses on the debate between a prominent post-war French
sociologist, Jules Monnerot, and a formidable sociology critic, the political theorist
and philosopher Hannah Arendt. Reconstructing the stakes of this debate raises a
number of complex issues. Was Bolshevism a kind of religion despite its avowed
atheism and, if so, what kind? Was National Socialism more of a Christian-inspired
movement than a pagan one? Does it really make sense to talk about a religion
without God (as Durkheim believed) or is this an obfuscation which leads us to
misunderstand the most dangerous developments of the twentieth century? The paper
concludes with an analysis of modern Islamism as a post-totalitarian movement and of
the use of such terms as “Islamophobia” to deter honest discussion about the religious
aspects of a terror ideology.
15
State, religion and prison
Jim Beckford
University of Warwick, UK
This paper will explore the different logics governing the provision of religious and
spiritual care to prisoners in several countries. It will draw on the empirical findings
of recent research into the practice of religion in prisons in the USA and Western
Europe. The central argument will be that the character of this care varies with the
institutional framework for accommodating religious diversity in each country. In
turn, these frameworks will be shown to reflect (a) the history of relations between
states and religions, (b) forms of constitutional and legal protection for religion, (c)
political contingencies and (d) the dominant forms of religious culture. The
conclusion will consider the implications of this argument for theoretical ideas about,
for example, post-secular societies, globalization and ultra-modernities.
The Search for Australian Separationism
Stephen Chavura
Macquarie University, Australia
This paper examines some of the problems in trying to come to grips with the
meaning of separation of Church and State in Australia. Attempts to describe
separationism in Australia often tend to impose the US model of judicial secularism
on Australian law and politics. Thus, funding of religious schools, faith-based
services, and religious arguments from politicians are frequently accused of 'blurring'
or 'breaching' the boundaries of Church and State in Australia. Furthermore, globally,
no two states have identical models of separation of Church and State thus basing
Australia's model on some type of international norm could be problematic. This
paper suggests that there is a separation of Church and State in our Commonwealth
Constitution, but history rather than comparative politics or even political philosophy
should be the first authority in coming to terms with its meaning for practical politics
in Australia. The paper calls for more research into the relationship between religious
institutions, lay people, and the state as a means of clarifying Australia's Church/State
heritage and helping to define the rights and limits of religion and state in Australia.
Religion and Governance: A Study of Muslim Countries
Riaz Hassan
Flinders University, Australia
The relationship between politics and religion in Muslim countries has become a
much debated and discussed issue among scholars of Islam and Muslim societies. A
commonly stated view of many Western and Muslim scholars and activists is that
Islam is not only a religion but also a blueprint for social order, and therefore
encompasses all domains of life, including law and the state. It is then argued that this
striking characteristic is what sets Muslim societies apart from Western counterparts
that are based upon the separation of state and religion. After examining these and
related issues, the paper reports empirical evidence, which shows that institutional
configurations form an important factor in mediating and articulating the nature of the
16
relationship between religion and politics in Muslim countries. Two types of
configurations—undifferentiated and differentiated—are identified. Undifferentiated
institutional configurations refer to social formations in which religion and the state
are integrated. In contemporary discourse, such a formation is labeled as an Islamic
state. In contrast, differentiated institutional configurations refer to social formations
in which religion and politics—by constitutional requirement or by tradition—occupy
separate spaces. The empirical evidence discussed in the paper indicates that, in
general, the trust placed in religious institutions and consequently their public
influence are greater in Muslim countries with differentiated institutional
configurations than in those with undifferentiated ones. In general, trust in religious
institutions is directly related to trust in political institutions. The paper offers some
theoretical underpinnings for this and other findings, and argues that undifferentiated
Muslim societies tend to take on the characteristics of differentiated societies over
time. An Islamic state, therefore, might also provide a route to the social and political
development of a Muslim society in which religion and politics coexist in an
autonomous but mutually.
State of Unease: Singapore’s Ambivalence Towards Religion
Michael Hill
National University of Singapore, Singapore
The Singapore State’s changing policies towards religion have been based on the one
hand by a series of perceived exigencies; and on the other by a sustained conviction
that religion has an inherent capacity for social disruption. Two strains of religious
extremism – associated with Islamic and Christian fundamentalism – have provided a
continuing focus of State attention. Iconic events enmeshed in religion are constantly
rehearsed as evidence for the need to exercise vigilant surveillance over the religious
sphere. This paper examines the construction of the problem, especially in the official
media, and the range of intervention strategies adopted. Some of these strategies, it
will be shown, have relevance for current debates about religious extremism in
Western societies.
Judaism and the Israeli citizenship: A mutual relationship?
Gal Levy
The Open University of Israel
When the 'secularisation myth' had still prevailed in many western states (Casanova
1994), the young Israeli state was an exception. Religion had not simply refused to die;
Judaism was the major foundation of the new nation-state. This was not a result of a
failed process of modernisation, nor an effect of popular revivalism. In fact, the
centrality of religion was a facilitator of the westernisation of the Jewish citizenry,
and a powerful mechanism in determining the scope and content of the fledgling
Israeli citizenship. In this respect, it is no wonder that in Israel, the sociology of
religion was subsumed by the politics of religion. Inversely, one cannot comprehend
Israeli society without paying close attention to the contours of the Israeli citizenship.
Arguably, in as much as religion remained powerful in shaping the intellectual and
political lives of the Israeli people and citizenry (and these are not interchangeable or
overlapping terms), it was the state itself which refused to let religion die. In the
17
proposed paper, I intend to walk through the development of an Israeli citizenship
alongside the crystallisation of an Israeli citizenry. The development of ethnicised
citizenship, I argue, was facilitated by the pre-eminence of religion in delineating
extra- as well as intra-societal boundaries. I will specifically look at three critical
moments in the development of socio-political categories: the early 1950s mass
immigration and the emergence of Mizrahim (Jews originating from Arab countries);
the military administration (1948-1960) and the configuration of the Israeli-Arabs; the
1990s mass immigration from the former Soviet Union and the integration of nonJewish (Russian)-Jews. The implications for the Israeli State (with a capital S) will be
discussed.
The Religious Background to Modern Political Opposition
Graham Maddox
University of New England, Australia
Political opposition not only signifies the respect given to diverse opinion in
democracies, but also conveys an Augustinian sense that government, as human
institution, is defective and requiring surveillance. The British idea of a constituted
political opposition, eventually leading to a settled dialectic between government and
opposition, began to form during the American Revolution, especially under pressure
of opposition to the war policy. As midwife to a theory of opposition, Edmund Burke
worked under the aegis of the Rockingham Whigs, who were inheritors of a ‘country
ideology’ motivated by visceral antagonism to the Court. ‘Country ideology’ was
evident in the earlier work of Bolingbroke, who, long before Acton, asserted that
government itself was inherently corrupting, and that it was more moral to oppose
political power than to wield it. Roman stoicism influenced Bolingbroke’s ‘country’
position, and it has also been argued (e.g. Pettit, Skinner) that neo-Roman republican
revivals evoked a newfound liberty, but the interpretation of Calvinist ‘resistance’
tracts that relegates biblical teaching to a subordinate role is far from convincing. An
inchoate notion of opposition was rooted in the uprisings of the previous century,
during which one king was tried and beheaded and another deposed and exiled. The
overriding motivation for the English revolution of the 1640s was religious, when
biblical sanctions on tyranny were levelled against the King.
After the Restoration of the Crown the puritan impulse to revolution was dissipated,
but studies, such as those of Underdown and Greaves, argue that this passion was
commuted to a ‘Whig’ political tendency. As Mark Goldie has written, when
‘Protestants shed the rule of the saints, this triad [prelatical, presbyterial and popish
usurpation] came to haunt their search for a civil religion, and in this awakening the
Puritan became the Whig’.
This paper explores how far religious passions of the seventeenth century were
transformed into an impulse for political opposition in the eighteenth, when the
modern institution of political opposition began to take shape.
18
Blair to Brown: Colours of Christian Politics
Marion Maddox
Macquarie University, Australia
In the UK at the beginning of the twenty-first century, one avowedly Christian Prime
Minister succeeded another. Same party, similar traditions, and both claimed the
Christian socialist mantle—but the transition marked a significant shift in the flavour
of Labour politics.
On the rare occasions when public commentators delve into the relationship between
religious and political commitments, the result is often naively determinist—‘He
believes X so he does Y’. But such a striking distinction invites over-simplified
analysis. The determinist approach bears little relationship to what we know about
real political and religious behaviour, and extreme examples do little to challenge it.
Taking a case study of two closely politically-aligned leaders can help avoid the
dangers of a ‘left wing / right wing’ oversimplification, and holds out the possibility
of a finer-grained exploration of the relationship between religion and politics.
Jihad, grammars of public life, and the ‘theologico-political’
Kevin McDonald
Goldsmiths (University of London), UK
The jihad has emerged as one of the most significant ‘global movements’ shaping the
beginnings of the new millennium. Orientalists look to older theories of frustration
and violence, regarding the jihad as an expression of Islam’s failure to allow the
development of autonomous public spheres. Others argue the jihad is the expression
of a modern form of anti-imperialism, secularising this movement and locating it
within largely western political traditions. This paper seeks to move beyond these
alternatives, and sets out to explore redefinitions and changing relationships between
the religious and the political at stake in this movement. This requires a break from
the ‘imagined community’ paradigm that has become an orthodoxy in the analysis of
public spheres, and underlines instead the central role of ‘the extraordinary’ (Giesen
2005) in constituting the political, in this case the unimaginable and the
inexperiencable. In the process the jihad alerts us to contemporary reconstitutions of
the ‘theologico-political’ (de Vries 2006), a profound transformation at work at the
centre of contemporary social life, and one with major implications for the way the
social sciences approach the questions of the state, sovereignty and democracy.
19
Concerning the current recompositions of religion and of politics
Patrick Michel
Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, France
The purpose here is, while taking note of the impasse reached by the sociology of
religions, to grasp the religious factor not as such, but as a sign which, once it is
contextualized, appears likely to constitute a remarkable analyzer of the
recompositions of the contemporary.
We are in fact utterly unable to define the whole extent of the effects of a trend
towards the individuation of the establishment of a relation to meaning. What is at
stake on the religious field intervenes here as the vehicle and the revelatory element of
this individuation of believing as well as a potential resource to curb, contest, or even
refuse both the individuation and the strong tendencies which the latter partakes of
and that it may seem to recapitulate. It allows just as much, by supplying the requisite
indexes to ensure its translation, « to get to grips » with these trends.
Secondly, and in the same perspective, we should acknowledge the limits which the
analyses « traditionally » developed concerning the religious have to deal with. The
contemporary processes of decomposition-recomposition experienced by our societies
emphasize the obsolescence of a conceptual apparatus articulated for the most part
with the theories of secularization and – symmetrically more than contrarily – with the
« religious creations » of modernity. Hence the necessity, evidenced by the confusion
existing around that theme, of rethinking at new expenses, the relationship of our
societies with believing, by standing in the perspective of an approach through the
« believing », and to draw out a renewed and effective intellectual toolbox from this
reflection.
Finally, it is important to come back to Michel de Certeau’s statement that when
politics gives ground, the religious comes back. But if it comes back, it is most
certainly not as such. Its visibility would first fulfil the function of stressing a deficit
of politics that is so cruel that it would not have the political words to tell itself. Hence
the recourse to the religious factor as a register of articulation, in a situation of
generalized wavering of reference points and markers, of the urgency and the
simultaneous impossibility of building a renewed relation to totality. And on this
background of exhaustion of the believable in which even more than the credibility of
religion, it is the credibility of politics which is now being questioned.
Starting with the question "when one talks of religion, what is at stake?", we will
focus on the recompositions of the religious as an indicator and mode of management
of the redefinition of points of reference in a world that bears the mark of movement
and acceleration; of the triple crisis of identity, mediation and centrality; and finally of
the deficit of politics.
20
The tension between State and religion in American foreign policy
Doug Porpora
University of Drexel, USA
This paper examines the contested relation between state and religion in America,
particularly as it relates to the American state’s foreign conduct. Within the U.S.,
there is a strong pressure to preserve what has been called a “naked public square,”
that is a public sphere shorn of specifically religious argument. Yet, among
industrialized nations, the U.S. is said to be religiously exceptional, having a
population that continues to exhibit high levels of religious belief and religious
observance. The result is palpable tension between state and religion in America.
This paper examines such tension in three, related, post-September 11 contexts: (i)
President George W. Bush’s use of religious language to frame America’s war on
terror; (ii) the flap over the “black liberation theology” of Barack Obama’s pastor,
Jeremiah Wright; and (iii) the difference in public sphere debate between religious
and mainstream secular reaction to the attack on Iraq and subsequent abuse of
prisoners at Abu Ghraib.
It is argued that America’s largely naked public sphere permits the exploitation of
religious imagery to legitimate American foreign policy while simultaneously
disabling collective deliberation from the application of the most rigorous moral and
legal scrutiny to state conduct abroad.
The International Society for Krishna Consciousness: Religion and Politics in
West Bengal.
Bryan Salter
University of Western Sydney, Australia
West Bengal; India’s poorest and most densely populated state, has been governed for
thirty years by the democratically elected Communist Party of India (CPI Marxist).
The CPI ethic of separating religion and politics is not shared by rival Hindu
nationalist party, the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party). West Bengal is primarily Hindus
(72.5%) and Muslims (25%); and is the home of Chaitanya Vaishnavism, a
monotheistic and salvific religion. Vaishnavism is currently expanding globally via
the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKCON), which has its
headquarters in West Bengal. Research was conducted on an intentional community
started by ISKCON members just prior to the rise of the CPI. Causes of tension
between government and the community were investigated. Perceptions of an alliance
between the community and BJP were found to aggravate tension related to the CPI’s
need to stay true to its principles and remain relevant while providing the capitalist
infrastructure required to foster economic development and free West Bengalis from
poverty. Paradoxically, by supporting the community as the state's major tourist
attraction and income-earner, the CPI may simultaneously be sewing the seeds of its
own destruction. The research highlighted sensitivities at the intersection of religion,
politics, and communal development in an expanding “third-world” economy.
21
Gramsci, the Standardisation of Popular Religion and the State
Adam Possamai
University of Western Sydney, Australia
Gramsci viewed popular religion as having the possibility of being a progressive
movement against the bourgeois hegemony produced and reproduced in symbiosis
with official religion and the state. In this pre-mass consumption society, there was, in
this popular religion, the germs of a revolt that could help the revolutionary push
needed and guided by earlier Marxists. The goal of this paper is to argue that with the
entry of popular religion in the consumer societies of the western world, popular
religion has lost its oppositional characteristic against the state. Following Simmel
and Beck, I will argue that popular religion like money, now individualises and
standardises. I will claim that when popular religion entered consumer culture, this
moment not only liberated this type of religion from state control, but paradoxically
through standardisation, made it lost its oppositional strength against the state and
became ‘emasculated’ in late modern society.
Managing Religions: states, citizens and consumerism
Bryan Turner
Wellesley College, USA and University of Western Sydney, Australia
When we talk about the management of religions or the crisis of multiculturalism or
the problems of secularism, we are essentially talking about how modern liberal states
respond to the revival of Islam or more generally to ‘pietization’ or more crudely to
‘fundamentalism’. There is increasingly an awareness of both the limitations of
Lockean liberalism to cope with such developments and the need to think seriously
about what Habermas and others are now calling ‘post-secular society’. This question
is not simply an issue for conventional liberal societies. In a recent publication on
Muslims in Singapore, we (Nasir, Pereira and Turner) examined Singapore’s strategy
of ‘upgrading’ Islam primarily through the agency of MUIS (the Singapore Council
for Muslims). Singapore might in the language of Rawls be considered as a ‘wellordered hierarchical society’ (WHS). While Australia, Britain and the United States
also have similar policies to manage religion, their approach will probably remain
primarily liberal rather than disciplinary. Liberal post-secular consumer societies
(LPSCSs) may be prevented from adopting an explicit policy of management and are
more likely to continue to treat religion as a life-style option. In any case, a recent
Pew survey (Muslim Americans) concluded that the great majority of Muslims are
‘middle class and mostly mainstream’. The liberal policy of LPSCSs suggests that we
must always examine policies towards religion against the background of different
forms of citizenship.
In this paper, I suggest that modern liberal citizenship is becoming a consumerist not
contributory right as states increasing treat citizens as an audience that must be
managed by seductive sales techniques (focus groups, opinion polls, marketing
strategies, and national identity as branding). Political success depends increasingly
on media ownership and immunity from prosecution – a strategy perfected by
Berlusconi. The new spirituality in the West and commodified religions in the East
may well fit into a pattern of citizenship as consumerism. The disciplinary
22
management of religions in WHSs may remain unavailable to LPSCSs which must
aspire to contain religious movements as the life-style of post-secular consumerism
and passive consumptive citizenship, thereby supporting those that are middle class
and mainstream and occasionally suppressing those that are underclass and alienated.
Hand of History and Human Rights Perspective: Challenges for Religion and
State in Post-Communist Europe
Sinisa Zrinscak
University of Zagreb, Croatia
The social position of religion in post-communist countries underwent complete
transformation after the fall of communism thus eliminating any significant
differences between Western and Eastern European countries. Right of religious
liberty and the religious incompetence of the state have become a norm. However, the
third similarity, that of selective cooperation of state and religious groups, has risen
many public debates and controversies about the degree of state intervention.
Basically, there is a kind of clash between the need for guaranteeing religious rights
and equality of different religions with a visible strong historical legacy and even a
need to differentiate between historically and socially ‘acceptable’ religions and
others, particularly those very new and non-traditional. The paper will give an
overview of legal patterns and social reality of Church-Sate relations in Central and
Eastern European countries and will question sociological position in researching
these relations.
23