Religion and International Relations

Religion and International Relations Edited by

K. R. Dark

Religion and International Relations

Also by K. R. Dark THE NEW WORLD AND THE NEW WORLD ORDER (with A. L. Harris) THE WAVES OF TIME: Long-Term Change and International Relations NEW STUDIES IN POST-COLD WAR SECURITY (editor)

Religion and International Relations Edited by K. R. Dark Lecturer in International Relations University of Reading

First published in Great Britain 2000 by

MACMILLAN PRESS LTD Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS and London Companies and representatives throughout the world A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 0–333–71159–9 First published in the United States of America 2000 by ST. MARTIN’S PRESS, INC., Scholarly and Reference Division, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010 ISBN 0–312–23067–2 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Religion and international relations / edited by K. R. Dark p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0–312–23067–2 1. Religion and international affairs. I. Dark, K. R. (Ken R.) BL65.I55 R45 2000 291.1'787—dc21 99–053007 Selection, editorial matter, Introduction, Chapter 3 and Chapter 8 © K. R. Dark 2000 Chapters 1, 2, 4–7 and 9 © Macmillan Press Ltd 2000 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No paragraph of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, 90 Tottenham Court Road, London W1P 0LP. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. 10 09

9 08

8 07

7 06

6 05

5 04

4 03

3 02

2 01

Printed and bound in Great Britain by Antony Rowe Ltd, Chippenham, Wiltshire

1 00

Contents List of Contributors

vi

Introduction K. R. Dark

vii

1 Religion and International Conflict Scott Thomas

1

2 Theological Reflections on Religious Resurgence and International Stability: a Look at Protestant Evangelicalism Harriet A. Harris

24

3

Large-Scale Religious Change and World Politics K. R. Dark

50

4

The Churches and the Conflict in Former Yugoslavia Peter Palmer

83

5

Islamic Militancies and Disunity in the Middle East Christopher M. Wyatt

6 Islam, Human Rights and Religious Intolerance: The Case of the Bahá’ís of Iran Nazila Ghanea 7

Hindu Nationalism and the International Relations of India C. Ram-Prasad

100

113

140

8 The Political Consequences of Large-Scale Religious Change in China and the Asia-Pacific Region K. R. Dark

198

9 The Church of England in International Affairs: 1979 to mid-1997 Roger Williamson

217

Bibliography

250

Index

279

v

List of Contributors (All contributions were written in a personal capacity and correspondence relating to chapters should be addressed to the specific author, not the editor.) K. R. Dark, Lecturer in International Relations, University of Reading Nazila Ghanea, Postgraduate student, Department of International Relations, Keele University Harriet A. Harris, Lecturer in Theology, University of Exeter Peter Palmer, Brasenose College, Oxford C. Ram-Prasad, Visiting Fellow, Clare Hall, Cambridge Scott Thomas, School of Social Sciences, University of Bath Roger Williamson, Policy and Campaigns Director of Christian Aid Christopher M. Wyatt, Research Fellow, University of Reading

vi

Introduction K. R. Dark

This book aims to explore some of the implications of religious beliefs and religious change for world politics. Recently, much attention has focused on the role of culture in shaping the actions of actors in world politics.1 This has drawn attention to the ways in which cultural factors can affect actors’ perceptions and decisions, and to the extent to which these factors shape their activities.2 Such studies have relied on the understanding that cognitive factors, whether consciously expressed or not, play a formative role in human decision-making.3 They have seen human behaviour as inextricably situated within cultural matrices, which stand in a reflexive relationship with that behaviour. Consequently, the roles of beliefs and values have become widely accepted as an intrinsic aspect of the field of study of International Relations.4 In this context, therefore, it is entirely understandable that religion (whether as part of an inclusive concept of culture or separately) has also been the subject of renewed attention in International Relations.5 If beliefs and values, in general, play a major part in shaping the actions of actors in world politics, then it is only logical to ask what part is played by religious beliefs and values. Religious beliefs and values are usually among those most deeply held, and most formative, in the actions of individuals. Thus, they might be expected to act in this way in both states and non-state organizations in world politics, given that these are necessarily comprised of groups of people. Religious organizations can also act directly as non-state actors in world politics, and can indirectly affect the policies and behaviour of other actors. So, religious beliefs, values and organizations are of general interest to the analyst of world politics. Unsurprisingly, therefore, this book is by no means the first to examine the role of religion in world politics. The study of this subject by other scholars has already paid attention both to religious beliefs themselves, and religious organizations, and highlighted the analysis of transnational religious organizations as actors in world politics.6 So, the studies presented here attempt to build on important work already undertaken within the mainstream of the discipline. However, most studies of this topic have focused on a narrow range of issues. By far the majority have highlighted the political role of Islamic organizations or the destructive aspects of religious intolerance vii

viii Introduction

or ‘fundamentalism’.7 Also much discussed have been the political role of the Roman Catholic Church – for example in South and Central America – and the question of whether religion played some part in the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe.8 The relatively narrow focus of existing studies has arguably led to a somewhat misleading impression of the role of religion in world politics. To look at the vast majority of such studies one would suppose that religion was a factor only outside North America, western Europe and, perhaps, the Asia-Pacific region. This would, of course, be consistent with the oft-stated view that these areas have been affected by dramatic secularization in the previous century, a suggestion which (as we shall see) may be far less solidly grounded than is often supposed.9 From such studies, one might also get the impression that religion only plays a role in world politics when religious intolerance prompts conflict or aggravates processes of state collapse. In particular, some recent studies might well lead one to counterpoise their imagined ‘secular West’ with an equally imaginary ‘fundamentalist Islamic’ bloc, threatening global war against it.10 There are, of course, exceptions to these generalizations. Some scholars have, for example, taken a more positive view of the role of religion or have warned against assuming that Islamic ‘fundamentalism’ represents a unified ‘anti-Western’ threat.11 However, surprisingly little work has attempted to look at the role of religion in world politics on a truly global scale, to examine these assumed categories, and to analyse religious communities who are neither Muslims nor outside the ‘West’. Whole religious communities have been virtually ignored in discussions of international politics, at least on a global scale. These include most non-fundamentalist Protestants (for example the majority of Anglicans, Methodists and Lutherans) among the Christian Churches, and Hindus, Buddhists, and believers in traditional Chinese religions among non-Christians. Atheism has also been almost completely ignored, although it has been the official policy of several large states – including the USSR and the People’s Republic of China – to promote atheism at various points in twentieth-century history. The range of analytical issues relating to religion covered by scholars of world politics has also been very narrow. Although ‘fundamentalism’, conflict and nationalism have received extensive coverage and discussion, few other aspects of world religion have been discussed at all on a global scale. This book takes a broader view of religion as a factor in world politics. It places more importance on the role of religious values and

Introduction ix

religious change than do most other recent studies. Its approach to the subject of religion and world politics is based on two simple premises. The first is that religious factors can affect human decision-making and actions. So, when individuals change their religious beliefs, this might be expected to have some effect on their decisions and actions. The second premise is that, as all states, nations and other organizations taking part in world politics are comprised of people, then those people’s religious beliefs and affiliations may affect their decisions and actions. From this it also follows that religious change can, although need not always, both help shape (and bring about) change in the decisions and actions of actors in world politics. Neither of these premises would present any theoretical difficulties for most scholars in history, anthropology, archaeology, sociology, geography or any of the other academic disciplines concerned with human societies. So, it is very hard to see any compelling reason why they should present problems for analysts of world politics. Of course, the one possible source of disciplinary difficulty with such a view might be derived from the Realist theoretical heritage of International Relations. It might be claimed that the role of religion is difficult to accommodate within an entirely state-centric model of international politics. However, by no means all Realist theorists – in the past or present – share these potential reservations about using the analysis of religion and religious change in this way. Notably, some of those contemporary analysts most willing to see religion as a major factor in international politics have come from a Realist theoretical background.12 Thus, neither of these two simple premises need present theoretical difficulties for International Relations scholars, even if they adopt a Realist theoretical framework. If one accepts them, then the study of religion and religious change is obviously an area of central interest to the discipline. Thus, the contributions here both aim to add to existing debates and open new areas of study. Many new interpretations and many new data are presented, and the range of topics covered and originality of the studies presented will hopefully make this work of interest to all those analysing or studying world politics. It must be stressed at the outset that no unified view, interpretation or single theoretical basis has been employed by the authors whose work is included here. Nor should it be assumed that any of the contributors (including the editor) agree with the discussion, conclusions or beliefs of any contribution in this volume which does not specifically bear their name as author. As one would expect, when discussing

x Introduction

a controversial subject, in some cases this would emphatically not be the case.

Notes 11. For example: Katzenstein 1996a, 1996b; Johnston 1995. 12. For example: Howard 1989; Little and Smith 1988; Ganslen 1986. 13. As exemplified by: Vertzberger 1990; Cassels 1996; Carlton 1990. 14. Lapid and Kratochwil 1996. Again, there is a much longer disciplinary tradition behind these recent theoretical developments, for example, see Kegley 1969; Kedourie 1979; Deutsch 1981; Mackinnon 1980. 15. For examples, see Westerlund 1996; Juergensmeyer 1993; Mayer 1995; Huntington 1993a; Shupe and Hadden 1988; Swatos 1989; Mews 1989. In this book the terms ‘world politics’, ‘international politics’, and ‘international relations’ are employed synonymously to refer to global politics as a whole, without any additional implications or nuances of emphasis. The term ‘International Relations’ is used to indicate the study of world politics, again with no further implications. 16. For example: Haynes 1994; Ramet and Treadgold 1995; Moyser 1991; Rudolph and Piscatori 1997; Sahliyeh 1990; Mews 1989; Furlong and Curtis 1994. 17. For example: Jurgensmeyer 1993; Mayer 1995; Huntington 1993a; Janke 1994; Maddy-Weitzman and Inbar 1997. 18. Hanson 1987; Kent and Pollard 1994; Weigel 1993b; Bordeaux 1992; Goekel 1990; Pungur 1993. 9. Haynes 1998, especially ch. 1. 10. For discussions, see for example: Jurgensmeyer 1993; Huntington 1993a; Fuller and Lesser 1995; Esposito 1997. 11. For example: Halliday 1995, and Wyatt, this volume, Chapter 5. 12. For example: Huntington 1996. For older Realist perspectives: Kedourie 1979; Mackinnon 1980.

1 Religion and International Conflict Scott Thomas

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. This chapter begins by examining the different ways scholars have approached the global resurgence of religion, and how this has influenced their interpretations of religious conflict in International Relations. It then goes on to consider in what ways the global resurgence of religion poses a threat to international society.

Religion as a form of ideology International Relations scholars have approached religion as if it was a part of the larger problem of how to understand the force of ideas, belief systems, or ideologies in international relations. People’s ideas, their beliefs, what they consider to be right or wrong, powerfully shape their behaviour. This is particularly true in regard to religion, because religion is considered to be at the core of a society’s – or even a country’s – value system in many parts of the world. The focus on religion as ideas and as a form of ideology emphasizes how differences in religious ideas – differences in religion – hold the potential for conflict and for making existing conflicts more intractable. One reason is that religions involve core values, defining what is good and bad, which are held as absolute truth and very often also as 1

2 Scott Thomas

universal truth. That is, believers usually hold that these beliefs and values should be accepted by everyone else in the world. The identification with, and devotion to, religion springs from the natural tendency to perceive the values of one’s own religion to be superior to other belief systems.1 Religions can be described as ‘closed’ belief systems, and like other ideologies and belief systems they frequently resist change. Their adherents often see other religious beliefs as a threat, or even that ‘Those whose religious practices differ are easily disdained and treated as unworthy or even inhuman’.2 This competition between religions easily leads to hatred and hostility in international relations.3 Religious conflicts are a type of ideological conflict, and another reason why they are more intractable is because they exclude – almost by the way the conflict is defined – the possibility of compromise, coexistence, or the finding of common ground to resolve disputes. Ideas, unlike territorial disputes, and economic conflicts over trade, money, and natural resources, cannot be divided. Religious conflicts are also often the result of differences that go back centuries. When, for example, Robin Cook, the British Foreign Secretary, met with Franjo Tudjman, the President of Croatia, and raised the issue of human rights abuses in his country, all he was given was a lecture on Croatian history back to the Middle Ages, and the denial of any human rights problem.4 Religious conflicts are also less likely to be resolved through compromise, because each side argues it ‘cannot compromise with evil’. Thus, the way the conflict is defined may make the peaceful resolution of the conflict unlikely, and this can lead ‘true believers’ to a jihad to destroy those who are considered to be not only opponents but ‘infidels’ as well.5 For these reasons, ‘religion is an intractable force that can be quite unresponsive to all the normal instrumentalities of state power, let alone the instrumentalities of foreign policy’.6 The focus of religion (as a set of ideas) has also led to a consideration of whether specific religions – or specific ideas in particular religions – makes them more prone to violence.7 Some analysts have drawn a connection between monotheism and violence, suggesting that the belief in a single, all-powerful deity such as that which is found in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, makes these religions more authoritarian and prone to violence than other religions.8 The idea of a ‘chosen people’ is considered to be one of the most important ideas behind the religiously based conflicts in Israel, South Africa, and Northern Ireland.9 The Islamic notion of jihad, or holy war, is considered to be one of the ideas behind Islamic militancy.

Religion and International Conflict 3

But most religions have been local, or even tribal, and many do not claim to represent universal values or have a universal message: ‘For all the peoples walk each in the name of its god’ (Micah 4:5). In the Classical world every city had its temple and was popularly associated with ‘its’ god, and even today in many societies – traditional African societies as well as Japan – tribes or clans frequently claim their own gods or ancestors. These gods were, and are, not seen as ‘transnational’ (in the language of International Relations), because they were associated with a particular sacred place or territory, and were not worshipped outside of them. Four religions seem to be the exception: Buddhism, Christianity, Islam and Judaism. The first three religions are notable for having an identifiable founder and teacher, who believed himself to have received a revelation of universal significance, and commissioned disciples to proclaim the message as widely as possible. Both Christianity and Islam still claim their message to be universal and are proselytizing religions, in contrast to the eastern religions, and this may be one of the reasons for the conflict between them.10 The religion-as-ideology approach needs to consider how religious ideas differ from secular political ideologies. Is there something more at stake in religion that is more likely to lead to conflict and less likely to the peaceful resolution of conflict? President Ronald Reagan called the Soviet Union an ‘evil empire’ but he was still willing to negotiate with it. Iran’s conception of the United States as ‘the Great Satan’ undoubtedly makes the normalization of relations between these countries more difficult, and religion prolonged the Iran–Iraq war. The religious interpretation of the United States as a ‘beacon set on a hill’ influenced the doctrines of ‘American exceptionalism’ and of ‘manifest destiny’ leading to the violent ‘westward expansion’ of the US into American Indian lands, and to colonialism in the Pacific (the Philippines and Puerto Rico).11 The use of religion and religious beliefs in politics is different from secular political ideologies because moral commitments and policy options derived from religious beliefs, practices, and institutions are associated with the absolute and ultimate. This means religious beliefs and values can command an extra degree of potency to exert a hold over individuals.12 When religious institutions are in the service of the state, such as the Greek Orthodox Church in Cyprus or the Russian Orthodox Church in post-Soviet Russia, state policy can become more uncompromising. When religion is mixed with nationalism, such as in the case of the Serbian Orthodox Church, state policy can legitimate the abuse of human rights and ethnic cleansing.13 But the extra

4 Scott Thomas

potency of religion also means religion can give individuals and communities the added strength to act independently, or to defy the state, such as with ‘the confessing church’ in Nazi Germany or in the German Democratic Republic, the Catholic Church in communist Poland, or in the anti-apartheid struggle of the Christian Churches in South Africa.14

Religion as a form of identity The second way religion has been understood in International Relations is as the main source of individual and social identity. This approach believes religion is one of the basic sources of differentiation between groups. A system of religious beliefs provides followers with the main source of their identity. There is a basic essentialism and determinism about the nature of religion because religious differences are fundamental and immutable, and they are more important sources of difference than ethnicity, class or gender. As Samuel Huntington says, ‘Even more than ethnicity, religion discriminates sharply and exclusively among people’.15 In reply to his critics, Huntington has strongly emphasized this point: In the modern world, religion is central, perhaps the central, force that motivates and mobilizes people … What ultimately counts for people is not political ideology or economic interest. Faith and family, blood and belief, are what people identify with and what they will fight and die for.16 Bogdan Denitch has been concerned to show why religion is a more important determinant of social identity than ‘ethnicity’ in the former Yugoslavia and the Transcaucasian republics of the former Soviet Union, but his analysis can be applied to multiethnic states in general: One reason why a melting pot is hard to imagine is that in a number of cases the majority ‘ethnic’ nation is also identified with a specific religious conviction. Thus, to become a member of a dominant nation, one must not only adopt the language of that group but also its religion.17 Religions are, therefore, sometimes considered to provide the basis for incompatible identities, and this may be said to be the reason why religion has become a source of international conflict. Identities help

Religion and International Conflict 5

determine whom people consider to be their friends and whom they see as their enemies. A shared identity produces a sense of psychological affinity, while conflicting identities produce a sense of psychological distance, and the presence or absence of such affinity will reinforce or undermine geographical distance. Thus, the major conflicts in global politics are anchored more in attitudes than in geography. Yugoslavs are located in a small geographic area but are separated by an abyss, the product of incompatible self-identities as Serbs, Croats, and Muslim Bosnians.18 Globalization facilitates the construction and consolidation of religiously based social identities. Globalization creates a global culture based on western modernity. Industrialization, capitalism, and urbanization transformed religions and fragmented historic religious communities in the west, and now through globalization similar processes are transforming the Third World. Globalization detaches people from traditional, local identities, and it universalizes their experiences and relativizes their beliefs and values. In reaction to this process, globalization revitalizes marginalized religious and cultural communities, and helps them assert their identities, beliefs and values in domestic politics and international relations.19 Early Egyptian Islamic movements, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, for example, reacted to the transnational modernism of the British Empire. From this perspective, it is argued that global resurgence of religion is more about increasing the political power of marginalized communities rather than bringing ‘religion’ into politics.20

Transnational religion The third way religion has been understood in International Relations is a variant of the notion that religion is a form of ideology. Religion is a type of ‘transnational idea’. That is, religions are transnational belief systems or, for short, one may refer to them as ‘transnational religion’.21 Ideas are said to be ‘transnational’ when people in many different countries hold to a similar belief system, conception of morality, or believe in particular international laws or international norms. ‘Proletarian internationalism’, anti-racism, and a commitment to basic human rights are all transnational ideas. Transnational ideas are usually thought to be at odds with nationalism because, as an ideology,

6 Scott Thomas

nationalism brings together a particular territory, state, and people (or ‘nation’), but this is not always the case. The aim of some transnational ideas is the creation of multinational or multiethnic states, such as those envisaged in Pan-Islam, Zionism, or Pan-Africanism. Transnational ideas often also have a coherent set of symbols and texts. This is particularly the case for the main world religions, and examples include the Crescent, the Bible, the star of David, and the Qur’a–n. But secular transnational ideas also have their texts and symbols, such as the red flag and the Communist Manifesto. Transnational ideas also have leading individuals, such as prophets or teachers – examples include Muhammad, Marx, or Theodore Herzl.22 Transnational ideas urge a transnational course of action on their adherents. In Marxism, the workers of the world are meant to unite and to spread socialism or communism, while Muslims and Christians help members of the same religion in other countries with education, and financial and humanitarian assistance. Members of each religion are concerned about the persecution of their respective believers. In the past, European support for Christian minorities in the Balkans, Turkey, and the Middle East led to western ideas about humanitarian intervention.23 This sense of religious identification, what might be termed a type of the ‘kith-and-kin’ syndrome,24 or what Huntington has called ‘civilizational rallying’, can provide the basis for conflict between states today.25 One of the most obvious religious examples is Pakistan’s support for Muslims in India’s state of Kashmir, and the support of diaspora Jews for the state of Israel. Shi’ite Iran is understandably concerned for Shi’ite holy places and Shi’ite minorities in other countries. Such concern is not, however, universal, and an important counter-example is the lack of support Islamic states have given to the Bosnian Muslims. The growth of transnational religion has also been facilitated by globalization.26 Globalization, the process by which the world is becoming one social space through technological changes in communications, travel, and transportation, has contributed to the formation and consolidation of transnational religious groups with linkages in different countries at the national and subnational levels. The way in which globalization has facilitated transnational religion, however, is better described as the formation of ‘transnational religious subcultures’. This notion focuses attention on the role religion plays in forming and maintaining cultural and social identity rather than on ideas, on a transnational ideology such as the doctrines of religion. Globalization promotes closer links between people of similar religions

Religion and International Conflict 7

in different countries. It accomplishes through technology what used to be accomplished through the expansion and consolidation of empires, albeit at a slower pace. Through global telecommunications, for example, the Indian army’s actions at the Golden Temple in Amritsar, the Sikh’s most sacred shrine, was shown around the world. This angered even moderate Sikhs around the world, contributing to their sense of common identity and organizational strength as pressure groups.

Religion as a form of ‘soft power’ The fourth way in which religion is considered in International Relations is as a form of ‘soft power’. In contrast to ‘hard power’ (military or economic power), ‘soft power’ is the power of attractive ideas.27 When ideas are attractive (or even the opposite, repulsive, like racism or anti-Semitism) they become attitudinal capabilities that make up intangible elements of ‘power’ for actors in international relations. They inform (or indeed, sometimes infuriate, in the case of racism or Islamic, or Hindu, fundamentalism) the popular beliefs, perceptions, and attitudes of particular constituencies.28 When this happens, transnational ideas become a form of ‘soft power’. People – as individuals, as citizens, as believers, and as political activists – adhere to them and believe they should influence the behaviour of states in world politics. When religion is conceived of as a transnational idea in this way it is often embodied in particular states and non-state actors. For example, Islam as a transnational religion is embodied in states that proclaim themselves to be ‘Islamic states’ (in contrast to those states that only claim Islam is the country’s sole, or main, religion), such as Pakistan, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Iran, the Sudan, Malaysia and Indonesia. Their claim to promote ‘Islamic’ foreign policy goals has raised the concern that this threatens the political and economic interests of the west.29 Transnational religion can also provide the basis for international organization. The Organization of the Islamic Conference and the World Muslim League are organizations whose membership depends on their association with Islam, either as ‘Islamic states’ or as states whose dominant religion is Islam. Until the abolition of the caliphate in 1924 (as part of the emergence of modern Turkey) Islam had a central religious leader comparable to the Pope in Roman Catholicism, but this is no longer the case.30 The Organization of the Islamic Conference is unique among religious organizations because it is really a religious international actor rather than a transnational one, and because its

8 Scott Thomas

membership consists of states rather than non-state religious groups. It represents ‘Islamic interests’ in international relations in a similar way that the Vatican represents ‘Roman Catholic’ ones. But as an organization of states, the OIC cannot operate with the same degree of coherence in international relations as can the Vatican. There are no other organizations of states whose membership is based on religion, although the goal of the newly formed Development Eight group is to foster economic cooperation among Muslim states.31

Religious movements as transnational actors Transnational religion can also provide the basis for non-state actors as transnational actors, or as non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and this is the fifth way the impact of religion in international relations has been examined. Transnational actors can influence international relations through the use of force or through the ‘power of ideas’. Through the use of force, national liberation movements, rebel groups, and terrorist groups challenge the state’s near-monopoly on the use of force in the international system. Unfortunately, in most International Relations textbooks, Islamic movements are commonly discussed only as terrorist groups, such as Hizballah, Hamas, and the Muslim Brotherhood.32 Other Islamic non-state actors are ignored, leaving the impression that most Islamic movements only pursue their objectives through violence, and this simply is not true.33 Transnational actors can also influence international relations through ‘the power of ideas’. They represent – or are seen to represent by individuals and the international community – the ‘soft power’ of ideas, ideas ‘whose time has come’, ideas which increasingly shape the values and norms of the international system. As non-state actors, liberation movements (like the exiled ANC) represented the principles of anti-racism and national self-determination. Transnational environmental groups (like Greenpeace) represent global environmentalism, and human rights groups (like Amnesty International and the International Committee of the Red Cross) represent human rights and international humanitarian law. This gives them the potential to influence both the political agenda and the vocabulary in which political debate is conducted. Thus, they can influence the parameters of permissible political outcomes. It is for this reason some transnational actors have a greater impact on the world stage and receive more foreign policy attention from leading states than many ‘weak’ states in the international system.34

Religion and International Conflict 9

The Vatican (Holy See) in Rome (the centre of the Roman Catholic Church) is considered to be one of the most prominent religious nonstate actors in international relations. Because of its historic role in European politics its status in international law as a sovereign state (or city-state: Vatican City) is unique among non-state religious organizations, but the importance of this legal status for the Vatican’s role in international affairs is not widely discussed. It is because of the Vatican’s status as a state that it can legitimately participate in UN conferences, such as those on human rights, women, and population, and influence the deliberations and final resolutions more than other nonstate actors that attend these conferences as observers. The Vatican represents the Roman Catholic form of Christianity in the world, and commands the attention (if not always the respect or allegiance) of Roman Catholics around the world. Pope John Paul II, however, along with many sympathetic observers, would argue that – although the Vatican is concerned about the status of Roman Catholic minorities throughout the world – the other (ostensibly ‘Roman Catholic’) interests which the Vatican supports in international relations reflect a wider concern, with universal moral values that promote human dignity and freedom. Indeed, given the popularity of cultural relativism and multiculturalism in the world today, the Vatican is one of the few international organizations that still believes in (and promotes) those moral values it considers to be universal.35 The role of religious non-state actors in relief and development has been widely neglected in most accounts of the role of religion in international relations. When their activities are mentioned at all, they are often dismissed as ‘irrelevant’ to ‘genuine’ development needs. They adopt what Goldstein calls the ‘the missionary model’ of foreign assistance, because their activities resemble the charitable works performed by missionaries in poor countries in past centuries. They contribute, he argues, ‘goods to third-world economies, but often with little understanding of local needs or long-term strategies’.36 Although there is a grain of truth in this characterization of some missionary organizations and religious NGOs, it is an unfortunate generalization and distorts the contemporary situation. One of the most important aspects of international development since the end of the cold war has been the failure of the state – whether because of political corruption or economic mismanagement – to provide basic social services to the wider population. As a result, basic governmental social services are increasingly being provided by NGOs, particularly religious NGOs. These often bypass the state altogether in providing these

10 Scott Thomas

services. Because of governmental corruption and mismanagement donor governments are bypassing Third World governments, and are using NGOs even with a religious (or, more specifically, denominational) affiliation, to supply foreign assistance directly to the people of the Third World.37 A number of religious NGOs are involved in these activities including the American-based Catholic Relief Services, CAFOD, the British Catholic relief organization, the Lutheran World Federation, and the World Council of Churches, the umbrella body for the mainline Protestant Churches. They are often linked formally and informally with secular relief and development organizations. A variety of Islamic non-state actors also participate in similar educational and humanitarian activities in the Islamic world,38 such as Jama’at-Islami, the World Muslim League, the Islamic Development Bank (IDB), and Muslim Aid. The latter was set up on the model of Christian Aid by Cat Stevens, a former pop singer who converted to Islam. Because of the spectre of ‘radical Islam’, however, the west has been suspicious of their activities. So, for example, there was an outcry in the west at the attempts by the IDB and the OIC to help the Muslims in Albania.39 Another increasingly important religious non-state actor is the Orthodox Church, which includes the Greek and the Russian Orthodox Churches. Since the end of the Cold War it has become prominent in the conflicts confronting Christians in those European states within the borders of the former Byzantine Empire and the former USSR.40 Religions can organize themselves across state borders in the face of hostility from national governments. One example of this is those Christian missionary groups that have deliberately built up and nurtured transnational links throughout the world as part of their evangelistic activities.41 Although they are also involved in providing education, health care, and other social services, their presence is resented in the Islamic world although many ‘Islamic’ countries also have Christian minorities. Christian missionary groups from the west are also resented by the Orthodox Church in Russia. Although religious non-state actors are growing in importance in international relations, key religious individuals have also played an important role. Gandhi, for example, played an influential role in India’s independence, and Pope John Paul II, Mother Theresa, and Archbishop Desmond Tutu all use the moral force, authority, integrity, and legitimacy that religion gives them to advance the interests of human dignity and freedom.

Religion and International Conflict 11

Religion as civilization or culture area The sixth way religion has been analysed in international relations is as a ‘civilization’ or as a ‘culture area’. The ‘cradle lands’ of the major world religions closely match the core locations of major ancient civilizations. This was the starting point for one of the most influential ways religion was interpreted in international relations prior to the Second World War.42 Samuel Huntington has resuscitated this tradition of analysing ‘civilizations’, based on religion, for the post-Cold War era. The civilizations he examines includes four of the major world religions: Confucianism, Islam, Hinduism, and (Slavic-Orthodox) Christianity; but he leaves out Buddhism and Judaism.43 He argues that the East–West axis of world division during the cold war has been replaced by a ‘clash of civilizations’. Civilizations determine the greatest distinctions among humankind and, as a result, cultural differences will be the major source of future conflict in the world.44 A variation of Huntington’s thesis claims that culture has become the main source of division among humankind. This views cultural differences as the main source of international conflict, and is relevant here because the world’s major cultural groupings and the main world religions overlap to a considerable extent. Michael Vlahos, director of the Centre for the Study of Foreign Policy in the US Department of State divides the world into different ‘culture areas’ (rather than civilizations) – a concept he has borrowed from anthropology. He says, ‘if culture is a reality, then the broader cultural community – or cultural area – forms the living boundaries of that reality’, and not the world divided by geographical regions or by political boundaries of nationstates. ‘Patterns of thought and behaviour are shaped by culture and are not the product of mere nationalism.’ This means the world is not a global village, but a series of culture areas.45

Religion as a transnational ideational community Seyom Brown presents the seventh way religion has been examined in international relations, as transnational ideational communities. This concept combines the views of Huntington and Vlahos on the ‘clash of civilizations’ or ‘cultures’ with the role of religion as a transnational idea in world politics. Most of the ideational communities Brown examines are religious groups: Islam, Roman Catholics, other Christians, Jews, and what he calls ‘eastern’ religions (including Hinduism, Buddhism and Shintoism in Japan).46

12 Scott Thomas

He argues that the deep commitment people have to the wellbeing of their community is the only durable cement of states, and this cannot be coerced or purchased. In the long-term, he believes, it is ideas that bind communities more than chains or bank accounts. In the post-cold war world, a state’s ability to ‘prevail in conflicts’ with its opponents will depend ‘on the attractive power of ideas that bind people to one another in ideational communities. Who is on whose side (issue by issue) will be determined by the ideational communities dispersed around the world that transcend state borders and comprise some of the most consolidated communities in the world.’47

Religions as ‘interpretive communities’ Most of the approaches to religion so far have emphasized the primordial, essentialist, and immutable nature of religion or religiously based social identities, ideational communities, civilizations or culture areas. This is what makes religion such a source of conflict, when social groups and communities based on different religions become active as part of domestic politics and international relations. The ‘social identity’ approach to religion and religious conflict is based on religious essentialism. Religion is considered to be a primordial, unchanging irreducible part of individual and social identity. Religion matters because it is one of a series of traits that distinguish between communities and determine their identities. A contrary, ‘modernist’, or instrumental approach sees ethnic identities – and by implication, religious identities – as no more important than any other kind of identity. What is important are the conditions (material, political, or social) under which individuals and groups use religious and other forms of identity to achieve other more political or social ends. The resurgence of religion is a contingent, situational, circumstantial force.48 This is why religious conflicts brought about as a reaction to globalization are considered really to be about increasing the political and economic power of marginalized groups in international relations rather than about bringing religion into politics.49 This modernist position is unsatisfactory for a number of reasons. First of all it fails to explain what makes religious conflicts so violent and intractable. Religious ideas do not explain the horrendous levels of violence that often occur as a result of religious conflicts. Crawford Young has set out an intermediate position that tries to do this: Primordialism usefully completes instrumentalism by explaining the force of the ‘affective tie’ through which interest is instrumentally

Religion and International Conflict 13

pursued. It helps make comprehensible the emotionality latent in ethnic conflict, its disposition to arouse deep-seated anxieties, fears and insecurities, or to trigger a degree of aggressiveness not explicable in purely material interest terms (e.g. the conflicts over the Ayodhya temple, the Golden Temple, or the Temple Mount in Jerusalem).50 Another problem, common to most primordial or modernist approaches to social identity, is that they treat religion as a static component of social identity (with a given set of doctrines, beliefs, and practices) and they treat religion as a static component of political culture. Although it is usually recognized that political cultures adapt and change, religion has been seen as a static, selfcontained element within political culture. Religious change and adaptation must fit into a more dynamic understanding of political culture. It is not sufficient to say, for example, that the emergence of Islamic, Hindu, or Christian fundamentalism is a reaction against modernization and indicates the strength of traditional political culture.51 This interpretation of religion and politics is based on two assumptions of modernization theory. First, that secularism is an inherent part of modernization, and second, that there is a static, immutable understanding of religion in traditional society that determines political culture.52 Both of these assumptions are increasingly questioned. As a variety of developing countries are now modernizing it is no longer clear that modern societies must be secular societies, and this view becomes more plausible as support for ‘modernity’ itself is called into question.53 Religions are not made up of a body of static, immutable beliefs, nor are religious groups made up of a body of believers ‘hermetically sealed’ off from the forces of modernization or globalization. Religious interpretations cannot be separated from politics. The great world religions – Islam, Confucianism, Hinduism, and Christianity – may have fixed texts but they do not have fixed beliefs, only fixed interpretations of those beliefs. No matter how religions are described – as ideational communities, civilizations, or culture areas – they are more dynamic than many scholars realize. What is most important about them is that they are ‘interpretive communities’ in dialogue with their members and with society on the contemporary significance of each religious tradition. The relationship between religion and modernity, how the postcolonial state should be constituted (along secular, liberal democratic, or confessional lines) is not a new debate; it has been going on in different societies since the days of colonialism and imperialism.54

14 Scott Thomas

All globalization has done is increase the geographic scope, widen the scale of issues, and increase the pace of this dialogue in countries around the world.

The religious challenge to international society So far, this chapter has examined the relationship between different approaches to religion and religious conflict in international relations in a general way. It is now time to examine how these different approaches to religion influence how scholars have interpreted the impact of religion on international order. How does the global resurgence of religion affect the principles, rules, and norms of international society? State sovereignty is one of the most important foundational principles of international society. Since the end of the wars of religion and the rise of the modern state system it has been sustained by two important conditions. First, there is the absence of a transnational ideology that seriously competes with states for people’s political loyalties and, second, there is the existence of a common set of principles, rules, and norms that engender an element of respect for other states in the international system.55 Does the resurgence of religion weaken both of these conditions, or ‘pillars’, as they have been called, that uphold Westphalian international society? Does transnational religion involve a new transnational ideology that challenges allegiance to the state, and does it brings into international relations new beliefs and values incompatible with the rules, norms, and principles of international society? Strong religions and weak states The first contention is that religion is a source of conflict because it promotes a transnational ideology that challenges allegiance to the state as the basic political unit of international society. Developing countries were dominated by successive empires. Colonial states were created with artificial borders that did not correspond to existing ethnic or clan boundaries. They did not experience a long period of national integration under colonialism and so, at independence, very few postcolonial states had any meaningful national identity. The societies in the ‘new states’ continued to see religion, clan, and ethnicity as the basis of social identity. This tendency was exacerbated by modernization. Contrary to the predictions of social scientists in the past,56 modernization has not caused religion to weaken and

Religion and International Conflict 15

disappear, but instead to grow stronger in the public sphere. Because of the weakness of the state and the lack of other strong social institutions, religion has come to play a very important role in postcolonial societies, in defining social values and goals, and in determining foreign linkages. It has provided the basis of support for rulers and the basis for opposition movements. Religious groups have the greatest presence and influence among ordinary people in such societies, and the only serious competitor is usually the military. As a result, the problem in developing countries and (in the wake of the collapse of communism) also in some states in central Europe and the former Soviet Union, is that there are ‘strong religions’ in ‘weak states’, with the state exhibiting low levels of political legitimacy, national integration, and institutional capacity. In an international society of ‘weak states’ and ‘strong religions’, the resurgence of religion threatens both domestic stability and international order. Because Buddhism, Christianity and Islam are the only three main world religions to have universalistic aspirations they have had the greatest potential to undermine the principle of state sovereignty by promoting transnational religious and political institutions. Buddhism has not expressed itself in this way to any great extent, and European history has been characterized by politics separating religious from political institutions. So, Islam – which has not experienced such a separation – is the only religion in which there is potential to undermine state sovereignty in this way. That much of the Islamic world was once a transnational community, and has been under foreign occupation through colonialism, has only fuelled the vision of rekindling transnational political religion. Islamic fundamentalist movements undermine the principle of state sovereignty by creating new transnational ties among Muslims. These challenge allegiance to the state as the basic political unit of international society in favour of pan-Islamism, an Islamic notion of the transnational religious community. Some movements want to create a single political state resembling the one that included most of the Middle East during the period AD 600 –1200. As part of the Islamic political imagination, there is a mythic longing, a supranational ideal of pan-Islamic unity among the faithful based on theological conviction and a remembrance of past Islamic empires.57 This ideal still affects politics today, but simplistic conceptions of transnational Islam (or of global networks of Islamic militants) conflict with the fact that Muslims are divided into states in international society.58 The fact that the Islamic community was divided in

16 Scott Thomas

this way by the imperialist west only fires the imagination for the renewal of political unity. However, the experience of Islam in the Muslim world is that it has not provided a basis for transnational religion in a way that undermines loyalty to national states. On the contrary, Islam has been an instrument for the pursuit of particular state interests, reinforcing the principle of sovereign statehood and the existing society of states. This is apparent in many ways. The transnationalism of Islamic movements is mitigated by their local or national orientation. The main Sunni Islamic movements are the Muslim Brotherhood based in Egypt and the Ja’amat-I Islami based in Pakistan. Although they share a common desire to reIslamicize society, there is a cultural division so that the MB has local branches in Arab countries and the Ja’amat-I Islami in the Indian subcontinent and Britain. Although each movement has a transnational network with leadership from the centre, it is used mainly for finance and distribution of literature and educational materials, the creation of Islamic institutes, publication centres, and the holding of seminars and conferences. There is a great deal of local or national autonomy. Each branch defines itself in terms of domestic concerns, and not the concerns of the centre. So, for example, the MB cooperates with the governments in Kuwait and Jordan, it is peacefully opposed to the government in Egypt, and it is involved in armed opposition to the regimes in Libya and Syria.59 Second, apart from the Muslim Brotherhood, the major Islamic movements were created as the instruments of cultural diplomacy by particular Islamic states with the political purpose of weakening their rivals. This has weakened Islam as a transnational force in world politics. The Organization of the Islamic Conference was founded by Saudi Arabia to promote pan-Islamic unity at a time when the Kingdom felt threatened by Nasser’s attempt to promote pan-Arab unity. The World Muslim League was founded by Saudi Arabia (1962), the Bureau of Islamic Propaganda by Iran, and the Arab–Islamic People’s Conference by Islamic Sudan (1990).60 The manipulation of ideological debates within these social movements (on forms of Islam, like Shi’ism and Wahhabism) is reminiscent of the Sino-Soviet manipulation of the Afro-Asian People’s Solidarity Organization and other communist front organizations in the Third World, which a generation earlier weakened international communism as a global force. Third, although the divisions between Sunni and Shi’ite Muslims should have cautioned analysts against any simplistic notions of

Religion and International Conflict 17

transnational Islam, the Iranian revolution exacerbated this split by forcing the conservative, Gulf Arab states to more actively promote an alternative, Sunni, version of fundamentalist Islam. The oil resources of both states enabled them to promote their inter-state rivalry in the region by supporting rival forms of transnational Islam, which is also reminiscent of the Sino-Soviet ideological rivalry in the Third World. Saudi Arabia’s ‘petropower’ enabled it to back Sunni Islamic movements and guerrilla groups, like the Hizb-I Islami in Afghanistan, provided that they opposed Iran. Fourth, transnational Islam may have little or no influence on a Muslim country’s foreign policy. State interests rather than Islamic unity is the basis of foreign policy in many of these states. This is clear since the fundamentalism of the Gulf monarchies has no bearing on their pro-western foreign policy orientation, nor did Pakistan’s prowestern stance (as a supply base for the Mujahidin) during the war in Afghanistan. The Gulf War in 1990 –91 divided the Arab world rather than united it. The conservative Arab monarchies in the Gulf backed the west, and Arab nationalists and the mass of ordinary people backed Iraq. Fifth, transnational Islam is weakened by the fact that national identity is as important as a religious, or Islamic identity. Islamic nationalism is tied to the history and cultures of specific countries. This means being an Egyptian or a Palestinian is as important as being a Muslim. The main influence on the Islamic Salvation Front in Algeria, for example, is not Iran or the Sudan but Algerian history. FIS looks back to the role of Islam in the country’s liberation struggle against the French that was – from their point of view – derailed by secular nationalists of the FLN after independence. Likewise, although there has been a resurgence of Islam in Central Asia because of the collapse of the Soviet Union, there, too, Islam unites the peoples of Central Asia, but also divides them because of the way religious identities are mixed with national identities.61 Thus, although religious non-state actors (along with MNCs, terrorist groups, and ethno-national groups) have transformed international relations, the concept of transnational religion should be used in international relations with caution. Transnational religion that aspires to a pan-religious and political community challenges the principle of sovereign statehood. However, few world religions, apart from Islam, aspire to this aim today, and the concept of transnational religion breaks down when it is applied indiscriminately to describe global Islamic politics. The politics of existing national states and regional

18 Scott Thomas

realities determine political developments in the Islamic world more than transnational Islam. Transnational religious groups can still challenge the sovereignty of ‘weak states’ by representing ideas and values that cannot be confined or controlled by states. Religion challenges the allegiance individuals give to their national states, or more to the point, secular national states, many of whom have governments kept in power by the west, such as Egypt and Algeria. Transnational religious actors – by developing linkages at the subnational and transnational level in other countries – can promote the interdependence and interpenetration of domestic and international politics. What transnational religion has undermined is not the principle of state sovereignty (neither the existence of the national state nor the idea of a society of states are in doubt) but the secular national state.62 This leads to the next question regarding religion and international relations. Religious beliefs and values The second main contention is that the resurgence of religion is a source of conflict. This is because it promotes new beliefs and values that are incompatible with rules, practices, and norms of international society, such as territorial integrity, state sovereignty, and nonintervention. International society is based on European cultural values and norms, and was created by the expansion of the European states – through colonialism and imperialism – across the globe. What was once a European international society is now a global international society. ‘As transnational belief systems, religions often are taken as a higher law than state laws and international treaties.’63 After the Islamic revolution, Iran refused to uphold the principles of diplomatic immunity and to protect either US diplomats or the territorial integrity of the US embassy in Tehran.64 The training and support the Islamic states of Iran and the Sudan give to fundamentalist fighters in Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, and the Lebanon violate non-intervention norms as well as international prohibitions on terrorism. Khomeini’s fatwa on Salman Rushdie violates western norms concerning the civil rights of individuals (such as freedom of speech) and international human rights conventions. Jewish fundamentalists in Israel, supported with American money, continue to build settlements in the Israeli-occupied territories and vow to cling to the land even if the Israeli government evacuates them. This is in violation of Israeli law and the Oslo peace accords, a binding international treaty that the government has signed.65

Religion and International Conflict 19

That is, most examples of the way transnational religion challenges the basic principles of international society come from Islam or from the Middle East. No doubt there is reason to be concerned about these developments, but they are related to the unstable politics of the region rather than to anything that is specific to Islam.66 Perhaps, if the territorial disputes in South Asia were included Hinduism and Sihkism could be added to this list. But they are examples of the way religious nationalism still affects the politics of postcolonial territorial settlements rather than the way the beliefs and values of transnational religion undermine the principles of international society. Transnational religion is also considered to undermine diplomacy, one of the main institutions of international society, because religious conflicts are not amenable to diplomatic bargaining: The classic tools of diplomacy typically include an exchange of information, the often manipulative signalling of positions, and one or more forms of negotiation. These measures are normally quite suitable for dealing with conflicts that relate to power politics and tangible interests. Such interests are inherently divisible and thus subject to compromise. Nonmaterial ‘identity-based’ conflicts, on the other hand, are often not well understood by practically-minded diplomats accustomed to operating in the old East–West context of nation-state politics.67 This judgement correctly recognizes that religiously based conflicts are conflicts between communities defined on the basis of religious identity rather than about conflicts over ideological-religious ideas. But its conclusion about religion or identity-based conflicts and diplomacy is wrong. Although religion can make conflict resolution more difficult, by investing the conflict with religious legitimacy, what is required is that the genuine fears, concerns, and anxieties of each community be taken into account in the political settlement. The Edict of Nantes, bringing to an end the so-called ‘wars of religion’ in France, did not refer to ‘religion’ any more than the Dayton Peace Accords over Bosnia. However, both conflicts were about religiously based identity and how it can be secured through territory.68 The global resurgence of religion does not pose a significant threat to the main institutions of international society but it does challenge important international norms. In recent years states that comprise non-western religions have challenged the universality and the content of international norms on human rights. More broadly, they have

20 Scott Thomas

challenged the secular western consensus on the values behind international social policy, particularly those concerning women’s rights, reproduction, and population. Because this consensus is rooted in ideas coming from the western Enlightenment these areas of social policy and similar ones are likely to pose religious and cultural conflicts in international relations. Some Asian countries, particularly China, have argued that ‘Confucian values’ are different from western values, and Malaysia, Indonesia and other Islamic states have argued that Islamic principles of human rights are different from those found in the west. One of the most important forums for this challenge was the UN Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993. It is clear to many people that cultural relativism and multiculturalism cannot become ‘the last refuge for the scoundrel and autocrat in international relations’. Although western liberals have strongly criticized the Vatican’s policies on women and population policy (as already noted), it strongly supports the universality of human rights in the world at a time when cultural relativism and multiculturalism are increasingly popular in the west. Since the changes to Roman Catholicism after ‘Vatican II’, the Vatican has contributed to the spread of democracy in Latin America and Africa.69 There is another way to express the challenge transnational religion poses to the principles, rules, and norms of international society. This is to say that it challenges the secular construction of international society rather than the principles of international society itself. From a ‘religious’ perspective the axis of world division is not between cultures but between devout believers of the main world religions on the one hand, and secularists and modernists in all countries, on the other. According to this perspective the choice before the world is between oppositions such as ‘Muhammad and Madonna’, or between ‘Consumerism and Christ’. The global culture spreading around the world is rooted in the spiritual and moral decay of modern western society, what Pope John Paul II has called ‘the culture of death’. The devout of all faiths are allied in an ‘ecumenical jihad’ against secularists and modernists in all countries, to prevent the rot of modern society from spreading and corrupting indigenous values and cultures. An indication of this ecumenical cooperation occurred at the UN Conference on Population in Cairo in 1994. Egypt’s Al Azhar University, the centuries-old bastion of Islamic teaching, and the Vatican, joined forces against what they considered to be a secular interpretation of population and human life issues that were contrary to the traditional

Religion and International Conflict 21

moral teachings of both Islam and Christianity.70 Population and other social issues such as birth control, family planning, and the role of women in society, are deeply connected to religious and cultural beliefs. It is not surprising they have caused controversy when UN Conferences on Population (Cairo, 1994) and on Women (Beijing, 1995) adopted what appear to be ‘western’ and ‘secular’ social policy positions. The west’s blatant disregard for the indigenous values and ethics of societies with different religious and cultural values, and the way the social and moral decline of western society is spreading to developing countries, is what has turned social policy into foreign policy. From the perspective of ‘ecumenical jihad’, religion does bring beliefs and values into international relations that are contrary to the secular principles on which the international order has been based until now. But there is no ‘original position’ of intercultural ignorance, as Asian authoritarians or western multiculturalists might have us believe, in which different regions of the world have different religions and cultures with ‘different standards’ of human rights. It was explained earlier that the best way to understand religions is as ‘interpretive communities’ in dialogue with their members and their religious traditions to determine their contemporary relevance for faith and social life. Different cultural values about religious and secular authority, about relations between the sexes, or about reproduction have been coming into conflict in developing countries since at least the colonial era. All that globalization has done is to increase the geographic scope, the widening scale of issues, and the pace of this dialogue in both religious communities and countries around the world. What has changed about this intra-religious and cultural dialogue is that the political relationships, beliefs, and values that created modern international society are in decline. It is really only since the end of the cold war world that states from non-western religions, cultures, or civilizations (mainly in the Pacific Rim) have been able to challenge the hegemony of western beliefs, values, and practices that made the institutions of international society. This does not have to pose a threat to western political and economic interests. What is becoming possible for the first time is the construction of a genuinely multicultural global international society. The West has an interest in influencing the dialogue within religious communities in developing countries in ways that broadly reflect its values of political participation and individual rights. This requires a long-term commitment to cultural diplomacy, and not just to foreign aid and ‘antiterrorism’ campaigns.

22 Scott Thomas

Notes 11. Kegley and Wittkoph 1997, pp. 181–86. 12. Goldstein 1996, p. 204. 13. Mansbach 1997, pp. 166–67. 14. ‘The Ethical Mantra’, Financial Times, 2/3 August, 1997, p. 7. 15. Kegley and Wittkoph 1997, p. 183. 16. Luttwak 1994, p. 13. 17. Juregensmeyer 1993, chapter 6. 18. Fowden 1993. 19. Akenson 1992; O’Brien 1988. 10. Neill 1964, pp. 13–14. 11. Bellah 1992. 12. Barker 1995, pp. 103–18. 13. Cigar 1995. 14. de Gruchy 1985, 1996. 15. Huntington 1993a, p. 27. 16. Huntington 1993b, pp. 186–94. 17. Denitch 1992, pp. xi, xii. 18. Mansbach 1997, p. 163. 19. Barber 1992, pp. 55–63; Barber 1995. 20. Beyer 1994. 21. Rudolph and Piscatori 1997. 22. Rourke 1993, p. 193. 23. Akehurst 1984, pp. 95–118. 24. Holsti 1992, pp. 109, 110. 25. Huntington 1993a, pp. 35–9. 26. Beyer 1994. 27. Nye 1990a, pp. 160 – 4; Nye 1990b, p. 181. 28. Hocking and Smith 1990, pp. 199–200; Mansbach 1997, pp. 163–9. 29. Piscatori 1991. 30. Lewis 1961. 31. ‘Moslem Nations Join Forces’, Financial Times, 16 June, 1997, p. 4. 32. For example, Mansbach 1997, pp. 222–6 and 265–6; Kegley and Wittkoph 1997, pp. 186–9; Russett and Starr 1993, pp. 166–9. 33. Said 1995, pp. 188–91. 34. Holsti 1992, p. 53. 35. Weigel 1993a. 36. Goldstein 1996, p. 545. 37. Gifford 1994, pp. 513–34. 38. Kalimullah and Frazer 1990, pp. 71–92. 39. Vickers and Pettifer 1997, chapter 6. 40. Webster 1995. 41. Goldstein 1996, p. 270. 42. Joll 1985, pp. 91–104. 43. Huntington 1996, chapter 2. 44. Huntington 1996, pp. 22– 49. 45. Vlahos 1991, p. 62. 46. Brown 1992, p. 157. 47. Ibid, pp. 157–8.

Religion and International Conflict 23 48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66. 67. 68. 69. 70.

Gurr 1994, pp. 347–77. Beyer 1994, pp. 1–5. Young 1993, pp. 3–35. Almond 1990, pp. 138–56. Turner 1991. Berger 1997, pp. 32–6; Kepel 1994, Introduction. For example Hourani 1967; Davidson 1992. Zacher 1992, pp. 61, 62. Haynes 1994. Landau 1994. Coll and LeVine 1993, pp. 6–7. Roy 1994, p. 128. Husain 1995. d’Encausse 1988. Westerlund 1996. Goldstein 1996, p. 204. Ibid, pp. 296–7 and p. 501. Ibid, p. 204. Halliday 1995. Johnson 1994a, p. 3. Holt 1995, Introduction and chapter 6. Huntington 1991. ‘Al Azhar Joins the Vatican’, The Economist, 27 August, 1994, pp. 44 –5; Weigel 1995; Kreeft 1996.

2 Theological Reflections on Religious Resurgence and International Stability: a Look at Protestant Evangelicalism Harriet A. Harris

Is religion a menace to international stability, or can it be a tool for the promotion of peace? This is a question raised in the recent volume Religion, The Missing Dimension in Statecraft, edited by Douglas Johnston and Cynthia Sampson.1 Johnston and Sampson take the focus away from conflictual elements in religion to look at possible positive contributions of religion to international relations. The potential of religion to promote peace is located principally in ‘some version of the Golden Rule’, what we might call the principle of neighbourly love. Johnston avers that some version of this ethical principle exists in all the major world religions.2 I would like to pose some questions about two areas in particular where contributors to the volume have said little: theology and religious resurgence. Although theology is central to Johnston’s definition of religion as ‘an institutional framework within which specific theological doctrines and practices are advocated and pursued, usually among a community of like-minded believers’ (p. 4), there is little consideration of the role of theology in shaping the actions and aspirations of religious communities as these relate to statecraft. Moreover, the concept of religion is often used interchangeably with that of spirituality, which is defined in more personal terms and without a theological component (p. 4). One conclusion of the volume is that ‘spiritual factors’ are the missing element in analyses of foreign policy.3 However, it remains unclear how ‘spiritual factors’ are to be understood, and how their influence is to be studied in relation to other factors. Theological reflection on international affairs has tended to concentrate on the ‘just war’ tradition, pacifism, and the development of international law. One aim of this chapter is to show that the theology of religious movements affects their members’ social and political 24

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 25

outlook more broadly. How religious movements view this world in relation to the ‘kingdom of God’ (as Christians would say) undergirds their support for political activism or quietism. Pertinent to this study, their doctrine of human nature informs their understanding of who their neighbours are and how they should behave towards them, and this has a bearing on tolerance and human rights. ‘Religious resurgence’, like all general terms, is problematic because of the heterogeneity of the movements it is meant to cover. In Gilles Kepel’s words it is a ‘new religious approach’ that has ‘spread all over the world’, which perceives a societal crisis and responds by attempting to recover a ‘sacred foundation for the organization of society’.4 Movements which are regarded as part of this resurgence are perceived to be significant and threatening to western interests, and some scholars argue that this is their only common feature.5 They are sometimes labelled ‘fundamentalist’ – another contentious term not only in its generality but in its pejorative overtones and because of its specific historical referent. The term was first used within American Protestantism in the early twentieth century, and every new application presents new sets of problems. The subject of this chapter is Protestant Evangelical movements, and I will mention difficulties with the concept ‘fundamentalism’ in this context. Johnston and Sampson divert attention away from the threat of fundamentalism due to a proper concern with the peacemaking potential of religion. However, this betrays an unquestioning acceptance of the category ‘fundamentalist’ for describing multifarious movements (p. 16), and an assumption that the movements are uniform with respect to international relations. Thus, the perceived threat of religious resurgence remains unexamined and an important and interesting line of inquiry unpursued, namely, how the principle of neighbourly love might be located in religious resurgence. This chapter is broad in scope, the intention being to raise questions which open up areas for future exploration. In it, I shall hope to indicate relevant literature which helps bring together the disparate disciplines of Theology, Politics and International Relations, particularly in the study of religious resurgence. It is divided into three parts. Part 1 identifies the sorts of movements that I include under the label ‘Protestant Evangelical’. Part 2 suggests ways in which theology is relevant to the role of religion in political and international affairs: theology as one tool for analysing actions and attitudes of religious movements; theology as a variable, subject to cultural, political and social influence; and theology as a means for educating religious movements into

26 Harriet A. Harris

tolerance in contexts of cultural diversity and religious plurality. The last section also addresses the allegation of ‘cultural imperialism’ which prevails with regard to evangelical Christianity, whose global expansion is a result of mission activity. Part 3 then addresses concerns over the effects of global religious resurgence on international stability, moving from what I regard as the most to the least speculative anxieties. In Part 3, I consider whether religious resurgence provides commitments which compete with national interests, and which bind religious believers together into ‘global tribes’ which exclude and conflict with one another. Samuel P. Huntington argues that the revival of religion, often in the form of ‘fundamentalist’ movements, provides a basis for identity that transcends national boundaries and is likely to contribute to future conflicts between civilizations.6 Resurgent movements which strongly assert their own particular identities may be a particular source of conflict. Secondly, I address anxieties about religious movements destabilizing international politics through attempts to redefine the state. Thirdly, I look at religious-orientated foreign policy. My observations will be specific to Protestant Evangelical movements but may invite reassessment of some general statements regarding religious resurgence. While the chapter is broad and exploratory, it develops the following argument. Evangelicalism has a global mission but has not become part and parcel of political discourse in the way that Islamicism has. Elements of Evangelicalism which are potentially most threatening to international stability are defused by theological ambivalence towards politics, whilst Evangelicalism’s success at crossing national boundaries lies more in evangelism than in political manoeuvring. Theological analysis is relevant in assessing how menacing the success of Evangelical expansion is, for it affords insight into how Evangelicals view and behave towards their non-Christian neighbours.

1. Protestant Evangelicals Patrick Johnstone compiled the evangelical missionary prayer manual Operation World for ‘Bible-believing Christians who want to obey the last great command of the Lord Jesus by evangelizing the world. This means primarily Protestant Evangelical Christians (including Pentecostal and Charismatic Christians).’7 These are the people I have in mind. They are diverse but all are Biblically conservative and recognize one another in contradistinction from those of a more liberal theology. They emphasize acceptance of the ultimate authority of scripture as a primary feature of

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 27

their religious identity and attempt to adhere to what they believe is ‘the Biblical position’ on religious, social and political issues which affect their lives. This does not mean that they are unified in their actions or goals or that they agree on what ‘the biblical position’ is on any given issue. The disparate nature of Evangelicalism will be apparent from the persons, groups and movements cited throughout this chapter, including: the New Christian Right, the Evangelical left, fundamentalist separatists, Reconstructionists, Evangelical missionaries around the world, and the growing movements in Latin America, East and South East Asia, the South Pacific and sub-Saharan Africa which are largely Pentecostal or charismatic. The distinction between fundamentalists and Evangelicals within Protestantism is a thorny issue.8 Self-proclaimed Evangelicals accept the fundamentalist label only insofar as it retains the meaning of upholding and defending ‘the fundamentals of the faith’. They reject what they regard as pejorative connotations of separatism and fanaticism.9 Yet there are self-proclaimed fundamentalist Christians in Africa,10 and in the United States represented by such bodies as Bob Jones University, who ‘wear the label’ with pride. Moreover, the New Christian Right in the United States, which comprises mostly theologically conservative and politically right-wing Evangelicals, is sometimes referred to as neofundamentalist and sometimes accepts the designation.11 Further confusion arises because commentators on fundamentalism as a worldwide, transreligious and often political phenomenon use the terms ‘Evangelicalism’ and ‘Christian fundamentalism’ interchangeably. They have made little contact with studies assessing the relationship between Evangelicalism and fundamentalism specifically within Protestantism.12 How one distinguishes between Protestant fundamentalism and Evangelicalism depends on the sorts of questions one is asking: questions about scripture, tolerance, social organization, or political involvement all suggest different criteria. Here, the term ‘fundamentalist’ is used only of those who describe themselves as such. For the purposes of this chapter the more important distinction is between the Evangelical ‘right’ and the Evangelical ‘left’. The ‘right’, by whom I mean the NC and like-minded pro-American conservatives, have a high profile and are often designated ‘fundamentalist’. The ‘left’ receive little media or scholarly attention. They are regarded as ‘radical’, especially by the Evangelical right, but they are not usually labelled ‘fundamentalist’. Both are involved with the spread of worldwide Evangelicalism but they differ in their methods, theologies and

28 Harriet A. Harris

international policies. The ‘right’ preach to win souls, provide financial and other resources to support the spread of democratic capitalism in places of American interest around the world, and are generally in favour of nuclear defence. The ‘left’ draw on Latin American liberation theology, and join voices with challenges from African, Asian, Latin American, Antillian and Black North American Evangelicals to take seriously ‘the social, political and economic issues in many parts of the world that are a great stumbling block to the proclamation of the Gospel’.13 They seek not only inner conversion but justice and freedom from oppression, insisting that in ‘Jesus’ new redeemed society’ the Holy Spirit transforms ‘all relationships whether emotional, social or economic’.14 They tend towards pacifism and resistance to nuclear arms. Not all Evangelicals are selfconsciously ‘left’ or ‘right’. Many, if asked to reflect, would situate themselves somewhere in the middle, both politically and theologically. It is helpful to think in terms of a spectrum, and some in the middle are also mentioned in this chapter. However, in order that we recognize the spectrum, this chapter will focus on those who are the most politically and socially involved at either end of that spectrum. Evangelicals regard themselves as ‘global Christian[s]’.15 This does not mean that they endorse multifaith attempts to establish global religious agreement on certain issues.16 Rather they take their own particular theology around the globe. The whole world is their mission field. Their dramatic increase in numbers worldwide has encouraged some comparison between Evangelicalism and conservative Islam. Peter Berger regards these as ‘two truly global movements of enormous vitality’ which are sometimes in direct competition.17 It is for its global significance and confused associations with fundamentalism that Evangelicalism is worth considering here, more than for its theological richness. Presentday Evangelicalism is criticized for its piecemeal, unsystematic theology and many Evangelicals lament its shortcomings in this respect.18 Yet theology, even if impoverished, is relevant to the political and international interaction of this vital and expanding movement.

2. The relevance of theology Theology as a criterion of analysis Until recently, a Realist concern with balancing ‘power’ in order to maintain international stability has undermined interest in belief systems as they relate to international relations.19 In addition, secularizing and liberalizing tendencies to confine religion to the private sphere

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 29

have made it particularly difficult to render theological concerns relevant to the terms used to discuss relations between states. However, the role of religion in International Relations is now a growing area of study, and normative theory has been revived.20 Case studies suggest that foreign policy is affected by the religion of statesmen and by the communication made possible by transnational networks of religious believers.21 Religious councils have been established to make the offices of religion available to intergovernmental organizations concerned with international affairs.22 If religion is operative in foreign affairs we should endeavour to understand how it can operate for the good. As yet, no clear criteria have been derived for assessing religion’s contribution to world politics. That theology establishes norms for religious communities should be a significant consideration in one’s analysis. Understanding the theology of a religious community helps one to understand the behaviour and decisions of members from that community. This is so, however directly or indirectly believers intend their theology to bear on their politics. Fundamentalist groups sometimes make rapid and immediate transitions from theology to political imperatives which is one reason for the concern over fundamentalist positions. At the same time, Protestant fundamentalists and Evangelicals harbour political quietism. Theological analysis affords insight into the formation of political viewpoints, and also reveals an ambivalence concerning religion and politics which itself has political repercussions. Atheological discussions of religion’s ‘power’ to motivate and inspire are vague and sometimes misleading. For example, Edward Luttwak suggests that by ‘introducing the authority of religion into the negotiating equation’, the conflict-resolution efforts of religiously motivated third parties ‘enable the parties, if they so desire, to concede assets or claims to the authority itself, so to speak, rather than to their antagonists’.23 Thus, he speaks of religion as though it itself is authoritative. It is not clear what exactly is meant by ‘religion’ in this claim. Religions may attribute a derivative authority to scripture, to institutions and to religious leaders, derived from the God or the absolute to which religions point, but to speak of religion as itself having authority is obscure, theologically inappropriate and difficult to imagine in real terms. Barry Rubin may provide a clue to the neglect of theology in recent political discussions of religion. He emphasizes that religion is a profoundly political influence in public life and should not be viewed as a set of theological issues.24 His point is that religion is ‘political’ even in

30 Harriet A. Harris

the absence of theologically generated political conflict (p. 21). Rubin is right that religion does not cease to be political when theological disputes do not lie at the core of conflict (as they did in the early Church and at the time of the Reformation, as Rubin mentions). However, nor does theology cease to be relevant where it is not at the core of religiopolitical matters. By way of illustration, we might consider the decision against political involvement as made by some Evangelical Protestants. This is in part a theologically informed decision. Aspects of theology which influence the withdrawal from politics include doctrines of human nature, salvation, the Church and the end-times. Generally, groups which heavily emphasize the fallenness of the human condition and view salvation in more individual than societal terms, direct their energies towards saving and nurturing souls and away from political activity and worldly entanglements. (In Part 3 we will encounter such sentiments from an Evangelical writing on international politics.) If they also possess a cataclysmic as opposed to a progressive notion of the world moving towards its end, they usually regard political involvement for the sake of social progress as futile or at least as irrelevant for Christian discipleship. In particular, premillennialist fundamentalists and Evangelicals in the United States have shunned politics for much of this century.25 They believe in a literal Second Coming and a thousand-year reign of Christ following a period of chaos and destruction. The rise of the New Christian Right (NC) marked a turn-around in the attitudes of many premillennialists towards political activity.26 Some premillennialist leaders, notably Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson, have endorsed rightwing economic and political ideologies in fear of apostasy and the decline of traditional values.27 Nevertheless, it remains possible to distinguish the reform programmes of socially radical Evangelicals from the sorts of issues with which the NC concerns itself, which are largely matters of ‘private’ morality and piety (such as sexual practice, or prayer in schools) which have been brought into the public realm.28 The right combine pessimism about human nature and the future of the world with faith in America as a chosen nation and the American constitution as the political norm. The left attack social, political and economic injustice at a more fundamental level. They see themselves in a prophetic Biblical tradition which puts justice before the American way of life.29 Theological analysis contributes to our understanding of these differences, and in such ways helps us to clarify rather than to obscure the relation between religion and politics. For a fully rounded

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 31

understanding, however, we must recognize that theology itself is affected by cultural, political and social change, as we shall see in the next section. Hence, members of the NC are modifying their premillennialist views now that they have become politically motivated.30 Theology as a variable Religious communities work out their theology in response to their contexts and needs. Aside from the NC, Evangelicals are increasingly aware of the need for more serious theological thought to underlie their political engagement.31 This requires not simply adopting laws that are consistent with basic Biblical principles, as some in the NC assume, but serious reflection on, among other things, the state of our world and the nature of humanity. A wide spectrum of Evangelicals have rejected political and social withdrawal. In the middle of this century those who broke away from their fundamentalist roots in this respect, primarily because they felt they had a social responsibility ‘to connect their convictions with the wider problems of the general culture’, and perhaps because they found themselves socially marginalized, developed a more optimistic doctrine of human nature and human society.32 Carl F. H. Henry’s polemic The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism,33 replaced fundamentalist aloofness with an active concern for suffering humanity and an anticipated response to the redemptive Gospel. More dramatically, as we shall see in the next section, evangelical missionary interaction with peoples of other cultures and faiths requires more fundamental revision of an Evangelical theology of human nature. Given the two-way relation between social and doctrinal change, we should resist not only atheological concepts of religion but the equally distilled, asociological view of religion posited by Charles Liebman.34 Liebman disregards the essentially social nature of religions in favour of some pure concept of religion as that which ‘claims absolute truth about ultimate reality’ (p. 84). In contrast to Luttwak and Rubin, Liebman writes, ‘Extremism is “pure” religion in the sense of being totally differentiated from other forms of culture and independent of all social institutions’ (p. 79). He implies that religion in its essence is a body of ideas that is resistant to change or compromise. He views moderation as that which occurs when religion is tempted or distracted by worldly demands, understood in the sense of demands posited by society. It has long been acknowledged in religious thought that there are philosophical and theological obstacles to making absolute any human effort to grasp and articulate ultimate reality. Christians use an image

32 Harriet A. Harris

from the apostle Paul to express this difficulty: we ‘see through a glass darkly’, now we know only in part but there will come a time when we know in full (1 Corinthians 13: 12). Moreover, neither religion nor theology are diluted by the world affecting them. If the world did not affect them they would not be doing their job. Religion has a social and interpretative function in responding to humanity’s sense of the transcendent, and is intimately affected by all that affects humanity. Theology, which articulates the body of ideas belonging to a religion, is central to this function. The discipline of theology might be defined as the (faithful) interpretation of the tradition for one’s own generation. It provides coherence, correction and justification to the stance which emerges from a mass of influences, and has always had an historical and cultural context. Religion is of most relevance when it responds to the issues of its time and place. Good theology helps religion to make a faithful response. Theological responses to cultural diversity and religious plurality An important context at present for religious movements in our changing and shrinking world is that of cultural diversity and religious plurality. This context raises issues about the nature of tolerance and religious commitment. A good theological response widens believers’ recognition of their fellow human beings and recognizes neighbours across religious traditions. Does it also require a reduction in theological particularity? It is of interest to see how Evangelicals adapt their theology to multicultural and multifaith environments while retaining a very particular Christian outlook. Especially significant are challenges to western missionary theology from non-western Evangelicals who appeal to the universality of Christ in affirming their people’s pre-Christian identity. Kwame Bediako from Ghana criticizes the failure of western missionaries ‘to view man-inAfrican “heathenism” as man in the same terms as man-in-Christianity’, and hence to discern the activity of God in the lives of Africans.35 He emphasizes that Christianity is a non-western religion and a religion suited to the African.36 He encourages those of Akan heritage to see ‘our creation as [God’s] original revelation to, and covenant with, us’, and to find ‘our true human identity, as men and women made in the image of God … [not] in terms of racial, cultural, national, or for that matter lineage, categories, but in Jesus Christ’ (pp. 145, 144). Bediako endorses the belief that it is in Christ’s promise of a new humanity that true human fulfilment lies – that ‘we become what we are truly intended to be, by his gift, the children of God’ (p. 145). He, and others such as

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 33

Lamin Sanneh,37 have given western Evangelicals the means to reflect on their past record, while also maintaining that it is possible to accord a proper dignity and respect for people’s pre-Christian past and nonChristian culture without relinquishing the uniqueness and exclusiveness of Christ’s claims.38 They attempt to undo the legacy of cultural imperialism while maintaining the uniqueness of Christ and what might be called the imperialism of the Christ-perspective.39 Evangelicals believe that they have a privileged understanding of what it is to be truly human, since humanity can only be fulfilled in Christ. ‘This particularism carries with it universal implications’ writes North American Evangelical theologian Clark Pinnock: ‘when we confess the finality of Christ we are confessing Jesus as the universal saviour … There is a wonderful broadness in the apparent narrowness of the Christian confession. Our hearts are alive with the hope that the saved will come from all the corners of the earth and sit down at table with the Lord in his kingdom.’40 The more challenging problem for Evangelicals is how to respond to people who remain non-Christian. Stewart R. Sutherland considers the task of religious studies in informing the role that religion plays in international relations, and names as one of its responsibilities education as a means of promoting toleration.41 Through historical and social scientific analysis, religious studies enhance our knowledge of the world’s faiths. Such study, Sutherland argues, properly changes hearts and wills as well as minds (p. 99). He assumes that increased toleration must be accompanied by weakened commitment to a particular religious system. He therefore suggests that the consequences of toleration may be both the benefit of the diminution of the dangers of the ‘errors’ of religion, and the neutralization of some of the existential powers of religion to motivate and inspire (pp. 99, 101). Theology is a different discipline from that of religious studies. Insofar as it promotes toleration it does so through reflection on the nature and will of God and the articulation of doctrine rather than through the scientific study of religion. In particular, the theological veto on making absolute particular human articulations about God advances humility and respect between people of different religious beliefs. How do Evangelicals relate to this veto? Many like to follow the former bishop of Madras, Lesslie Newbiggin, who plays down the difference between pluralism and confessionalism in this respect. A pluralist believes that all religions are equal and valid paths to divine reality. A confessionalist holds to a particular religious confession. Both acknowledge that their religious claims are not absolute. It is possible

34 Harriet A. Harris

to hold that, while there is absolute truth, no one and no religion has fully grasped it. The difference between them lies more definitively in the way in which the truth is to be sought: through the pluralist’s philosophical construct of an abstract Ultimate, or through an historic person and series of events.42 Evangelicals approach the matter of plurality precisely by reference to the historic tradition of the teachings and actions of Jesus. In particular, the Evangelical ‘left’ respond to pluralism by representing the interests of the poor and marginalized, as did Jesus in His ministry to the outcast of Israel. Christopher Sugden insists that the unique and exclusive claims of Jesus are expressed not by appeal to philosophical arguments but by beginning as Jesus did, with ‘questions and judgments of the marginalized within his own religious culture’.43 Those who experience the questions of the marginalized find in Jesus the answer to their quest. This is to claim that the Christian faith has a superior or even unique humanizing influence: ‘The exclusiveness and uniqueness of Jesus Christ pose the question “what other religion in its revelation and best expressions presents itself as good news to the poor and affirms those elements in other religions as the work of God?” ’ (p. 160). It is, perhaps, clearer from a theological than from a religious studies perspective how one might remain committed to a particular confession while expecting that it is ‘in some way fulfilment of every aspiration of the most pluralistic of worlds’.44 One can articulate theologically how Christ’s liberating and salvific work has implications for all of creation. From such a standpoint the weakening of commitment is an inappropriate context for toleration. This is what Evangelicals argue. Vinoth Ramachandra promotes a strongly particularist view of tolerance which to many will seem extreme in its religious sentiments: Genuine respect for the other is far more virtuous than the easy tolerance being advocated by many in our pluralist societies. Whoever boasts of being ‘tolerant’ towards other beliefs while, at the same time, asserting either that such beliefs are fundamentally no different to any other set of beliefs or that, even if they were, they do not make any decisive difference to a person’s life now or ever, is simply emptying the word tolerance of any moral value … To believe that my neighbour is wrong in her beliefs and that as long as she clings to her beliefs she will suffer eternal ruin, and yet at the same time to defend and protect her freedom to hold those beliefs, this surely is the real meaning of tolerance.45

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 35

Such toleration preserves diversity and can only operate in relation to that with which it differs. Evangelicals distinguish authentic and respectful relations with those of other faiths from an affirmation of the validity of all religions.46 They remain passionately committed to their religious system, experiencing no diminution in its ability to inspire, even while modifying aspects of their theology through experience of peoples of different religions and cultures.

3. Religious resurgence Now I would like to ask in what ways Evangelicalism, which through missionary expansion has become a global phenomenon, might be associated with worldwide religious resurgence and regarded as potentially disruptive of international stability. Transnational communities and commitments One approach to religious resurgence is to see it as an aspect of globalization theory, which posits that through worldwide communication the world is becoming a single social space.47 From this perspective, global integration is said to result in a revitalization of religion, and especially in transnational movements. Religious resurgence is seen both as a reaction against the relativizing and secularizing tendencies of the global system and as a proactive force within it. Questions arise over the cohesive or divisive role of religion in the ‘New World Order’, especially insofar as religion provides communities and commitments which transcend national borders. Resurgent ‘fundamentalist’ groups, especially Islamicist ones, are regarded as among the most potentially disruptive.48 Opinion is divided as to whether a return to religion might provide a basis for a sense of cohesion and social solidarity or is more likely to fuel conflict. Anthony H. Richmond takes the latter view: ‘Globalization and religious revivalism may be closely related’, he writes, ‘but they are also the arena for ideological confrontation and fanaticism.’49 He counts fundamentalism as one of the risks of a ‘nostalgic view’ of the new world order. A nostalgic view regards the survival of the ethnic as the dominant value, and looks back to a real or imagined situation in which traditional values could be maintained free from the threat of globalization (pp. 218, 224). Anyone who does not share the same language, religion, culture and history is seen as a threat to the unity and solidarity of the community and must be excluded, by force if necessary: ‘Protestant sects shun, Catholics excommunicate, and Muslims declare “holy war” against those who threaten the orthodox view

36 Harriet A. Harris

through their beliefs and writings, or who endanger the solidarity of the community by their behaviour’ (p. 226). We need to discover whether there are Protestant fundamentalist sects who fit Richmond’s depiction and whose behaviour affects international stability. The most exclusive fundamentalists, notably those associated with Bob Jones University (BJU), keep themselves separate even from fundamentalists who associate with non-fundamentalist Christians. They do not support the NC, which comprises a variety of religious conservatives. In 1966 BJU notoriously awarded Ian Paisley an honorary doctorate. In 1976 Bob Jones Sr and Paisley organized the First World Congress of Fundamentalists which met in Edinburgh. Paisley spoke of the ‘Fight of the Fundamentalist’ and Jones preached that the ‘very word carries with it the clash of arms and the sound of the battle shout’.50 The Second Congress convened in Manila in 1980, to ‘give united witness to the fact that there are thousands around the world who have not bowed the knee to compromise, who stand strongly in defense of Scripture, and who are opposed to “liberalism,” Romanism, false religion and heresies’.51 A third meeting was held at BJU in Greenville, South Carolina, with over 3000 delegates and additional observers from across the United States and 29 other countries.52 These North American and Ulster fundamentalists seem the most likely of Protestants to meet Richmond’s fears. The crucial questions are whether they have the ability to unite and mobilize likeminded believers around the world into any significant force, and whether their battle cries relate to something more than evangelistic zeal. Both are doubtful. One commentator argues with some justification that their open militancy generates ‘considerably more publicity than warranted by their relatively meager power in modern society’.53 Still, there are important contrasts between the American and Northern Irish contexts. Steve Bruce points out that Paisley is both a Church and Party leader and is fighting a constitutional issue which draws support from ‘non-religious’ Protestants.54 Bruce suggests that even nonEvangelicals are influenced by religion in their opposition to a united Ireland, and that they like being represented by fundamentalists. Evangelical Protestantism provides the ideological foundations for their ethnic identity. Paisley’s popularity is connected to his political and religious traditionalism. The irony here, though, is that his actual power arises not from his tendencies to shun religious apostates – the sect-like behaviour that Richmond fears – but from his pivotal position in a religio-political struggle which brings together rather than separates Evangelicals and non-Evangelicals.

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 37

In this section we are interested specifically in the transnational effects of religious resurgence. Of the most high-profile Protestant separatists, BJU’s global influence is negligible and Paisley’s more localized power is not owed to his religious separatism. Perhaps we are looking for the wrong sorts of effects in the wrong sorts of places. Two areas to consider in attempting to discern the transnational significance of Protestant Evangelicals are: the propensity towards violence, especially on the Evangelical right, and the extent to which this has resulted in actual violence of international consequence, and a theological and practical emphasis upon universal humanity which emerges, particularly among the Evangelical left, where Evangelicals face transnational situations. Violence David C. Rapoport has drawn attention to comparative war statistics which, if correct, would suggest that Christianity has historically been the most warmongering of all religions.55 Given that religious fundamentalist movements are often violent, if Rapoport’s analysis is correct we might expect Christian fundamentalists to be especially so. Yet Rapoport finds no example of Christian fundamentalist violence which has international implications. Why is this? In fact, Christian fundamentalists, by whom Rapoport means the Evangelical right in the United States (he does not mention Ulster Protestants), do manifest a propensity towards violence. However, they are not fundamentally opposed to the political system in which they live. On the contrary, although they see problems which they wish to reform, they regard American democracy as God-ordained. They form pressure groups in response to perceived threats to their culture but, unlike Ulster Protestants, they are not an ethnic group under political threat. Even in Ulster, Paisley operates constitutionally, and is not clearly associated with Protestant violence. Some Ulster terrorists have blamed Paisley for their actions but he has never promoted freelance violence and denounces loyalist murderers as non-Protestants.56 So to an extent Rapoport’s inability to locate Christian fundamentalist violence of international significance in a comparative study of fundamentalism betrays difficulties in comparative analysis. Multifarious movements and groups are categorized as ‘fundamentalist’ or as constitutive of the worldwide religious resurgence, and we should be discriminating regarding the characteristics they can be said to share. Many, though not all, movements labelled ‘fundamentalist’ are agitated by a political ideology or regime in their own territory.

38 Harriet A. Harris

American Protestant Evangelicals are a significant exception. The antiwestern nature of Islamicist movements and their refusal to separate religion and politics dominate representations of fundamentalism, although labels are insufficient even to accommodate their diverse and fragmented nature.57 The peculiar problems with comparative characterizations for Protestant Evangelicalism (especially in the United States) include it being pro-western, fiercely pro-democratic, and in principle supportive of Church and state separation (though not always consistent in maintaining this separation).58 American Evangelicals consider the Declaration of Independence to contain principles fundamental to Christian America and democratic freedom, and they ‘pray to keep our government truly secular and truly neutral and to keep Church and state really separate’.59 Hence, their violence is differently located from that of other socalled fundamentalist movements and we need different types of sensors to detect it. Militaristic images of ‘conquering’, ‘marching on the land’ and ‘defeating the powers’ pervade Evangelical and charismatic worship choruses. Violent emotions are vented in the spate of charismatic novels which have appeared in the last two decades. Wayne Booth recoils from the sentiment displayed in Roger Elwood’s apocalyptic fantasy Wise One, ‘he who is not with us is against us – and deserves to die’.60 This is spiritualized violence aimed at the forces of evil, and it is with spiritual rather than physical weapons that many Evangelicals fight. When feeling threatened by alien political systems the Evangelical right are violent indirectly, particularly, as we shall see, in supporting nuclear arms and in lending support to anti-communist foreign policy goals. Otherwise their propensity towards violence is less worrying internationally than it is ‘domestically’, in both a national and familial sense. They resist gun reform, interpret the Constitution in defence of the individual’s rights to bear arms, and share with right-wing militia a certain paranoia about government power. Some militia groups have recruited from Protestant fundamentalist and Evangelical Churches, such as the Christian Identity movement which subscribes to British– Israelite ideas that Anglo-Saxons are the direct descendants of the Lost Tribes of Israel. But the message of the militia to safeguard their own survival by building up food stores and arms, differs from that of the fundamentalists who await the inevitable end-times and the act of God which will save them from destruction.61 The main context of actual and public American fundamentalist violence has been the pro-life campaigns where guns have been used against doctors and workers in

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 39

abortion clinics.62 Actual ‘private’ violence in the home is more widespread. Evangelicals are becoming aware of the link between strict religiosity and abuse in homes, and are realizing that Church leaders and pastors may teach traditional family values while abusing their wives and children at home – a problem exacerbated by traditional Evangelical teaching on male leadership and female submission.63 Our common humanity Evangelicals perceive themselves to be serving the world. To this extent they apply the love of neighbour concept universally, their major theological justification being that all human beings are created in the image of God. The transnational implications of this thinking are apparent in their support for human rights and their assumption of Christian and western superiority in this area.64 John Stott, an Anglican clergyman and one of the most influential transdenominational and international Evangelical leaders this century, states that man received human rights ‘with his life from the hand of his Maker’.65 It is a principle arising ‘out of the Christian doctrine of man’, he writes, that ‘consciences are to be educated, not violated’, and for this reason ‘Christians oppose autocracy and favour democracy’ (p. 51). For the same reason, ‘we cannot try to impose [God’s truth and law] by force’ (p. 51). Rather, Christians should serve by example. The renunciation of one’s own rights in order to protect the rights of others ‘is an essential characteristic of God’s new society’ of which ‘Jesus Christ is the supreme model’, and in which the Christian community is to ‘set an example to other communities’ (pp. 149, 151). Since Evangelicals regard their mission as global, many of their aid programmes and relief agencies are established among non-Christian people.66 They see a fine line between providing relief and saving souls.67 They believe that their own tradition has the resources to affirm the true identity of persons who have been torn from their ethnic environments, and can make them whole. ‘In response to the hostility of ethnic barriers’, writes Vinay Samuel, ‘Christians are to replace them with wholeness and a new humanity through the power of the cross.’68 He writes that in the New Testament the stranger, who is defined ethnically as an outsider, becomes a neighbour. Love is to be shown to the stranger by demonstrating that ‘the person has oneness with us – the barriers are broken down’ (p. 29). He affirms the power of the Cross to lift people up into a new humanity, and claims uniquely for Christianity the concepts of restoring dignity, selfrealization and selfworth. He believes exclusively in Christ as able to make people

40 Harriet A. Harris

whole, but excludes no-one from the reach of Christ’s redemptive power. A few Evangelicals emphasize our common humanity specifically with regard to foreign affairs: ‘we are all children of God … united in our common humanity … graced with equal dignity, and … this deep recognition should inform our actions in the political realm.’69 The small number of Evangelicals writing on international relations combine an emphasis on human sin with a sense of hope and social responsibility. Dean C. Curry writes that ‘because of sin, human beings cannot forge a world of perfect peace and perfect justice. But because of God’s gift of common grace, human beings can forge a relatively more just and more peaceful world.’70 Paul Marshall supports the Realist claim that there is a human desire for power but, like Idealists, he looks beyond this power struggle and maintains faith in human beings who are ‘still called to do justice and … have not lost the image of God’.71 We have found little evidence that Evangelical resurgence binds Evangelicals together transnationally in such a way that they are set to become international actors in defence of a religious identity. Putting on hold for a moment their support for US foreign policy goals (support which anyway betrays nationalist concerns rather than transnational sympathies), their violence does not have international implications. Evangelicals do have trans-state motives, but their global mission affects the world on a different level. It is bound up with a theology of Christian uniqueness and universality, that we are all made in the image of God and can find true fulfilment in Christ, such that Christians can speak, act and theorize for the good of all humanity. Redefining the state A further problem for comparative analysis of religious resurgence is that unlike many of the movements occasioning anxiety, Evangelicalism’s global nature lies in its taking hold among peoples who have no Protestant heritage. It is now especially strong in Latin America, Korea and sub-Saharan Africa. Outside of the United States evangelical resurgence is about missionary expansion more than it is about returning to the traditions of one’s own national religion, as is the case with much Buddhist, Hindu and Islamic revival. Inside the United States it is situated within a political system which Evangelicals, particularly those on the right, support as foundational to the chosen or at least exemplary status of their nation. The political energies of the Evangelical right are largely concentrated on correcting their country’s immorality, and not with fundamental political redefinition.

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 41

Hence, alhough they are recently politically mobilized, the Evangelical right remain rather other-worldly. Ervand Abrahamian distinguishes Islamicist groups from Christian fundamentalism because the latter ‘conjures up doctrinal obsessions with “moral” concerns – such as abortion, man’s creation, and Judgement Day – rather than with such political issues as revolution, imperialism, and social justice’ which exercised Khomeini and his disciples.72 By the same reasoning, it has been suggested that Islamicist ideas are closer to the quasi-Marxist views of Christian liberation theology than with those of Protestant fundamentalists (for which it is possible to read the Evangelical right).73 Evangelicals worry that the lure of a political cause will compromise their faithfulness to their calling in Christ. Their commitment to political involvement is fragile and still perceived as detracting from the primary task of saving souls.74 Although writing on international politics, Dean Curry betrays a world-denying theology that undermines political activity. He warns (Evangelical) Christians not to make the mistake, committed by liberation theologians, of merging the task of the Church with the task of politics: ‘Politics is concerned with mankind’s temporal well-being, while the Church is concerned with mankind’s eternal well-being. These two tasks … should not be confused.’75 While Christians should not avoid social involvement, it is a task for the political sphere. Evangelism is the central mission of the Church. Earthly well-being, he reminds his readers, is not the same as eternal salvation (pp. 69–81). Practical instances of Evangelical other-worldliness are not hard to find. ECONI (Evangelical Contribution on Northern Ireland) has developed as an organization since 1987 and represents many Protestant denominations. It rejects both political quietism and religious nationalism, and is concerned to correct the perception that Ian Paisley is the only voice of conservative Evangelicalism in the Province. ECONI members meet with politicians and discuss such issues as the freeing of prisoners and the conduct of marches. But in reminding Evangelicals that their primary allegiance is to Christ they intend to temper political allegiance: ‘Political allegiance is not wrong in itself, but it becomes wrong when earthly allegiance becomes the sole, or supreme, or even equal allegiance in our lives. Christians cannot live for God and Ulster. Jesus constantly challenged those who followed him to set their priorities. They were given one option – all or nothing.’76 Pentecostals are now yielding a greater influence than liberation theology in Latin America, and they celebrate stories of guerillas exchanging their guns for Bibles. Even in Southern Africa, where Evangelical groups back

42 Harriet A. Harris

reactionary forces such as RENAME in Mozambique and UNITS in Angola, their backing has been to little political effect. Their ‘chief significance is religious, but often it is apolitical’.77 Furthermore, for the most part the Evangelical right in the US work within the system by mobilizing people to vote and to form pressure groups. Indeed they are criticized by other Evangelicals for placing confidence in the government to right the moral wrongs of the nation.78 The Evangelical left seek more radical reform, but they appeal first to Christians to reform themselves before making a stand for public justice: ‘It is a farce for the church to ask Washington to legislate what Christians refuse to live … The church ought to be far ahead of the rest of society in implementing biblical norms … Christians lack credibility and clout unless their local congregations are already starting to believe and model what they call on government to legislate.’79 Even then, when Evangelicals for Social Action speak of significant changes needed in government policy they mean changes which ‘preserve and extend democratic systems and the freedom upon which democracies are based’.80 There are some on the right, namely the Reconstructionists, who seek radical reform and attempt to reconstruct society according to Biblical law. Their initial inspiration came from R. J. Reston’s text, Institutes of Biblical Law.81 Reconstructionists are too fragmented to form a movement. They have bases in Vellicate, California, under Rusdoony’s leadership, and Tyler, Texas under the leadership of his son-in-law and adversary Gary North. They vehemently reject the premillennialist expectation of an imminent end to this world and its accompanying emphasis upon personal sanctification and disengagement from worldly affairs. They endorse the Evangelical right’s return to politics but not their quick-fix approach which concentrates on lobbying and mobilizing votes for Christian candidates, and which is perhaps a legacy of premillennialism. Reconstructionists operate with the more long-term vision, consistent with their postmillennial theology.82 ‘If there is no hope for the world as we know it what is the point in trying to reconstruct it?’, asks British Reconstructionist Tony Baxter: ‘If the end is nigh … why work to build long term Christian institutions?’ 83 The Reconstructionist programme is to influence the state through change among Christians at the grassroots level: As godly people begin to restructure their behavior in terms of what the Bible requires, the world about them begins to change. They serve as leavening influences in the whole culture. As more converts

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 43

are added to the rolls of the churches, and as these converts begin to conform their lives to the Bible’s standards for external behavior, all of society is progressively sanctified.84 Reconstructionists are highly prolific, and the amount of literature they produce obscures the fact that their following is small. At present their main significance may lie in the influence of their theology and their grassroots tactics on leaders within the more high-profile NCR.85 Religious foreign policy Despite a professed commitment on the part of the Evangelical right to the separation of Church and state, the right are not indifferent to questions of US national security. As Jeff Haynes notes, a large number of Evangelical missionaries and churches share and facilitate certain American foreign policy concerns: the containment of communism, the squashing of socially progressive movements especially in Central and South America, and the spreading of democracy and free markets as in South Korea and the Philippines.86 For many Evangelicals such nationalist sentiments are awkwardly allied with premillennialist theology – a theology which encouraged American fundamentalists and Evangelicals to withdraw from politics for much of this century. Foreign affairs have always captured the imagination of premillennialists, who watch international developments for signs of the end-times. The future they predict is at once catastrophic and cause for hope. During the cold war leading Evangelicals, including Jerry Falwell and Hal Lindsey, author of the apocalyptic bestseller The Late Great Planet Earth,87 regarded nuclear war with Russia as imminent and requisite for Christ’s Second Coming. Ronald Reagan invited Falwell to attend national security briefings, and approved of Lindsey talking to Pentagon strategists. Reagan himself seems to have believed that we were heading speedily for Armageddon.88 Such apocalyptic speculators regard their country’s decline as inevitable because they find no major political or military role for the United States in Biblical prophecy about the end-times.89 Yet they wish to protect America until Christ’s Second Coming. So premillennialists, including Pat Robertson, were among those Evangelicals who lent support to the Contras in Nicaragua and who protect America’s political and economic interests abroad.90 In such ways they may be said to endorse indirect forms of nationalist violence. Currently their fear of communism has been replaced by a more general fear of an emerging political-economic oneworld system which threatens America’s superpower status.91

44 Harriet A. Harris

By contrast, the Evangelical left call for economic and trade reform which will benefit the Third World rather than western multinationals. Ronald J. Sider urges western citizens to demand a foreign policy that unequivocally sides with the poor. He criticizes US support for repressive regimes within poor countries, blames affluent nations for their part in establishing economic structures that contribute to today’s hunger and starvation, and calls for the promotion of ‘nonviolent movements working to empower the poor’.92 The left seek non-violent resolutions to conflict situations through such organizations as the Evangelical Committee for Aid and Development (CEPAD), which cosponsored the founding of Witness for Peace (WFP) to oppose Contra and US government violence in Nicaragua.93 The organization JustLife campaigns for both justice and life, fighting poverty and proclaiming the sanctity of life against both abortion and nuclear arms.94 That Evangelicals have foreign policy interests does not render them efficacious in this area. Allen D. Hertzke has found liberal religious groups to be the most active and effective lobbyists on foreign policy, aid and international trade. Fundamentalists, by whom Hertzke means the NC, are not linked to international Church networks and so rely on connections they are able to make through their travels abroad. Evangelicals, among whom he includes ESA and JustLife, also have less access than do liberal groups to people around the world with information, and fewer agencies to represent the beneficiaries of their campaigns.95 With foreign policy, as with the other areas considered in this chapter, it is important to note both the diversity of Evangelical interests and the frequency with which these interests issue in internationally significant results.

Concluding reflections We have been contemplating whether Evangelicalism, as a global movement of religious resurgence, creates instability by asserting its particular identity in a global, multicultural and multifaith society. I have suggested that this matter be considered theologically, while also being addressed in other ways, and have also been concerned to illustrate the diversity of both Evangelicalism and religious resurgence. Questions about stability arise when religious movements inspire transnational commitment, attempt to impose their model for society nationally and internationally, or provide religious direction for foreign policy. Among Evangelicals, the right in America seem to be the greatest cause for concern in these respects. However, their transnational significance is less

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 45

great than their media profile suggests. At home they are beset by theological qualms about political involvement, and those who have resorted to violence have incurred division within their ranks.96 Moreover, since they regard the American political system as providing a better context for a Christian society than other possible alternatives, they are not seeking radical political reform. Their pro-democratic foreign policy interests are more tangible, though they are supportive of rather than formative for US foreign policy aims. The global nature of Evangelicalism lies in the success of its missionary endeavours. Evangelicalism is taking hold in places without an indigenous evangelical tradition. Evangelicals are imperialistic in that they interpret different belief-systems from their own perspective and believe that the optimum outcome for all peoples is for them to come to an Evangelical faith. They interpret the lives, practices and beliefs of all persons through their own religious perspective. ‘The God you wonder about is the God we know personally’, they are fond of reciting. They do not often talk of ‘dialogue’ without advocating ‘proclamation’97 or desiring that the Christian worldview penetrate other religious worldviews to ‘present a better and more attractive picture’.98 At the same time they are affected by encounters with diverse cultures and religions, and are aware that much missionary activity has undermined the identity of non-Christian peoples. The love of neighbour principle has been significant in other studies of the bearing of morality and religion on international relations. I have looked not at diplomacy but at how Evangelicals in pluralist environments view their fellow human beings. This seems the most sensible area to research when examining the potentially destabilizing effects of religious resurgence on world affairs. It enables us to ask what is entailed by an assertion of Evangelical identity within a multicultural, multifaith global community. No Evangelical relinquishes the ‘imperialism’ of the Christian perspective. Some believe that allegiance to Christ requires division and separation from those who appear to dishonour Christ and therefore fall beyond neighbourly concern – such as supporters of communist regimes, doctors who perform abortions, or Christians who forge the wrong theological alliances. Other Evangelicals affirm ‘the unique role of Jesus Christ in breaking down the barriers between different groups’.99 Hence they regard an assertion of their own faith not as divisive, but as alone able to effect true cohesion among peoples. How far this theological conviction translates into reality depends on Evangelicals achieving a truly non-separatist stance and an ability to convey their faith through genuine practical care.

46 Harriet A. Harris

Notes 11. Johnston and Sampson 1994. 12. Johnston and Sampson 1994, p. 316. Whether the Golden Rule addresses conduct only between individuals or is adequate for guiding the foreign policies of states is a long-standing debate, renewed by Kennan 1985/6, pp. 205–18. 13. Burnett 1994, pp. 301–2. Nevertheless, Vendley and Little 1994, pp. 306–15, urge religious communities to perform the essentially theological task of searching their traditions for teachings which promote peace. 14. Kepel 1994, p. 2. 15. Smith 1990, pp. 33– 44; Juergensmeyer 1993, p. 5. 16. Huntington 1993a, pp. 22–49. Cf. Robertson and Chirico 1985, pp. 219– 42. 17. Johnstone 1993, p. 10. 18. For in depth discussion see Harris 1998. 19. See Marshall 1992, pp. 7–24; Packer 1958, p. 29; Stott 1978, pp. 44 –6. 10. Haynes 1994, p. 109. 11. E. Dobson, once an associate of Jerry Falwell, describes his position as ‘new politicized fundamentalism’, in ‘The Bible, Politics, and Democracy’, in Neuhaus 1987, p. 3. 12. See especially Barr 1977; Marsden 1980. 13. Statement of the Consultation on World Evangelism, Pattaya, Thailand, 1980, quoted by Costas 1983, p. 2. The Evangelical left have been greatly influenced by Evangelicals from the two-thirds world such as Rene Padilla from Argentina, General Secretary of the Latin American Theological Fraternity. Leading figures in North America include Ronald J. Sider, director of Evangelicals for Social Action and author of Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger (Sider 1990), and Evangelicalism and Social Action (Sider 1993); and Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourners magazine and author of Agenda for Biblical People (Wallis 1976) and The Call to Conversion (Wallis 1981). In Britain the Evangelical left is represented by Third Way magazine, and views of like-minded Evangelicals from around the world are brought together through the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies. See n. 40 below. 14. Sider 1993, p. 99. 15. Johnstone 1993, p. 10. 16. Attempts to formulate a global theology or a global ethic in the interests of world peace include Ambler 1990; Braybrooke 1992; Küng 1993; Küng and Kuschel 1993; Küng 1996. 17. ‘Foreword’ to Martin 1990, p. vii; cf. Haynes 1994, pp. 15 and 44 –63; Cox 1996; Poewe 1994. 18. See Barr 1977, pp. 160ff, and 1984, pp. 118 and 148ff. For Evangelical selfcriticism see Noll 1994; Wells 1993. 19. Little and Smith 1988. 20. Smith 1992, pp. 489–506; Thomas 1995b, pp. 289–99. 21. Johnston and Sampson 1994; Sims 1981. 22. Notably an inter-religious Peace Council held its first meeting in November 1995 at Windsor Castle. Its work relates to the Multifaith and Multicultural Mediation Service which is currently being developed by the World Conference of Relation and Peace (WCRP) in cooperation with the Gandhi Foundation. The Conference (now Council) on Christian Approaches to Defence

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 47

23. 24. 25. 26. 27. 28.

29. 30.

31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37.

38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50.

and Disarmament (CCADD) was founded in London in 1961 by Christians from the United Kingdom, the United States of America and the Federal Republic of Germany. It has continued after the end of the cold war and is addressing among other issues the current role of Islam in the international scene. Luttwack 1994, p. 17. Rubin 1994, pp. 20 –34. Sandeen 1970; Weber 1987. Falwell 1980; Bruce 1988; Kepel 1994, pp. 100 –39; Leibman and Wuthnow 1983. Weber 1987, pp. 216–26. S. Maitland argues that neofundamentalists campaign on those elements which Victorian morality had privatized and domesticated and which the Utopian Left and feminism brought into the political or public sphere (Maitland 1992, pp. 26– 44, esp. p. 41). J. W. Skillen also comments on the generally moral rather than exclusively political and governmental concerns of the NCR, in Skillen 1990, pp. 37– 44. Skillen 1990, pp. 141–61. Harding 1994, pp. 57–78. For a discussion of changes in Falwell’s and Robertson’s positions see respectively Schultze 1993, pp. 490 –535, esp. p. 510; and Iannaccone 1993, pp. 342–66, esp. pp. 349, 363 n. 35. For a diverse range of Evangelical political positions see Neuhaus and Cromartie 1987; Noll 1994, pp. 221–8; Skillen 1990; Smith 1989. Carnell 1958, pp. 142–3. For a separatist fundamentalist critique of this development see Beale 1986, pp. 261–72. Henry 1947. Liebman 1983, pp. 75–86. Bediako 1983, p. 131. Cf. Bediako 1995. Sanneh 1993. Like Bediako, Sanneh judges Christianity to be a truly transcultural religion, by which he means that it can be translated linguistically and theologically without doing violence to the particularity of indigenous cultures. Sugden 1990, pp. 148–65, see especially p. 156; cf. the papers of ‘Mission in Plural Contexts’ (London: Consultation of Partnership in Mission, 1986). See Sugden 1990, pp. 148–65, esp. pp. 150 –1, 154 –5 and 159. Pinnock 1988, p. 157. Sutherland 1995, pp. 89–102. Newbiggin 1995, p. 166. Sugden 1990, p. 157. Hastings 1990, p. 240. Ramachandra 1996, p. 271. Sugden 1990; cf. Stott 1984, pp. 45–61; Nazir-Ali 1989, pp. 85–100. Beyer 1994; Garrett and Robertson 1991; Robertson 1989, pp. 10 –23; Robertson, R. 1992; Sahliyeh 1990; Swatos 1989. Lechner 1989, pp. 11–27; Beyer 1994, esp. pp. 1–5 and 160 –84; Haynes 1995, pp. 9, 18–20. Richmond 1994, pp. 202–3. Beale 1986, pp. 347–50.

48 Harriet A. Harris 51. 52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62.

63. 64.

65. 66. 67. 68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. 79. 80. 81. 82.

83. 84. 85.

Quoted in Schultze 1993, p. 504; cf. Bruce 1989, pp. 145–94. Beale 1986, p. 349. Schultze 1993, p. 504. Bruce 1993, pp. 50 –67. Rapoport 1993, pp. 429–61 and p. 446, citing Wilkinson 1980, esp. pp. 87–91 and 112. Bruce 1993, pp. 50 –67, esp. pp. 50 –1 and 57–8. See C. Wyatt in this volume, chapter 5, and Roberson 1988, pp. 85–108. Garvey 1993, pp. 28– 49. D. A. McGavran of the School of Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary in California, in Thomas et al. 1977, p. 146; cf. Falwell 1980; Walton 1975. Booth 1995, p. 381. Kaplan 1995, pp. 44 –95, esp. p. 52. The resort to violence by a minority of antiabortion campaigners, and the theological developments to justify this move, has been well chronicled by Kaplan 1996, pp. 128–63. Alsdurf and Alsdurf 1990. Capps cites mostly Evangelical examples in ‘Religion and Child Abuse: Perfect Together’ (Capps 1992, pp. 1–14). The suspicion with which other religious traditions view the western concept of human rights is due to the suggestion that individuals possess characteristics independently of the community or of God, and the corresponding de-emphasis upon duty and obligation. See Juergensmeyer 1993, p. 187. For similarity between religious traditions on human rights see Pollis and Schwab 1980; and Witte and van der Vyver 1996. Stott 1984, p. 143. Ferris 1993, pp. 43 and 44. As R. C. Kent found in interviewing Peter Searle of World Vision. See Kent 1987, pp. 164 and 172 n. 50. Samuel 1995, p. 29. Finn 1993, p. 62. Curry 1990, p. 66. Marshall 1984, p. 121; cf. Amstutz 1987; and Skillen 1981. Abrahamian 1992, p. 110. Haynes 1994, p. 4. Harris 1998, pp. 331–3; Bruce 1988, p. 175. Curry 1990, p. 67. Thomas 1995a, p. 22. Fuller 1996, p. 34. Skillen 1990, pp. 46–53. Sider 1987, p. 25, quoted in Skillen 1990, p. 144. ESA statement, quoted in Skillen 1990, p. 244, n. 14. Rusdoony 1973. See Skillen 1990, pp. 163–79. Postmillennialists believe that Christ is currently reigning on earth and that His reign will become more widespread until the eventual Second Coming. ‘Postmillennialism’, Calvinism Today 1/4 (1991) 24. North 1984, p. x. Iannaccone (1993) observes Reconstructionist theology filtering into the NCR and informing Pat Robertson’s position on economics (p. 349).

Theological Reflections: Protestant Evangelicalism 49 86. 87. 88. 89. 90. 91.

92. 93. 94.

95. 96. 97. 98. 99.

Haynes 1994, pp. 95–6, 117–21, 139– 44 and 153. Lindsey 1990. Halsell 1987, pp. 40 –50. Weber 1987, p. 218; Lindsey 1990, pp. 161–2; McCall 1976. Haynes 1994, p. 118. Especially ominous are signs that appear to fulfil their predictions of an Arab–African confederacy which will attack Israel. These fuel speculation over whether the European Community or the United Nations looks most like being the ten-nation revived Roman Empire which will offer Israel security and whose dictator will be the Antichrist. See Lindsey 1980; Dyer 1993; Graham 1992. Sider 1990, pp. 122–78, 217–59, and quotation p. 223. Sider 1988, pp. 41–54. There is no Evangelical consensus on matters of war or nuclear defence. I would describe majority Evangelical opinion today as situated between the left and the right, rejecting pacifism and conditionally accepting nuclear deterrence while supporting proposals to reduce the number of nuclear arms. For Evangelical debate see Barclay 1984; Kirk 1988; Sider and O’Donovan 1985. Hertzke 1988, pp. 111–15 and 155. Kaplan 1996. Anderson 1984, pp. 176–94; Goldsmith 1989, pp. 139–57. Stott (1984) prefers a tactic of ‘persuasion’ (pp. 50 –57). Nichols 1995, p. 22. Sugden 1990, p. 159.

3 Large-Scale Religious Change and World Politics K. R. Dark

Introduction This contribution has a simple purpose. It seeks to show that major religious changes are underway that will probably have profound implications for world politics. Few analysts of world politics or global history would doubt that religious change has played a central part in shaping the contemporary world. The emergence and maintenance of communities of religious believers – such as Christians, Jews, and Muslims – has been an important factor in the formation of states, empires and civilizations.1 Many of the most characteristic aspects of contemporary political systems, at least arguably, also derive from the distinctive religious heritage of different states, peoples and areas of the world.2 If one thinks of key contemporary European or North American political values, one might include individual liberty, the innate equality of all human beings at birth, liberal democracy, and human rights. All of these have been argued to derive from the Christian religious background of European and North American polities.3 These values are epitomized in the constitutions of such ‘secular’ states as the French Republic and the United States of America, not only in those polities where religious and political identities are formally linked. Thus, religion is not only a ubiquitous feature of human communities, but even permeates the politics of nominally ‘secular’ states. Given the recent emphasis placed by International Relations analysts on the role of perceptions and values in world politics, on these grounds alone religious change might be supposed to have world political consequences.4 This might be through altering the values and perceptions of interest groups or whole populations, or more directly in bringing about foreign policy derived from religious loyalties or beliefs.5 50

Religious Change and World Politics 51

However, there are many other ways in which religion affects world politics. Perceptions of religious community are able to create political linkages between polities, as in the case of medieval Christendom or among the twentieth-century Arab states. Religious organizations – such as churches or aid agencies – can play a directly political role, or religious believers can form transnational communities, relating political issues affecting people in one part of the world to people in another. Religious change might promote or decrease the part played by particular actors and lead to the formation, strengthening, or decline of interpolity and transnational political linkages. It can alter public or élite attitudes to governments, policies and values and it can change perceptions of other polities, communities and even whole regions of the globe. Consequently, religious change can make wars or political conflicts or, for that matter, peace and political cooperation, more or less likely. It can increase or reduce nationalist feeling, increase or decrease stability within a polity or region, and shift emphasis from regional to global concepts of concern. That is, large-scale religious change can, potentially, have large-scale impacts on world politics, but its consequences are extremely varied. Religious change can also affect international political economy in equally profound and varied ways.6 A very clear example is to be found in the decline of slavery as an economic institution in western Europe and North America.7 To summarize a much more complex process, one might outline the way in which this came about as follows. The spread of Christianity and its political consequences resulted in the reduction of slavery in the Roman world and former Roman empire in the first millennium AD, from being an economic mainstay to a socially marginal and minor aspect of the medieval economy. Although there was a return to large-scale slavery in the course of imperial expansion in the period after AD 1400, the end of western European (and North American) slavery did finally occur in the nineteenth century. However, when this occurred it was once again based – at least in large part – on Christian religious beliefs. As a result of the global reach of European imperial rule, the resulting abolition of slavery in Europe was enforced as a global norm. But societies which did not share this religious heritage frequently maintained, and even in a few cases still maintain, slavery as an institution. So, in a direct sense, changes in values based on religious grounds led directly to the end of slavery in western Europe and North America, and eventually more widely. The speed at which these changing religious values were able to be articulated into political action also shaped the temporality of the economic changes.

52 K. R. Dark

Consequently, there can be little doubt that religious change can play a central role in shaping both world politics and international political economy. However, it need not always be a force for the transformation of political, cultural and economic values and forms. Religious change can also have a conservative affect, acting to preserve political and economic forms under challenge or in decline elsewhere. For example, in immediately post-Roman Europe, while secular society collapsed, the establishment of the western European (Catholic) Church preserved the heritage of (secular) Classical culture and learning.8 The recovery of Classical culture and learning in the Renaissance was, itself, associated with religious change and contacts with the Byzantine world, where the Orthodox Church had played a central role in keeping this cultural heritage alive.9 If it was not for these religious factors, it is debatable whether western scholarship and science would have developed at all. It is, therefore, surprising that global and regional religious change has received relatively slight attention from scholars working in the academic field of International Relations. If religion played such a significant part in past world political and international economic changes, then it seems curious not to place emphasis on the role of religion and religious change in the study of current global political and economic change. This is also, of course, what recent political change in Africa, in eastern Europe, in the Middle East and in Asia would suggest.10 In each of these areas, religious change has been associated with – and, at least possibly, has been an important factor in bringing about – large-scale political changes with important regional and global consequences. It is, then, surprising that International Relations analysts have usually overlooked the part played by religion in global political change. The reasons for this scholarly omission may be complex. Partly, disciplinary traditions of focusing on military and economic factors alone may be to blame. So, too, may be academic assumptions about the relative role of religion in the past and present, in particular the so-called ‘secularization thesis’. The first of these problems, which pervades several aspects of International Relations, has been widely discussed and criticized in other contexts.11 The second problem, which is specific to the relationship between religious change and world politics, may deserve more detailed discussion here.12 The argument that secularization has eliminated the political or economic significance of religion is favoured by those scholars who concede the past relevance of religious change to world politics, but

Religious Change and World Politics 53

would like to consign the role of religion entirely to history. To such scholars the principal religious change in the twentieth century has been the decline of religion overall, especially in western Europe and North America.13 More specifically, they argue that the populations of North America and western Europe were very religious in the past, but ‘modernization’ has eradicated this.14 They assert, therefore, that religion is no longer a factor in world politics. This leaves proponents of this hypothesis with the problem that religion has recently played a very visible part in political and social transformation in – for instance – South Africa and Iran.15 This has usually been addressed by them with the assertion that secularization is a fate still awaiting such ‘non-Western’ societies as they modernize.16 These scholars claim that religion continues to affect the politics of those states they see as less ‘modernized’, usually due to ‘fundamentalism’ or ‘religious militancy’. However, this argument has several serious flaws which have so far remained insufficiently discussed, or perhaps even gone unnoticed. As we shall see, if it is countered, we can place the study of religious change more firmly in the mainstream of the analysis of world politics, and also recognize some far more interesting patterns linking global religious and political change than the growth of ‘fundamentalism’ alone.

‘The secular West’? If true, a large-scale and general decline of religion to the point of political, social and cultural insignificance would certainly represent the most important twentieth-century religious change affecting western Europe and North America. It would enable one to contrast the ‘secular West’ with other parts of the world. It would also enable us to claim that religion previously played more of a role in western European and North American politics in the past than it does today. So, it is useful to begin any discussion of global religious change and its political consequences by examining the claim that these areas are now fully ‘secularized’. This, of course, requires that we first define ‘secularization’. This is not an easy matter, as secularization means different things to different people. In this context it is generally taken to mean either that people are less religious than they once were (‘individual secularization’) or that societies are less religious than they once were (‘societal secularization’).17 In political terms we must, of course, include the possibilities that states and political parties are less aligned with religious views

54 K. R. Dark

than they once were (‘political secularization’), or adopt a nonreligious identity (‘state secularism’). There remains the question of how to evaluate whether or not contemporary western European and North American populations and states are more or less secularized (in any sense) than in the past. A very useful group of sources exist whereby the relative proportions of people belonging to religious groups and communities can be ascertained, because western Europeans and North Americans have long been generally willing to record their religious affiliation in censuses and other surveys.18 This material is particularly useful, as it is based on a high degree of religious self-identification rather than wholly on external classification. Moreover, in many cases, surveys have sought to go beyond superficial claims of identity, to discover detailed information regarding beliefs and values. So, our clearest evidence for whether individual or societal secularization has occurred is in the form of statistical surveys conducted by governments and by independent organizations. While there are the usual problems associated with using any such survey data, scholars have generally accepted that this material can be used to ascertain the relative proportions of different religious communities in western Europe and North America. Moreover, some surveys also give data about changes and variations in political, social and moral attitudes among these communities during the course of the twentieth century.19 We can use these survey data to test the proposition that western European and North American populations are individually or societally secularized at the end of the twentieth century and, if not, to understand what religious beliefs and values prevail. These data offer clear resolution to these questions. This evidence does not support the conclusion that the majority of people in any western European and North American state lack religious beliefs and affiliations.20 Instead, very high levels of religious belief and selfidentification with religious communities (for example, a particular Christian denomination) are shown in all western European and North American societies.21 In no western European or North American state do Christians in general represent less than a clear majority (that is, less than 60 per cent) of the total population.22 So, even counting only the Christian population (that is, without including members of other religious communities, such as Jews, Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs) it is clear from this evidence that these are not societies which have undergone dramatic individual secularization.23 This may be a surprise for those who have believed that such ‘Western’

Religious Change and World Politics 55

societies have become thoroughly secularized but, given its basis in self-identification and large-scale survey data, it is hard to argue against on normal academic grounds.24 For example, figures for (self-identifying) Christian believers provided by confidential survey data have recently been given in several statistical studies as between about 70–85 per cent for Britain, and for the USA above 90 per cent.25 Obviously, if one looked at levels of religious belief overall, the figures would be higher. Even allegedly clear cases of extensively secularized societies, such as France (where over 80 per cent of the population say they are Christians) and Spain (where over 85 per cent of the population say they are Christians), have similarly high self-identifying Christian majorities. Obviously, one cannot claim ‘social convention’ led to these figures and yet assert that society is largely secularized. If social conventions are the outcome of social circumstances, then a highly secularized society should lead more people to assert that they are less religious than is the case, not more so. This can be observed in the most secularized social environments in European and North American societies, as will be discussed shortly, but these are exceptional contexts. So, statistically, western European and North American societies in the 1990s were mostly comprised of people holding religious (and, in fact, usually Christian) beliefs. It is also clear that most of these populations are not comprised of merely nominal Christians. Some confusion regarding this may have arisen in the past from the relationship between most western European Christians and the professional clergy. For example, expectations regarding religious practice between clergy and lay believers seem to differ dramatically, particularly in relation to church attendance.26 Most western European Christians attend church rarely, if at all.27 So, estimations of commitment based on church attendance are deceptively lower than those based on other sources. But the faith of those self-identifying Christians who do not attend church is not nominal or traditional: questioned about their specific personal beliefs, these populations evidently do believe in the basic tenets of Christianity.28 This statistical evidence also suggests that many Christians in western Europe and North America differ drastically from the denominations with which they tend to align themselves over matters of morality regarding social issues, and even on – usually peripheral – theological issues.29 So, these self-defining Christian communities are comprised of Christian believers, more of whom participate in private religious practices (such as Bible reading or private prayer) than might

56 K. R. Dark

superficially be supposed.30 But they are characteristically not churchgoing, nor are they uncritical of the clerical establishment of those denominations with which they are associated.31 The latter points are especially significant when assessing individual and societal secularization in western Europe. Clearly, the low percentage of churchgoers should not be seen as an indication of a lack of religious conviction, nor – as the high instance of private prayer and Bible reading shows – of an unwillingness to practise their religion. The reasons for low levels of churchgoing may be much more complex. Obviously, aspects of contemporary lifestyles (such as work practices), disagreements with the Church establishment on non-theological matters, or divides between local clergy and lay believers over theology or practice, may also promote non-attendance.32 This also casts serious doubt on the one piece of apparently contradictory evidence. In these areas church attendance did fall between 1940 and 1990.33 Many churches did pass out of ecclesiastical use. But most of these churches were never anywhere near full, new churches have been built, and early twentieth-century figures for church attendance seem to have been exceptionally high compared to those for the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.34 To take the UK as an example: 1 per cent more British people went to church each week in 1992 than in 1840 – when, according to most supporters of the secularization thesis, the British were ‘more religious’.35 That is, even if we were to base our interpretation on church attendance (which we have already seen is an erroneous measure of religious belief and affiliation), the picture is not that of a once-religious society which then went into steep secularization. Much more convincing, historically, is the argument that very extensively and deeply Christianized western European societies, such as Britain, did not exhibit large-scale church attendance until the late nineteenth century.36 This culminated in a shortlived period of particularly visible public expressions of religiosity between 1900–30. This period also saw the construction of far more churches than could possibly have ever been filled, so that their obsolescence in the twentieth century was almost assured without taking religious factors into consideration at all. The fall in church attendance and disuse of churches in the later twentieth century is, then, no index of the rise and fall of public adherence to Christianity. Instead, it was simply a matter of changing religious practice rather than in patterns of belief, values or identity. There are more general points regarding both the secularization debate and religious change in general arising from this. Public expressions of

Religious Change and World Politics 57

religiosity are no index of popular beliefs and values. Values and practice may differ from what we would at first assume to be conventional patterns, and there may be major differences between the religious establishment and lay believers. It also shows that it may often be useful to differentiate between believers in a religion and the practising members of a religious community who participate in public religious activities.37 Ironically, a popular terminology for this contrast has existed among Christians in Britain for generations, differentiating between people who are ‘religious’ – who outwardly express (genuine, conventional, or socially expedient) religious adherence in terms of church attendance and other formal public religious activities – and the ‘God-fearing’.38 The latter are characterized by their genuine belief and personal aspiration to follow Christian religious teachings in their life, but who may never attend places of worship and may express scepticism about many outward displays of religiosity. So instead of assuming that religion has been in decline in these areas in the twentieth century, it seems much more sensible and academically respectable to take the rigorously collected statistical evidence at face value. The most straightforward conclusion from this is that western European and North American societies, including Britain and the USA, are predominantly comprised of people holding religious beliefs. Of course, large minorities of atheists, and even larger numbers of agnostics, exist in all of these societies, in some more than others.39 But agnostics may be more common than committed atheists, and may more or less strongly align themselves with religious beliefs at different points in their lives.40 Nowhere are committed atheists more than a very small minority in western European or North American populations.41 Atheism and agnosticism may be more common in some walks of life than others, perhaps facilitating unequal access to public policy-making or the media.42 But such access should not be confused with either an ability to change majority beliefs or a potential to lessen their effect on world politics. On the basis of this evidence, western Europe would, then, seem in the 1990s to have a substantially Christian, but somewhat freethinking population. But this is hardly new: an unwillingness to adhere strictly to ecclesiastical regulation has characterized western European Christianity since at least the late Roman period.43 Nor do a majority of western Europeans ever seem to have attended church services, although the majority of them have long held Christian religious beliefs. This looks more like solid evidence of religious continuity, rather than dramatic secularization.

58 K. R. Dark

It seems strange, therefore, that more scholars have not doubted the assumption that widespread secularization has occurred.44 The main objection one usually hears to any such doubt is the (clearly somewhat personalized) claim that statistical and historical data must present an incorrect picture as it does not match with the experience of the particular individual making the assertion. This ‘evidence’ is necessarily anecdotal and such arguments, if they have any weight whatsoever, may more likely relate to the way in which particular social groups in particular societies are more ‘secularized’ today than in the earlier decades. Some professional or social groups may include more or less religious believers than others, so might encourage both overestimates and, in other cases, underestimates of the extent of religious belief in the broader population. Particular viewpoints on issues such as religion, morality and society may tend one to particular circles of friends and acquaintances, and might prompt particular responses from those one meets. So this is not ‘evidence’ with sufficient weight to counter the statistical or historical data. In the case of personal experience, the sample of the total population is likely to be very small, very biased, and liable to much more contextual influence and ‘peer-pressure’ than are the statistical data so far discussed. Thus, far from being ‘secular’, the ‘West’ has a population comprised mostly of religious believers. In all contemporary western European and North American states the Christian community forms the majority of the population. Moreover, in all these ‘majority Christian’ societies there are also many other religions. Among the contemporary population of western Europe, for instance, one can find a wide range of religions represented: for example, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Hinduism.45 Consequently, a society with even 50 per cent of members of one religion – and in no western European or North American state are figures for Christianity anywhere near as low – surely has to have a majority of religious believers overall. It is hard to argue that such states are fully societally secularized, when so many people adhere to religious beliefs and values. If (as argued above) secularization has occurred in particular social groups within these societies, then they may produce secularized environments within otherwise unsecular societies. Greater access to the media and more input into the formation of intra-state policies by the most secularized groups may well have promoted societal secularization but, while some societal secularization has occurred, its extent is probably less than frequently assumed.

Religious Change and World Politics 59

So much for individual and societal secularization, but what of political secularization or state secularism? Of course, the USA and France are officially secular states, but in western Europe the role of the Christian Church is formally institutionalized within the structure of most states.46 Moreover, the role of the Christian Churches (especially Roman Catholicism) in concepts of European unification has been widely acknowledged.47 In Scandinavia, religious parties play a major part in political life and the Christian Democratic movement has been a dominant feature of politics in postwar Germany, Italy and several other western European states.48 Many states in the European Union formally have state religions, usually Protestant Christianity, or give substantial funding to one Christian denomination alone.49 Even in the USA, religious groups carry much political weight within the political system.50 Consequently, any claim that political secularization characterizes western Europe is hard to sustain. There is more evidence of political secularization in North America but, even there, this is not entirely the case.51 Moreover, the active European state funding of specific denominations belies the view that this is all no more than a redundant historical legacy. On academic data – rather than anecdote and speculation – western Europe and North America continue, therefore, to have majority Christian populations mostly living in (officially or de facto) Christian states. Of course, there has been some religious change in these areas through the twentieth century, as for centuries before.52 In particular, élites may be less inclined to legitimate their positions with reference to religion, perhaps due to the decline of monarchy, and religious diversity has increased over the previous century. However, the latter has mostly derived from migration and from shifts within the main religious groups inside each state (such as from one Christian denomination to another), not from dramatic secularization. In discussing the majority religious community, it is important not to overlook the existence of many other religions than Christianity in both western Europe and North America. They, too, can play a political role in these states, although none of these religious communities presents any prospect of becoming a majority in any western European or North American state.53 Nor is there any prospect of any North American or western European state actively favouring a non-Christian religion above all others, or adopting a non-Christian religious identity for the state itself. Conversely, religious diversity has long characterized many western European states, and, of course, North America. Most of the non-Christian religions in western Europe and North America have

60 K. R. Dark

been present in these areas for generations without winning (and in some cases without wanting) substantial numbers of converts outside the ethnic communities with which they have long been associated. The longest surviving of these minority religions is Judaism.54 In the modern period, Judaism has generally had no missionary ambitions and the proportion of the population identifying itself as Jewish has been dramatically declining in recent decades in many western European states, including Britain.55 Muslims comprise the numerically largest of the new religious minorities in western Europe and North America, but even Islam has not won large numbers of new believers.56 Apart from the non-orthodox Muslim sect, the ‘Nation of Islam’, it has remained a religion almost entirely held by those coming from a traditionally Muslim background.57 There is, then, much more evidence of religious continuity in western Europe and North America than there is of secularization or change in the majority religion. All the well-known preconceptions about a ‘secular’, ‘post-religious’ or ‘post-Christian’, ‘West’ are demonstrably false on normal academic grounds. These terms are simply unsupportable by evidence or logic, and all should be abandoned in all future discussions of this subject. Insofar as there has been religious change in these areas during the twentieth century, this has been in terms of a return of church attendance to early nineteenth century levels, shifts in allegiances and attitudes between different forms of Christianity, changes in the relative numbers of different religious minorities, a reduced inclination for élites to employ religious legitimation of their status (probably for constitutional rather than religious reasons), and a rise of religious diversity largely resulting from migration patterns.58 If we accept that religion is an important factor in contemporary western Europe and North America, then we need to look again at its role when discussing the policies and actions of western European and North American actors in world politics. Recognizing that the presumption of secularization has largely been illusory, even in these areas, we also need to ask what really are the main global religious changes currently underway, and how do they impact on international relations.

Large-scale religious change at the end of the twentieth century One way to answer these questions is to look at those religious changes affecting the largest number of people globally, on the grounds that

Religious Change and World Politics 61

these are likely to have the greatest effect on world politics. Of course, there are some exceptions to this rule, depending upon who those people are and especially on whether a religion commands majority support within a single state, as in Israel – the only majority Jewish state.59 However, as a broad generalization, the world political significance of a religion will be proportional to the number of adherents, if we assume that religion mainly acts on world politics principally through shaping individual beliefs, values and actions. Where changes occur affecting those religions with the greatest number of believers worldwide, it is possible to term these ‘large-scale religious changes’. One such change, the rise of ‘fundamentalism’, has been widely discussed by others and will not be examined further here.60 In the remainder of this contribution, several other large-scale changes will be highlighted: the global decline of state-sponsored atheism and of state secularism, the global growth of Christianity and Islam and the rise of religious diversity. It will be argued that these have profound implications for world politics.

The global decline of atheism The widespread official promotion of atheism by state governments occurred for the first time in the twentieth century. This was associated with the establishment of communist governments in Europe and elsewhere.61 Consequently, by far the most widespread religious change of the 1980s and 1990s has been the global decline of atheism, both as a belief system and a political force, in the course of the collapse of communist political systems. Surprisingly, given this close link between cold war politics and religious policy, the international politics of atheism have not been much discussed in International Relations, even by atheists writing about religion and world politics.62 Governments sponsoring atheism did not merely stress official indifference to religion but, in some cases, actively persecuted religious believers. This state-sponsored religious persecution appears to have had a destabilizing affect on internal order in many of these states, as in the former Soviet Union and in eastern Europe. The churches and other religious groups formed an important part of the political opposition to communist rule, and antireligious campaigns rapidly alienated the very low-status groups which communism claimed to champion.63 There seems some strength in the argument that this contributed to the collapse of communism in eastern Europe. This raises an interesting possibility with more general relevance to world politics. Perhaps religious persecution has a politically destabilizing

62 K. R. Dark

effect on those states which undertake it. If so, perhaps anti-religious campaigns contribute to state collapse through their promotion of dissent, the strengthening of alternative allegiances, and the delegitimation of government. Interestingly, atheist campaigns were most effective against traditional Chinese religions and Buddhism, whereas Christian, Jewish and Muslim communities not only survived these campaigns, but were among the most vocal of the political opposition to the governments as a consequence of them. This may, in part, be a consequence of the more transnational character of these religions, making opposition to them within any one state or bloc unsustainable. Another world political lesson might also be derived from this experience: polities which promoted state-sponsored atheism also persecuted not only religious believers but other sections of the public. Characteristically, human rights in general were held in far lower accord in such states than in neighbouring ‘western’ polities, and personal freedom restricted. This immediately gives lie to the claim that atheism promotes greater freedom and tolerance of difference than does religious belief. These states also show a striking correlation between state-sponsored atheism and mass murder by the state. Few scholars would doubt that the Stalinist USSR, Pol Pot’s Kampuchea, and the People’s Republic of China during the Cultural Revolution, were among the most murderous states of the twentieth century. While other states have pursued genocidal policies (most infamously, of course, Nazi Germany) no similar percentage of officially Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, or other religious states have (over the preceding millennium rather than in the twentieth century alone) undertaken such campaigns against their own citizens.64 Although the number of states and time period here are both limited, there seems, therefore, a clear association between state-sponsored atheism and intra-state oppression. The overall impression must be that any state which promotes atheism or anti-religious policies should be treated by its neighbours and its own citizens with great suspicion in future. The specificity of state-sponsored atheism to twentieth-century world politics also raises an intriguing possibility. Could the state promotion of atheism in the twentieth century be a response to specific and relatively shortlived historical circumstances? Clearly, the political rise and fall of Marxism is central here, but both the attraction of Marxism and atheism to governments may be linked to broader historical

Religious Change and World Politics 63

trends. One possibility is a correlation between atheism and the positivist and mechanistic mentality of late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century European industrialism, science and society. That is, perhaps atheism was itself a distinctively ‘Industrial Age’ belief-system, which – as the ‘Industrial Age’ slips into history – is also beginning to recede into history.65 So, state-sponsored atheism may appear to International Relations scholars of the future much in the same way as we would regard Classical Greek religion: associated with a particular time in global history, in specific societies. If so, the rise and fall of state-sponsored atheism may, then, be a clear example of the correlation between large-scale political and religious change. Not only did religious change accompany the establishment of such states, but it may have led to particular patterns of political behaviour by them, and have played a part in their internal instability and swift collapse. Here, large-scale religious change and large-scale political change may have been closely linked.

The decline of state secularism Another non-religious response to religion by state governments has been secularism. As we have seen, this must be differentiated from other forms of secularization and is not necessarily a consequence of them. Secular state governments can be defined as those which officially favour no religion, but officially tolerate all religions. Secular states need not be anti-religious, and might simply hold that religion and politics are to be separated, as in the USA. While this sounds equitable, in practice most – if not all – ‘secular’ states are much less impartial in relation to religion than one would suppose.66 Moreover, state secularism has different meanings in different states: state secularism in the USA, for example, has a very different form from that in Turkey or in India.67 This raises the issue of how, in practice, a secular state should relate to the religious communities living within it. This is, of course, a much more problematical issue if one religious community forms the majority of the state’s citizens. Moreover, while secularism need not have this effect, it has been used as a way of masking a state-sponsored religion. Thus, by no means all secular states actually pursue tolerant religious (or other) policies, and they generally favour one religion, or a few religions, over others. So, state secularism is a much more problematical concept – and usually not nearly as benign in practice – as might initially be supposed.68

64 K. R. Dark

Like state-sponsored atheism, state secularism largely emerged in the twentieth century – although a few secular states predate this century – and has been in rapid decline since the 1980s.69 Several already-secular states have been reassessing this position and new states are not usually adopting a secular model. Among the new republics to emerge from the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe, and in Central Asia and the Caucasus, arguably none has pursued effective state secularism.70 Instead, states characteristically choose to reassert their religious identities, or even build new nations around them. The apparent unpopularity of pursuing effective state secularism outside the few states in which it was established prior to the twentieth century (notably France and the USA) is due to many factors. It too, like state-sponsored atheism, may be seen as associated with characteristically ‘Industrial Age’ mentalities and worldviews, at present waning. Differing identities and values between the majority of the population and the government may prove major political difficulties in practice for the pursuit of secularism in some states, as in India.71 Even in the USA – where secularism would seem most successfully to have been enacted as state policy – the relationship between majority Christianity and state secularism was plainly somewhat uneasy at the end of the twentieth century.72 Far from being an obvious model for the relationship between the state and religious communities, the practice of state secularism has run into a number of serious obstacles. These, like religious persecution in atheist states, largely derive from the incompatibility of perceptions, values and attitudes between a state’s communities of religious believers and the values and attitudes of the official ideology. Such clashes of values and perceptions are clearly destabilizing to secular as well as atheist states, so that the most successful secular states are those where secularism is either a shared value between people and government or where an overwhelming majority of the population share a single religion. Yet, even in the latter, changes in religious perception can lead to secularism becoming incompatible with the majority religious perspective. Unless current trends are reversed, it appears increasingly unlikely that either state-sponsored atheism or state secularism will become the dominant model of state religious policy in the twenty-first century. The decline of state secularism suggests that many states have populations that are far from apathetic about religious issues. However if, in the future, states are likely to adopt identities built around the religion of the majority of their populations, this may make them more

Religious Change and World Politics 65

politically stable, but it raises the question of what are those majority religions likely to be, what are their likely relations, and how these religious majorities will relate to minority religious communities within the same states? This again emphasizes the global political significance of large-scale religious change, and highlights the significance of the next theme.

The global growth of Christianity and Islam Two religions have experienced extraordinary growth in the twentieth century: Christianity and Islam. Their believers now account for approximately half of humanity.73 By the 1990s Christianity was the religion of about 33 per cent of the world’s population. Christians are already by far the most populous religious group globally, and one of the two fastest growing religions. Currently, the Christian Church overall is growing at perhaps 2.3 per cent per annum worldwide. This is mostly due to converts, although growth rates in some denominations are far higher. For example, among Protestants in general, growth is probably at about 3.5 per cent, and among Evangelical Protestants it is perhaps 5.4 per cent. The Pentecostal Church is growing at around 8 per cent – the highest growth rate for any religious group worldwide. Not only Protestantism is growing, but also Orthodox Christianity, probably at 7 per cent in some parts of the world and around 3.3 per cent overall. This general growth in the number of Christians is differentially distributed geographically. For example, Christian religious resurgence following the collapse of communism has characterized the traditionally Christian areas of the former Soviet Union since the early 1990s and growth in Christianity is also especially visible in sub-Saharan Africa, East Asia and Oceania. It is slowest in the already heavily Christianized societies of western Europe and North America. Islam is also growing very rapidly and has increased from about 12.4 per cent of the world’s population in 1900 to slightly under 19.6 per cent in the 1990s. Although Islam is probably growing at 2.9 per cent, unlike growth in Christianity most of its increase during the twentieth century has been for demographic reasons. This is because birth rates and longevity in traditionally Islamic societies have increased dramatically. Again, this has not been evenly distributed around the globe, with the greatest growth in South East Asia, the Middle East and Africa north of the Sahara. The traditionally Islamic areas of Central Asia have also seen a growth of Islam since the collapse

66 K. R. Dark

of the Soviet Union. That is, where Christianity is growing fastest, Islam tends to be growing most slowly, while the opposite is also true. Because of its demographic basis, Islamic growth tends to be fastest in already Islamic states. Consequently, there are now more Christians and Muslims (both numerically and as percentages of the world’s population) than ever before. More states choose to express their identities in terms of these two religions than any other.74 The growth rates of both religions were exponential during the course of the twentieth century and do not seem to be slowing down, although demographic factors could well slow the rate of growth in Islam in future. Other religions have either failed to grow equivalently, or have declined as a consequence of this growth. In Oceania, for instance, local religious beliefs have declined very greatly as large numbers of former adherents convert to Christianity.75 In sub-Saharan Africa, Christianity has been rapidly gaining ground at the cost of local beliefs, and seems set to become the main religion of the population of a majority of sub-Saharan African states in the twenty-first century.76 Nor has state secularism slowed this growth: north of the Sahara, Islam has not only retained its hold on traditionally Islamic people, but begun to roll back state secularism, even against harsh opposition.77 Perhaps the most surprising changes occurring as part of these trends are in Asia.78 Until the late twentieth century, Christianity made slow progress outside the Philippines, but Islam was established in parts of South East and Central Asia. However, the last few decades have seen a very rapid growth of Christianity in East Asia, especially in China and in South Korea. In South East Asia, Christianity has also gained ground – especially in Singapore. During the post-Second War World period, Islam has consolidated its position in Indonesia and Malaysia and re-emerged as a national identifier for ethnic minorities in China. Again, we see both Christianity and Islam not only growing rapidly but in largely geographically exclusive areas. Again, while Christianity has been growing by winning converts, Islam has primarily grown demographically in traditionally Islamic communities. Distinct areas of Christian and Islamic growth do not merely comprise neighbouring states or regions but sometimes different parts of the same state. In Asia, this is easily seen in the People’s Republic of China. Most Muslims in China are in the west of the People’s Republic, whereas – although Christians tend to be more widespread in China regardless of ethnicity – Christianity is especially popular in the east and among the majority Han population.

Religious Change and World Politics 67

A similar situation of geographically distinct growth in Christianity and Islam prevails in the former Soviet Union and in formerly communist central and eastern Europe.79 There, a major religious transformation also seems to be underway in the form of a resurgence of religion in general. In traditionally Christian parts of this area, this has mostly taken the form of the widespread reassertion of traditional Orthodox and Roman Catholic Christianity, but there has also been an increase in the number of small religious minorities.80 Some degree of religious affiliation was probably held by the majority of the population throughout the communist period, but there is also an element of overall religious growth.81 In Russia, an especially significant aspect of this religious change has been the strong alignment between the Russian Orthodox Church and the state.82 This has led to the Orthodox Church regaining much of its former symbolic position in Russian identity and politics, although perhaps not much influence on party politics.83 Likewise, the Roman Catholic, Uniate and Orthodox Churches in Ukraine have experienced some degree of revival, both in terms of numbers of adherents and political position.84 This ‘reconstruction’ of Russia and Ukraine as specifically Christian polities has been a feature of the post-communist period, parallelled in both Armenia and Georgia. Islam has also been growing, but in the traditionally Islamic areas of Central Asia, and an identification between religious belief and political identity has been attempted there also.85 In Kazakhstan, ethnic diversity and the presence of large numbers of Christians has made this problematical. But elsewhere in Central Asia, especially in Uzbekistan and Tadjikistan, Islamic identity has been a mainstay of postcommunist political transformations.86 Likewise, in Chechnya, religious resurgence has formed one aspect of local political reassertion in Russian politics.87

The worldwide increase in religious diversity While the global growth of Christianity and Islam is widespread, this pattern of religious change is not found everywhere in the world. In western Europe and North America, as we have already seen, one of the main religious changes in the twentieth century has been an increase in religious diversity.88 This is also a more general trend worldwide, although in western Europe and North America it is offset by widespread religious continuity in states where dramatic religious change on the part of the majority of the population seems extremely unlikely.89

68 K. R. Dark

A similar pattern of increasing religious diversity is found in Japan.90 This cannot entirely be explained simply as largely a result of changing migration patterns, as in western Europe, because in Japan we can see the growth of religious minorities without large-scale migration. In this area, religious diversity appears to derive from increasing individualism and greater access to information about, and members of, other religions.91 What the North American, western European and Japanese examples have in common is that all may result from increasingly easy global communications, whether in terms of human mobility or information flows. Other examples of increasing religious diversity may also have similar causes. For instance, the growth of Protestantism in South and Central America is usually explained in terms of Protestant media broadcasts and missionary work from the USA.92 This has been occurring simultaneously with the migration of large number of Hispanic Americans to North America, again facilitated by the increasing ease of movement.93 Consequently, the division between a Protestant North and Roman Catholic South in the Americas seems to be breaking down. However, the growth of Evangelical Protestantism in North America may erode the traditional Roman Catholicism of the Hispanic immigrants as time progresses. So, perhaps it is equally likely that Protestantism will emerge in the twenty-first century as the main form of Christianity in the Americas overall. While this may suggest that religious convergence could be an eventual outcome of such processes, at present increased rates of communication have produced increased diversity. It appears, then, that in these cases greater ease of communications is promoting religious diversity. However, this diversity is largely occurring within the context of the other trends noted here, and as seen in the case of Japan, the growth of individualism may also play a significant role. This serves to erode traditional adherence to religions, enabling experimentation and the adoption of new beliefs. A link can, then, be made with the worldwide growth of Protestantism, as this is the form of Christianity which permits the greatest individualism and widest variation in personal beliefs and practices.94 The strongly individualistic character of Protestantism – in theology and practice – coincides well with the individualism evidenced in increasing religious diversity, while Protestants have been swift to employ worldwide communications and media for missionary purposes.95 So, perhaps the growth of Protestantism and the rise of religious diversity in many societies are outcomes (at least partly) of an increase in the wider

Religious Change and World Politics 69

assertion of individualism worldwide, the increased global flow of information, and the greater international mobility of people.

The world political implications of large-scale global religious change Obviously, here it is only possible to discuss a few of the most salient implications of these large-scale religious changes. However, these will, at least, be able to demonstrate the importance of examining the issue of religious change as a regular part of the mainstream analysis of world politics, rather than assigning it a relatively minor role or ignoring it altogether. In relation to the international politics of states, the implications of these changes are profound. The reassertion of religious identities by states (frequently in the face of increasing religious diversity), the collapse of state-sponsored atheism and the decline of state secularism, all suggest that religions will play a more prominent role in the politics of states, and perhaps inter-state systems, in the near future.96 This may be directly through the identification of states or other actors with religious viewpoints, or more subtly as religious values and beliefs affect policy, values, perceptions or actions. In relation to non-state actors, religious change may also have important implications: increasing allegiance to global religious communities may enhance the political role of religious organizations, both as transnational and intra-state actors. Moreover, transnational religious allegiances – especially to much more widespread and numerous Christian and Islamic religious communities – may supersede those to specific states, nations, or regions. If the coming decades see an increased significance attached to transnational identities, then religious loyalties are likely to be among the foremost allegiances enhanced. This may suggest that, whatever the fate of the inter-state system as it exists today, religious communities will be central to world politics in the twenty-first century. This highlights the relationship between these large-scale religious changes and globalization.97 If one sees globalization as accompanied both by the emergence of ‘transnational communities’ worldwide and ‘fragmentation’, then this is very similar to the pattern found in the trends discussed here. We can see the two already most ‘populous’ world religions are increasingly globalizing, but the diversity of belief and practice (including that inside those religions) is also intensifying. The latter is not exactly ‘fragmentation’ – because this is not usually splitting up religious groups – but rather ‘diversification’, a term which

70 K. R. Dark

might well be used more widely in relation to globalization in general.98 This, perhaps, more adequately grasps the character of contemporary political, economic and cultural change in general than does ‘fragmentation’. Another link between other forms of globalization and these patterns may be suggested by the role of information exchange and population movements in promoting religious change.99 Moreover, the association between religious beliefs and values and political attitudes may form a further link between religious and political globalization, or even between religious globalization and the global economy. In particular, the possible relationship between religious change and increasing individualism requires further study, as this may have important political and economic consequences for the future. The spread of Christianity through the winning of new converts, rather than demographics, is especially interesting in relation to the emergence of intensified worldwide information exchange. If the spread of this religion is partly linked to information exchange and communication, as it must be to win converts, then it may particularly benefit from increasing global information flows and increasingly rapid communications.100 Faster rates of communication and information processing might, therefore, speed up its growth rate still further. Moreover, the emergence of global media might also enhance the spread of Christianity, as may have been the case in the Protestantization of South and Central America. So, the growth of Christianity may be enhanced by the technologies and information networks accompanying globalization in general, and perhaps especially by the global media.101 In contrast, if Islam is largely growing as a result of demographics, it is unlikely to be affected in the same way by increasing rates of global communication. While local reactions to globalization might include an intensification of local religious allegiance (for example to Hinduism) it seems unlikely this will be in the form of widespread shifts to Islam.102 However, such intensification could explain the rise of both Christian and Islamic fundamentalism.103 Thus, the global growth of Christianity and Islam can be seen to be occurring to some extent in parallel with other forms of globalization, although there is no evidence that one is ‘causing’ the other.104 Rather, it is more plausible to suggest that religious, political, and economic globalization are all occurring both in a context of wide-ranging processes of change and according to separate reasons and causes specific to each.105 Globalization may promote the growth of Christianity,

Religious Change and World Politics 71

while enabling Islamic communities to be more dispersed worldwide. If so, this may add to the growth of religious diversity, enlarge minority religious communities of Christians and Muslims globally and lead to more societies where Muslims and Christians live side by side in substantial numbers. The global growth of Christianity and Islam, the intensification of religious allegiance and the rise of religious diversity are all likely to have profound political consequences for the future. If the potential world political significance of any religious change is (as a general rule) proportionate to the number of people affected, then these are clearly by far the most likely religions to have worldwide political effects in the twenty-first century. This is not to underestimate the potential political significance of other religions, but the role of these two religions is highlighted by their unequalled global growth. Whereas Judaism and Hinduism are likely to have a political role in relation to particular states and regions, Christianity and Islam are more likely to have a global role. Moreover, the growth of these religions is in largely geographically exclusive areas and due to different factors. Christianity and Islam can both encourage a strong sense of global religious identity and these religions are those most widely supported by states. This raises questions regarding the likely effects of these religions separately or in relation to each other in world politics, especially in those parts of the world where they are growing rapidly in the same states or neighbouring zones.

The world politics of Christianity and Islam Recently, some scholars have seen the global growth of Islam as almost inevitably leading towards violent conflict with other ‘civilizations’ and religious communities.106 They have particularly highlighted the possible role of Islamic ‘fundamentalism’ in promoting conflict, and of border areas between Christian and Muslim communities as potential zones of political or military confrontation.107 But throughout the history of the coexistence of Christianity and Islam, Christians and Muslims have frequently lived and worked together on friendly terms.108 Christian and Muslim states have been in political alliances, and traded with each other. Although there have been periods of Islamic religious war against Christians, and of Christian crusading against Islam, the ability of these two religious communities to live in close proximity peacefully is also well-attested in both global history and contemporary western European societies. Nor, of course, should

72 K. R. Dark

we forget the wide diversity of views encompassed within these two religious communities. Thus, violent conflict between Christians and Muslims in the future is not inevitable. But nor can it be denied that these religions have some central beliefs and values that are clearly incompatible with each other.109 Some of these differences could have important implications for world politics, because both Christianity and Islam have historically been associated with particular and differing perspectives on human rights, individualism, freedom, economic practice and liberal democracy.110 Whether or not such political differences derive from core aspects of the religions, these differences are highlighted in some forms of Christianity and Islam more than in others.111 Political differences can clearly be seen if we compare western European and North American states with Christian majorities, with those states with Muslim majorities.112 For example, fewer states with mostly Islamic populations have adopted liberal democracy in the ‘Western’ sense than is the case in North America and western Europe.113 Arguably, the Arabian peninsula contains no fully democratic state in this sense, and Egypt is the only multiparty democracy in Islamic North Africa.114 Outside the Arab world, in the Middle East perhaps only Turkey has liberal democratic institutions on the ‘Western’ model and a Muslim majority, but in the Turkish case this has been associated with state secularism.115 Consequently, while the Turkish example shows that an Islamic majority and liberal democracy are not incompatible, it is equally clear that far fewer states with mostly Islamic populations currently have democratic governments. Other shared political differences can be found between western European and North American states and those with Muslim majorities. In a recent overview of religion and international politics, it has been suggested that few states with Islamic majorities have free trade unions, almost all hold political prisoners and repress other religions and almost all do not allow freedom of speech.116 So, although political or military confrontation are not a necessary consequence of the growth of Christianity and Islam globally, the potential for conflicts of values between states with Islamic majorities and those of North America or western Europe must remain. If most states with Muslim majorities are more authoritarian and less tolerant of minorities at present than western European and North American states (as these data suggest), then this might also have political implications for minority religious communities within these states.

Religious Change and World Politics 73

The importance of these differences to world politics can only be enhanced by the unprecedented growth of these two religions worldwide. Were these rates to persist, around 54.2 per cent of the world’s population would be Christian by 2020, and 36.76 per cent of the population would be Muslim. Obviously, such high rates of growth are extremely unlikely to be maintained – 100 per cent of the global population would be either Christian or Muslim by 2050 if current rates continued! As this is highly unlikely, it seems more plausible that growth rates will slow for one or both religions. There seems no immediate likelihood of this, however, so that it seems probable that Christians and Muslims will account for much greater percentages of the world population by the mid-twenty-first century than previously. Relations between these two religions may, therefore, be central to the future of world politics. If political contrasts between Christian and Muslim states remain unresolved then potential flashpoints might – as some have argued – emerge where the two religious communities border each other or coexist in close proximity. However, this would perhaps be most likely to trigger intra-state rather than inter-state conflicts, although when more than 50 per cent of the world’s population is affiliated with these world religions, the implications of intra-state confrontation might well be global.117 Based on values subsumed into secular political ideologies, such conflicts need not be expressed, or even perceived in religious terms, but could have wide-ranging consequences. But it must be stressed that it would be a mistake to assume that such inter-state or intra-state conflicts are an unavoidable, or even the most likely, outcome of the global growth of Christianity and Islam. Political change within states with majority Islamic populations might as easily lessen these differences, and the ability of Christians and Muslims to live together peacefully as part of the same – or proximate – societies has already been noted. So, it would be rash to assume that it is necessarily more likely that a model of conflict rather than peaceful coexistence will be pursued by most Christians and Muslims in the future. It is easy – in highlighting situations in which particular groups of Christians or Muslims have persecuted, or waged war against, each other – to forget that both religions also include longstanding traditions of tolerance, albeit on differing bases.118 However, it is easy to focus on issues of conflict and confrontation such as these, and neglect the possible beneficial political consequences of religious growth. For example, global religious change may also be actively promoting values such as human rights, freedom and

74 K. R. Dark

democracy. If such values derive (even partly) from a Christian religious background, as others have argued, then the global rise of Christianity may make large numbers of people throughout the world newly favour such concepts.119 Likewise, if an attraction of Protestantism is its individualism, then this may promote individualism still more and encourage a concern for the individual in political and economic affairs also. An enhanced role for transnational religious concerns and organizations might also promote action to end persecution and other injustices, encourage famine relief and disaster relief programmes, precipitate conflict resolution and assist in enforcing human rights regimes and other international norms. This may stabilize otherwise crisistorn states and consolidate, or even introduce, concepts of personal freedom and of individual rights and responsibilities in societies and states where these have hitherto been scarce. It is at least arguable that these large-scale religious changes could, then, produce international political convergence on political values and institutions probably favoured by most scholars of world politics. Likewise, the promotion of these political views may further the growth of those religions most compatible with them, by attracting people already committed to similar values. In this way, the spread of concepts of liberal democracy, human rights and political and economic freedom may already be promoting the spread of Christianity.

Conclusion The issue of global religious change needs to be taken more seriously as a major factor in world political change, and discussed in broader terms than debates over the alleged ‘threat’ of ‘fundamentalism’ alone. One should not assume that the ‘West’ is any more ‘secular’ than any other part of the world, nor that state secularism will ‘take religion out of world politics’. Instead, state secularism and state-sponsored atheism seem unlikely to spread in the twenty-first century, and the latter may be entirely erased. The role of religion, especially of Christianity and Islam, is likely to be greater in the future of world politics than in the twentieth century. Large-scale religious change – especially the growth of these religions – may be occurring at a greater rate as global communication increases. Attempts to prevent this, through the oppression of religious communities, are likely to be both unsuccessful and to destabilize any state which undertakes them. Transnational religious communities are

Religious Change and World Politics 75

as likely to play a beneficial role in world politics as to be a source of conflict. These points highlight the need for much more work on large-scale religious change in International Relations. This remains almost entirely undiscussed beyond debates about ‘fundamentalism’ and the ‘clash of civilizations’. The positive aspects of religious change in general require far more attention, and in particular much more work is needed on the growth of Christianity and its implications. Conversely, the potential relationship between state-sponsored atheism, oppression and the practice of mass murder by the state requires more detailed investigation. Much more attention needs to be given also to the role of communication in relation to large-scale religious change, and this may form a link with recent work on long-term analysis in International Relations.120 Likewise, greater attention needs to be given to the remarkable longevity of religious communities compared with states and other political organizations and to the long-term study of religion and world political change. Hopefully, therefore, this chapter has indicated some future topics of research, and introduced some new themes and issues. However, as already remarked, it can be no more than a preliminary sketch of some possibilities in a more wide-ranging discussion of religious change and world politics than hitherto attempted.

Notes 1. For examples: Smith 1991a, ch. 3; Hastings 1997; Mowat 1991, p. 251; Parker 1993, pp. 72–3, 92–3 and 100–101. In my contributions to this book, the term ‘religious community’ refers to a group of people who can be identified as belonging to a specific religion. These communities encompass a wide diversity of beliefs, values and practices, so that they may be subdivided at other levels of analysis. 2. For example: de Gruchy 1996. This extends to many aspects of contemporary life, including science, for example see Harrison 1998. 3. For examples see de Gruchy 1996; Mowat 1991. 4. Ibid. Haynes 1998, chs. 2 and 4. 5. For examples of the differing ways in which religion and religious values can affect politics: Jelen and Wilcox 1998; Kiecolt and Hart 1988; Montefiore 1990; Smith 1996; Findaly 1998; de Gruchy 1985. 6. This has, of course, been the basis of the ongoing debate begun by the Weber Thesis. For an interesting recent discussion of the empirical evidence: Jones 1997. 7. Laub 1982; Turley 1991; Jennings 1997.

76 K. R. Dark 8. Riche 1976; Grant 1997. 9. The extent to which Classical culture survived in the Byzantine east can be debated, but it clearly did so more than in western Europe: Mango 1980, ch. 6. 10. For examples: Maley 1998; Haynes 1998; Johnson and Sampson 1994. 11. For example: Kegley 1995; Kratochwil 1993; Lebow 1994; Schroeder 1994. 12. This issue has been largely implicit in debates regarding the role of religion in world politics, with a few notable exceptions, including Haynes 1998. 13. For example: Wilson 1976; Hammond 1985; Smith 1974; Bruce 1992. 14. Smith 1974; Bruce 1992; Martin 1987; Wilson 1966. 15. Johnson 1994b; Maddy-Weitzman and Inbar 1997; Abrahamiam 1993; Graybill 1996. 16. See works cited in note 15 and Wilson 1985; Hadden and Schupe 1989; Dobbelaere 1981b. 17. This terminology is my own, although alternative ways of classifying secularization have been widely discussed. For example, see Dobbelaere 1981a; Tschannen 1991. Previous academic debates on the problems and nuances of discussing religion in society and politics are summarized in Haynes 1998, ch. 1, pp.1–19. 18. In this chapter, unless otherwise referenced, all statistics are based on: Kidron and Segal 1995; Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993. I have also made extensive use of the statistical data collected and collated in Johnstone 1993. While the latter is a non-academic work, compiled specifically for religious purposes (and, perhaps for this reason, often overlooked as a source for relevant data in academic discussions), the methodology and standards of data collection employed – described on pages 15–18 and 656–9 – satisfy normal scholarly criteria and cover an impressive breadth of possible informants. For the UK and USA see also: Jewell, Brook and Dowds (with Arendt) 1993; Finke and Stark 1992; Bruce 1995; Alton 1991; Brierley 1991; Davies, Watkins and Winter 1991. 19. Greeley 1992; Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993; Jewell, Brook, Dowds (with Arendt) 1993; Ashford and Timms 1992; Hoffman and Miller 1997. 20. Kidron and Segal 1995; Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993; Finke and Stark 1992; Bruce 1995; Alton 1991; Brierley 1991; Davies, Watkins and Winter 1991. 21. Ibid. Especially: Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993; Ashford and Timms 1992. 22. Ibid. 23. By this, I mean that most (much more than 50 per cent) people in all these societies retain Christian beliefs and values, even if some of these are at variance with the denominations to which they affiliate themselves. So that social customs and cultural values in these states are, as a whole, permeated by Christian values – even if other value-systems (such as capitalism) coexist with these. 24. One would, quite literally, have to argue that people did not themselves know their own religious beliefs. While some degree of ambiguity may be present, this seems far too arrogant and presumptive an attitude to be acceptable in an academic study. 25. Greeley 1992. Greeley’s figures for Britain, while in this order, may be too low, as other studies (such as Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993; Ashford and Timms 1992) have produced somewhat higher levels of Christian

Religious Change and World Politics 77

26. 27. 28.

29. 30. 31. 32.

33. 34. 35.

36. 37.

38.

39. 40. 41.

self-identification in the UK, ranging between 71–85 per cent. See also Kidron and Segal 1995; Finke and Stark 1992; Ashford and Timms 1992. Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993. See work cited in note 26. See work cited in note 26. For Britain see also Greeley 1992; Davie 1990a, 1990b. For additional evidence of the more-than-nominal religious beliefs of these non-churchgoing Christian populations in western Europe and North America: Baril and Mori 1991; Hay 1990. See works cited in note 28 and Hoffman and Miller 1997; Osmond 1993; Beter 1997; Ashford and Timms 1992. See works cited in note 29. See works cited in note 29. Clearly illustrated in the case of the Roman Catholic Church in the USA and Germany: Greeley 1990; D’Antonio, Davidson and Wallace 1989; Ostling 1996. Brown 1992. Gill 1993 effectively demolishes the existence of empty/disused churches as a basis for an argument for individual or societal secularization. Brown 1992. On p. 42, a graph shows church attendance at a little over 13 per cent in 1840, peaking at about 14.5 per cent in 1880 and then in 1900–20, the low point was 1940–60; similar data for Scotland show same trends but peak at c. 50 per cent in 1900, down to mid-19th century levels at around 30 per cent in the 1980s (p. 43). Recent (1992) figures suggest that weekly church attendance in the UK (excluding Northern Ireland) is currently at 13 per cent, with an additional 10 per cent attending once a month: Ashford and Timms 1992, p. 46. In other western European states weekly attendance varies between 10 per cent (in France) and 81 per cent (in the Republic of Ireland), with an average of 29 per cent: Ashford and Timms 1992, p. 46. Brown 1992; Virgin 1989; Finke and Stark 1986. Strangely, this point – often made by theologians and students of religious affairs – seems to have been largely omitted from discussions of secularization, perhaps because it is almost unquantifiable. See Kidron and Segal 1995. Survey evidence may support the view that some of those listed as having no religious affiliation or as agnostics, may in fact be Christian believers: Greeley 1992; Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993. There seems some possibility that some respondents are confused as to the meaning of questions or terms (for example ‘agnostic’) used. As a Londoner, I can confirm that this terminology has been in use throughout my own lifetime (and remains in use) at least in inner South London, and was a classification well-known to my grandparents’ generation of Londoners (born c. 1880s/ 1890s). Greeley 1992; Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993. This is clearly illustrated by the works cited in note 39. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 40–41, summarizes the data. From this, it is clear that in 1993 (outside Cuba, the People’s Republic of China and South Korea, where Marxist governments were still in place) only in Uruguay and the Netherlands more than 30 per cent of the population failed to align themselves with a religious community. ‘Committed atheists’ were

78 K. R. Dark

42.

43. 44.

45.

46. 47. 48.

49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55.

56. 57. 58.

recorded by Humanist organizations at more than 5 per cent only in Germany, Hungary, Hong Kong, the Netherlands, Sweden, Uruguay and the remaining Communist states. Only in North Korea and Albania were there more than 15 per cent committed atheists according to this data, while in most states the figure is below 0.1 per cent. Clearly illustrated by a recent survey on religious and ‘mystical’ beliefs among academics: Patel 1998, where religious belief would seem at much lower levels in some fields than among the general population. Obviously, this might well have influenced some scholars perception of ‘secularization’. R. Runcie (lecture at University of Cambridge 1986) pointed out a similar tendency for British journalism to be affected by the wider prevalence of agnosticism and atheism in that profession than among their readership, and so present a more secularized perspective on contemporary societies and events than that of their readers. For example Herrin 1987. In sociology, the secularization thesis has, in fact, been under increasing scholarly attack and prompted various attempts at defence, mostly from sociologists: Lechner 1991; Tschannen 1992; Wallis and Bruce 1991; Yamane 1997. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 22–3. See also Kepel 1997; McCloud 1995; Nonneman, Niblock and Szajkowski 1991. It is important to recognize that the religious beliefs and practices imported into western Europe and North America during the twentieth century may also be changing. This has been recently identified among Asian communities and in relation to Asian religions: Knott 1992; Hardy 1984. Madeley 1991; Berger 1982; Remond 1997; Whyte 1981; Audi and Wolsterstorff 1997. Lamberts 1997; Zeller 1991; Jansen 1991. For Catholicism and politics more generally, see Schmitt 1997; note also Schuman 1963, p. 56. For instance: Kalyvas 1998a; Papini 1996; Hanley 1994; Fogarty 1957; Rauch 1972; Lynch 1993; Pridham 1977; Mayeur 1980; Clemens 1989. For the background: Kalyvas 1996; Conway 1997. Compare Kidron and Segal 1995, pp 110–11 and O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 22–3 and 56–7. Hertztke 1988; Neuhaus 1986; Wald 1987. For a brief, but poignant, statement of the contemporary political significance of religion: Elliot with Power 1996, p. 2. For example: Parsons 1988; Lipman 1990. Heath, Taylor and Toka 1993. Shahak 1997. Klein 1996; Lipman 1990; Waterman and Kosmin 1986; Cudrey 1987; Cohen-Sherbok 1991. These changes have been occurring simultaneously with new efforts at understanding and cooperation between Christians and Jews: Braybrooke 1990. Nielson 1992. Gardell 1996. For example, the main growth in religions other than Christianity and Judaism in the UK has been as a result of mass migration from the Asian subcontinent and from Africa (especially the expulsion of African Asians

Religious Change and World Politics 79

59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64.

65. 66. 67.

68.

69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. 79. 80. 81. 82. 83.

from Uganda). Islam, Hinduism, Sikhism and Buddhism have made a negligible number of converts in Britain. An interesting discussion of the relationship between Judaism and the state of Israel is Cohen-Sherbok 1992. For examples, see Marty and Appleby 1993; Cohen 1991; Fuller and Lesser 1995; Piscatori 1991; Esposito 1997. Haynes 1998, ch. 5; Bociurkiw and Strong 1975; Evans 1994; Ellis 1986. For instance, in Haynes 1998, Haynes says he is a religious nonbeliever (2, n.1) but does not discuss atheism in any detail in the following text! Weigel 1993b; Bordeaux 1992; Goekel 1990; Pungur 1993. Of the remaining genocidal states of the twentieth century, it may be relevant that Nazi Germany or Fascist Italy also opposed the two main religions found within their borders: Christianity and Judaism. See Mowat 1991, especially pp. 162–5 and 320. On the twentieth and twenty-first centuries as transformative periods in global history: Dark 1998, ch. 7. Juergensmeyer 1993; Robbins and Robertson 1987; Casanova 1994. For examples: Hertztke 1988; Neuhaus 1986; Ilesanmi 1995; O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 56–7, 58–9 and 62–3. See also Ram-Prasad, this volume Chapter 7; Wald 1987. That is to say, one should not assume that state secularism is intrinsically preferable to the identification of a state with a specific religion, if the latter is accompanied by effective religious tolerance and the protection of minority rights. State secularism can easily be (and has been) the basis for political oppression, antidemocratic politics and the denial of human rights, and it remains an open question as to whether any secular government could be entirely neutral in relation to religious issues and religious communities. Thus, political analysis should not assume its intrinsic merit as an a priori ‘fact’, rather this is a topic worthy of much more investigation and critical evaluation. Berger 1996/7; Westerlund 1996. Michel 1991; Swatos 1994; Ro’i 1995; Akiner 1996. Kramer 1996; Berkes 1998; Power 1997. For India, see Copley 1993; Hellman 1996; Mitra 1991 and Ram-Prasad, this volume, Chapter 7. Coleman 1996. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 16–17, 22–3 and 56–7. Compare O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 56–7 with 22–3. Swain and Trompf 1995. See also: O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 32–3 and 18–19. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 22–3. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 22–3. The following account is based on Dark, this volume, Chapter 8. Michel 1991; Gautier 1997; Vorontsova and Filatov 1994; Babiuch 1994. Luxmoore 1997; Luxmoore 1995; Swatos 1994. For an example of one minority religious group in this area: Ross 1995. Ware 1983; Ramet 1988; Pazukhin 1995; Borciurkiw 1990. Smith 1997; Parland 1996. White, McAllister and Kryshtanovskaya 1994; White and McAllister 1997. Although the relative lack of ‘domestic’ political influence must be set in

80 K. R. Dark

84. 85. 86. 87. 88.

89.

90. 91. 92. 93. 94. 95. 96.

the context of the re-emergence of a sense of shared officially sponsored Orthodox Christian religious identity among states in eastern and south eastern Europe since the collapse of Communism, and its possible political consequences. For example, see Usher 1997; Prodromou 1996; Yannaras 1992. This has also led to the reassertion of longstanding rivalry between the patriarchates of Constantinople and Moscow for leadership among the Orthodox community: Keleher 1997; Meyendorff 1996. Hank 1992, 1993. Aboulmagd 1992; Troyansky 1991; Akiner 1989. Poliakov 1992; Akiner 1997; Barylski 1994. Tishkov 1997. Diversification has taken place in several ways: variation within longestablished major religious communities, as a result of migration patterns and demographic factors, and in the growth of small religious minorities (‘sects’). The diversity of practice found among those identifying themselves as belonging to the major Christian denominations could also be interpreted in this way. Thus, for example, Protestants who attend church regularly, pray regularly but do not attend, or do neither of these but nevertheless believe, could be seen as distinctive forms of diversifying religious practice rather than degrees of ‘commitment’ to their religion. Particularly interesting in relation to western Europe and North America is the concept that religious belief is increasingly a matter of private choice (‘privatized’) rather than tradition or communal allegience – as a consequence of globalization: Beyer 1990. While privatization may be a misleading term for this process – family beliefs and practices would still seem to play a major role – a greater individualism seems evidenced. This might itself be explained as a consequence of the spread of Protestant Christian concepts of individual belief and responsibility, through the globalization of ‘western’ values. Also, note, such ‘privatization’ of belief does not imply the lessening of the political significance of religious belief or organizations, as values and perceptions can still affect political decisions or policies. For an important recent demonstration of the correlation between religious belief and political/social values: Jones 1997. Nor are ‘secularization’ and ‘privatization’ of religious beliefs at all the same thing (contra Haynes 1998, where both these latter points are asserted). For instance, privatization might well be associated with an intensification of personal religious commitment, while communal forms of religious adherence could be simply customary. See also Ester, Halman and Du Moor 1993. Dark, this volume, Chapter 8. Dark 1998, pp. 133–6. Lynch 1991; Stoll 1990; Stoll and Burnett 1993. Dark with Harris 1996, ch.2. For the growth of perhaps a more analogous, and more ‘Protestant’, form of Orthodox Christianity in Russia, see Meek 1997. Dark 1998, pp. 133–6. For an interesting example of the increasing role for religious organizations as providers of social care and the relief of poverty as welfare states contract: Cohen 1997. For additional discussions of the international dimension: Robertson 1991a; Ramet and Treadgold 1995.

Religious Change and World Politics 81 97.

98. 99. 100. 101.

102.

103.

104.

105. 106. 107. 108. 109.

110.

111.

112.

The study of the globalization of religion in the contemporary world has been pioneered by R. Robertson and P. Beyer. For examples of their work on this theme, see Robertson, R. 1987, 1989, 1991b, 1992; Robertson and Chirico 1985; Beyer 1994. See also Casanova 1997; Simpson 1991. Dark 1998, pp. 226. Dark 1998, ch. 4. Dark 1998, pp. 133–6. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 48–9, who note that Christian media broadcasts reached 260 states in 1993 compared with 120 reached by Islamic broadcasts. Bahá’í, Buddhist and Hindu broadcasts combined reached only 120 states. See also Negrine and Papathanassopoulos 1990; Reeves 1993. Such reactions might account for an intensification of religious conservatism, for example in parts of the Islamic world, India and in the USA, as communities reassert traditional values in the face of increasing rates of change and information-flows, and increasing diversity. A possible consequence of this is an increased emphasis on the regional or ethnic associations of some religious beliefs, perhaps including Hinduism, Sikhism and Judaism. This is distinct from the argument that fundamentalism is a reaction to ‘modernity’, as proposed by Meyer 1989, and Lawrence 1990. On that point of view, see Hallencreutz and Westerlund 1996. In particular, it is noteworthy that economic change cannot be held responsible for religious or cultural change. See K. R. Dark, ‘The Myth of Economic Determinism in Global History and World Politics’, in M. Casson and A. Godley (eds), Culture and Economic Growth, Berlin (forthcoming). Dark 1998. Classically: Huntington 1996. For alternative views: Gray 1998; Salamé 1993. Huntington ibid.; Nielsen 1997. Courbage and Fargues 1997; Ye’or 1985; Watt 1991. Difference in beliefs and/or values is, of course, intrinsic in any two different religions. Such differences need not, in every case, have different political outcomes nor lead inexorably to intolerance. The issue is usually one of the political expression of these values: how believers in these religions base political policies on them. Obviously, this can (but need not) lead to political conflict arising from contrasting values. For an example of the differing political expression of similar religious values, compare differing political consequences of Roman Catholicism: Roberts 1998; Kalyvas 1998b; Fleet and Smith 1997. de Gruchy 1996; Song 1997; Witte 1993; Abdulaziz, Little and Kelsey 1988; Little 1988; Dalacoura 1998; Iqbal 1986. For an example relating to foreign policy: Nair 1997. Farsoun and Mayshayeki 1990; Saveed 1994; Kedourie 1980; Eickelmann and Piscatori 1996; Amir 1988; Menashari 1990; Ahmed and Dornan 1994. This is clearly mapped in O’Brien and Palmer 1993. See also Salamé 1994.

82 K. R. Dark 113. Esposito and Voll 1996; Kedourie 1994; Kramer 1997; O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 74–5. Kidron and Segal 1995, pp. 46–7, 62–3, 78–8, 98–9, 111–12 and 114–15. 114. Compare: O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 16–17, 22–3, 56–7 with Kidron and Segal 1995 pp. 78–9. 115. Power 1997; Lovatt 1997; Yavuz 1996. 116. Hussein 1991; Dalacoura 1998; Little 1988; Kelsay and Twiss 1994. For a summary, compare: O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 16–17, 22–3, 56–7 with Kidron and Segal 1995, pp. 46–7, 62–3, 78–8, 98–9, 111–12 and 114–15. 117. For recent examples, see: Keating 1998; Maley 1998; Deng 1998; Haafkens 1991; Cederroth 1996; Malcolm 1998; Rubin 1991. However, note that clashes of values can occur within a single religious community, as in the majority Islamic states of north Africa: Samut 1994; Burgat 1993. 118. For Christian relations with other religions, including Islam, see Cox 1989; Anderson 1984; D’Costa 1985, 1986; Küng 1995. 119. The growth of Christian missionary activity has been associated with the expansion of the extensive activities of Christian charitable and aid organizations, also promoting these values: O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 44–5, 48–9 and 50–51. By contrast, Islamic charitable work is concentrated in existing Muslim states, and so unlikely to consolidate missionary activity: O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 52–3. 120. For a discussion of long-term processes in world politics, see Dark 1998.

4 The Churches and the Conflict in Former Yugoslavia Peter Palmer

Observers of the violent collapse of Yugoslavia frequently chastised the Churches,1 accusing them of identifying too closely with the war aims of their respective nations, of failing to speak out loudly enough against aggression and atrocities committed by their peoples, and even of fanning the flames of the conflict. Apart from any direct connections with the war, the Churches were also accused more broadly of deepening divisions which existed in Yugoslavia, and thus contributing to a climate which led to war. Such criticism is unsurprising in a region where national identity and religious affiliation correspond closely. In a region where people of different faiths, but who speak the same language, live alongside each other, religious affiliation has been closely connected with ethnic differentiation. With few exceptions Croats are Catholic and Serbs are Orthodox. The quality and the degree of the connection between religious affiliation and national identity have been much disputed. Certainly in the modern Balkans one does not have to look very hard to find statements which clearly suggest an explicit link. But that is not the same as saying that national identity derives principally from religious affiliation. Some writers do see religious affiliation as being a defining factor of differentiation in the Balkans, as the key badge of identity, while the Churches are described as having been the guardians of the distinctive cultures and heritages of the peoples of the region during centuries of foreign domination in the Hapsburg and Ottoman empires.2 One writer has suggested that the coalescence of religious and ethnic identity is so close that it is ‘mandatory’ to apply the word ‘ethnoreligious’.3 But other factors have played a crucial role in the formation of the national identities of the Balkan peoples. Paschalis Kitromilides is 83

84 Peter Palmer

correct to dispute the notion that Orthodox tradition is centred on the concept of the nation, and that the Orthodox Church played a major role in guiding the national awakenings of the nineteenth century.4 He sees nation-building as having been closely linked with the formation and development of nation states in the modern era. He points out that the Orthodox Church in the Balkans resisted the modernizing trends associated with nationalism in the nineteenth century, and that the Serbian bishops vehemently opposed the linguistic reforms of Vuk Karadzic´ which were crucial in defining a modern secular Serbian identity. But, Kitromilides acknowledges, the new states in the Balkans sought legitimization partly through the proclamation of national Churches, and there was thus a nationalization of the Orthodox Church in the region. But this nationalization represented a radical departure from the ecumenical religious tradition of Orthodoxy, and it followed the advent of the nation state.5 Neither was the Catholic Church in Croatia a key factor in the national awakening of the nineteenth century, which was centred on linguistic issues and historical memory, built around the notion of a legal continuity with the medieval Croatian kingdom, upon which basis the theory of Croatian ‘state right’ was elaborated. Having accepted that the nationalization of the Churches in the Balkans is a feature of the modern era, one must allow that there is indeed a powerful identification between the Churches in the region and the nations and their national aspirations. One very often hears from Church leaders (Orthodox and Catholic) in former Yugoslavia that the Church must stand with its people. Clearly this can very easily translate into identification with the national state of that people, and sometimes even with that state’s political goals. There is a tradition in both Croatian Catholicism and Serbian Orthodoxy to interpret national history as a history of the ‘martyrdom’ or ‘Golgotha’ of the respective nation. In this use of religious terminology can be seen a tendency to dedicate a particular nation to a religious faith. There is also a tradition of ascribing a historical role to one’s nation in the history of a particular confession. Thus, a nation is described as being at the frontier between faiths, and as acting as a guardian of that frontier. Finally, as national identities have been consolidated, religion could be a crucial element in a common shared culture of a nation in an area where different religions meet. This has been the case with both Serbs and Croats.6 Another important question connected with the close identification between Church and nation is whether the recent war has been a

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 85

religious war. Certainly religious imagery has often been exploited by the warring sides, and religious symbols have frequently been the targets of those who have sought to wipe out the evidence of the presence of other cultures in the territories they claim. The leaders of all the major religious communities in the region have hotly denied that it is a religious war, pointing out that the motives of those who hold responsibility for the war have nothing to do with religion, and claiming that they have been powerless to alter the actions of political and military leaders. Serbian Orthodox Bishop Lavrentije of Šabac has stressed that after half a century of atheistic communist rule, the people have been divided from the Church. No one, he says, went in the name of Christ to fight against Islam, and Orthodoxy has not been engaged in a fight against Catholicism. It was, he claimed, a civil war, and a war of atheists.7 Some have suggested that claims that the war was not religious are based on too narrow an interpretation of the social role of religion, and that the circumstances of the Balkans are such as to lend substantial religious traits to the warfare.8 However, religious symbols were worn by soldiers, not primarily due to their religious significance, but as signs of cultural belonging to a national community, while religious monuments were targeted principally out of a desire to wipe out all trace of a rival community from an area. The motivation has not been religious, and the vigorous condemnation by all religious leaders of any attempt to give the war a religious content cannot be dismissed.

The Roman Catholic Church in Croatia The Roman Catholic Church is a universal Church, not tied to any individual nation or state. However, in his encyclical Populorum Progressio, Pope Paul VI acknowledged that nationalism, in the sense of national pride and patriotism, can be positive, that it can play a constructive role in society. The Catholic Church in Croatia follows this spirit, seeing itself as having a historical role in protecting and nurturing the Croatian national identity. This has been made quite explicit, for example by the Archbishop of Zagreb, Cardinal Kuharic´ , in 1983, when he said that: ‘If anyone can speak of the history of the Croatian people, it is the Church which lives in their midst, and which has been present in all the centuries of this often difficult and painful history, so that this Church simply becomes the soul of that history.’9 The Catholic Church in Croatia has, however, been accused of going much further than this, of being a centre and a focus of extreme nationalism

86 Peter Palmer

and chauvinism in Croatia. Such accusations have particularly been connected with the stance adopted by the Church during the Second World War, when a Nazi puppet regime, led by the Croatian fascist Ustaše, sought to exterminate the Serbian, Jewish and Romany population on the territory allotted to them following the carve-up of Yugoslavia in April 1941. The Church’s accusers allege that the Church hierarchy was intimately involved with the Ustaša regime, that it approved of its policies of genocide and forced conversions of Orthodox Serbs to Catholicism, and that some among the lower clergy actually participated in atrocities against the Serbian population. Under communist rule, the Catholic Church was accused of continuing in the same vein after the war, as a centre of reactionary forces opposed to their revolution. Both the accusations regarding the wartime conduct of the clergy and alleged postwar subversive activities were particularly focused on the person of Archbishop (later Cardinal) Alojzije Stepinac of Zagreb. In the months following the war he strongly resisted the communist policy of undermining the position of the Catholic Church in Croatian society, and was, as a result, arrested in September 1946. Tried on various charges, including wartime collaboration with the Ustaša regime, responsibility for its campaign of forced conversions to Catholicism and postwar subversive activities against the new regime, he was sentenced to a long term in prison. The experience of the Catholic Church under communist rule is crucial to an understanding of its stance following the fall of Yugoslavia and the advent of Croatian independence. Historically, and in spite of the assertions of its critics, the Church in Croatia has had very little record of political involvement. But the communists, at the same time subjecting the Church to severe persecution and allowing it to continue as an independent institution, forced it into a role to which it was not accustomed, that of a national symbol, and a focus for frustrated national aspirations. In fact, many Catholic clergy and faithful had cooperated with and even joined the communist-led Partisan movement during the Second World War. However, the speed with which the communists reneged on their wartime promises to respect the Church once the war had finished, quickly led to disillusion among those who had hoped that perhaps an accommodation could be reached with a communist regime. In the postwar period the Catholic Church suffered severe repression. Hundreds of priests were arrested and executed, Church property was seized, the Catholic press was drastically curtailed, religious education was heavily restricted, and shrill press campaigns against the Church and the clergy were conducted in the communist press.

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 87

The Church vehemently denied the accusations levelled against it. As for Stepinac, if the intention of the communists had been in part to undermine the esteem in which he was held by the majority of the Croatian people, they failed badly. Rather, his popularity was enhanced, and in the minds of most Croats he was raised to the position of a national symbol of the injustices suffered by the Church and by Croatia. Far from accepting his wartime guilt, he was seen as a hero for his efforts to mitigate the effects of Ustaša terror, for condemning racist ideologies, for insisting that forced conversions were unacceptable and intervening wherever he could to help those who had fallen foul of the Ustaše. That Stepinac opposed communist rule was true, but few regarded that as a crime given their persecution of the Church and the harsh and violent nature of the regime in the immediate postwar period. No amount of propaganda could diminish the devotion of the majority of Croats towards him. The then Papal representative in Belgrade commented that Stepinac had entered the court as leader of the Church in Croatia, but had emerged a national hero.10 Thus a persecuted yet defiant Church, represented in particular by the person of Stepinac, was firmly established as a symbol of Croatia’s suffering and as a rallying point for disaffected Croatian nationalists. The communists feared the Catholic Church in Croatia. It was the only autonomous national institution. Believing that there was indeed a connection between religion and nationalism, they feared that the Church might use its position to reawaken exclusivist Croatian nationalism and the desire of many Croats for secession. The communist regime claimed to have solved the national question in Yugoslavia, but in fact only allowed the expression of national feelings within the very restricted framework which they provided. Thus national sentiments, and indeed nationalistic sentiments, that fell outside this framework were left to fester beneath the surface. Resentment in Croatia, the feeling that Croatia’s position in Yugoslavia was unjust, remained strong. As the only autonomous institution within Croatia, and the only one which most Croats could regard as being able legitimately to represent the Croatian people, the Catholic Church became the only possible focal point for Croatian nationalists. This was especially the case after the so-called ‘Croatian spring’, the ‘Maspok’ period at the beginning of the 1970s. During that period Croatian nationalists had alternative outlets through which to express their views, especially through the cultural organization, ‘Matica Hrvatska’, but also through the official media, to which they had access at this time. They could openly

88 Peter Palmer

engage in debate with Croatia’s communist rulers. However, when Tito suppressed all the manifestations of the ‘Croatian spring’, such outlets were again closed off to Croatian nationalists, who once again had to look to the Catholic Church as the only institution which could represent the values which they espoused. For many Croatian Catholics, who saw their Church restricted and persecuted, the very idea of Yugoslav unity came to be associated with the communist regime that was repressing them. After all, one of the chief slogans of the communists had, since the days of the Second World War, been the ‘brotherhood and unity’ of the Yugoslav peoples. For most Catholics, the idea of Yugoslavia itself – which had earlier enjoyed some support among some strands of Croatian Catholicism – came to be discredited during the post-Second World War decades. In the early 1980s relations between the Catholic Church and the communist state, which had for some time been relatively stable, deteriorated. The Stepinac case was brought up again, attacks upon his record reappeared in the media, and the Catholic Church was once again lambasted as a centre of reactionary forces. Cardinal Kuharic´ responded defensively, insisting that Stepinac, who had died in 1960, had been an example of dignity and courage for the Croatian people. It is uncertain why the authorities chose this time to resurrect the Stepinac case. The Catholic hierarchy was becoming more active. For example, it spoke out against the heavy-handed suppression of Albanian riots and demonstrations in Kosovo in 1981. It may be that the authorities were alarmed by the Polish example, where the Catholic Church had played a major role as a rallying point for opposition to the regime. However, in defending Stepinac, who was, as explained earlier, one of the most potent Croatian national symbols, Cardinal Kuharic´ was, in effect, making a nationalist appeal, whether that was his primary intention or not. Since the end of communist rule in Croatia in 1990, the Catholic clergy and hierarchy have identified strongly with the Croatian national cause. For them the allegation that their attitude deepened the divisions in Yugoslavia is more or less meaningless. With their focus always on Croatia and very rarely on Yugoslavia, the notion that the preservation of Yugoslavia might have been regarded positively, as the best available means of reconciling the conflicting national aspirations of its constituent peoples, was irrelevant. For them Croatia’s right to selfdetermination is unquestionable. Indeed, this had been clear much earlier. Referring to the conversion of the Croats to Christianity, Cardinal Kuharic´ had declared in 1979 that ‘the young Croatian nation

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 89

had the right to its own life, and the right to be free’.11 Thus the Catholic clergy and faithful were among the most enthusiastic supporters of Croatian independence in 1990 and 1991. The bishops expressed their support for independence in a ‘Letter from the Croatian bishops to the bishops of the whole world’, and in the declaration of the Bishops’ Conference held in October 1991.12 Similarly, there is no doubt in their minds that the war was caused by Serbian aggression, and that Croatia was justified in exercising its right to self-defence. Cardinal Kuharic´ has frequently made this plain, as when he said that ‘we have to objectively analyze the situation there is an aggressor and there is a victim.’13 Sometimes support for the Croatian war effort has gone further. Thus, Bishop Ante Juric´ of Split declared that ‘It is the duty of every Catholic to defend his fatherland actively. In a moment like this a false pacifism is indirectly strengthening the aggressors and the bandits.’14 Some members of the lower clergy were sometimes more strident. In 1991 and 1992 sermons in which the main theme was the defence of the Croat nation were common, with Serbs sometimes clearly identified with the cause of evil. In the early months of the war, when Croatia was gripped by something approaching hysteria, numerous demonstrations were held, during which rosaries were held alongside flags, and prayers and nationalist slogans, hymns and nationalist songs were mingled together. To the observer the modern connection between the Catholic Church and nationalism in Croatia was on open display. Criticisms of the stance of the Church in Croatia came from several quarters during the war. Representatives of the World Council of Churches and of the Conference of European Churches who tried to promote ecumenical relations between the Catholic Church in Croatia and the Serbian Orthodox Church complained that, while the Croatian bishops paid lipservice to the forms of ecumenism, their hearts were not in it. They were accused of footdragging, and their tendency to be privately dismissive, even contemptuous, of the Serbian Orthodox Church caused concern. It was widely reported that the Vatican encouraged the Church in Croatia to play a constructive role.15 No doubt Rome had in mind the damage which antagonism between the Churches in former Yugoslavia could do to wider ecumenical contacts with the Orthodox Church, if not checked. Croats were especially outraged by criticisms from an Italian clergyman which appeared in the Italian press in October 1993, that Croatian Catholics were not serious in their desire for peace, and that priests had, in their sermons, encouraged feelings of hatred and revenge.

90 Peter Palmer

Cardinal Kuharic´ made a strong protest to the Vatican Secretariat of State, rebutting the accusations.16 The usual defence was that the Church must stand with its people. But critics might with reason note the enthusiasm with which the Croatian Church stood with some of the more stridently nationalistic among its people. However, it has to be acknowledged that the public pronouncements of the Croatian bishops were, in general, in the spirit of the postSecond Vatican Council era. Far from condoning hatred or revenge, they called upon Croats not to sink to the depths of their enemies, and condemned all atrocities. Cardinal Kuharic´ condemned Croatian excesses against the Serbian population of Krajina during and after the Croatian offensive there in the summer of 1995, and called for Serbs who fled to be allowed to return.17 Public references to the Serbian Orthodox Church have been cautious, and Cardinal Kuharic´ spoke of the need to avoid offending the ‘Christian essence of Orthodoxy’. Meanwhile, the notion of an inherent link between Catholicism and Croat nationhood has been refuted.18 The bishops vigorously condemned Croatian policy in Bosnia when, in 1993, Croats and Bosniacs (Bosnian Moslems) were engaged in warfare there and it appeared that the intention of the Croatian government was to participate in carving up Bosnia at the expense of the Bosniacs. Cardinal Kuharic´ came into conflict with Bosnian Croat political leaders over this, while the Bosnian bishops condemned the destruction of mosques by Croats. In February 1996 the Bosnian Bishops’ Conference called for peace and mutual respect between the Catholic, Serbian Orthodox and Islamic communities.19 Thus, the picture during the war was mixed. The hierarchy was cautious in its public statements, while clearly and unambiguously supporting the national cause and enthusiastically welcoming the fall of Yugoslavia and the advent of Croatian independence; the clergy have engaged in ecumenical contacts, but without much conviction; they have condemned Croatian misdeeds, but usually defensively and accompanied by an insistence that the misdeeds of others have been much worse, appearing to offer some kind of excuse and weakening the condemnation of their own side. As to any thought that the Church might play a leading role in promoting reconciliation, this is dismissed. Indeed, Catholics tend to react defensively to such a suggestion, insisting that as it is the Serbs who are in the wrong, it is for them to take steps to make future reconciliation possible. Cardinal Kuharic´ explained that ecumenical contacts would not make progress until the Orthodox clergy accepted the existence of independent Croatia, and

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 91

Serbian priests in Croatia declared their loyalty to the Croatian state.20 So, Cardinal Kuharic´ not only chose to opt out of playing a leading role in promoting reconciliation, but clearly subordinated the interests of ecumenical relations to the interests of the Croatian state. Indeed, part of the reason why Croatian nationalists tend to be shy of moves towards reconciliation is that they fear that they mask an attempt to force them back into some sort of Yugoslav union.

The Serbian Orthodox Church In contrast to the Catholic Church, the Serbian Orthodox Church is a national Church, seeing itself as the ultimate protector of the Serbian identity, and identifying totally with the Serbian nation. Serbian Orthodox theology emphasizes an organic link between Church and people over history, seeing an identification of Church, people and land, existing in a kind of mystical union represented by the presence of monasteries. This identification has often been made quite explicit. So, for example, an article in the Church paper Vesnik described the Serbian Orthodox Church as an ‘inalienable element of the national identity, conscience and honour of the Serbian people’.21 The Serbian Church’s view of itself also stresses a history marked by particular suffering, constantly surrounded by enemies. This emphasis on the suffering of Church and people, especially the experience of the Second World War, has gone so far as to identify it with the suffering of Christ on the cross.22 This preoccupation with the suffering of the Serbian Church and people has to be seen in the light of the events of the Second World War, which were experienced as a terrible trauma, the wounds of which have yet to heal. The attempted extermination of the Serbian population of the wartime German puppet ‘Independent State of Croatia’, which comprised most of present-day Croatia, all of Bosnia, and a small part of Vojvodina, has been mentioned earlier in this paper. The policy included the slaughter of Serbs in death camps (as well as in or near the towns and villages where they lived), the expulsions of Serbs to German-occupied Serbia, and the forced conversions of Serbs to Catholicism. Serbian Orthodox Churches, monasteries and other buildings were looted and destroyed, and hundreds of priests were murdered or driven out. Three Serbian bishops were among those who were killed. This appalling toll has left a scar on the Serbian Orthodox Church, which colours its whole outlook. As a result, Serbian clergy tend to be extremely sensitive, seeing themselves as

92 Peter Palmer

struggling for their Christ and their people in a hostile and threatening world. Their trials continued after the War, as the Church and the clergy were repeatedly vilified in the media as centres of Great Serbian nationalist chauvinism, much as the Catholic Church was attacked as a centre of Croatian nationalism and ‘clero-fascism’ in Croatia. The communist regime could not tolerate the competition of an independent organization which had been accustomed to a central position in Serbian society and moved drastically to curtail the role of the Serbian Orthodox Church. Its property was confiscated, and its role in the education of the young severely restricted. The clergy were frequently harassed, sometimes arrested, and subjected to all manner of petty indignities. In addition, the communist authorities moved to divide the Orthodox Church within itself, encouraging the formation of a separate Macedonian Orthodox Church and encouraging the lower clergy to set up priests’ associations in defiance of the Church hierarchy. By all these measures the communists sought to diminish the standing and influence of the Church. However, in spite of all these attacks, the Serbian Orthodox Church did not become a focus of opposition or of nationalism within the Serbian community as the Catholic Church did become among the Croats. When nationalism was reawakened in Serbia in the 1980s, it was Serbian intellectuals who provided the focus, particularly in the Serbian Academy of Arts and Sciences. It seems that the Orthodox Church was a much weaker institution in Serbian society than the Catholic Church has proved to be in Croatia, and that it has not been able to maintain its influence over its potential flock in the way that the Catholic Church in Croatia has. Religiosity is much lower among the Serbs than it is among the Croats. One major difference was that the Catholic Church showed much imagination in getting around the restrictions placed upon religious education, while most of Serbia’s young people have, during the period of communist rule, had little or no introduction to Orthodox beliefs. The situation has, however, changed markedly in recent years. When he took power in Serbia in 1987, Slobodan Miloševic´ discarded the by then discredited communist ideology as a basis for the legitimation of the regime, and instead turned back to the more traditional and more persuasive sources of legitimacy to be found in the appeal to nationalism. As a traditionally crucial element in the Serbian national identity, the Orthodox Church has gone a long way towards retrieving its position of respect. Orthodox festivals have been publicly celebrated,

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 93

church attendance has risen, and, as a symbol of this renewal, building of the enormous cathedral of St Sava, Serbia’s patron saint, proceeded in Belgrade. Many were critical of the easy relationship which the Church appeared to establish with the Miloševic´ regime in the late 1980s, pointing to an empathy between a nationalistic regime and a nationalistic Church. The Church was adopting an assertive stance in defence of national interests even before the start of the war, especially over Kosovo. Kosovo, a land dotted with some of the finest medieval Serbian monasteries, seen as Serbia’s cultural cradle, where medieval Serbia was defeated by the Turks in a battle since infused with religious significance, has a special place for Serbian Orthodoxy. Since the Albanian riots there in 1981 the Church has sought to place itself at the forefront of those calling for the defence of Serbs in this Albanian majority province. In the wars which accompanied the dissolution of Yugoslavia the Serbian Orthodox Church has identified very strongly with the Serbian cause. For a Church which identifies itself so closely with the nation to which it belongs, and which shares the national aspirations of that nation so totally, it would have been inconceivable for it to do other than to commit itself to the national cause for which its people was struggling. The unity of the Serbian people in a single state has long been the most important Serbian national goal, and it is an aspiration which the Church holds particularly dear. The prospect of the Serbian people being divided up among the newly independent former federal units of Yugoslavia was thus something to which the Serbian Church could not easily adapt. Its objection was heightened by the fact that Serbs in the regions of Croatia where such horrors were inflicted upon the Serbian population by the Ustaše during the Second World War, would once again find themselves under the rule of a strongly nationalistic Croatian regime which, moreover, had revived many symbols which the Serbs inevitably associated with the Ustaša period. As for Bosnia, the prospect of the Serbs coming under the rule of a coalition of Croats and Bosniacs was no less disturbing. Thus, in almost all cases, the hierarchy, clergy and believers of the Serbian Orthodox Church identified completely with the Serbian side in the recent war. For them, there was no doubt that the Serbian cause in Croatia and Bosnia was just, that the Serbs there were fully entitled to exercise their right to selfdetermination, to refuse to live in a Croatian state or in a Bosniac-dominated Bosnian state, and to remain in a united Serbian state. The frontiers between the former federal

94 Peter Palmer

units of Yugoslavia, which they regard as having been imposed by the former communist regime so as to divide and weaken the Serbian nation within Yugoslavia, did not hold any legitimacy for them. Seeing the Serbian people in Croatia and Bosnia as being under threat, it appeared to them that the Serbs in those areas were fighting to defend and to preserve themselves. The identification of the war as a war of defence against a new genocide of the Serbs appeared in numerous statements and in Orthodox publications. Some of the latter appeared to revel in horrific scenes of the aftermath of massacres with glee, as if satisfied that their thesis that the events of the Second World War were being repeated was confirmed. A letter of the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church in October 1991 included the following: These our compatriots, of the same faith and blood, are faced with the following tragic choice: either they, with weapon in hand, fight for survival in the same country where the majority of Serbs live, or they will be forced, sooner or later, to emigrate from that new Independent State of Croatia. Nothing else remains. So it is that the Serbian State and the Serbian people must protect them with all legitimate means, including also the armed defence of Serbian lives and of all Serbian provinces.23 The obsession of the Serbian Orthodox Church with the sufferings of Serbs has tended to make it blind to the sufferings of others, Albanians, Bosniacs and Croats. However, reports of Serbian misdeeds in Bosnia reached the Serbian bishops, who condemned them. The Sabor (Assembly) of all the Serbian bishops, from 1992, distanced itself from the regime in Serbia, accusing it, together with the leaders of other former Yugoslav republics, of being responsible for the war, and for bringing the Serbian people close to the edge of a precipice.24 Patriarch Pavle repeatedly insisted upon the need for peace and reconciliation, and emphasized that selfdefence must not become a war of conquest, by which one would gain territory, but lose morally.25 A frequent theme has been that the Serbs can better survive injustices against them than they can the moral debilitation that results when Serbs themselves commit injustice. Patriarch Pavle asserted that if a united Serbian state could only be achieved by violent means, he did not wish to live in such a state.26 It should be stressed that Pavle does not dispute the right of the Serbs to live in a single united state, which would include most of Bosnia and much of Croatia. In this sense he is a Serbian nationalist. But in insisting that this is not something that is

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 95

worth achieving by any means, he made it clear that he was not prepared to compromise his Christian principles in the interest of the nation. But the tone and substance of statements issued by Pavle in his own capacity have often been very different from those he has issued in his official capacity, on behalf of the Holy Synod, which have often been bellicose and marked by extreme hostility to other peoples and other faiths. This points to differences of view among the Serbian bishops, some of whom showed themselves to be extremely nationalistic and aggressive supporters of the Serbian war effort. It was evident that the principal reason why some were vociferous critics of the Miloševic´ regime was that they believed that it was too ready to compromise over Croatia and Bosnia, and was guilty of a betrayal of the Serbian people. In an interview in 1992, Bishop Atanasije Jevtic´ denounced Miloševic´ as a traitor and a capitulator before the internal frontiers fixed by the communists, which he characterized as the graveyard of the Serbian people.27 So, the Serbian bishops were not always condemning the policies of the regime, so long as it stuck to the nationalist path which Miloševic´ followed early in the war, but rather its perceived failure to carry them through effectively. Thus, the bishops were among the opponents of Miloševic´’s change in direction over Bosnia after 1993, when he began to pressurize the Bosnian Serb leadership into acceptance of the peace plans advanced by the international community. In 1994 Miloševic´ threw his weight behind the Contact Group plan, which envisaged the withdrawal of the Serbs from much of the territory they held in Bosnia, remaining in control of 49 per cent, and exerted considerable pressure on the Bosnian Serb leadership to accept it. They resisted, and were offered support in the form of a solidarity visit by three of the most senior bishops, Pavle, Atanasije, and Amfilohije Radovic´. Amfilohije, the Metropolitan of Montenegro, cursed the Montenegrin parliament for issuing an appeal to Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic´ to accept the plan.28 The Dayton accord, which brought peace to Bosnia in the autumn of 1995, resulted in confusion in the Church’s ranks. In leading the Serbian negotiations in Dayton Miloševic´ had succeeded in imposing his will upon the Bosnian Serb leadership, and in his determination to reach a peace deal he was prepared to make major concessions to the Serbs’ erstwhile enemies. Before leaving he sought a broad expression of support for his negotiating position, and Patriarch Pavle was among those who signed a document setting it out. Following the

96 Peter Palmer

announcement of the Dayton deal the bishops held a special meeting of the Sabor, at which they denounced the Dayton peace as unjust. Amid calls from some quarters for Pavle’s resignation, the Sabor disassociated itself from his endorsement of the Dayton process. Pavle, who has earned widespread respect for his simple holiness, tolerance and genuine interest in reconciliation, is neither a representative example of the Serbian Church hierarchy nor a skilled player in the worldly affairs of politics. Following the Sabor meeting he backtracked, writing to US President Bill Clinton complaining that according to the Dayton agreement the map of Bosnia was being redrawn to the detriment of the Serbs.29 Church leaders also expressed solidarity with the breakaway Serbs of Krajina in Croatia. Just before the Croatian offensive of the summer of 1995, which wrested control of the territory from the Serbs, a group of high Church dignitaries led by Patriarch Pavle visited the rebel stronghold of Knin to support the Krajina leadership’s defiant stand.30 Since the Serbian defeats in Krajina and Bosnia the bishops have bitterly attacked the Serbian authorities for abandoning the Serbs of those regions.31 That there has been considerable ambiguity in the response of the Serbian Orthodox Church to the war is clear. The war presented it with extremely difficult dilemmas. Convinced of the basic justice of the Serbian cause in Bosnia and Croatia, the Church leaders were unable to renounce the Serbian national goals to which they adhered. But following the end of the war there have been signs of efforts to adapt to the new reality. The most senior figure in the Orthodox Church in Bosnia, Metropolitan Nikolai, returned to Sarajevo for the first time since the war to celebrate the Orthodox Christmas liturgy in January 1996. Calling upon God to ‘bless Serb, Croat and Moslem people who have always lived in harmony here in Sarajevo’, he asked Serbian people to contribute to the rebuilding of the tolerant atmosphere which existed in Sarajevo before the war.32 The Belgrade media reported that another of the Orthodox bishops in Bosnia called upon Serbs to return to their homes in areas under Bosniac and Croat control, and not to settle in the homes of expelled Bosniacs and Croats, who are refugees just as they are.33 The dilemma faced by the Serbian Orthodox Church is inherent in Orthodoxy, given the particularly intimate connection between Church and nation. The conflicting tone of many of the statements regarding the war reveals the anguish which the dilemma has caused to many. Representatives of western Churches have frequently taken a

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 97

very harsh view of the identification of the Serbian Orthodox Church with Serbia’s war aims.34 But it is all too easy for outsiders, to whom the Orthodox mindset is alien, based as it is on an entirely different historical experience from that of the Catholic and Protestant west, to judge the Church based on a superficial view of its external appearances. Such an approach ignores the depth of the religious content of the Church, and leads to a failure to understand the dilemmas that Orthodoxy faces in the modern world, to which it is much less adapted than western Churches.

Conclusion: the Churches as vehicles for reconciliation Certainly the leaders and faithful of the Roman Catholic Church in Croatia and of the Serbian Orthodox Church were among the most vociferous supporters of the nationalist cause. This tended to hamper their response to the war, as they found it difficult to disentangle their devotion to the cause of their nation from their devotion to the cause of God. Both Churches have to a large extent formed their current attitudes during the period of communist rule, when the role of guardian of the national identity and of the distinctive historical memory and culture of their respective nations was thrust upon them, as the communist regime closed off other avenues for the expression of such values. Now they find themselves in a new situation, and it would seem that they have so far failed to rise to it. Each is highly suspicious of the other, and identifying, as they do, totally with their respective national causes, they have not played the role of bearers of peace and reconciliation. There have been ecumenical contacts, and Patriarch Pavle and Cardinal Kuharic´ met on a number of occasions, for example at Sarajevo in May 1994, in the presence of Patriarch Alexei of the Russian Orthodox Church. Such contacts, by the example they set, have a very positive effect. For example, shortly after an early meeting between Pavle and Cardinal Kuharic´ in 1991, just before the war started, there was an opposition rally in Belgrade, at which the key address was given by the senior opposition figure, Vuk Draškovic´. Draškovic´ was a man whose approach had undergone a marked change since he first became prominent on the Serbian political scene at the beginning of the 1990s. He initially appeared as a fiery nationalist, but toned down his nationalism, emphasizing the value of peace at all costs. When he came to prominence in 1990, many observers feared that he was even more dangerous than Miloševic´. During his speech at

98 Peter Palmer

this rally, he said that if he found one cause for hope that peaceful solutions could be found to the problems that were then dragging Yugoslavia toward war, it was the sight of Patriarch Pavle and Cardinal Kuharic´, hand in hand, praying together. Here was an example of how the religious leaders in Serbia and Croatia can, through the prestige which they hold among Serbian and Croatian nationalists, influence the attitudes even of senior politicians, and make a contribution towards the achievement of peace and reconciliation. So, when Cardinal Kuharic´ was dismissive of the possibility that his meetings with Patriarch Pavle could achieve anything, he was wrong. His apparent view that, as it is Serbia which was at fault, it is the Serbs who bear total responsibility for opening the paths to peace and reconciliation will not do. While the Church leaders are correct in saying that this was not a war of their making, and was not a religious war, they have all too often used this as an excuse for standing aside from attempts to promote peace and reconciliation. The Churches do hold very strong positions of respect and prestige and have a great capacity to influence their peoples, for good or for ill. In that they have consistently tended to identify strongly with the nationalist cause, it cannot be said that they have fulfilled their potential to influence events in the direction of peace. Yet if the Churches, and especially their leaders, were to bear witness before their nations to the fact that reconciliation is possible, their prestige as guardians of the national identity and their indisputable credentials as champions of the national cause, would enable them to play a positive role in the search for peace. Thus, the strong connection between Church and nation in Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia could actually be used to positive effect.

Notes 1. This chapter concentrates on the main Christian churches in the war torn regions of former Yugoslavia, the Roman Catholic Church in Croatia and Bosnia and the Serbian Orthodox Church. 2. For example Steele 1994, p. 172. 3. Mojzes 1994, pp. 126–7. 4. As argued by Steele 1994, pp. 172–3. 5. Kitromilides 1994, pp. 150 –82. 6. Vrcan 1994, p. 376. 7. In NIN, 12 Jan. 1996, Crkva i rat: spisak srpskih grešaka (The Church and War: A List of Serbian Sins), a roundtable discussion. 8. Mojzes 1994, pp. 125–6. 9. Ramet 1984, p. 164.

Churches and Conflict: Former Yugoslavia 99 10. French Foreign Ministry archive, Yougoslavie, Vol. 35/ docs. 43– 49. Letter from French ambassador to Yugoslavia of 17 October 1946. 11. Ramet 1984, p. 165. 12. Cited in Van Dartel 1992, p. 281. 13. Jane Arraf, Reuters, 6 March 1996. 14. Cited in Steele 1994, p. 169. 15. Van Dartel 1995, p. 200. 16. See article entitled ‘Da je i od neprijatelja, bilo bi previše’ (‘Even From An Enemy It Would Be Too Much’), in Glas Koncila 43, 24 October 1993. 17. OMRI Daily Digest, 2 October 1995 and 27 December 1995. 18. Report, under the title ‘Hrvatska – katolièka drava?’ (‘Croatia – A Catholic State?’) in Glas Koncila 45, 6 November 1994, on a conference of Catholic theologians, journalists and others held in Zagreb in October 1994. 19. OMRI Special Report: Pursuing Balkan Peace, 6 February 1996. 20. Jane Arraf, Reuters, 6 March 1996. 21. Cited in Ramet 1984, p. 162. 22. Van Dartel 1992, p. 282. 23. Letter of 24 October 1991 from the Holy Synod of the Serbian Orthodox Church to Hans Van den Broek of the Netherlands, then holding the presidency of the European Community. 24. Bardos 1992, p. 12. 25. For example, in 1991 the bishops rejected wars of conquest. Bardos 1992, p. 11. 26. Politika, 8 October 1994. Article entitled ‘Patrijarh Pavle: Ništa po cenu zloèina’ (‘Patriarch Pavle: Nothing at the Price of Crime’). 27. Bardos 1992, pp. 11–12. 28. Vreme, 15 August 1994. Article entitled ‘Slika sa Pala: pejza velièanstven, atmosfera otrovna, narod tvrdoglav’ (‘The Picture from Pale: Landscape Magnificent, Atmosphere Poisonous, People Stubborn’). 29. NIN, 12 January 1996. ‘Crkva i rat: spisak srpskih grešaka’ (‘The Church and War: a List of Serbian Sins’), a roundtable discussion; OMRI Daily Digest, 17 December 1995 and 10 January 1996. 30. The Independent, 1 August 1995. Article entitled ‘Men of God and Guns Come down on Knin’. 31. This view was expressed by Bishop Lavrentije in NIN, 12 January 1996, ‘Crkva i rat: spisak srpskih grešaka’ (‘The Church and War: a List of Serbian Sins’), a roundtable discussion. 32. Reuters, 8 January 1996. 33. OMRI Daily Digest, 22 February 1996, citing Belgrade’s Veèernje Novosti. 34. See for example Van Dartel 1995, p. 202– 04.

5 Islamic Militancies and Disunity in the Middle East Christopher M. Wyatt

Introduction The purpose of this chapter is to disprove the notion, that still exists in some of the scholarly and popular literature, that the west is faced by a united threatening and Islamic monolith. Instead, I suggest that there is a plethora of smaller groups with different backgrounds and agendas. In doing this, I have confined my attentions to the Islamist movements of three countries: Algeria, Egypt, and Palestine. The groups examined here are: The Islamic Salvation Front (FIS), The Armed Islamic Group (GIA), The Armed Islamic Movement (MIA), and The Islamic Salvation Army (AIS) of Algeria; The Islamic Jihad Movement and Hamas (Harakat al-Muqawana al-Islamiyya or Islamic Resistance Movement) in Palestine; and The Gama’a al-Islamiyya and Jihad/New Jihad in Egypt. Throughout this chapter, reference is made to the term ‘Islamist’. Despite the fact that any Muslim is, by definition, an ‘Islamist’, it has been widely used in academic literature as a term to describe the ideals and intentions of those concerned with promoting Islam. It is more accurate than any other label – such as ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’ – as a description of Islam’s militant advocates and, while aware of the limitations of the term ‘Islamist’, the word has a certain descriptive utility which serves to clarify some of the points raised here. The discussion of these Islamist movements will take place in three sections. The first of these sets out to demonstrate how different regions have given rise to their different groups. While there are certain elements of similarity here, there are also different features, such as the actual origins of the movements themselves. The second section shows the differences in the radicalisms and agendas of the movements. 100

Islamic Militancies in the Middle East 101

The analysis here focuses upon the attitude of each of these groups to the issues of violence, democracy, and civil society. The final section disproves the notion of an internationally united Islam. The dilemma for Islamists is encapsulated by the choice between an Exportation de la Charte throughout the Middle East or ‘Islamism in one country’. The effect of Iran upon the movements of the Middle East is studied here, given the attention afforded to Iran in past scholarly debate about Islamic militancy.

‘Breeding grounds’ and conditions This section examines the backgrounds to the Islamist movements, particularly their social origins and their long- and short-term growth and development. It is easy to assume that these movements are recent developments, but on closer inspection they have longer-term origins and intellectual influences. One of the most stereotypical depictions of the Islamist movement in general is to see it as a monolithic threat to the stability of the west. This has become apparent in the debate begun in Foreign Affairs in the Spring of 1993. For example, while acknowledging the differences of the peoples of the Middle East, Judith Miller argues that Islamism is a danger to the West.1 While it is clear that there are differences between Muslim peoples, Miller’s approach seems to presuppose one single monolithic Islam throughout the wider Middle East, and exemplifies a tendency to group together the Islamic world in academic debate. Another common approach is the argument that Islamist groups are inherently non-democratic and antipluralistic.2 But to what extent can one judge other cultures by western values, as Edward Said has argued in Covering Islam?3 The westernized image of Islamic culture goes a long way towards the creation of the stereotypical images of a ‘barbaric’ or ‘backward’ culture with fanatical, bearded mullahs and imams at its forefront. At the beginning of her article, Miller presents us with a rogues gallery of Islamists, all of which are seen to be the enemies of the west.4 Taken individually, however, both the stereotype and the façade of unity rapidly crumble. The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood has announced itself, in 1988, as in favour of the PLO’s efforts to work towards some sort of Palestinian state alongside Israel, although they are concerned about the general Palestinian position. This approach apparently took Sheikh Ahmad Yassin and Hamas by surprise.5 Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and the Hezb-I-Islami group has been displaced by the Taliban in

102 Christopher M. Wyatt

Afghanistan,6 with such ferocious fighting as hardly suggests a united Islamist front. The Algerian FIS have shown themselves willing to talk to the Zeroual Government, but the Government and the Eradicateur parties have refused to talk, despite an FIS rejection of violence and a clarification of its position, especially concerning democracy.7 Of course, not all scholars share in these stereotypes. Conversely, Leon T. Hadar suggests that Miller’s thinking is stereotypical and argues that, while Islam is neither unified nor a threat to the United States, American stereotypes may lead it into protracted conflict in the region, with a concomitant growth in the support given to corrupt and reactionary governments.8 Miller’s argument, in his view, leads to the assumption of a monolithic Islamism as the result of an oversimplistic grouping of different trends and traditions.9 Hadar also points out that Islam (as a whole) has adopted a defensive posture in the world today. This is apparent in Bosnia, Tadjikistan, Chechnya, India, not to mention the violence of extremist settlers on the West Bank and Gaza and the outbreaks of violent racism in France and Germany.10 It is this defensive posture that Graham Fuller and Ian Lesser have termed A Sense of Siege in their book of the same name.11 This ‘sense of siege’ is one of the few characteristics of Islamism which is common throughout the Middle East, being the case whether a movement seeks to resist the continuing illegal Israeli occupation of Palestine12 or oppose the Eradicateurs of the Algerian and Egyptian military. Other similarities between Islamists include the social conditions in which they find themselves. The sense of siege throughout the Islamic world manifests itself by the formation of armies containing two sorts of activists who seek to overthrow the status quo and so ‘break the siege’. The first of these are what might be termed ‘generals’ – the educated leadership of the Islamist groups – and the second consists of ‘soldiers’ – the economically disenfranchized product of state mismanagement. This duality in the membership applies across all groups, regardless of stance. The social origins of the generals lie within the professional middle classes.13 Several commentators identify key groupings, such as doctors, engineers, lawyers, writers, educators, and graduates of technical colleges. Larger, more amorphously expressed groupings include professionals, students, syndicates, unions, and the urban middle class.14 While the educated ‘generals’ have become increasingly radicalized, the Middle East has suffered from both war and mismanagement which have led to the impoverishment of the working class. In some

Islamic Militancies in the Middle East 103

areas the socioeconomic conditions have been terrible for decades, creating a breeding ground for radicalism.15 Wadood Hamad, writing on ‘The Dialectics of Revolutionary Islamic Thought and Action’, encapsulates the situation well, when he argues that disillusionment and distrust are reasons why people will turn to Islam and Islamist parties. Moreover, Islam is also seen as a means to change existing arrangements and to herald a new era.16 In Algeria a failing economy has been matched with chaotic urban planning. Brûlé and Mutin argued over a decade ago that the lack of serious coordination presented real problems for the future.17 While urban overcrowding has been a factor in people’s discontent, this has been further exacerbated by massive unemployment, reaching 75 per cent of people under 30,18 and a massive foreign debt. In 1992, 14 million of Algeria’s population of 25 million lived below the poverty line. Moreover, the $25 billion foreign debt consumed 70 per cent of Algeria’s oil reserves, making repayment all but impossible.19 Figures provided by the Banque d’Algérie forecast a dismal trade balance for the future.20 In such an economic climate, the working classes have been the hardest hit, and it is they who have become and are becoming the foot soldiers of the Islamist armies. In many ways the situation in Egypt is similar to that of Algeria. One commentator, for example, has noted that the cause of the rise of Islamic radicalism lies in poor economic conditions,21 and the same problems of unemployment and hunger apply as much in Egypt as Algeria.22 David Hurst has argued that the ruling cliques in both countries have ‘feathered their own nests’ to the detriment of the general population, who remain poor.23 This viewpoint has been echoed by other commentators, such as James Adams, who argues that the Egyptian Islamic movement does not have its centre in Iran, but that it is a homegrown movement based upon economic disenfranchizement.24 Another feature common to Egypt and Algeria has been the return of expatriates who had fought in the Afghan war against the Red Army. When they returned home – highly trained, experienced and radicalized – they were disillusioned to find the level of unemployment which greeted them.25 In Egypt they invigorated the pre-existing structure of that country’s Islamist trend.26 In Algeria, an estimated 3000 Afghan war veterans, the so-called ‘Afghans’, have joined the radical GIA, where their talents are welcome.27 It has to be said, however, that the ‘Afghans’ represent a more radicalized force within the Islamist movements. Most participants tend to be unemployed youth with no other military credentials than raw

104 Christopher M. Wyatt

enthusiasm and Islamic fervour. The deteriorating educational standards and persistent unemployment have served to push youth as a whole further from the state power.28 In Algeria, the FLN 29 revolution has no relevance to the youth of today.30 Writing along the same lines, John P. Entelis observes that this youth are inclined to see the Government as corrupt and, consequently, to see it as their natural enemy.31 Perhaps the most coherent portrait of the disaffected youth which makes up the ranks of Islamism’s ‘soldiers’ has been furnished by Luis Martinez, who sees a population which has been effectively marginalized by those in power. Both the FIS and the GIA have found a fertile recruiting ground from the most impoverished urban areas. The disenfranchized youth is usually young, between 16 and 18 years of age. These represent a very different strand from the veterans of the war in Afghanistan. It is this youth which forms the basis of the GIA membership.32 Such youth finds itself led by the generals, such as Mohamed Said, who had been a professor at the University of Bab Ezzouar, and who was later head of the GIA in 1994.33 In any analysis of the origins of Islamist movements, it is important not to lose sight of the fact that many of their actions are, in reality, a direct response to political and economic disenfranchizement.34 The FLN Government of Algeria, the Egyptian Government, and the PLO have all been both secular and socialist movements. The defeat of the latter two in 1967 has had an acute effect upon Arab thinking in general.35 This has led to a political bifurcation within Palestinian and Egyptian society where Islamic alternatives to socialism were sought out.36 In the search for Islamic ideals, the Islamists themselves were assisted by the wealth of intellectual tradition which stretched back to the interwar period.37 However, such a search has served to splinter the Islamist movements in the region into ever smaller and competing factions.38 A similar process of oppositional fragmentation is also occurring in Algeria. The very fact of this delivers a keen blow to the fiction of a monolithic ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’.

Radicalisms and agendas As part of the search for an Islamist basis for society, there has been a continuing series of debates regarding the means of establishing an Islamist state. Those who advocate violence stand opposed to those who approach it warily, and those who support democracy are opposed to those who do not. Some Islamists wish to build civil society and

Islamic Militancies in the Middle East 105

some aim to destroy it. Within these debates, different groups adopt differing stances to different issues. Broadly speaking, there exist – within the fabric of Islamist activity – the trends of moderation and radicalism. Although these terms are relative, and do not fit the attitudes of those concerned precisely, they are nevertheless useful conceptual tools which enable us to differentiate between contrasting methods of Islamism. On the question of violence in Algeria, the Islamist parties as a whole are deeply divided. The GIA, AIS and MIA, the Armed Islamic Group, Islamic Salvation Army and the Armed Islamic Movement, are all beyond the control of the FIS, Islamic Salvation Front.39 Their agendas, in contrast to that of the FIS, are radical, extreme, violent. They attack those they see as traitors (and so threats) to the Islamist cause.40 Like the Egyptian Islamist group Jihad, the GIA believes that the secular state itself is jahili (a term referring to the ‘age of ignorance before the prophet came’) and, therefore, needs to be overthrown.41 Furthermore, the GIA sees negotiation with the government as compromising its principles. Consequently, the organization refuses to negotiate with those in political control.42 A far more moderate position is held by the FIS. Their position regarding violence became clear during the negotiations for the Rome Platform. Hugh Roberts has argued that the FIS only considers violence necessary because other – electoral – means have not been available, and it is clear that the FIS and GIA maintain positions regarding both the use, and legitimacy, of violence which differ to a great degree.43 The FIS has also become concerned that its position may be undermined by the GIA, and so has sought to extend control over it by using its armed wing. However, FIS control over its own armed groups is questionable, with those groups having much in common with the radicals, as is manifested in cooperation between the groups in field operations. Arun Kapil has even suggested that the FIS is willing to allow the Algerian Army to destroy the GIA so that any Islamist opposition to it in the future would disappear.44 From this it would seem that, in Algeria at least, there is a unified Islamist cause. One sees a similar contrast between the policies of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The reality of the new situation has caused Hamas to consider a reconciliation with Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority. They have even offered to recognize the reality of treating with Israel in return for an amnesty.45 Hamas is in much the same position in this regard as the FIS in Algeria. Like the FIS, Hamas has its own military wing, called Kata’ib ‘Izz-al-Din al-Qassam, or ‘the Regiments of

106 Christopher M. Wyatt

Izz-al-Din al-Qassam’. The Hamas position regarding violence is also strikingly like that of the FIS. In an interview with Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, one of the Hamas founders and leaders (Ziad Abu-Amr) indicates that, for Hamas, no progress can be made by peaceful means, and recourse to violence is the only way to put across its message.46 The position of Islamic Jihad is very different from that of Hamas. Philosophically, Islamic Jihad does not regard an Islamic Palestinian population as a necessary precursor to either liberation, or to the establishment of an Islamic state. This position puts it apart from the Muslim Brotherhood, which spawned Hamas. Moreover, Islamic Jihad, like the Algerian GIA, views negotiation as an unacceptable compromise of its principles.47 Islamic Jihad’s agenda is also very violent. The aspect of revenge against ‘Israeli state terror’ is something emphasized by the (recently assassinated) Fathi Shkaki, the former leader of Islamic Jihad.48 To such a degree as a direct comparison can be made, Islamic Jihad has, on many issues, more in common with the GIA in Algeria than with Hamas. It seems that the Islamist part of the Rejectionist front is, itself, divided. In Egypt, division is concentrated on the conduct of jihad and the nature of the state. Mamoun Fandy argues that there is a north–south split which accounts for this.49 The southern group is the Gama’a alIslamiyya which believes that the state is not unIslamic. The northern Jihad movement, on the other hand, sees the state as Jahiliyya. This is not merely a difference between rival perceptions of the state and the nature of jihad. Instead, these are deepseated political and doctrinal differences. Fandy argues that these differences prevent the formation of an Islamist alliance like the Algerian FIS.50 The Islamist position, then, is as split in Egypt as it is elsewhere. Regarding the twin issues of violence and jihad, Islamist factions are deeply divided over the use of force, its legitimacy, its targets, as well as by concerns relating to the Islamic transformation of society and its role in the jihad. As if this were not enough, there are also divisions over the nature of the state they seek to overthrow. Similar divisions may be found in the attitudes of Islamist groups to democracy and civil society. There is also the general question of the compatibility of Islam and democracy, which continues to be debated.51 What is clear is that different groups approach the question of democracy in different ways, creating several contradictory strands within the Islamist movement. The case of Algeria is informative here. The FIS, as an umbrella organization, has more difference of opinion over democracy than on any other issue. Of the leaders, Abbasi Madani

Islamic Militancies in the Middle East 107

is on the moderate wing of the movement, espousing the virtues of democracy, whereas Ali Belhadj rejects such an approach.52 Despite this difference, the FIS decided to accept the principles of political pluralism at the Rome Platform. Hugh Roberts sees this as a step towards a fully democratic FIS. So great is the change that, in Roberts’ opinion, such a conversion casts doubt on the position of the FIS as a ‘pure’ Islamist movement.53 It is clear from this that the FIS has adopted a position which differentiates itself from the other, more radical, armed groups. The position of these armed groups is well demonstrated by the MIA. Their view of democratization is different from that of the FIS. The chief ideologue and founder of the MIA, Said Mekhloufi, has argued that democracy has been used by the state as a means of control. His solution is to overthrow that state power, Le Pouvoir, followed by its substitution with an Islamist state.54 As Norton and Wright argue, there are many diverse views among Islamist movements regarding democracy.55 In contrast to the Islamic Jihad view, some members of Hamas seem ready to discuss democracy. This position may result in the fragmentation of Hamas, as the movement is far from united on this question.56 John L. Esposito has argued for the need to distinguish between extremists and moderates. He goes on to state that if all the groups are seen as the same, and are treated the same regardless of their differences, then the moderates will lose out to the radicals.57 The price of exclusion, then, may be high.58 In many ways the legitimacy of the state has been undermined in the Middle East by its refusal to permit any viable democratic structure.59 The case of Algeria, with its cancelled 1992 elections, provides evidence of this. Arun Kapil has argued that the Eradicateurs in the government have called themselves democratic while acting undemocratically. The effect has been to discredit the ideal of democracy in the eyes of much of the population.60 In their rejection of democracy, many Islamists are attempting to replace the civil society upon which it is based with one of their own.61 While it is clear that this is of more value to some groups than to others – as we have seen, of more use to Hamas than to Islamic Jihad – the new civil society being created is a resolutely Islamist one.62 The struggle to forge a new civil society is one of the key battles being fought by the Islamists. It is in society itself that the issue will probably be decided.63 The achievements of the Islamists themselves in the construction of their own civil society should not be underestimated. Ghassan Salamé

108 Christopher M. Wyatt

adds to this description, emphasizing their role in the universities and in keeping their districts and streets clean.64 This is contrasted with the governments of the region, with their corruption, austerity measures, and inability to react effectively to social problems. Salamé goes on to state that the lumping together of all Islamist groups, coupled with the security preoccupations of the west, serves to ignore the diversity which exists among them.65

Exportation de la Charte or Islamism in one country? The international character of Islamist revolution is as diverse internationally as it is domestically. A key and distinctive feature of this revolution is the question of whether it should be exported or strengthened at home.66 Some commentators, such as Edward G. Shirley, have suggested that Algeria might become ‘another Iran’.67 Such thinking is flawed, not least because of the oversimplification of a complex set of differing outlooks, cultural identities, religious beliefs. Moreover, the idea that Iran is exporting its revolution to Algeria has already been shown to be false.68 Claire Spencer sees the Iran–Algeria link as the result of prejudice, while Shireen T. Hunter argues that such connections are exaggerated.69 Iran’s power to stimulate, or incite, revolution has not been especially marked. When the Iran–Iraq war broke out, the Ayatollah Khomeini believed that the Shi’a people of Iraq would turn on the Ba’athist Government and topple Saddam Hussein, but this never happened.70 The reason for such inaction lay in the underlying differences which divide the Middle East so markedly. If one looks at the political campaigning during the Iranian Revolution, and that of Hamas during the Intifada, these differences become clear. Ervand Abrahamian has argued convincingly that the central tenets of Khomeinism were populist, with much drawn from leftist political influences.71 Hamas’ influences are very different, concentrating on opposition to Israel and its occupation of Palestine.72 The crucial difference here is the issue of emphasis. With such nationalistic Palestinian rhetoric at the forefront of these Hamas pronouncements, a global, pan-Islamic position seems a long way off. Another reason why the Islamists are unable to unite, and why the revolution cannot encompass the Middle East, lies in the key differences between the Iranian and Arab models. Its basis lies in the differences between Sunni and Shi’a Islam. Indeed, the Ayatollah Khomeini was able to build an élite from the Ulema which was then able to rule

Islamic Militancies in the Middle East 109

the state. This has not happened in countries like Algeria. One of the central tenets of the Iranian Revolution is the Velayat-e Faqih, or the jurist’s guardianship, which amounts to the Islamic government of the clergy and which is enshrined in Article 5 of the Iranian Constitution.73 This position has remained the same, despite the massive upheavals of the latter part of the revolution, with much control remaining with this doctrine and its implementation.74 What is clear, is that none of the Islamist groups being studied here seeks to adopt this Iranian measure, suggesting that any Exportation de la Charte cannot realistically succeed while the Islamist groups remain preoccupied with the institution of Islamist states in their own countries. Further proof of this lies in the conflict of loyalties which arises when different interests and different states clash. The position of Islamist movements during the Gulf War has already been discussed in a volume edited by James Piscatori, who argues that these conflicts of interests serve to undermine the façade of unity as groups begin to act in their own selfinterest.75 Any attempts to unify Islamist movements (of whatever hue) will be doomed to fail. If the leaders of various Islamist groups seize control in their respective countries, they will be loath to surrender it to anyone else. This will be so much more the case when that someone else is too different – on the basis of Sunnism or Shi’ism or on the basis of regional geopolitics. A unified Islamist Umma state is, therefore, unrealistic in the present political climate. Indeed, if Islamists were to take over government in different states in the region, it is not inconceivable that they would be willing to wage war – hot or cold – against each other for influence, resources, territory. Tensions between Saudi Arabia and Iran illustrate this. Consequently, the ideal of ‘Islamism in one country’ will become the rule, rather than the exception, for the foreseeable future.

Conclusion What emerges from this is a portrait of disunity among Islamist groups in the Middle East. Muhammad Rizvi has argued that, since the different groups choose to interpret the Sharia in different ways, there become almost as many ‘political Islams’ as there are political Islamists. The resultant disunity, then, is the product of a plurality of individual innovation.76 None of this serves to argue that there cannot be a single religion of Islam, merely that the multiplicity of viewpoints represented in the spectrum of radical Islamism makes for differentiation.

110 Christopher M. Wyatt

Such disunity emerges from different traditions which, to a certain extent, manifest themselves in policy. There is no unity of vision on the questions of democracy, civil society, or violence. Such disunity is also symptomatic of differing approaches to the nature of the state – both that to be established and that to be overthrown. Moreover, the groups are disunited on the question of regional and financial loyalties, as well as by constituency pressure. Overarching this is further disunity on the question of the export of the revolution. The picture has become one of profound disunity over all spheres, and such disunity and diversity serves to show that the suggestion of a wide-ranging, monolithic ‘Islamic Fundamentalism’, as it is called, is nothing more than a myth.

Notes 1. Miller 1993, p. 45. 2. Ibid, p. 50. 3. Said 1981, p. 163. 4. Miller 1993, p. 43. 5. Abu-Amr 1994, pp. 72–3. 6. Hekmatyar’s stronghold at Chara Siab fell to the Taliban on 14 February 1995. For details, see The Guardian, The Independent, The Financial Times and Ettela’at for 15 February 1995. The Guardian of 16 February stated that with the fall of Chara Siab, the Taliban had replaced Hezb-i-Islami as the main force rivalling Burhanuddin Rabbani’s Government. 7. Roberts 1995, pp. 259–63. The FLN’s position is also made clear in de la Gorce 1995, p. 23. 8. Hadar 1993, p. 27. 9. Ibid, p. 30. 10. Ibid, p. 31. 11. See Fuller and Lesser 1995. 12. See Farer 1991. 13. Azar 1988, p. 349. 14. Pelletreau, Pipes and Esposito 1994, p. 12; Norton and Wright 1994 –5, p. 11; Norton and Wright 1993, p. 20; Norton and Wright 1992, pp. 16–18; and Auda 1991, p. 111. 15. ‘Provoking the Peace’, The Middle East 222, April 1993, p. 12. 16. Hamad 1994, p. 40. 17. Brûlé and Mutin 1982, p. 65. 18. ‘The Islamization of Modernity’, The Middle East 220, February 1993, p. 20; and ‘Taking Responsibility’, The Middle East 222, April 1993, pp. 17–18. 19. Wright 1992, p. 134; Spencer 1994, p. 151. 20. ‘Algeria: Politically Bankrupt, Financially Embarrassed’, The Middle East 225, July 1993, p. 20.

Islamic Militancies in the Middle East 111 21. ‘Lessons For Egypt’, The Middle East 233, April 1994, p. 11; Reed 1993, pp. 95–97; Martin-Muñoz 1995, p. 406. 22. Cassandra 1995, pp. 12–13; Norton and Wright 1994 –5, p. 15. 23. Hirst 1994. 24. Adams 1993, p. 12. 25. ‘Against Sin’, The Economist, 15 February 1992, p. 70. 26. Hogg and Berger 1993, p. 13; Nakhoul 1993, p. 10. 27. ‘Algeria’s Assassins’, The Economist 2285, 23 December 1993, p. 3. 28. Spencer 1994, p. 148. 29. Front de Libération Nationale or National Liberation Front. 30. Dunn 1994, p. 148. 31. Entelis 1995, p. 16. 32. Martinez 1995, pp. 39– 46. 33. Ibid, p. 48. 34. Azar 1988, p. 349. 35. Abu-Amr 1994, p. 11. 36. Ibid, p. 91. 37. Ibid, pp. 1– 4. 38. The process by which this occurs is exhaustively documented in Abu-Amr 1994; Kepel 1993. 39. Spencer 1994, p. 160; Dunn 1994, p. 145. 40. Entelis 1995, p. 16. 41. Dunn 1994, p. 150. 42. Ibid, p. 154; and Roberts 1995, p. 251. 43. Roberts 1995, p. 260 and ‘A Whisper From The Cloisters’, The Economist, 14 January 1995, p. 56. This position has lasted for at least a year, with continuing calls from the leaders of the FIS, such as Rabih Kebir, for talks. See ‘A Flicker From Algeria’, The Economist, 25 November 1995, p. 16. 44. Kapil 1995, p. 5. The hostility between the FIS and the GIA is shown clearly in Hermida 1994, p. 12; Labat 1995, p. 98. 45. ‘Arafat Rules’, The Economist, 23 December 1995, p. 70. See also ‘Palestinians Vote For Democracy But Will They Get It?’, The Economist, 27 January 1996, p. 49; Usher 1995a, pp. 27–34; Usher 1995b, pp. 72–73. 46. Abu-Amr 1994, pp. 67, 79. See also Said 1988, p. 382. 47. Abu-Amr 1994, p. 106. 48. Richards 1992. 49. Fandy 1994, pp. 607–25. 50. Ibid, p. 609. For further treatment of the perception of Egypt as Jahiliyya, see Kepel 1993, pp. 12, 13, and 36–67. 51. Esposito and Piscatori 1991, p. 428; Entelis and Arone 1992, p. 28. 52. Dunn 1994, p. 149. See also Brumberg 1991, pp. 63–5. 53. Roberts 1995, pp. 260 –61. See also Richards 1994. 54. Entelis 1995, pp. 15–16. 55. Norton and Wright 1994 –5, pp. 11–12. 56. Ibid, pp. 12, 17–18; ‘What is Hamas?’, The Economist 2324, 20 October 1994, p. 3. In connection with Hamas disunity, see Silver and Hadi 1995, p. 8. 57. Pelletreau, Pipes and Esposito 1994, pp. 9, 12. Hosni Mubarak makes Esposito’s point for him in an interview in Le Monde, 17 November 1995, p. 3.

112 Christopher M. Wyatt 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66.

67. 68. 69.

70. 71 72. 73. 74. 75. 76.

Hudson 1991, p. 414. Wright 1992, p. 135; Entelis and Arone 1992, pp. 33–5. Kapil 1995, pp. 6–7. Pelletreau, Pipes and Esposito 1994, p. 14. See Note 47 for the differences between Hamas and Islamic Jihad; and Entelis 1995, p. 17 for a similar societal/statist division in the FIS. Norton and Wright 1994 –5, p. 17. Salamé 1993, p. 26. Ibid, p. 32. The phraseology for this heading is based on the contrast between two revolutionary traditions applied to a third. Ali Habib has put the debate in terms of a struggle between the national community and the Islamic community in Habib 1995, p. iv. Shirley 1995. Pelletreau, Pipes and Esposito 1994. Observations by Pelletreau, p. 3. Spencer 1994, p. 160; Hunter 1987, pp. 77–8. The problems of making comparisons too directly are also ably demonstrated in Ajami 1995, pp. 75–6. King 1987, pp. 9–10. Abrahamian 1993, pp. 13–39. Examples are taken from pp. 31–2. Abu-Amr 1994, p. 78. Simpson and Shubart 1995, p. 95. Ehteshami 1995, pp. 48–51. Piscatori 1991; of particular note are Chapters 1, 4, 6, and 7. Rizvi 1994, pp. 9–27.

6 Islam, Human Rights and Religious Intolerance: The Case of the Bahá’ís of Iran1 Nazila Ghanea

‘The Bahá’í community, persecuted from its very inception … probably represents the clearest case of religious persecution in the world today.’2

Islam in world politics Many books and articles have been written in recent years emphasizing the naiveté of those who crudely categorize ‘Islam’ as a unitary phenomenon in world politics.3 Of course, Islam can be seen as a unitary phenomenon in terms of its acceptance of certain shared beliefs, norms and the assignment of special spiritual and cultural significance to specific historical events. In terms of its implications for political practice across a variety of Islamic cultures, however, little commonality can be perceived, other than to vague concepts that are used as the hue and cry of Islamic terminology across cultural and political borders. Returning to the theoretical basics of Islam, however, one can also detect shared challenges. These occur primarily in areas in which the original Islamic writings shed little light, but which are, nevertheless, very significant to present day realities. Examples include the question of leadership in the post-caliphate and post-imamate periods and whether the Islamic leadership should recognize the borders of the modern nationstate or direct its appeal to Muslims worldwide. The question of the role and significance that should be attached to human rights and international law,4 the treatment of religious minorities and the meaning and application of Islamic justice to modern day politics are also problematical. Despite having recognized the fact that the social teachings of Islam have evolved to mean different things to different people, or are used by politicians to ascribe different meanings 113

114 Nazila Ghanea

at different times to suit their political ends, the residue of common theoretical gaps (like the ones mentioned above) remain. The Muslim leadership needs to decide upon such matters in order to govern under the demands of present day political realities.

Islam, human rights and the discretion of the state ‘Scapegoating’, repression (in order to distract attention from internal problems of the economy and government), stereotyping, and the denial of full rights of equal citizenship occur in many countries. This occurs especially when the reins of government fall into the hands of autocratic rulers with short political histories and less developed constitutional protections for the citizenry. Why then, should such events, when occurring in the Islamic world, be ascribed to the Muslim basis of those societies rather than the commonality of such events across a range of countries? As Bielefeldt has stated, ‘Even if some governments try to vindicate political oppression by invoking “Islamic values” or by waging “holy wars”, one should not blame Islam as a whole for its being politically abused.’5 Nevertheless, I suggest that although such events, without doubt, do occur in other states as well, the concentration of almost unlimited powers in the hands of the leader as justified in Islamic societies by reference to Islamic law6 and Sharia law greatly accentuate the problem. These put the application of human rights at the mercy of the leader. Although some Muslim writers have labelled authoritarian and dictatorial forms of government as unIslamic, this has rarely been enforced by either the ulama or the Muslim populace.7 Indeed, it appears that only the Qur’a– nic injunctions equating obedience to the ruler with obedience to God (Qur’a– n 4: 59) have been emphasized, and those calling for the pious and just nature of such leaders conveniently swept aside. This investment of almost total authority into the hands of one man is common both to Shi’i and Sunni communities and across a variety of Muslim cultures. The justifications given for this perilous position of the citizenry in relation to the ruler rely on recent8 interpretations of the Qur’a– n and Sharia, and brings to the fore the issue of human rights under Islamic law.

Recent Islamic documents on human rights The debate about the relationship between Islam and human rights has accelerated in the past decade or so, primarily due to political events in

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 115

the Sudan, Algeria, Pakistan, Egypt, Afghanistan and Iran. Conservative Middle Eastern states, such as Saudi Arabia, have been coerced into paying ‘lip service’ to the cause of human rights. Although the reality of these changes may be very limited indeed, it is interesting to note the number of Islamic documents on human rights that have emerged. Fred Halliday has outlined five approaches by which the relationship between Islam and human rights can be portrayed. He describes them as the assimilation, appropriation, particularism, confrontation and the incompatibility theses. The term assimilation is said to describe those who deny any intrinsic conflict between Islam and current human rights norms, and can be described as the ‘liberal’ or ‘modernist’ interpretation of Islamic texts. 9 One example comes from the 1979 First International Conference on the Protection of Human Rights in the Islamic Criminal Justice System, which stated, ‘It has been established … that the letter and spirit of Islamic law on the subject of the criminally accused are in complete harmony with the fundamental principles of the human rights under international law as well as in complete harmony with the respect accorded to the equality and dignity of all persons under the constitutions and laws of Muslim and non-Muslim nations of the world.’10 Appropriation describes the position of those who assert that there is a unique ‘Islamic’ approach to human rights, and claim that this outlines the divine standard of the dignity of the human person and enhances the current norms of rights. Proponents of this outlook often emphasize both duties and rights in the same context. Particularism is the means by which countries such as Saudi Arabia have sought to avert criticisms of their internal rights regime by arguing for the ‘cultural and historical specificity of their societies’, and that, ‘their societies are “different” by dint of tradition and belief’,11 hence requiring a different approach to rights. Confrontation is the ‘much more militant, and usually “anti-imperialist” approach that confronts the perceived reality of Western domination’12 and it rejects the basis of international human rights standards as secular and, therefore, inferior by definition. Incompatibility sees the international human rights code as being inevitably in contradiction to Islam. Thus human rights have to be, ‘defended against attempts either to deny that they conflict with “Islam” or to subordinate them to Islamic states and Islamist movements’.13 Recent Islamic human rights documents include The Islamic Declaration of Human Rights, The Azhar Draft constitution, The Cairo Declaration, The Saudi Basic Law and the Iranian Constitution. All these documents seem to fit into Halliday’s ‘appropriation’ category,

116 Nazila Ghanea

presenting Islamic human rights schemes as a more worthy definition of human rights, due to their divine heritage. The Islamic Declaration of Human Rights of 1981 outlines the Muslim position on human rights as being superior to those from a secular perspective. The Azhar Draft constitution dates from 1979 and seeks to, ‘represent an official position of that institution as to what rights should be recognized in a political system based on Sunni Islamic principles’.14 The Cairo Declaration was proposed at the 1990 Conference of Islamic Foreign Ministers and submitted at the 1993 UN World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna.15 It emphasizes the divine source of human rights in Islam. The Saudi Basic Law dates from 1979 and claimed to set out the Islamic concept of human rights. It claims that the Islamic perspective of human rights enhances the manmade norms of secular international norms. The Iranian Constitution was approved in April 1979. –nic text, ‘As Although the postscripts to the constitution cite this Qur’a for such (of the unbelievers) as do not fight against you on account of (your) faith, and neither drive you forth from your homelands, God does not forbid you to show them kindness and to behave towards them with full equity: for verily, God loves those who act equitably,’16 the Constitution does not recognize all ‘unbelievers’ and lists the religious minorities which it recognizes as the Iranian Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians only. Mayer argues that all these Islamic human rights schemes, ‘provide for the use of vague Islamic criteria to restrict basic rights and freedoms … (and use) a variety of Islamic formulas to qualify rights’.17 Such restricted provisions tend to enfeeble women and religious minorities most, and further strengthen the grip of the state over the citizens. The rights in such documents and constitutions ‘are subject to vague Sharia criteria’,18 thus giving the monopoly of defining Islamic restrictions solely to the state or clergy leadership. Vyver accentuates this position in categorically stating that, ‘In countries where Islam is afforded special recognition as the official state religion, or where sharia has been proclaimed a source … of legislation, the dichotomy between Islamic perceptions of a person’s legal status and the protection of human rights inevitably translates into de facto discrimination and repression.’19 Amin argues that, ‘Islamic law is originated from a divine revelation to the Prophet Muhammad’20 and that, ‘the name given by Muslims to these divinely inspired, objective, spiritual and worldly commandments is “Sharia”. Accordingly the term Islamic law should be used to mean Sharia only. The term “Islamic law” therefore, does not apply to the legal systems of the 42 individual Islamic countries.’21 However,

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 117

such a definition proves problematical when one seeks to analyse human rights schemes that claim to be ‘Islamic’. Such schemes are, undoubtedly, trying to present a unitary outlook on human rights within Islam, and monopolize a debate which is far from being so simplistic. ‘Islamic’ human rights schemes within the context of a state’s constitution can be ascribed to the legal systems of the state concerned more easily than those which are not linked to particular states, such as the al-Azhar declaration. When, however, the state’s legal system is made subject to Sharia the situation becomes more complex. Amin seems to be asking us, for example, to ascribe the Iranian constitution to Iran’s legal system and not to Islamic law. The Iranian constitution, however, states in principle 4 that, ‘Islamic rules and standards’ – as defined by the ulama and the leading mujtahids – are ‘absolutely dominant over all of the principles of the Constitution’.22 The legal system in Iran is, therefore, nominally subject to the Sharia, but in reality is subject to the interpretations of the trusted leaders who are to decide on the definition and application of Islamic law to the constitution and to the citizens. Thus, the Sharia can be used to justify the whims of the ulama23 and the leader of the Muslim state; while Amin wants us to recognize its distinction from Iran’s legal system.

Islam and the rights of religious minorities Attention now needs to be given to the decisions of contemporary Islam regarding human rights and international law and, in particular, the treatment of religious minorities within (so-called) Muslim states. To allow a deeper study of this issue the focus will be on the Islamic Republic of Iran and its treatment of its largest24 religious minority, the Bahá’ís. Using the example of the Bahá’ís of Iran is particularly revealing, as this group avoid involvement in party politics, do not demand selfdetermination and hold obedience to government as one of their religious tenets. Many scholars considered that the group posed no threat whatsoever to the Islamic Republic of Iran.25 The issue of national security was also bypassed because the Bahá’ís did not take the law into their own hands, engage in any use of force or ever have any secessionist desires. What was particularly significant was the ‘religious’ justification given by the Iranian authorities for this treatment. If such justifications are tacitly accepted by the international community in the name of cultural relativism and non-interference in the affairs of other states,

118 Nazila Ghanea

then what would this imply for the status of all non-Muslim national minorities living in Muslim states? Can other Islamic states ultimately be trusted to carry out the legal obligations they are party to? At times of political upheaval Muslim states can conveniently resort to the unity that comes from pursuing one ‘enemy of God’ or another. This political tactic will, most likely, involve a religious minority. If this is an option open to all Muslim states does this mean that all nonMuslims are potentially living under the same precarious fate? Of course one may acknowledge that all revolutions have their victims and scapegoats. So, it may be questionable to what extent the Bahá’í case was just an unfortunate example of the sacrifices entailed in all changes of leadership and revolutionary struggles, but to no significant degree attributable to Islam or its political application? What is significant in this example, however, is the extent to which Islamic writings and interpretations were subscribed to it. It was not just the ‘side-effect’ of the first few tumultuous revolutionary years of mob violence, but around 155 years26 of clergy-led hatred and violence, including around 20 years27 in which this violence was highly systematic and institutionalized. This led to centrally directed and controlled execution and discrimination. What is also unique is that, unlike the Jewish massacres and genocide, the Bahá’ís can escape their fate instantly by a verbal conversion to Islam, hence amplifying the theological assumptions that underlie it. What allows this level of systematic ‘scapegoating’ to evolve seems primarily due to the absolute powers of interpretation and application concentrated into the hands of the leadership by Muslim movements and peoples. It brings to the fore the problem and role of religious fundamentalisms and the clashes of cultural norms in international relations. Interestingly enough, historical accounts seem to suggest that the populist revolt behind the fall of the Shah and the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979 had not foreseen the likelihood that their efforts would result in direct clerical rule.28 The new Islamic Republic would be ruled not by the people, but by the precepts of Islam as interpreted by the Fundamentalist Shi’i ulama. Khomeini, assuming the title Velayat-I-Faqih, appointed himself … as the last word in scriptural interpretation. In essence, the new government of Iran would be a theocracy … Given Khomeini’s incomparable popularity in the flush of victory against the Shah, few Iranians were willing to question the eighty-year-old Ayatollah’s judgement.29

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 119

It would, therefore, seem that it was despite the wishes of the public – rather than due to their revolutionary demands – that an Islamic government came to power in Iran, with direct clerical rule by one man.30 Many of the clergy too were opposed to such leadership, due to the traditional view that the Shi’i clerical establishment should never assume direct leadership posts, as this would counter the belief that all political leadership and temporal authority is illegitimate until the return of the Twelfth Imam. Shariatmadari and Bazargan, for example, believed that the clergy should only assume an advisory role in relation to the political leadership in Iran.31 In fact, ‘the vilayat-I faqih thesis was rejected by almost the entire dozen grand ayatollahs living in 1981 … Only one grand ayatollah, Muntazari … approved the concept.’32 Bani-Sadr was removed from his position as president in 1981, after he started to attract support for himself (from Ayatollah Qomi and Ayatollah Abdullah Shirazi, amongst others), and so oppose direct clerical rule. Khomeini institutionalized his 1960s innovations in the Iranian constitution,33 within the principles of Vilayat-I-Faqih34 (Rule of the Jurist), Hokumat-e Islami (Islamic government) and Marja’-I Taqlid (rule of the leading mujtahid). Writing of the situation after 1987–88, Ayubi explains: ‘Khomeini … carried his theory of the guardianship of the juriconsult to its logical conclusion, emphasising that his guardianship (now analogous to that of the Prophet) is absolute, even if it contradicts the stipulations of the Sharia. It is now the government that is supreme, not the Sharia; the State, not the ideology.’35 Theologically, the investment of ultimate sovereignty and authority in the hands of a cleric acting as politician led to the interesting fact that as the leader of the Shi’is Khomeini was to rule until the promised one, the Qa’im, was to fulfil the prophesies of the day of judgement and come to rule in full glory.36 Akhavan refers to this theological and theocratic dilemma as having, ‘profound implications on religious tolerance in Shi’i Islam’.37 This is due to the fact that, ‘On the one hand, the Qa’im is accorded absolute doctrinal authority while on the other, the ulama assume absolute doctrinal authority in identifying Him.’38 All movements that historically postdate Islam are therefore totally at the mercy of the judgement of the ulama, in deciding whether it fulfils the prophecies accorded to the Qa’im. They have to either concede all their theological and political authority to such movements or repress them. As the voluntary relinquishment of power by clerics has historically proven even less likely than the abandonment of temporal rule, the possibility of such an occurrence seems highly improbable. In the meantime, it places such religious minorities in the precarious state of

120 Nazila Ghanea

attracting the wrath of both cleric and autocrat, acting under the puissant umbrella of law and divine authority combined.

The case of the Bahá’ís of Iran It may be argued that the case of Iran and the Bahá’ís is unique, due to a number of factors that make it exceptional, rather than a standard by which to judge Islam and human rights in general. For example, Iran is the only country that has Shi’ism rather than Sunnism as its official doctrine, although there have been and are significant populations of Shi’is living in neighbouring countries such as Iraq and Bahrain. Shi’is account for around 10 per cent of the world’s Muslims. Its Twelver39 branch, that is followed by the Iranian leadership and almost 90 per cent of the Iranian population, may be said to have a different political expression and voice to Sunni Islam. Shi’i Islam has had a particularly strong attitude towards spiritual and political leadership and power being combined within the figurehead of the Imam. ‘Shi’ism accepts the notion of spiritual authority in a sense that Sunni Islam does not, and it makes a distinction, even if it is a de facto rather than a de jure one, between spiritual and temporal authority.’40 It is also significant that, according to Fuller, ‘Only Shi’ism has a promising theoretical basis for dealing with the problem of “up-dating” Islam’,41 hence providing the more fertile ground for new concepts such as Khomeini’s ‘Velayat-I-Faqih’. However, it is also not only in Shi’i states that the position of nonMuslims is problematical. Kuwait denies Kuwaiti nationality to nonMuslims and so does not give them the rights and protection enjoyed by other citizens. Amin argues, ‘it is undeniable that Islamic law shows a high degree of consideration for human life and provides safeguards for the protection of human rights. Exceptionally, in certain cases Islamic law treats differently a particular sector of the society for religious or public reasons, e.g. the status of non-Muslims.’42 Unfortunately, although there are significant percentages of non-Muslim nationals living under Muslim rule as loyal subjects, they are not guaranteed equal human rights. Amin seems to want to argue for the ‘separate but equal’ principle, but there have been sufficient historical precursors to this idea that have demonstrated that it is unrealizable. Furthermore, human rights should be aiming precisely at those who are in the position of weakness in any society. A scheme which only recognizes the worth of the powerful majority, or the state itself, cannot really be referred to as a human rights scheme at all. Amin’s thesis, therefore, only serves to highlight the perilous state of non-Muslims living under

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 121

Islamic rule, whose religion the leadership does not recognize as having a revealed scripture. The assertion that remains is that, ‘For a Muslim country … the most pressing human rights issue is … the protection of individuals from a state that violates human rights, regardless of its cultural-ideological facade.’43 The problems Bahá’ís face with legal and political repression due to belief is not unique to them or to Iran. Problems are also faced by the Ismaelis in Pakistan, Shi’is in Iraq and Bahrain, Christians in Egypt44 and Christians and Jews in Iran. Their situations may be different due to varying levels of legal recognition, varying political involvement, or their representation of a different kind of threat to the state, but the impact on their legal rights is very similar. Mayer45 even argues that there is little fundamental difference between the threat faced by Muslims and non-Muslims in Muslim states. Each and every individual can be accused of being an ‘apostate’, and hence receive the punishment of execution. Of course, the situation is more convenient if that person is explicitly known to belong to a minority religion or belief which can be depicted as representing the ‘fashionable’ threats and slogans of the time, but this is not absolutely necessary. There are many Muslim writers and campaigners that detest this assignment of secondary citizenship, or rejection of recognition, of non-Muslims and believe it to be totally without foundation in the religion of Islam. Zakaria, for example, states of this unquestionable discrimination against non-Muslims, ‘neither the Qur’a–n nor the sunna support this. There is, in fact, no basis for such discrimination in temporal affairs.’46

Iran and ‘the Bahá’í question’ Background to the Bábí/Bahá’í repression Although the Islamic revolution did not give rise to the first Iranianbacked attempt at weakening the foundations of the Bahá’í faith, and of its predecessor the Bábí faith, it did constitute the first time that such repression was labelled ‘genocide’ and the first time it was carried out so publicly.47 From their historical beginnings in mid nineteenthcentury Iran, the Babi and Baha’i faiths have never enjoyed even tacit civil or religious recognition, nor any notable periods of toleration in Iran, the land of their origin. Throughout this period, the Islamic clergy in Iran has seen their suppression as a significant ambition. The clergy’s ability to destroy these movements has been defined by their political proximity to the rulers and government of the time. This is

122 Nazila Ghanea

why the relationship between clergy and government has always been a critical factor in the treatment of the Bahá’ís in Iran.48 So much have truth and fiction become muddled in the course of over 150 years of ‘scapegoating’, that the Iranian public’s knowledge of what the Bábí and Bahá’í faiths claim for themselves is almost nonexistent. Instead, what remains in the mind of the average member of the Iranian public is a list of impressions that various political movements and ‘power struggles’ have concocted in the name of Bahá’ísm and Bábísm. The most timeless of these accusations include those of imperialism, espionage, the destruction of the foundations of Islam and Iran, prostitution, Zionism and its colonial origins.49 In order to be best understood, such accusations need to be put into their context of the political aspirations and frustrations of the Iranian Shi’i clergy of the time. Fischer has explained such ‘religiously phrased protest’50 in Iran over the last century in terms of the relationship between the Iranian state and its citizenry. The constantly recurring instances of Bahá’í persecution can be seen as a religiously disguised means of the demonstration of dissatisfaction by the public or the clergy with the government, and also a means of protest against all outside (especially western) intervention or influence in Iran. In this scenario, the periods of governmental refusal to curb antiBahá’í demonstrations and protest (whether in the 1850s, the 1930s or the 1950s) may be seen as the government’s tacit recognition of such protests and violence being, as far as it was concerned, the less damaging means of the religious leaders and public ‘letting off steam’. It does not, however, satisfactorily explain the more direct role of the government in Baha’i persecution after the Islamic revolution took place in Iran. Nor does it excuse the fear minorities in Iran have to live in, knowing that each period of political unrest or dissatisfaction will unleash yet another period of repression and killings of their followers.51 Buildup towards the 1979 revolution: Khomeini’s vendetta As Khomeini was to become the embodiment of the leadership of the Iranian revolution and be assigned an almost divine52 role, his views and experiences would be critical to his future leadership. It is, therefore, interesting to note his prerevolutionary role in persecuting the Bahá’ís. In describing the first time Khomeini came into contact with Bahá’ís in Semnan, Taheri explains how the Ayatollah immediately wanted to organize an antiBahá’í gathering in a mosque, and how, ‘For a mullah in those days, coming face to face with a Bahá’í was far more dramatic than meeting Satan in person.’53

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 123

Khomeini was also active in the Shah-supported wave of repression against the Bahá’ís in the mid-1950s. In fact, this campaign was probably the first and last time that Khomeini and the Shah collaborated on a shared political goal. The Shah wanted to attract the support of the clergy in his anticommunist campaign,54 and Khomeini wanted the Shah’s support in the Halabi plan to, ‘seek out and destroy members of the Bahá’í faith’.55 The clergy and the crown made a short-term uneasy alliance, which resulted in the official destruction of the Bahá’í centre of Tehran. As Avery explained, ‘In 1955 observers were surprised when the Government suddenly instituted moves against the religious minority of the Bahá’ís; although there is religious toleration in Iran, action against the Bahá’ís was condoned on the grounds that their faith is not recognized as a separate religion.’56 After this short alliance ended, however, there was never to be any further alliances between Khomeini and the Shah. In fact, their policies became so polarized and dichotomous that Taheri has claimed, ‘From 1963 onwards anyone engaged in political activity in Iran was taking the side either of the Shah or Khomeini, often without realising it.’57 The Shah must have taken note of the strong antiBahá’í feeling amongst the clergy, because his October 1962 Local Council’s Law once again denied Bahá’ís legal recognition. In contrast, members of the recognized minority faiths – Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians – were given separate votes in the parliamentary elections for the Majles (Lower House) under this law.58 Halabi’s antiBahá’í organization continued to grow, until it is said to have boasted 12 000 members throughout Iran by the late 1970s.59 Bahá’ís had become so significant a symbol of political and Islamic hatred in Iranian politics that Taheri explains how, in the 1970s, a terrorist group named ‘Fajr’ (Dawn), ‘had been founded by a number of students in Mashhad originally as a means of fighting the Bahá’í faith, but had quickly developed into an active paramilitary organisation capable of carrying out assassinations and sabotage missions’.60 Khomeini chose to forget his alliance with the Shah in destroying the Bahá’ís and, in fact, benefited from the public’s impression of him as one who had never collaborated with the Shah’s regime. Despite knowing from personal experience of the Shah’s willingness to eradicate the Iranian Bahá’í community, in 1978 he discredited the Shah with, ‘a savage campaign of character assassination, rumours and the exposure of the regime’s links with the Zionists, the “Cross-Worshippers”, the Bahá’ís and other enemies of Islam’.61

124 Nazila Ghanea

From the early days of the revolutionary unrest in Iran during 1978, Khomeini, then in exile in France, was asked about the new system of Islamic justice that would be applied and the rights of women and of non-Muslim religious communities in the new Islamic Republic, of which he was the main symbol. He assured the Jews that their rights would be preserved, but when asked by a journalist about the Bahá’ís he categorically stated that, ‘They are a political faction; they are harmful. They will not be accepted.’62 Despite the persecution of Bahá’ís not being a new theme in Iranian politics, the tone of this remark and the conscious separation of the Bahá’ís sent a chill down the spines of the 350 000 or so Bahá’ís in Iran. During his campaign Khomeini continuously asserted his claim that, ‘the Bahá’ís in Iran acted as the agents of the Jews and Israel’.63 He also made passionate appeals such as, ‘The Koran and Islam are in danger. The independence of the state and the economy are threatened by a takeover by the Zionists, who in Iran have appeared in the guise of Bahá’ís.’64 Unfortunately, these attacks did not just remain verbal in nature. The next decade and a half was to witness over 200 executions (including those of girls as young as seventeen and the arson attack on an elderly couple), torture, imprisonments and hundreds of homes being ransacked. Thousands were thrown out of employment, youth was denied an education, and all Bahá’ís forbidden to leave the country by being denied exit permits and passports. Attempts were made at every level and from every angle to destroy the Bahá’í community. The leader was the law, his intense hatred of the Bahá’ís was institutionalized as representing ‘God’s will’. The post-1979 repression of the Bahá’ís What was original about the post-1979 nature of the repression of the Bahá’ís is the extent to which the Islamic Republic endorsed these attacks. It institutionalized and legitimized the bases of this religious intolerance, and fully supported the attempts to suppress this religious community. The international community was shocked at the full horrors of Hitler’s ‘final solution’ and vowed to prevent such atrocities ever occurring again. What remains shocking is that when what might be argued to be a similar challenge faced the international community almost 40 years later, there was no effective mechanism to prevent the massacre of a national minority community by its own government. Although the principal doctrines of human rights and the laws against genocide, and crimes against humanity, were supposed to recognize no national boundaries, they were still seriously hindered by the lack of

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 125

means to realize them. The challenges may have altered, but borders seem no more permeable four decades on. This time, the issues raised were those of the nonrecognition of a community that was established in dozens of other states around the world as a religion. National jurisdiction, cultural relativism, territorial integrity and the need to protect the foundations of the state, were still powers in the hands of the national government that could be called upon even in the case of religious persecution. Justifications for the targeting of the Bahá’ís The perspective that has had most impact on the stereotype of Bahá’ís for the Iranian public is the accusation of the religion being a colonial movement, and a source of espionage against Iran. However, no historical or political records have shown a linkage, nor have any of the diplomatic records of the various states that have been associated with Bahá’ís ever suggested even a possible motive. Fantastic claims were made against the Bahá’ís. One example comes from Najafi.65 He accused the Bábís and the Bahá’ís of having fostered political links not only with the Russians, but also the British and French consulates, the Greek and Balkan rebel leaders in Adrianople, the Ottoman empire, the British King George V, Zionists, the Pahlavi leaders and the Ba’athist Party in Iraq! Generally, the claim is that the British invented the Bábí and Bahá’í movements. It is alleged that they then became involved with the Ottomans and French, after which they became involved with the Zionist movement when the Bahá’ís started to assist with the creation of the state of Israel. Najafi also suggests that the Bahá’ís have continuously been involved in anti-Islamic and anti-Iranian campaigns worldwide and in upholding the regime of the Shah.66 Early on in their historical emergence the Bábís did cause a political stir in Iran due to their appeal and strong position on issues such as the rights of women. However, persecution accompanied the growth of this religion from the earliest days and it would have been a most risky game for any foreign delegation to want to get involved in. If the Bábí Faith had been an imperialist creation, surely such outside powers would have dropped the experiment within the first few years. Within the first decade of the start of the Bábí Faith, its founder (Mirza Ali Muhammad,67 known as the ‘Báb’) had been executed and at least 5000 of its members killed.68 It is unlikely that a colonial power would want to persist with such a bloody venture, or that such a movement would become arguably the second-widest spread religion in the world by the 1990s.69 Furthermore, the Russians or British had strong political

126 Nazila Ghanea

and economic leverage over the Iranian government and clergy of the time anyway, and could have no need for the services of a severely persecuted minority. The Bahá’í Faith constitutes the largest religious minority in Iran,70 with Shi’i Islam as the majority religion. Its mere existence presents Shi’is with what is at once perceived as both a threat and a heresy – how can any independent religious faith claim to have come into existence after the Prophet Muhammad? With its historical roots in Islam, this challenge and resulting intolerance is only heightened further. Thus, in Iran, it has never been recognized as a religion although it has 17 148 local administrative assemblies and 174 national assemblies, and has been established in over 190 045 independent states and major territories worldwide.71 Of course, the real reason for this nonrecognition is due to the success of the Shi’i clergy in putting anti-Bahá’í attacks high on their agenda consistently over the last 155 years. After all, the implicit threat in the recognition of the Bahá’í Faith is that it believes that the Báb (1819–50) fulfilled the Shi’i prophesies of the return of the Twelfth Imam and Mahdi, and that Bahá’u’lláh (1817–92) was the founder of a new religious revelation from God.72 In the eyes of the Shi’i clergy, therefore, ‘the repression and extermination of the Bahá’í minority represents a basic act of self-preservation.’73 Postrevolutionary events Despite such documents as The Charter of the United Nations, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 1981 Declaration on the Elimination of Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief and the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, standards worldwide often fall short of the norms endorsed. As Robertson reminds us, ‘It is easy to see that it is at the level of application that human rights law is at present least satisfactory.’74 Problems often arise in relation to minorities who resort to violence, demand selfdetermination, their collective human rights or the freedom to practice the outward exercise of their religious belief. However, in the case of the Bahá’ís in Iran the issue, more simply, relates to international criminal law and attempts at the destruction of a minority group by a state. The wave of persecution against the Bahá’ís led many to describe the situation, 1979 to 1989 in particular, as ‘genocide’.75 The treatment of the Bahá’ís affected Iran’s obligations regarding civil and political rights and collective human rights, and may have amounted to genocide. Despite numerous attempts internationally to bring all legal and

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 127

political means of pressure into play there were serious limits to the effectiveness of these measures. It is interesting, in this regard, to note Glaser’s distinction between genocide and a ‘crime against humanity’. He claims that the distinction primarily depends on the motive of the person committing the crime, ‘If his aim is to eliminate the victim because of the latter’s race, religion or political beliefs, with no other interest, his act constitutes a crime against humanity, whereas if committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national ethnic, racial or religious group, it will be qualified as genocide.’76 According to the Principles of International Law recognized in the Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal and in the judgement of the Tribunal (1950),77 crimes against humanity are defined as, ‘Murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation and other inhuman acts done against any civilian population, or persecutions on political, racial or religious grounds …’ In the case of the Bahá’ís it is clear (as will be discussed later) that the motive of the Khomeini and post-Khomeini revolutionary government has been to destroy the roots of the Bahá’í Faith both in Iran and abroad. The motive of individuals involved in mob violence may have primarily been to destroy Bahá’ís for not consenting to convert to Islam, but would be more likely to have stemmed from the government’s wish to destroy the Bahá’í Faith once and for all. Article 2 of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948) – to which Iran is a signatory – defines genocide as, ‘any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such: (a) Killing members of the group; (b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; (c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part …’ It would, therefore, seem that the Iranian government’s actions did amount to genocide. Scholars such as Kuper,78 Whitaker79 and Harff and Gurr,80 for example, classify the Bahá’ís as victims of genocide. In 1982 the International Commission of Jurists stated of the case, ‘[The] treatment of Bahá’ís is motivated by religious intolerance and a desire to eliminate the Bahá’í Faith from the land of its birth. This comes close to an allegation of genocide.’81 Allen claims, ‘The Bahá’ís’ persecutions are tantamount to systematic genocide.’82 The greatest testimony of all regarding this matter may be provided by a document – said to be from the office of Dr Seyyed Mohammad Golpaygani, Secretary of the Supreme Revolutionary Council and dated 25 February 1991 – described in the

128 Nazila Ghanea

report to the UN Commission on Human Rights by the UN Special Representative for Iran.83 What is important to note is that its recommendations suggest a more subtle and sophisticated approach to continued attempts at eliminating the Bahá’í movement and members worldwide. They include these provisions: The Government’s dealings with them must be in such a way that their progress and development are blocked. A plan must be devised to confront and destroy their cultural roots outside the country. Deny them employment if they identify themselves as Bahá’ís. Deny them any position of influence, such as in the educational sector, etc. They can be enrolled in schools provided they have not identified themselves as Bahá’ís. They must be expelled from universities, either in the admission process or during the course of their studies, once it becomes known that they are Bahá’ís. To the extent that it does not encourage them to be Bahá’ís, it is permissible to provide for them the means for ordinary living in accordance with the general rights given to every Iranian citizen, such as ration booklets, passports, burial certificates, work permits, etc. It, therefore, becomes clear that in seeking to ‘destroy the cultural roots’ of the Bahá’í faith, both within and outside Iran, the Iranian leadership continues to harbour hopes for the suffocation of the Bahá’í movement and its final elimination. Cooper, nevertheless, believes that, ‘Those who speak of genocide should remember that even at its highest estimate the number of Bahá’ís killed is only a tiny fraction of the whole community, though none the more excusable for that.’84 Regardless of whether or not the numbers involved would qualify the application of the term genocide to the case there is no doubt that Iran sought to ignore its obligations in international law in relation to the Bahá’ís by choosing to deny them legal or political recognition. The repression of the Bahá’ís clearly violated customary international law, especially in relation to the rights to life, prohibition against torture, equal protection under the laws, freedom from arbitrary arrest, freedom of travel out of Iran, freedom of religion, right to social security, right to work and right to education. ‘International opinion holds that the UDHR constitutes binding law to the extent that it defines and implements the UN Charter’s human rights provision … The UDHR thus

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 129

binds Iran whether or not Iran recognises the UDHR as customary international law.’85 Reference to customary international law, however, is not necessary. As, ‘States are more likely to respect a commitment which has been accepted specifically rather than one which arises by virtue of customary law,’86 emphasizing the treaty law involved provides a stronger case. Tahzib87 outlines 30 UN instruments that refer to the legal protection afforded the freedom of religion or belief in international law. Such documents go a long way beyond the freedom for the individual exercise of religion, and refer to the freedom to maintain or to change one’s religion or belief,88 the freedom of parents to choose the kind of education to be given to their children,89 the right of religious minorities to profess and practise their own religion in community with the other members of their group90 and the abolition of religious discrimination in admission to private and public employment.91 Iran’s position on the recognition of its treaty obligations, or international law itself, certainly does not reflect proof of a consistent or finely developed policy. Khomeini’s representative in the United Nations said in 1985 that human rights were, ‘a Judeo–Christian invention and inadmissible in Islam’.92 However, the argument seems to have gone full cycle by 1993, when Iran was attempting to be seen to champion the cause of human rights, in emphasizing the 1990 Cairo Declaration as the Islamic alternative to international human rights. Iran’s formal position on human rights at that point in time, however, seems to have little impact on the treatment of Bahá’ís. Bahá’ís are, once again, the exception to the rule. On numerous occasions representatives of the Republic of Iran have argued that the Bahá’ís are only executed and imprisoned in so far as individual members are criminals and politically disruptive. These are stunning statements to make considering the official documents93 that exist testifying to the fact that Bahá’ís are denied employment, a university education, even life, purely because they have refused to deny their faith and convert to Islam. Iran has continuously tried to persist in its denial of human rights to the Bahá’ís by refusing to recognize them as a religious minority. Even in his 1996 report Amor, the Special Rapporteur to the Islamic Republic of Iran, has stated that the Iranian authorities, ‘do not recognise the Bahá’ís as a religious minority. The Bahá’í organisation has been defined as a political sect historically linked to the Shah’s regime and, hence, as counter-revolutionary and characterized by its espionage activities for the benefit of foreign entities, particularly Israel.’94

130 Nazila Ghanea

According to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966), to which Iran is a signatory, ‘In those States in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion, or to use their own language.’ Recognition, or lack of recognition, as a religious minority has no impact on Iran’s obligations to the Bahá’ís under international law, as the existence of religious or other communities is a question of fact and not of law.95 Furthermore, ‘It may be asserted that the contemporary development of international law tends to favour the acceptance of self-identification as a criterion for the application of international standards in minority rights.’96

Conclusion Although Islam, as a religious doctrine, poses no threat to religious minorities, its political expression is often combined with discrimination against other religious communities, as can be seen with the case of the Bahá’ís of Iran. Historically, Islam frequently promoted religious liberty beyond the norms of the time in communities where it gained power. It is ironic that today Muslim movements often accept leadership patterns and policies that seriously deny the application of human rights to non-Muslim nationals. The urgency and implications of the possible clash between the political successes of Islamist movements and the threat to minorities has not been realized previously due to historical realities. Early in Islamic history Muslims were largely in the minority, hence the problem did not arise. When Muslims did come to constitute the majority and leadership they sometimes chose to recognize additional religions as ‘people of the book’ (Ahl al-Kitab) and hence extended the liberties offered to Jews and Christians under Islamic sunna of ‘Dhimmis’, to Zoroastrians and Hindus too. Another system that was operational was that of special European arrangements to protect religious minorities living in Muslim states.97 With the end of the Second World War and the independence of a large number of Middle Eastern states these systems largely came to an end. The growth of a secular form of nationalism and system of law still continued to offer some protection to the religious minorities of Muslim states. The recent growth in public pressure on Islamic governments in some Middle Eastern countries, and the extension of the Sharia law, has put religious minorities in the

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 131

position of considerable and likely vulnerability. This is due to such movements’ insistence on, ‘the sharp distinction between what is Muslim and what is not’ and to the concept of, ‘ideological faith, tied to temporal power which it cannot share with others not of the same faith’.98 It is unacceptable for Muslim states to abrogate their responsibilities according to international norms and covenants, once they decide to include a more religious aspect into their state constitutions and structures. Not only is it inconsistent with the high standards of morality which believers argue characterizes Islam, but it also demeans the foundations of their ‘new society’ in the eyes of their own citizens and the other members of the international community. The issues that are making the equal treatment of religious minorities problematical in Muslim countries seems to be primarily the total concentration of political control in the hands of the ruler. Such rulers, at times of waning popularity, may resort to violence against minorities as a show of strength and distraction from domestic problems. However, a more liberal interpretation of Islamic precepts, and one which arguably more accurately reflects early Muslim communities, is certainly possible. Islam is very flexible and its history is laden with examples of change. The precedent already exists for Zoroastrians and Hindus as having been recognized as ‘peoples of the Book’ (Ahl al-Kitab or Dhimma) despite them not being included in the Qur’a– n as those with a holy book from God. The same mandate could be used to recognize Bahá’ís and other minorities, who undoubtedly believe in God and share similar teachings and foundations to Islam itself. Such a provision, however, would be unlikely regarding the Bahá’í faith99 and other movements whose existence postdates Islam, as it may be unpopular and also because it challenges Islamic concepts such as that of apostasy.100 An all-inclusive reassessment of such questions would be needed from within Islam. Such changes would lead to significant advantages for the Muslim populace as well, as currently they are also living under the threat of the label ‘apostate’, if their writings, political thoughts or ideas challenge the exact policies of the Muslim state in which they reside. The reform of present policies would be likely – over time – to increase rather than to decrease the popularity and national, regional and international, legitimacy of the state concerned. For example the 1985 execution of Mahmud Muhammad Taha did not result in respect for the Sudanese government’s strong conservative position on ‘apostasy’ and ‘heresy’. Instead, it demonstrated a serious miscalculation of popular

132 Nazila Ghanea

feeling and, Mayer argues, led to the eventual overthrow of the Nimeiri regime.101 The Bahá’í persecutions too have done nothing for Iran’s international standing and certainly challenge its current attempts at getting rid of its ‘pariah’ status in international fora, such as the UN Commission on Human Rights, and at attracting foreign investment and tourism. It is difficult, and perhaps inappropriate, for outsiders to try to outline how reforms to present Islamic norms could be carried out. It is important to note, however, that this is a suggestion that many Muslims have put forward themselves, and it is a conclusion reached by many scholars. Such scholars have invariably differentiated between the requirements the early Islamic communities (in the face of fierce opposition and threats) were faced with and the present political realities; the substance of the Muslim moral code and the example of the Prophet Muhammad. The only political option open to the majority of these countries is to try to stimulate such a change. After all, the minorities implicated most strongly are political non-persons with no civil or legal voice or recognition. If the governments concerned realized the gains to be made in reform, or if the majorities realized their own perilous political status, then perhaps they would bring about gradual reforms that would also benefit the even more perilous position of their fellow citizens who are members of non-recognized minority religions. Then the Qur’a– nic principle of ‘no compulsion in religion’102 would become more than an empty hope and gain some real meaning from those who claim to champion such teachings and translate them into reality. Of course, the challenge with the Bahá’í situation is that the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh were Muslims, who founded what they claimed to be new faiths from God, fulfilling the prophesies of the Qur’a– n. They are seen as rejecting Islam and, therefore, as much more of a threat to it than would be posed by a separate religion. The fear, however, is that change will not be stimulated on the grounds of the spirit of justice, respect and toleration in Islam, but on political exigencies. ‘Islamic politics, like Islam itself, is both adaptable and tough; its viability in any given area rests finally on the possibilities that the national context affords.’103 The question that we should be asking, therefore, should perhaps be: which political array of forces, and in which state, has the inclination to liberate non-Muslims living under Muslim rule, including those whose beliefs and movements postdate Islam, but who pose no political threat to it? Secondly, would such an approach gain popularity and be adopted by other Islamic

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 133

states? ‘Human rights issues are unavoidably political, and unless this is appreciated, neither the development of the law to date, nor the possibilities for growth in the future can be properly understood.’104 ‘Intolerance and discrimination based on religion or belief cannot be prevented and eliminated in all its forms by legislative measures and legal remedies alone.’105 However, in the case of Islamic states, the structural form of intolerance, the legalistic heritage of Islam itself, and the backdrop of interpretations of the Sharia mean that legal remedies – and their political institutionalization – would eliminate the primary cause of the discrimination against non-Muslims in such states. The meaning of Islamic law, its sources, the patterns of leadership it legitimizes, the mechanisms for its interpretation and its relationship to international law all need to be clarified. This would prevent the type of situation in which Khomeini declared Islamic government as being superior to even the Qur’a– nic laws on prayer, and so able to break Sharia laws.106 Non-Muslim observers may be excused for concluding that, in Islam, the political leader is the law, and that the Qur’a– n and Sharia are mere instruments for the reinforcement of autocratic rule. It is, therefore, in the reformation of the law that the solution lies, rather than in the short-term measures of patient negotiating alone107 or General Assembly economic sanctions or humanitarian intervention.108 Its success, after all, would only amount to the final acceptance of the primacy of international law by around 40 nations of the world. These may have been tempted to compromise their obligations for the sake of internal political popularity, and to take advantage of the very extensive powers of ‘interpretation’ and ‘application’ Islamic rule affords them.

Notes 1. The author would like to thank Professor Patrick Thornberry, Mr Dan Keohane and Dr Rosemary O’Kane for their valuable comments. 2. Allen K. Jones quoted in Allen 1987, vol. 20.337, p. 338. 3. ‘The portrayal of Islam by Western and other non-Muslim scholars as an uncompromising, monolithic and fossilised faith is far from accurate.’ Zakaria 1988, p. 278. 4. This would be on the basis of the division of the world into dar-ul Islam and dar-ul harab. However, Zakaria denies that such a division is valid in Islam. ‘The so-called division of the world into dar-ul Islam (sphere of Islam) and dar-ul harab (sphere of war) is not mentioned in the Qur’a–n; nor is it found in the sunna. It is the invention of the classical jurists, which the Christians and the Jews have used to their advantage.’ Zakaria 1988, pp. 297–8. 5. Bielefeldt 1995, p. 595.

134 Nazila Ghanea 16. ‘While many of the practices for which these [Islamic] states have been criticised (most notably, the denial of political rights across a wide spectrum) are common to other countries, some pertain to specific aspects of the ideologies and laws of these countries, formally phrased as they are in terms of Muslim law and practice.’ Halliday 1995, p. 134. 17. For a discussion of this point see ibid., pp. 282–3. 18. Shi’i Islam had traditionally been opposed to the ulama’s involvement in politics. Khomeini’s stance on government gave rise to a reassessment of the Iranian clergy’s view of their role. For example, Husain explains how Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani was inspired by Khomeini’s new approach, ‘The impressionable teenager was greatly influenced by Khomeini’s revolutionary Islamic world view that contrasted sharply with Shi’i Islam’s apolitical and quietist tradition. Under Khomeini’s tutelage, Rafsanjani came to believe that the salvation of Islam and the Muslim world lay in the assumption of temporal power by the ulama.’ Husain 1995, p. 236. 19. Halliday 1995, p. 136. 10. Bassiouni 1982, p. 249. 11. Halliday 1995, p. 137. 12. Ibid., p. 138. 13. Ibid., p. 139. 14. Mayer 1991, p. 22. 15. Paragraph 19 of the Vienna Declaration, adopted 25 June 1993, includes the following statement, ‘The persons belonging to minorities have the right to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practise their own religion and to use their own language in private and in public, freely and without interference or any form of discrimination.’ 16. Quoted from Muhammad Assad’s translation, 1980, in Amin 1985, p. 38. 17. Mayer 1991, p. 75. 18. Ibid., p. 76. 19. van der Vyver 1996, p. 31. 20. Amin 1985, p. 1. 21. Ibid. 22. Quoted in Akhavan 1993, p. 213. 23. Criticizing the mullahs’ abuse of their power, Zakaria writes, ‘The mulla tried to strangle others, not only the secularists but also his theological opponents … on none of the basic issues involving religion and politics, was there at any time consensus among the ulama. Their views depended on the exigencies of the situation …’ Zakaria 1988, pp. 288–9. 24. See note 69 for a discussion of the population of non-Muslims in Iran. 25. Farhang, Mansour, in response to a letter about his article, ‘Khomeini’s Reign of Terror’, published in: The Nation, 30 January 1982, said in: The Nation, 27 February 1982: ‘The Iranian Baha’is are the only people whose persecution, which includes confiscation of property as well as summary arrests and executions, is motivated solely by fascistic aggression without any provocation whatsoever. For the Baha’is in Iran pose no threat at all to the regime.’ 26. The Bahá’í history and calendar begins with the declaration of the Báb in Shiraz, Iran in May 1844.

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 135 27. 28.

29. 30.

31. 32. 33. 34.

35. 36.

37. 38. 39.

40. 41. 42 43. 44.

45.

46. 47.

The Islamic revolution of 1979 in Iran marked this ‘systemization’. For example see Esposito 1984, p. 204: ‘Few, other than Khomeini’s colleagues and students, were familiar with his writings on the nature of Islamic government …’ Husain 1995, p. 227. There was a lot of confusion about whether or not Khomeini advocated direct clerical rule. Although Khomeini’s book Islamic Government was even translated into French, very few people had read it. In the build-up towards the revolution Khomeini intentionally sent out contradictory messages. ‘The mullahs, he said again and again, would not serve in executive positions … He whetted the appetite for power of numerous politicians and encouraged them to believe that they would be the future rulers of Iran.’ Taheri 1985, p. 232. For example see Husain 1995, p. 227. Olivier 1994, p. 173. See Articles II and V of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran. Linabury argues that this concept of rule by the high religious leader, ‘was passed on intact, although diluted,’ after Khomeini’s death as, ‘Khomeini’s legacy does not include the one-man rule that he enjoyed.’ Linabury 1992, pp. 34 –5. Ayubi 1991, p. 151. Shah Abbas, the leader who had established the Twelver branch of Shi’ism in Iran, had also declared himself deputy of the hidden twelfth imam decades earlier, ‘Because of his powerful personality the ulama gave in, and acknowledged his supremacy.’ Zakaria 1988, p. 148. Akhavan 1993, p. 205. Ibid. Also known as the Ithna ‘Ashariyah’. They believe that the twelfth imam Abul Qasim Muhammad al-Muntazar disappeared in a well, but is alive and hidden by God, due to return at the appointed time to establish justice and remove evil. See ibid., pp. 306–307. Mortimer 1982, p. 44. Fuller 1991, p. 272. Amin 1985, p. 37. Afshari 1994, p. 249. ‘The fear and insecurity of the Coptic minority in Egypt in the last 30 years led to an open confrontation between its leadership and the state in 1972 … Some Coptic writers frantically argued for a secular order in which a plural society could flourish and in which the essence of citizenship was allegiance to the nation, not religion.’ Vatikiotis 1987, p. 97. ‘The failure of Muslim conservatives to recognize the principle of religious freedom is not a mere theoretical problem. In real life it can mean adverse consequences for rights protections of people, including Muslims, who espouse religious positions unacceptable to Muslim conservatives and ideologues of Islamization.’ Mayer 1991, p. 160. Zakaria 1988, p. 128. For example, Adolfo Rivadneyra wrote of the situation in 1875, ‘In order to give an idea of the fear that, even today, the Babis, who are to be found all

136 Nazila Ghanea

48. 49.

50. 51.

52.

53. 54. 55.

56. 57. 58.

59. 60. 61. 62.

over Iran, inspire in the people, it is enough to say that even I, a European, would not dare to speak aloud the name of the sect in public, for fear of thus starting an immediate conflict.’ Quoted in Momen 1981, p. 28. For a discussion of the level of suppression suffered by the Bábís and Bahá’ís over their 154 year history and under the various regimes, see Douglas 1984. What needs to be noted is the commonality of this theme in the Iranian rhetoric of protest. Khomeini was accused of having written erotic poetry and of being a British spy, and the Shah of being corrupt, of pursuing animal pleasures and selling out to the foreigners, see Esposito 1984, p. 202; and Bakhash 1985, p. 36, respectively. Fischer 1980, pp. 184 –5. ‘More insidious [than the dress code] is the legacy of attacking minorities, which carried on into the 1970s as a kind of daily petty terror … Petty desecrations of graveyards and shrines of non-Muslims were also normal adolescent behaviour. Such terrorism makes it hard for non-Muslims to be enthusiastic about political protest in Islamic idiom, however much the political protest may be justified.’ Ibid., p. 186. As Afrachteh argues, ‘The title “Imam” bestowed upon Khomeini (and, it appears, readily accepted) is indicative of his belief that he is engaged in a divinely commissioned jihad.’ Afrachteh 1981, p. 108. Taheri 1985, p. 83. Ibid., pp. 113–14. Taheri describes the Halabi plan in this way, ‘a national register of Bahá’ís would be compiled, enabling the mullahs to contact each follower of the faith and try to bring him back onto the right path; if they failed, the Bahá’í in question would be put on a black list and boycotted by the Muslims. In some cases, the adamant Bahá’ís would be put to death.’ Ibid., 113–14. After the revolution, however, the policy of the Halabi group (called The Hojjatiyyeh) changed. ‘After the revolution, as the suppression of Baha’ism became the general clerical policy, the society turned to Marxism as the archenemy to be eradicated.’ Arjomand 1988, p. 157. Avery 1965, p. 469. Taheri 1985, p. 148. Despite such obvious decisions by the Shah to continue to deny recognition of the Bahá’í faith, this did not stop the mullahs from claiming, in their attempts at raising hatred against him, that the Shah was a Bahá’í and had given all senior posts to the Bahá’ís. In denouncing the 1962 Local Council Law Khomeini, ‘denounced the bill as the first step toward the abolition of Islam and the delivery of Iran to the Baha’is, the presumed agents of Zionism and Imperialism who were implicitly enfranchised by the bill alongside women.’ Arjomand 1988, p. 85. This ‘Hojatieh’ organization, however, rejected Khomeini’s Velayat-i-Faqih claim, and were ordered to disband by Khomeini in 1983. Taheri 1985, p. 190 Ibid., p. 197 Interview given by Khomeini to Professor James Cockroft of Rutgers University in December 1978, published in the 23 February 1979 issue of Seven Days, and the New York Times, 13 February 1979 ‘Two US Jews hold talk’, quoted in Martin 1984, p. 31.

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 137 63. 64.

65.

66. 67. 68. 69.

70.

71. 72. 73. 74. 75. 76. 77. 78. 79.

80.

81. 82.

Bakhash 1985, p. 26. Khomeini, Zendegi-nameh-ye Imam Khomeini (The Life of Imam Khomeini), 12 Moharram Publications, Tehran 1357 (1978), pp. 81–2, quoted in ibid., p. 26. ‘Bahaism: A Study in Pseudo-Religion’ (Review Article) Sa’id Najafiyan, in Al-Tawhid, vol. vi, no. 4, Shawwal-Dhu al-Hijjah 1409 (A Quarterly Journal of Islamic Thought and Culture), May–July 1989, pp. 157–79; book review of: Najafi, Siyyid Muhammad Baqir, ‘Baha’iyan’, Kitab Khaneh Tahuri, Tehran, 1979. For example; Noori 1988. The Báb was born in Shiraz, Iran, in October 1817. He declared his ‘mission’ in May 1844 and was executed in Tabriz in July 1850. Cole 1990, p. 27. ‘The Encyclopaedia Britannica Book of the Year, 1992, shows the Bahá’í faith, despite its relatively small membership, as the most widely diffused religions on earth, second only to Christianity.’ The Bahá’í World 1992–1993, 1993 Bahá’í World Centre Publications, Haifa, p. 251. The most recent census in Iran dates back to 1978. There has been no census since the revolution, and there is more uncertainty about the populations of non-Muslims in Iran due to factors such as emigration and persecution. However, John Simpson puts the figures at: 350 000 Bahá’ís, 310 000 Christians, 30 000 Zoroastrians and 25 000 Jews; Simpson and Shubart 1995, pp. 222–33. The World Report on Freedom of Religion and Belief, however, puts the figures at a possible 300 000 Bahá’ís, 250 000 Christians, 40 000 Zoroastrians and less than 40 000 Jews; Boyle and Sheen 1997, p. 419. The Bahá’í World 1995–1996, 1997 Bahá’í World Centre Publications, Haifa, p. 317. For details of the beliefs of the Bahá’í faith see Schaefer 1986; Huddleston 1976. Akhavan 1993, p. 198. Robertson/Merrills 1992, p. 289. Allen 1987 (vol. 20.337), ‘The Baha’is’ persecutions are tantamount to systematic genocide.’ Glaser, ‘Droit International Penal Conventionnel’, vol. I, 165, in Thornberry 1991, p. 58. Formulated by the International Law Commission as requested by the General Assembly on 21 November 1957, Resolution 177 (II). Kuper 1985, p. 152. Whitaker, Benjamin C. G., ‘Special Rapporteur’, requested by the Economic and Social Council from the Sub-Commission on Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, UN Doc. E/C.N.4/Sub.2/ 1985/6. Harff, B. and Gurr, T. R., ‘Genocides and Politicides since 1945: Evidence and Anticipation’, paper to have been published in Issues II of the ‘Internet on the Holocaust and Genocide’, Winter 1987–88, quoted in Schmid 1989, p. 61. International Commission of Jurists, 1982, quoted in Allen 1987, p. 338. Ibid., p. 339.

138 Nazila Ghanea 83.

184.

185. 186. 187. 188. 189. 190. 191. 192.

193. 94. 95. 96. 97. 98. 99.

100.

Confidential Iranian document from Dr Seyyed Mohammad Golpaygani, Secretary of the Supreme Revolutionary Council to the Head of the Office of Esteemed Leader [Khamenei], dated 6 December 1969 according to the Islamic calendar [25 February 1991], described in the report to the UN Commission on Human Rights by the UN Special Representative for Iran, UN Document E/CN.4/1993/41 dated 28 January 1993, published 22 February 1993. For full translation of this memorandum see The Bahá’í Question: Iran’s Secret Blueprint for the Destruction of a Religious Community: an Examination of the Persecution of the Bahá’ís of Iran 1979–1993, Bahá’í International Community Publications: New York, 1993, pp. 38–9. Of this memorandum, the US State Department stated, ‘In 1993 the UN Special Representative reported the existence of a government policy directive on the Baha’is … The Government claims that the directive is a forgery. However, it appears to be an accurate reflection of current government practice.’ US Department of State, Iran Human Rights Practices 1995, electronic format, dated March 1996, p. 10 (of 12), web page US State Department, directory: /Human Rights Report 1995/iran.txt. Cooper 1985, p. 12. According to the Special Rapporteur Mr Abdelfattah Amor’s report on Iran (Economic and Social Council, dated 9 February 1996, 52nd session, item 18 of the provisional agenda of the Commission on Human Rights, UN Docs. E/CN.4/1996/95/Add.2): ‘The Bahá’í community in Iran is estimated at 300 000. Since 1979 201 Baha’is have been assassinated and 15 have been missing and are presumed dead (para. 69), 10 000 Baha’is had been dismissed from posts in administration and teaching posts (para. 64). The percentage killed therefore comes to 0.072 per cent and the percentage thrown out of civil service posts comes to 3.33 per cent.’ Allen 1987, pp. 346–7. Robertson, A. H. 1992, p. 288. Tahzib 1995. The Draft Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, Article 18. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 26, paragraph 3. The International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, Article 27. The International Labour Organization, Convention 82 on Social Policy in Non-Metropolitan Territories (1947), Article 18. Sa’id Raja’i-Khorassani, Khomeini’s Permanent Delegate to the United Nations in a debate on Human Rights in January 1985, quoted in Taheri 1985, p. 18. For examples, see Martin 1984. UN Special Rapporteur Abdelfattah Amor’s report on the Islamic Republic of Iran, op. cit., paragraph 56. See Thornberry 1995, p. 22 and endnote 50. Ibid., p. 29. For example; Wright 1977. Vatikiotis 1987, pp. 98–9. See UN Special Rapporteur Abdelfattah Amor’s report on Iran op. cit., paragraph 57, ‘The authorities indicated that only the religious dignitaries could decide on the possibility of granting religious minority status to the Baha’is’. Recent cases of those accused of apostasy includes that of two Bahá’ís in Iran who currently face the death sentence due to the ‘crime’ of converting

Islam and the Bahá’ís of Iran 139

101.

102. 103. 104. 105. 106.

107. 108.

from Islam into another religion. Dhabihullah Mahrami was sentenced to death in January 1996 by a Revolutionary Court in Yazd. His sentence has been confirmed by the Iranian Supreme Court. Musa Talibi was found guilty of apostasy and imprisoned in July 1996 by a court in Isfahan. He also faces the death sentence. For more discussion of the issue of apostasy see Nazila Ghenea-Hercock, ‘The Compatibility of Islamic Law with International Human Rights Law: Reinterpretations of secularisation and apostasy’, paper presented at the BRISMES conference, Oxford University, on 8 July 1997. ‘The revulsion over the execution … provided a strong impetus for mobilising the popular coalition against Nimeiri that succeeded in toppling him from power on April 6, 1985.’ Mayer 1991, p. 159. – The Qur’a n (2:256). Piscatori 1983b, p. 10. Robertson, A. H. 1992, p. 295. Tahzib 1995, p. 9. In a letter to President Khamenei, Khomeini stated of his powers, ‘I should point out that government … is one of the primary rules of Islam, and that it has priority over all subsidiary rules, even including [those governing] prayers, fasting and Hajj. The [Islamic] government can unilaterally break [even] those contracts which it has made with the people on the basis of Sharia rules.’ In ‘Katouzian, Homa, Islamic Government and Politics: The Practice and Theory of the Absolute Guardianship of the Juriconsult’, paper at Symposium on the Post-War Arab Gulf, Centre for Arab Gulf Studies, Exeter University, 12–14 July 1989, pp. 15–16, quoted in Ayubi 1991, p. 151. For details of this suggestion see Cooper 1985, pp. 13–14. For details of such suggested action see Allen 1987, pp. 359–60.

7 Hindu Nationalism and the International Relations of India C. Ram-Prasad

Introduction The constitution of the Republic of India declares it to be a secular state. But secularism in India has its own special meaning in the context of a country which has many religions and where the passion of religious sentiments affects political life. Religious concerns have, therefore, often affected state policy despite what one might assume would be secularism’s constraints on the role of religion. The study of the impact of religion on a formally secular state would be interesting in itself. Some argue that greater account of the deeply felt religious sentiments of people should be taken than has been possible within the somewhat abstract and idealistic framework of the secular constitution. Something of a movement has gathered pace amongst Indian intellectuals in this regard.1 They are mostly careful to distinguish their position from that of Hindu nationalists. I implicitly do not intend here to examine either their nuanced academic views or their relationship to the more strident and expressly political views and actions of the Hindu nationalists. Instead, I want to concentrate on the political parties and extraparliamentary organizations which have carved out a space in the Indian polity for an aggressive religion-based nationalism which calls into question, in a very real and immediate way, the secular basis of the Indian political system. It has been made more urgent because the explicit advocacy of Hindu religious interests looks to make manifest the hitherto covert – or, at any rate, an ideologically neutral – mobilization of people on the basis of religion. The history of independent India reveals that such mobilization has almost always resulted in violence and death. 140

The International Relations of India 141

It has been made theoretically interesting in at least three ways. First, it becomes part of the resurgence of ethnic and religious nationalisms that mark the end of the twentieth century, and the sheer size and potential of India ought to command attention in the study of these nationalisms. More specifically, it is a prime example of how religion can play a role in a vibrant, politically pluralistic democracy struggling to emerge as an economic power. Secondly, the very concept of ‘India’ is being challenged and that calls for debate on the future of that country from Indians and those interested in India. Finally, it brings attention to bear on one of the world’s major religious traditions, in particular, one which is different in nature from the religions which have so far been, by and large, the motive forces behind religious nationalisms. While domestic issues involving religion have tended to dominate attention, India’s international affairs have also been affected. The exact role of religion has perhaps been more difficult to pin down because other, more general, strategic concerns have also influenced India’s relations with its neighbours and the rest of the world. Nevertheless, practical domestic concerns – mostly to do with the grubby but democratic business of winning votes – and abstract issues regarding the concept of Indian national identity have brought religious factors into India’s international affairs. Of course, the nuclear tests carried out in May 1998 under a coalition government led by the dominant Hindu nationalist party, the BJP, has dramatically brought attention to bear on the relationship between India’s foreign policy and Hindu nationalism. Now, not only Hindu traditions, but Islam and Sikhism, have affected these matters. But the great argument at the heart of the Indian polity is one which opposes the notion of an essential Hinduness – ‘Hindutva’, to give the Sanskrit neologism – with a variety of secular ideals, and Islam, Sikhism and other religions are affected by this. The simple demographic equation and the facts of history make the alternative nationalism of India a Hindu one rather than any other. My aim is to look at the way Hindu nationalist groups are affecting the nature of India’s international relations. In doing this, I may give the impression that I have let off non-Hindu nationalist parties easily, but this is not the case. The supposedly secular, Congress Party’s abuse of communal sentiments, both in search of Hindu and of Muslim votes, deserves a separate study.2 The difference is one of basic theory. The Congress exploitation of religious sentiment is electoral calculation pure and simple, for it stands in stark contrast to the Congress’ avowed secularism. But the Hindu nationalists’ approach is interesting

142 C. Ram-Prasad

because they claim to have a theoretical foundation for their actions. It is the relationship between their theory and action that is the subject of my study here.

India’s religious demography and geopolitical situation India is a pluralist democracy of 900 million people.3 About 80 per cent of the population counts itself as Hindu, but this figure is profoundly misleading as there are sects, castes and groupings which have little in common except, at times, mutual antipathy.4 Thirteen per cent of the population is Muslim (also of diverse composition, but together making India roughly the second largest Muslim country after Indonesia). Sikhs form about 2–3 per cent of the population, and Buddhists, Christians, Jains, Jews, and tribal animists make up the rest. The major features of India’s international relations are as follows. Since independence and the partition of British India, there has been a source of friction between India and Pakistan over Kashmir. Kashmir is the only Muslim-majority state in the Indian republic. There was meant to be a UN-sponsored plebiscite in Kashmir, but that never happened. The Hindu ruler of Kashmir acceded to union with India. Two of the three Indo-Pakistan wars were over Kashmir. Kashmir is presently divided by a ceasefire line between a Pakistan-controlled region (‘Azad’ or ‘Free’ Kashmir in Pakistani parlance) and what is currently the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. There is also a portion under Chinese control (which India disputes) but that is another matter. Pakistan supports a plebiscite, but implies that this should somehow result in the accession of the whole of Kashmir to Pakistan, although on present evidence, it is more likely to lead to an independent Kashmir. There is more or less convincing evidence that Pakistan arms and aids Kashmiri groups using violence to break away (for whatever end) from India. India claims that the union is sacrosanct and a breakaway Kashmir would threaten the very principle of a secular nationstate. It clings to the view that a proper election would result in the clear expression of a Kashmiri desire to stay within India, although the evidence is overwhelming that the majority of Kashmiri Muslims do not want it to remain in India. India uses the violent methods of Kashmiri militants to justify its own use of the military to retain an often brutal control over Kashmir. India’s relationship with a mostly Muslim Bangladesh is ambiguous. It went to war with Pakistan when the then East Pakistan broke away and declared independence. But since then, disputes over control over a

The International Relations of India 143

barrage on the Gangetic river system and other such issues have soured relations. The presence of a large number of migrants – often former refugees of the war of independence who never went back – is a source of much political trouble within India, in the neighbouring state of Assam and in other parts of India, especially in Bombay/Mumbai. India and Sri Lanka have also had prickly relations. In an absurd and tragic sequence of events in 1987, India sent in an army to destroy the Tamil Tigers (which it has fitfully supported as a mark of the ethnic connection between Indian and Sri Lankan Tamils) at the behest of the Sinhala-run Sri Lankan government and to put an end to the conflict between the government and the guerrilla group, lost therefore the confidence of non-violent Sri Lankan Tamils, scared by its presence elements in the Sinhala government who then proceeded to help the militants against the Indian army, decided that its losses were too much to bear, and pulled out. This left the situation largely unchanged in Sri Lanka’s balance of military power, but alienated Sri Lankan Tamils enough for some of them to assassinate Rajiv Gandhi, India’s Prime Minister at the time of the operation. India now cautiously watches events in Sri Lanka but the people, including in Tamil Nadu, have largely withdrawn emotionally from the island’s affairs. Unfortunately, the demon seed it sowed grows still, and the southern state continues to be the scene of an underground struggle between different Sri Lankan Tamil groups. India’s relations with Nepal are reasonably straightforward: it dominates the small Hindu kingdom, sometimes putting economic pressure on it when Nepal is perceived to be recalcitrant, but otherwise being noncommittally benign, to the resentment – but not the hostility – of the Nepalis. India was a founding member of the Nonaligned Movement, through which it sought to play a leading role in world affairs. From the beginning, it enjoyed the support of the Soviet Union for a variety of reasons. By the 1970s, it had a formal alliance treaty with the Soviet Union, which made a mockery of its nonalignment. Yet, there was some truth in the concept, because India also maintained a connection with the United States, both economic and cultural. The US always supported and gave massive military aid to Pakistan, seeing it as a bulwark against Soviet power projection, which automatically meant that it was strategically opposed to India. With the US rapprochement with China, this opposition was strengthened, for India was worried about China, having continuing border disputes with it and having had a brief border skirmish in which the Indian illusion of Chinese friendship

144 C. Ram-Prasad

was shattered and in which India came out badly. With the breakup of the Soviet Union, India lost a supplier of military technology on easy terms and a source of mutual support in the United Nations. Ties with the US improved for some time, as the Americans began to see India as a source of military stability in the Indian Ocean (congratulating India, for example, on its successful naval intervention to restore democracy in the Maldives). India’s ties with other western nations and Japan largely shadowed Indo-US relations, although there was a steady if restricted supply of civilian technology and moderately generous aid from these countries for most of the time. India, after following a socialist economic policy that practically cut off its trade with the rest of the world (apart from its unfree-market exchanges with the Soviet Union), is now liberalizing. The economic potential of India and the change in its economic policies is transforming its relations with the world. This seems to promise the possibility of India becoming a ‘major power’ much more than its crippling economic policies and political posturing of the past ever did. All this seemed to change on 11 May 1998. As the world knows, India conducted nuclear tests explicitly for making the country a nuclear weapons state, 24 years after the first – ostensibly ‘peaceful’ – explosion that had kept India’s status ambiguous. Within weeks, resisting tremendous international pressure, Pakistan too had conducted tests and ‘come out’ as another nuclear weapons state. China had been offended by Indian statements that it, not Pakistan, was considered India’s primary threat. The US imposed sanctions automatically triggered by the tests. Condemnation of both countries was virtually unanimous, although only a few followed the US in the imposition of sanctions. Aid-flow from multilateral agencies was constricted. Both India and Pakistan embarked on damage limitation, with very mixed results. The security situation was changed, not only in South Asia, but also perhaps in the whole world, given the impact of the tests on the nonproliferation regime and the possibility of nuclearization occurring in other states. It is uncertain as to what the eventual impact of these events will be on India’s consensual aim of becoming a major power. In the course of this chapter, we will look more closely at the possible outcome, specifically in the context of the tests having been conducted under a Hindunationalist-led coalition. It must be added that this description of relations is strictly in terms of official government policy. As a free and chaotically plural country, there has never been a control on the flow of Indians and information

The International Relations of India 145

in and out of India. Real personal and intellectual relations with the US and Europe (especially, of course, the UK) have always been infinitely better than political relations have been. It is in this context that we must look at the role religion has played and could play in India’s international relations.

Secularism in India It is, of course, a well-worn fact that secularism means many things to many people. But the best known conceptions of it are these: either it is a specifically antireligious attitude which maintains that civil society and polity must be run on principles which exclude religion from them, or it is the milder attitude that the conduct of public life in general should remain neutral towards religion and between religions. In India, on the other hand, secularism has come to mean something else. This Indian conception’s originality lies in the change it wrought on the latter, milder form so as to make it relevant to the conditions of Indian society. Public – or more particularly, state – neutrality between religions has generally coincided in western societies with a reduction in the public expression of religious sentiment and the reassessment of the significance of religion for public life. But the social context of the framers of the Indian Constitution was one in which religion played an intense and public part. Most people at the time of independence in 1947 saw themselves as Hindus and Muslims and Sikhs. British rule had reinforced identity by religious communities (what the Indian nationalists called Britain’s ‘divide and rule’ strategy), and the communal sense was critical to people’s lives. The growth of the Muslim League and its successful advocacy of the Islamic state of Pakistan had also had a profound impact on what remained as India, even among Muslims who stayed and thought of themselves as Indian. What confronted the constitution-makers was a largely poor country in which longstanding attachment to local loyalties had been transformed by the national struggle to a larger concept of self, in terms of a country but also in terms of a pan-Indian religious identity (amongst Hindus and Muslims). Throughout the later stages of the independence struggle, the Indian National Congress had argued for the concept of an Indian identity to subsume pan-Indian religious attachments.5 The Muslim League argued that this was only because the Congress’s largely Hindu leadership could afford to do so in a country in which the Muslims were a minority.6 But even in the Congress leadership there were many who

146 C. Ram-Prasad

thought of themselves as Hindu. There were Muslims in and out of Congress and Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Christians in the population at large to consider as well. As Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first prime minister asked rhetorically, ‘Every village in India has Muslims. There are Christians (as well). Is there Christian nationality, Muslim nationality, Buddhist nationality, Hindu nationality?’7 Obviously, he thought not. His rhetorical question was prompted by Nehru’s fundamental commitment to the value of a secular polity. As he said later, ‘We consider it an absurd, obnoxious and antediluvian theory to divide people into nations on a purely religious basis.’8 The Constituent Assembly attempted to resolve this tension by declaring that India would be a secular state. But this secularism could not merely be a neutrality towards private religious practice, since religion was not a purely private matter in India. There were worries about the identity of minorities, the safeguarding of their place and role in national life, especially so with Muslims who had chosen or somehow ended up staying in an India that wished to be secular rather than in explicitly Islamic Pakistan. Out of this situation grew the conception of an active rather than passive secularism: state-neutrality would take the form of an equal commitment to all the religions of India rather than an equal indifference to all of them.9 This understanding of secularism had profound domestic consequences. The chief of them was the attention paid to the entitlements of the non-Hindu communities. The idea was that sheer demographics dictated that there would be no danger to the rights of Hindus as such (although, of course, there would be special protection given to many weaker Hindu groups, the ‘Scheduled’ and ‘Backward’ castes and tribes); they would never need to worry about being treated as equals in a land in which they were the overwhelming majority. But the other religious communities, especially those which had a high proportion of the economically weak, needed special attention through the constitution to guarantee their future equality. In effect this meant the Muslims, Buddhists and Christians (but not the comparatively prosperous Sikhs, who later came to think they were not sufficiently well treated – but that is another story). So was born an idealistic, but hopelessly confused, policy of entitlements (in effect, reservation of seats at all levels of education and public sector jobs), which alienated middle – and upper – caste Hindus from disadvantaged Hindu groups as well as Muslims. In foreign policy, this secularism meant something very different. Here it was a conscious adoption of the consequences of the passive concept of secularism but from an explicit moral position derived from

The International Relations of India 147

the active concept. That is to say, Indian foreign policy would be conducted without reference to any religious concern, it would be free of any implication that India acted out of specifically Hindu – or, of course any other religion’s – doctrines. In this it was in contrast to Islamic states, most of which did not have democratic credentials. But this religion-free discourse drew upon the active conception of secularism in a way which in the Indian self-image was unique to India. India’s international relations were free of religious reference because all religions coexisted in India. All religions being equal in India, no particular religion’s doctrines would enter Indian policy thinking. Of course, Indian foreign policy rhetoric always contained expressions of moral piety: on nonalignment, on nuclear weapons, on the north-south divide. But these moral principles were argued as being universal, as common to all religions and indeed to nonreligious thought. This, therefore was the Indian ideal of international relations: India was a secular democracy in which most of the major world religions coexisted, and this coexistence provided the foundation for an attitude of universal – religion-transcending – moral discourse.

Hindu nationalism in the 1950s–1970s The theoretical underpinning of secular India may be said, to a large extent, to have derived from Jawaharlal Nehru’s conviction it was only in a polity built on ‘scientific, rational and modern’ institutions that humans could develop fully, not in a traditionally religious state.10 Hindu nationalists, and even those in the early post-independence Congress, who were alienated by what they took to be Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru’s disregard for the role of Hindu culture in the Indian polity, had always been unhappy with the way secularism was interpreted. Most insisted, however, that they were not against the concept of secularism so much as the interpretation that Nehru and other pluralists placed on it. As the then leader of the nonparliamentary but ideologically influential Rashtriya Swavayamsevak Sangh (RSS), M. R. Golwalkar, put it, ‘To a Hindu, the state is and has always been a secular fact. It was only a departure from the Hindu way of life that brought about, for the first time, a non-secular theocratic concept of state under Ashoka.’11 This unhappiness existed, however, even within the ‘broad church’ of the Congress after it won in the first and many subsequent elections of free India: Vallabhai Patel, Nehru’s Deputy Prime Minister was one of them. He thought that pluralistic secularism did not place adequate

148 C. Ram-Prasad

weight on nationalism, that it did not require rootedness in the national culture. As he asked after the first Indo-Pakistan war of 1948 over Kashmir, ‘To Indian Muslims, I have only one question. Why did you not open your mouths on the Kashmir issue? Why did you not condemn the action of Pakistan [in invading Kashmir]? I want to tell you very frankly that you can’t ride two horses. Select one horse. Those who want to select Pakistan can go there and live in peace.’12 There were also others outside Congress, mostly in the Jana Sangh (predecessor of the present Bharatiya Janata Party or BJP) and, as we saw, in nonparliamentary groupings like the RSS who felt even more strongly about this. Their conception of India was different, and the difference lay in their understanding of the Hindu religion and its place in India.13 Their idea of India and nationalism derived from the ideals of the Hindutva ideologues, especially through the forum of the Hindu Mahasabha organization.14 The core of their original understanding of Hinduism may be traced to certain nineteenth and early twentieth-century assertions of Hinduism in the face of the antiHindu polemics of Christian missionaries and other western thinkers. This assertion of Hinduism went thus: it is an essential feature of Hinduism that its texts are inclusive of the teachings of all other religions. There are many scriptural sources in the Hindu tradition and they proclaim that many alternative paths to the same reality are possible. Hinduism is already prepared for – indeed acknowledges the possibility of – the validity of other religions, and so can absorb them. Hinduism has universal validity because Hindu texts make space for other religions.15 So, ultimately, all religions are included in Hinduism. It is the gift of India to the world. It must be emphasized that this view emerged in the face of Christian criticism, and that it was also put in the context in which India’s place in the world had to be justified at a time of apparently insuperable western political and technological domination. Its corollary, as with the religious reformer Swami Vivekananda, often was that India would gain scientific knowledge from the West and give spirituality in return.16 This reconstruction of Hinduism, however, was directed against colonial rule, while being the dedication of the Hindu religion to the nationalist cause, it was – in itself – the propagation of the cause of Hindu nationalism, as the latter came to be understood in independent India. What is characteristic of Hindu nationalism is that this inclusivistic religious conception of Hinduism was yoked to a politicohistorical one: Hinduism was the religion of the Indian nation and the Indian people. This is not the place to explore the ways in which this

The International Relations of India 149

identification – still so central and powerful in Hindutva ideology – came about: I have looked at this in detail elsewhere.17 In brief, the preIslamic world of the subcontinent was reified by Hindus as a singular and single culture with the divine figures of the Indian epics (Rama, Krishna) historicized18 and several major religious texts (the Vedas, the Bhagavadgita, the puranic texts, and some devotional literature) amalgamated into a loose but popularly identifiable body of works. This was also a process in which the richness of the tradition was ruthlessly (if often unwittingly) denied in the search for easily identifiable sources of religious culture. Lacking scriptural essentials, the Hindu nationalists looked to a simplified history for the Hindu idea of India,19 the land in whose conceptual space these religious sources were found. The important point is that this simplified idea of Hinduism led to the claim that India was essentially a Hindu land,20 or conversely (and this is a characteristic confusion in Hindutva polemics), ‘Hinduness’ was essentially ‘Indianness’. As the Jana Sangh asserted in 1957, national unity under a future Jana Sangh government would be promoted by ‘nationalising all non-Hindus by inculcating in them the ideal of Bharatiya Culture’,21 although how this Bharatiya or Indian culture is identified and nonHindus ‘nationalized’ is not explained. The combination of the political identification of India with Hinduness and the inclusivistic conception of Hinduism led to an idea of India that was at odds with the pluralistic secular one dominant in Nehruvian policy. At its most subtle, it addressed the worry that the pluralistic idea of India was a rarefied one which did not meet the emotional needs of Hindus. Thus, it could be seen as a conservative call for policies more openly derived from Hindu sources, appealing to the majority’s longing for a more clearly expressed sense of a rich historical identity. Moreover, with the inclusivistic conception of Hinduism, it was possible to appropriate the moral rhetoric of the pluralistic secularists and simply locate them in (the real or imagined) Hindu sources, while all the while claiming to be speaking for India. This sort of ‘liberal Hindu’ ideology was evident in the Swatantra Party which, in the 1960s, rivalled the Jana Sangh as a right-wing opponent of the Congress Party. Primarily, it was antistatist and antisocialist, which committed it to freemarket capitalism as well. It had many conservative elements to its thinking: some of its supporters wanted restoration of many of the rights of the princes held under the Raj. This social conservatism meant that many of its leading members were comfortable with traditional forms of religio-cultural expression. This did not usually translate into a systematic Hindutva ideology.

150 C. Ram-Prasad

It more often meant that some Swatantra intellectuals instinctively drew from their personal lives élite Hindu beliefs and practices while making public pronouncements. This habit in fact contributed to such electoral success as the party had. Swatantra spokesmen seemed to articulate just those sorts of ‘existentially real’ cultural views which anti-secular theorists (even Hindutva ones) now argue speak much more authentically and immediately to large sections of Hindus than does abstract Nehruvian secularism. For example, Swatantra leaders occasionally quoted from sacred Hindu texts to demonstrate the identity of their doctrines with classical Indian beliefs, and the party campaigned for a ban on the slaughter of cows, considered sacred by Hindus but eaten quite commonly by Muslims. This orientation to religious thought made the party what we may call subreligious nationalist. Its dominating figure, C. Rajagopalachari (India’s last Governor-General), linked a responsible individualism and an antistatist economy to the maintenance of moral duty and virtue (using the ancient and elusive notion of dharma). His high cultural perspective simply presumed an abstract and spiritual Hinduism which made Hindu religious sentiment compatible with a plurality of religions and with rational and modern economic progress.22 Other Swatantra intellectuals, like K. M. Munshi, were more aggressively ideological. Munshi was prepared to argue for a greater role for Hindu beliefs and values (as he saw them) in public life. He was thought to be ‘the most sophisticated ideologue of Hindu revivalism’23 (which may not be the same thing as Hindu nationalism), but despite his ideological closeness to Hindu militants, he never joined the Jana Sangh.24 Most of the time, however, this Hindu nationalist idea of India was either a strident denial of the principle of religious equality or else (and more often) an incoherent combination of assertions of Hinduism’s supremacy and assurances of religion-transcending equality. As the anonymous ‘Free Thinker’ wrote in the Jana Sangh’s party organ, The Jana Sangh considers [Muslims] the flesh of our flesh, the blood of our blood … The Jana Sangh invites them to accept our hand of brotherhood. It expects them to shed all those complexes which militate against this brotherhood … They are welcome to worship the Islamic way. They are expected to live the Bharatiya way.25 This profound dislike of Muslims was usually justified by reference to the domination of the subcontinent by Muslim rulers from the eleventh century to the eighteenth. In the Hindutva mind, history is

The International Relations of India 151

one long story of a Hindu struggle against invasion, India in the last millennium in particular being ‘a battleground of (Hindu and Muslim) civilisations’.26 The very fact that the dominant empires of India were the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughal empire was enough to make Hindu nationalists view Islam as an alien domination of a native Hindu people. This has meant that Islam, and in international terms, Pakistan have been the great defining ‘Other’ of Hindutva ideology. This has had a profound impact on Hindu nationalist attitudes to Muslims in India and the Islamic state of Pakistan. In the realm of international affairs, Hindu nationalists after independence did not see matters of moralistic polemics, like equality between nations, very differently from secularists.27 But on some issues there was a divergence. With regard to Pakistan, Hindu nationalists for a long time did not accept partition28 (after all, Gandhi was assassinated for assenting to the creation of Pakistan), and the main parliamentary Hindu party of the 1950s and 1960s, the Jana Sangh, took the ultimate aim of Indian foreign policy in the region to be the reassimilation of Pakistan into an undivided India (‘Bharath’), and took exception to what it saw as Nehru’s policy of appeasement.29 With regard to global strategy, Hindu nationalists were suspicious of the atheism of the Soviet Union and China and were, therefore, cool towards nonalignment, preferring closer ties with the United States. There were some complexities in the foreign policy perspectives of more Hindu-oriented parties. As I have already noted, the Swatantra Party, in its conservative outlook, occasionally was quite close to the Hindu nationalist Jana Sangh. But not always. Significantly, many Swatantra intellectuals argued for détente with Pakistan (indeed, Rajagopalachari had, as a Congressman in the independence movement, accepted the Muslim League demand for Pakistan). They took this to be part of a movement towards closer ties with the noncommunist west, on which they were agreed with the Jana Sangh. Closer ties with Pakistan, ‘freezing’ the issue of Kashmir and concentrating on securing an anticommunist alliance, were dominant policy demands in the Swatantra Party. This brought it in direct opposition to the Jana Sangh call for forcibly reuniting Pakistan with India.30 In this, the Swatantra Party was far more realistic in its anticommunist strategy than the Jana Sangh. The Swatantra Party’s inclusivistic religious nationalism, while somewhat ambiguous in its attitude to Muslims, was definitely hostile to the atheism of Communist China. It was also open in its expression of the general Indian sympathy for Tibet (The Dalai Lama and his

152 C. Ram-Prasad

immediate followers, as well as other Tibetan refugees, have made their home in India since the Chinese occupation in 1956). Arguably, the Swatantra Party could claim to have read Chinese intentions before the 1962 war incomparably better than Nehru and his ministers and advisers, who were completely caught out by China’s swift invasion. The Swatantra Party did recognize realpolitik and acknowledged the need to be careful with China. But nonetheless it also recommended breaking off diplomatic ties after the occupation of Tibet and supporting a Tibetan government in exile in Delhi. It went so far as to ask for a security agreement with Pakistan and even Japan against China. This strong stance seems extraordinary both in its scope and its bold disregard for reality. If this policy had gone through, the subsequent history of Asia would have been very different: an even more dangerous and angry China, but also perhaps a resolved Indo-Pakistan relationship. The surrogate ‘superpower’ confrontation in the subcontinent in the 1970s and 1980s would not have come up at all. Above all, the subsequent and current Sino-Pakistani axis would not have formed. But then again, there has always been another yearning in Indian foreign policy thought: a grand alliance of the great and ancient civilizations of India and China. But neither scenario has ever had any real hope of success. To return to the Hindu nationalists of the Jana Sangh and its extraparliamentary groups themselves. They too like the Swatantra Party, in selfprofessed conservatism, disliked the redistributive policies of Nehruvian socialism. As we will see, there is an irony in this: the successor of the Jana Sangh, the BJP, arrived at somewhat different ideas in its opposition to the economic liberalization programme undertaken by the Congress government of Narasimha Rao which did a good deal to abandon the socialism which the party had presided over in the time of Nehru and Indira Gandhi. Hindu nationalist groups seldom amounted to serious enough political forces to gain power or even establishment influence. The history of Indian foreign policy was largely one of a consensus based on ideological and strategic concerns in which religion was marginal. When they were in power, in alliance with the left-wing, during the brief Janata government of 1977–79, they did not, as we will see, deviate markedly from Congress policy under Indira Gandhi. In other words, Hindu nationalism did not play a major role in considerations of international policy. In contrast, the greatest change thus far to have occurred in independent India’s history – the declaration of India as a nuclear weapons

The International Relations of India 153

state – did happen under a Hindu-nationalist led coalition. Without doubt, the testing had something to do with the nature and aims of the Bharatiya Janata Party. What is much less clear is exactly how the supposed ‘Hindu’ nationalism of the party contributed to the decision to go nuclear. This chapter is certainly not, as such, on the international relations and defence strategies of India. It is not even, primarily, on all the political decisions and calculations of parties past and present that have considered themselves exponents of an ideology based on the Hindu religions. Although an examination of these is unavoidable, it is so only in the service of the main purpose of the chapter, namely, the elucidation of the relationship between an avowed religious ideology and the actual decisions enacted in the sphere of international relations. My conclusion will be that religious ideology in itself has played virtually no direct role in major political and economic decisions. Its role has largely been to make old or continuing policies look new by providing specific referents that are explicitly derived from a reading of Hindu culture and history, and that secular parties would find hard to use without embarrassment. Although the nuclear tests themselves represented a break with the past, I think there is enough to suggest that domestic political calculation was a far more important factor in that decision than any theory based on a strongly ideological religious nationalism.

Foreign policy under the Janata government 1977–1979 The first chance the Hindu nationalists had of implementing their ideas, so long expressed in opposition, was after the victory of the Janata Party in the general election of 1977. But the Janata Party was a strange creature, composed of both left-wing elements (who provided the intellectual ancestry for the present-day left wing Janata Dal) and Hindu nationalists. A strong shift was expected from Mrs Indira Gandhi’s Soviet-oriented policy to a pro-American one.31 The Soviets listed the components of the Janata Party: ‘the Hindu chauvinistic Jana Sangh, the Bharatiya Lok Dal (set up … with the prowestern … Swatantra Party …), the Organisation Congress founded … by the Right-Wing Syndicate group … and the anti-Communist Socialist Party.’32 In retrospect, it was an odd gloss to put on things – even given the Soviet view of reality – but the relevant point is that the Jana Sangh elements were expected to affect foreign policy, especially since a longstanding spokesman of the old Jana Sangh, Atal Behari Vajpayee, became Minister for External Affairs.

154 C. Ram-Prasad

No such thing happened. India was expected to repudiate nonalignment (and the obviously pro-Soviet position of Mrs Gandhi),33 take a more ‘hawkish’ line on Pakistan, especially with regard to Kashmir, and be openly pro-Israel and anti-(Muslim) Arab, these being seen as Hindu nationalist objectives. Within a month, Vajpayee was declaring at a meeting of the Bureau of the Non-Aligned Movement in New Delhi that India would follow ‘genuine nonalignment’;34 and Indo-Soviet relations were restored, with Vajpayee assuring Soviet Foreign Minister Gromyko of ‘the bonds of friendship between the countries’, regardless of ‘the fortunes of a political party’.35 As for Pakistan, a succession of conciliatory moves led to a Congress MP, now in unaccustomed opposition, bemoaning the succession of what it took to be concessions given by India and declaring that this was all ‘because of our weak stand’.36 Vajpayee’s party, the Jana Sangh, had consistently argued through the 1950s and 1960s for the establishment of diplomatic relations with Israel, first because it saw the Jewish state as a model for a future Indian one, and second because it saw the Arab world as the natural ally of the Islamic state of Pakistan and, therefore, took India to be a natural ally of Israel. Yet, on becoming Minister for External Affairs, he told the Indian Haj Committee in Bombay, ‘Our position remains unchanged that Israel must vacate all occupied Arab lands.’37 He also asserted the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to selfdetermination.38 Vajpayee, as the Jana Sangh’s most high profile figure in the Janata cabinet, was often reminded of the party’s past criticisms of these very policies. In a telling remark, he replied on one occasion to this sort of reminder, ‘Forget the Jana Sangh … We have left the past behind’.39 The picture that emerges from this brief telling is clear: the Hindu nationalists of a parliamentary party did precious little to change the consensual nature of Indian foreign policy when they had some sort of a chance. But what is the relevant conclusion to draw from this? As commentators made the point then:40 the Muslim population of India, which had influenced past pro-Arab policies (despite the Arab world’s general suspicion of India, seen as rival and threat to Islamic Pakistan), was not going to change its mind. The Janata party, aware of its having come to power on an anti-Indira Gandhi wave, especially in Muslimdominated parts of North India, was not going to jeopardize future elections by adopting a course which might alienate Indian Muslims. This was reinforced by the ideological sensitivity of the Socialists in the Janata government to the Muslim minority’s views.41 This electoral calculation did not do them much good. After a brief and fragile two years, the coalition of parties came apart and Indira

The International Relations of India 155

Gandhi, forgiven for her excesses and suspension of democratic rule during the Emergency by an electorate fed up with Janata fractiousness, won again. But the point to keep in mind is that Indian foreign policy was not greatly altered during that time. It is possible to look at the history of India’s international relations, especially of the role of religion in it, without giving too much thought to the period of rule in which a Hindu nationalist party did have a say in government. What will be noticeable, however, is a much more recent phenomenon: the resurgence of Hindu nationalism from the 1989 election and through the 1990s, when the successor party of the Jana Sangh, the Bharatiya Janata Party, together with the extreme regional party of Maharashtra, the Shiv Sena, and the various extraparliamentary groupings, especially the RSS and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), have altered the very orientation of the Indian state. Their influence can be detected because they have attacked the consensual view of Indian foreign policy that held until the late 1980s. As we saw, the Jana Sangh did have ideological differences with Nehruvian foreign policy, but that was at a time when it was far from having electoral influence. In the time of Indira Gandhi, and to a large extent, Rajiv Gandhi, opposition did not come specifically from well-organized Hindu nationalists. Finally, the Hindu nationalists were too constrained to do much in their shared power during Janata rule.42 But from 1989 onwards, the BJP grew through systematically playing with Hindu religious sentiments on a variety of issues. The most spectacularly communal issue was the Ayodhya site: when calls for the destruction of a sixteenthcentury mosque built on an older Hindu temple – and importantly, claimed to be the birthplace of the divine avatar Rama – became a rallying cry for Hindu nationalists. This upsurge continued into the 1996 General Elections, when the BJP won the largest number of seats (albeit with only 23.5 per cent of the vote as against Congress’ 28.1 per cent and the National Front–United Front coalition – which eventually came to power – with 20.2 per cent). The BJP was invited to try and form a government, even though there was never much of a chance that it could command a simple majority in Parliament. In the February–March elections, the BJP and the Congress had roughly the same share of votes, 25 per cent. However, the share of the BJP combined with its allies came to 36 per cent. This led to their being the largest group in Parliament, but still short of a majority. Even with the support of unreliable external partners, the eventual majority was wafer thin. While the BJP gained the highest number of votes it ever had, there still was no clear mandate. With the electorate in future elections being able to judge the track-record of the BJP in government,

156 C. Ram-Prasad

it is likely that its share of votes has peaked. No longer can it ask for votes as the untested party of promise.

The 1990s and the growth of Hindu nationalist parties Above all, Kashmir looms large on the Indian foreign policy horizon. It is with regard to Kashmir that Hindu nationalist attitudes most concern experts in international relations. Disputes over territory usually do, and here is a lethal mixture for potential conflict. The Hindu nationalists ought in theory to be happy with a Muslim-majority Kashmir seceding from a Hindu India, but matters are not so simple. Apart from their instinctive hostility to any possibility of either another Muslim state or an increase in the size of Pakistan, they see in Kashmir an opportunity to flaunt their nationalist credentials. In theory, they have no quarrel with the longstanding Indian view that Kashmir is a part of the Indian union. But whereas the secular claim (whatever the actual Congress debasement of it) is that Kashmir being a Muslim-majority state only demonstrates the secular nature of the Indian polity,43 the Hindu nationalists’ argument focuses on a different aspect of the matter. They argue that, India being a Hindu state, the loss of Kashmir would be indicative of a Muslim victory over Hinduism. That is to say, they interpret Kashmir being a part of India as Kashmir being a part of Hindu India. So, Kashmiri Muslims should either leave their land or learn to live in a Hindu polity. Consequently, they propose a hard line against Kashmiri militancy. They have a very strong position here. If a secularist party in government negotiates with Kashmiri Muslims about autonomy or tries holding elections there to demonstrate Kashmir’s place in Indian democracy, the Hindu nationalists can represent this to right-wing voters as an Indian ‘climbdown’. If Kashmir withdraws from the Indian union, then in the catastrophic aftermath, they can claim that what is left of India is now surely a Hindu nation, and offer themselves as the best representatives of the new dispensation. On the whole, they seem to think, despite evidence to the contrary, that they can actually subjugate Kashmiri nationalism through ‘the full assertion of state authority’.44 Meanwhile, their rise to prominence has only played into the hands of the Islamic fundamentalists who form only a small part of Kashmiri discontent. Muslim fundamentalists are able to appeal to the Kashmiri sense of self-identity as a reaction to the Hindutva movement.45 But the more the insurgents represent the matter as not an issue about Kashmir’s maltreatment by a deceitful Delhi but one about the Islamic

The International Relations of India 157

nature of Kashmir, the more the Hindu nationalists can represent this as the invasion of Islamic fundamentalism into India. This is especially the case given widely accepted evidence of Pakistani support for militants,46 especially those who think Kashmir a case of irredentism. In fact, reactions in Pakistan – and there are many – to events in India are immediately used by Hindu nationalists as evidence of an Islamist threat. This is what happened when Pakistan seized on the destruction of the mosque at Ayodhya as ‘more important than Kuwait’ in order to divert domestic attention from its difficulties with Gulf War policies; the BJP used Pakistan’s rhetoric as evidence that Islamabad precipitated the very violence after the destruction that the BJP’s action had actually engendered.47 In the aftermath of the nuclear tests, it is Kashmir that, once more, is universally perceived as the flashpoint for a future war. Shelling on both sides has continued at points on the border between Indian and Pakistani Kashmir. Extreme statements on both sides have tended to associate the use of nuclear weapons with the issue of Kashmir. Although Kashmir and Pakistan remain at the top of the Indian foreign policy agenda and in the attention of the Hindu nationalists, relations with the other Muslim state with which India shares a border, Bangladesh, have not been easy either. Hindu nationalists treat Bangladesh as a threat, but a demographic rather than a military one.48 Hindu nationalists have picked up on two things to do with Bangladesh: the number of (Muslim) Bangladeshi migrants in India and the declaration in 1988 by Bangladesh that it was an Islamic nation, after having tended towards secularism in the first 17 years of its existence. These two have been neatly combined to produce the spectre of an actual Islamic invasion, albeit a silent demographic one.49 Bangladeshi migrants are then represented as ‘a threat to national security’.50 The situation is open to exploitation because the majority of Bangladeshi migrants are poor and can easily be represented as taking work away from poor Indians, especially Hindus. The Shiv Sena has used this tactic in Bombay and the RSS has increased dramatically in strength in West Bengal, which borders Bangladesh. This is telling, because West Bengal has long been governed by the communists, albeit ones who have been quick to invite foreign investment in the liberalization drive. The characteristic demands are to send back Bangladeshis51 as part of a campaign to make India a ‘pure’ Hindu land, and argue that with Bangladesh too having become an Islamic state along with Pakistan, India should become a Hindu state.52 This antagonism extends to making life difficult for Indo-Bangladesh relations, like opposing for

158 C. Ram-Prasad

many years the Indian commitment to give a small strip of land called Tin Bigha to Bangladesh.53 India faces strict financial constraints in the field of defence and nuclear weapons. But this never stopped the Hindu nationalists from calling for a ‘hawkish’ stand. The BJP calls for a ‘blue water’ navy which can be used for power projection, but this is nothing other than a repetition of a call made under the Janata government in 1978. Successive governments have not done much about it because the state cannot pay for it.54 While it is true that Pakistan and China spend a higher percentage of their GDP on defence than India,55 this may not be a good argument for increasing spending. China spends nearly three times more per capita on defence than India ($26 as opposed to $9). As a percentage of GDP, it spends over twice as much (5.7 per cent as opposed to India’s 2.5 per cent, even since the nuclear tests), which, given the larger size of the Chinese economy, amounts to a great deal more than India.56 This gap cannot be narrowed. The consequence is that China has capabilities that India cannot match. Even before the nuclear tests, Indian officials recognized that it would take at least two decades for India to build even second-strike capability against China.57 The rationale for undertaking weaponization of nuclear capability is therefore confined solely to deterrence. However, it still remains unclear as to whether this deterrence was necessary in the first place, given China’s anxiety to consolidate its position in world affairs as a responsible state and possible superpower. There is much disagreement on India’s strategic superiority over Pakistan. Very roughly, Pakistan stands to India as India stands to China: there may be a reasonable ability to cause pain to the larger power, but not enough to stand a good chance of victory in fullscale military engagement. But Pakistan’s rapid acquisition and building of military hardware in the 1990s seriously eroded India’s traditional confidence. Pakistan tested its Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile, the Ghauri – pointedly named after an eleventh-century Afghan invader of India – on 6 April 1998. The test seemed to have ‘deliberately coincided with the accession to power’ of the BJP.58 Pakistan itself claimed that this was its response to India’s ongoing missile programme, so that a familiar cycle of response and counter-response was set up, for ‘it appears that India’s decision to test nuclear weapons was finalised shortly after the Ghauri test’.59 At that time, India accused China of being the ‘mother of the Ghauri’ and of ‘encircling’ India.60 The double focus on Pakistan and China is a defining feature of Indian foreign

The International Relations of India 159

policy, and the BJP-led government’s statements after the tests clearly and sharply demonstrated this fact. The BJP originally took nuclear weaponry as a purely regional issue: ‘The BJP is of the view that India must go for a nuclear deterrent of its own’,61 in decisively establishing military supremacy over Pakistan. But through the 1990s, it became likely that Pakistan had acquired nuclear weapons technology through Chinese and North Korean assistance.62 The BJP began to talk of nuclear weapons as a matter of national pride: ‘Nuclear weapons will give us prestige, power, standing. An Indian will walk tall and talk straight when we have the bomb.’63 The BJP’s position on nuclear weapons always attracted attention. Indian policy, prosecuted by mainly Congress governments but upheld by the so-called Left parties, was studiously to avoid an explicit programme of building nuclear weapons, although it was clear that India had the capacity. This policy was supposed to allow India to take the high moral stand that the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which allowed only the five powers that had tested before 1968 to be nuclear weapons states, was discriminatory. India argued for a total ban on nuclear weapons. This isolated India outside the NPT regime but allowed it to be a player in global negotiations. India also refused to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. It saw the treaty as performing the same discriminatory function as the NPT, because it allowed the declared powers to keep their weapons up to date by building computer simulations on their existing data while stopping others from getting that data in the first place. But many military leaders, and more notably, many defence scientists in India favoured nuclear testing. BJP officials too were keen on it, despite Pakistani officials repeatedly stating that they too would conduct tests in response if India did so.64 A pattern to the Hindu nationalist alternative to the establishment consensus on foreign policy emerges: in general, Hindu nationalism is more ‘hawkish’ and tends towards any policy which may be thought to strengthen India’s claim to be a ‘great power’. The standard worry that Hindu nationalists have is that the Indian secular establishment and the world at large do not sufficiently recognize that India is strong. Electorally, they claim that they appeal to a Hindu nation that is tired of being marginalized in world politics. Now, this perception of India as being a ‘great power’ whose ‘power’ has not been recognized is one that many Indians share. It motivated Congress governments – and especially Indira and Rajiv Gandhi – in foreign policy as well. But the Hindu nationalist parties claim to have derived this view of India from the special source of ancient and classical Hindu culture. When

160 C. Ram-Prasad

unhampered by real power, they were able to insist on a more ‘hawkish’ stand on a variety of issues when the government of the day had to adopt a pragmatic line in keeping with very real geopolitical and – above all – economic constraints. So they were able to claim for themselves a near monopoly of the view that India was strong but unfairly neglected in world affairs, especially so in the regional context. The sense of neglect is strong in India, whatever the political persuasion. This similarity of attitude is clear when we consider how the fundamental demands of the Indian government remained the same even after the tests. The tests were seen as not changing the state of affairs in which India stood outside the international consensus only because that consensus was based on an unfair division of power. Jaswant Singh, a close advisor of Prime Minister Vajpayee, and the political coordinator of the tests, said that India had been forced into ‘weaponising’ only 54 years after launching ‘a futile campaign’ for global nuclear disarmament.65 The futility presumably came, not out of India’s policy being mistaken, but due to the intransigence of other countries.66 Nuclearization has been seen in India only as a particular strategy in the pursuit of the end of seeing India have proper recognition in world affairs. For example, the US and other countries denied India access to high technology like certain supercomputers, because they were held to contribute to India’s nuclear weapons programme. India insists that they are for many other development programmes too. After the tests, the security analyst C. Raja Mohan stated: ‘India does not want to discuss weaponization, but is prepared to join the international mainstream on nuclear issues if the technology blockades against it are lifted.’67 Indian strategists tend in common to see India as trying to put the world to rights on nuclear weapons (that is, to get them banned and not perpetuate a nuclear apartheid), and ask that India not be penalized for doing so. Further, they want India to be recognized for its views on the matter. In that context, the tests are seen by some as having been a reasonable way to secure that end, since ambiguity had not achieved it. The argument always was only whether the tests were the best way forward to a common goal, that of making India a major power with high moral demands, not whether a different goal – for example, reassessing threat perceptions – was involved in conducting the tests. This, I think explains the odd fact that, surprised though most Indian analysts were by the actual conduct of the tests, many were able quickly to contextualize the tests within a continuous Indian foreign policy. In short, even those who supported the BJP on the tests saw them as continuing India’s claim of making the world a

The International Relations of India 161

fairer place; a claim that hostile newspaper columnists in the west simply did not believe. We will return to the issue of continuity and change in foreign policy later. In the domestic debate on whether or not India’s high international goals would be achieved by becoming a nuclear weapons state, the BJP leadership was always consistent in its rhetoric. Perhaps it precisely was because it seemed merely rhetoric that the BJP’s statements were not taken seriously by Indian and foreign commentators. A report commissioned by the director of US Central Intelligence to investigate the failure of the US intelligence apparatus to detect the tests, acknowledged that US intelligence officials had an inaccurate perception of India’s intentions, although these were repeatedly stated publicly by India’s new leadership.68 All this is not to suggest that the BJP went ahead with the tests solely or even primarily with India’s longterm aim of becoming a major power in mind. We will take a hard look at the real motives when we come to examine the relationship between Hindutva ideology and the BJP’s policies. But on another issue, the Hindu nationalists have adopted a different perspective. This is the area of economic liberalization. Strictly speaking, this is not a matter of international relations, if international relations amount only to foreign policy. But it is at the heart of India’s international relations; indeed, one could argue that it was precisely due to a failure to see this that India has had so much difficulty in attaining that place in global politics to which it aspires. If India is to become a ‘great power’, it will have to export more, produce better goods, develop better infrastructure, make its people more prosperous. What looks like a truism now was never really grasped for a long time in India. It was assumed that India’s peculiar mix of a market economy tied up in state control and virtual trade and financial isolation was the best situation possible in its supposedly unique situation. ‘India is poor because India is poor’, countless economics students were sagely told over a generation. India’s programme of economic liberalization, begun in earnest in 1991, has changed the nature of the country’s relationship with the rest of the world. This, apart from the disappearance of the Soviet Union, is the greatest change in the foreign policy environment of India.69 Economic liberalization is a special part of India’s international relations because it is the world come to India (although, eventually, it is intended that through a longterm export drive, India will ‘go to’ the rest of the world through economic influence, not just through migration, as has been the case until now).

162 C. Ram-Prasad

It is in this special area of international relations that Hindu nationalism looks like playing a major role in future. An answer as to why this should be so, will say something about the nature of the Hindu religious tradition itself. For now, the point to note is that Hindu nationalists have here adopted the perspective, not that India is strong but that it is weak. Well, of course India is weak: India has the largest share of the poorest people in the world. That, however, is not the point Hindu nationalists make. Rather, it is that, given that India is weak, unbridled economic liberalization is the wrong policy to adopt. It will effectively rob India of its independence and result in the country being ‘tied to America’s apron strings’.70 The Indian liberalization programme, undertaken after India had nearly defaulted (for the first time) in its repayment to international institutions in 1991, is wide-ranging, even if the transaction costs unavoidable in a vigorous democracy mean that it has been slow. A crude distinction for our purposes can, however, be made between two sides to this programme. The intrinsic aspect is the lessening of government control of many areas of economic activity (reforming stock exchanges, affecting export credit, excise duties, banks’ loan portfolios, liquidity ratios, and so on), and the extrinsic aspect is that of opening the domestic market to foreign activity, by allowing multinationals to enter various sectors of the economy – usually in cooperative ventures, but often allowing them to have majority control.71 It is the latter aspect which brings Hindu nationalist sentiments into play in an international context. The basic claim is that they are the defenders of the country against an economic and ultimately cultural invasion, primarily from the west. So here, the rhetoric shifts from being the group assertion of a strong India to the call to defend a weak one. This shift, so like nationalisms everywhere, is informed in the case of Hindu nationalism, unlike other religious nationalisms, by only a very vague religious justification. This vague justification is through a call to defend Hindu culture, under threat from the consequences of economic liberalization. Unreconstructed and extreme Hindu nationalist economic ideology is really nothing other than a visceral protectionism.72 Characteristically, it seeks to ground this in a supposedly Hindu vocabulary. The movement against liberalization has been called ‘swadeshi’ (literally, ‘one’s own country’), deliberately adopting the evocative term used by Mahatma Gandhi. But where Gandhi had used it to name the movement to resist the British colonial policy of forcibly selling British manufactured goods to India out of raw materials forcibly exported cheap

The International Relations of India 163

from the colonies to Britain, the Hindu nationalists use it to indicate their opposition to multinational companies (MNCs) operating in India. The RSS formed a front organization called the Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM) to fight the ‘exploitation by MNCs’. The chief organizer of the SJM is BJP secretary general K. N. Govindacharya, often called the chief ideologue in the 1990s of Hindu nationalism. According to him, ‘Swadeshi does not mean just fighting MNCs. It is an integrated concept encompassing culture, politics and economics.’73 The attempt clearly is to link resistance to the liberalization programme to the Hindu conception of Indian culture, which is supposed to be under threat from the presence of MNCs. The Hindu nationalist attempt to link economics to culture is expressed in the attention given to consumer products: Pepsi, Coke and Colgate have been threatened with ejection from India.74 While the literal-minded commentator is tempted to ask how a dark fizzy soft-drink threatens 3000 years of cultural wealth, there is, perhaps, some symbolic appeal to slamming consumer products as physical embodiments of alien culture.75 But, electorally, this is double-edged; lots of Indians seem to like cola drinks and so forth. The story is often told of how Vajpayee talked of swadeshi during election campaigns but was often spotted drinking Pepsi on hot days!76 When Vajpayee became prime minister in March 1998, commentators noted pointedly that his breakfast was an American brand of cereal not yet available in India. In other sectors of the economy, it is unclear what role specifically Hindu considerations have in anti-MNC moves. The case in which the contract of the American power company Enron was cancelled by a newly installed Shiv Sena-BJP government in Maharashtra is one such. Pure electoral calculations, to do with accusations that the previous Congress government had engaged in improper negotiations, seem to have been the sole motive. The renegotiation of the contract on virtually the same terms (although with a more transparent process)77 by the Shiv Sena-BJP government shows, if anything, that the responsibility of power has a sobering effect on zealots in a democratic society. The minister for industry in the 13-day BJP government in 1996 was Suresh Prabhu, a stalwart of the chauvinist Shiv Sena, but he himself was the chairman of India’s largest cooperative bank and was quite prepared to encourage foreign investment. Only a rhetorical flourish made his words any different from those of the Congress: ‘We don’t want to just welcome foreign investors with garlands at the airport. We must also guide them through the bylanes of India.’78

164 C. Ram-Prasad

After the nuclear tests, commentators of every hue agreed that their popularity meant that the BJP-led government could push through any economic policy it chose in the budget following within weeks of the tests. The hope with the international and, to a substantial extent, the domestic business community was that the government would take advantage of its popularity and push through difficult liberalization measures. Despite some deregulation, the budget seemed to exemplify the traditional BJP creed of selfreliance and cultural pride; and these were judged by the international business community to be incompatible with liberalization. Selfreliance meant protectionism; for example, there was a sharp increase in import duties to protect domestic industry at the expense of consumers.79 Strikingly, subsequent reactions showed that domestic industrialists themselves largely considered the move selfdefeating. Cultural pride took the form of wooing overseas Indians (‘Nonresident Indians’ or NRIs), an appeal that was supposed to be based on Hindu nationalism’s interest in a greater Hindu world (defined by culture, not by political control).80 The reality, as many noted, was that, primarily due to the heightened sense of cultural affinity that exilic existence brings, Hindu NRIs have tended to be supportive of the BJP, even arguing that it would be a reformist party in power. As with any shaky coalition, the BJP-led government had many demands on it that countered whatever liberalizing reflex it may have had towards the budget. Where it could move with less political cost to itself, it did so when domestic attention was fixed on the perceived triumph of the nuclear tests. It ‘granted counter-guarantees for three power projects, signed production-sharing contracts for eighteen oil and gas exploration blocks and cleared twenty-eight proposals for prospecting for minerals. And many of the companies that won the deals [were] American.’81 All this activity did not seem to have produced much optimism, either in India or abroad. ‘Three months into its term, the verdict is out on the Government: it isn’t strong, doesn’t seem to care about business and even less about the economy,’ was the damning verdict of the domestic press.82 As with practically everything else, the Hindutva movement contains many contradictory pulls within it; so too with economic policy. So S. Gurumurthy of the Swadeshi Jagran Manch – the RSS front organization that was ostensibly set up to fight the presence of MNCs in India – actually argued after the nuclear tests that India had to fight the sanctions imposed on it through the World Trade Organization. At the same time, Kushbhau Thakre, the President of the BJP – the main

The International Relations of India 165

political party within the Hindutva movement and usually the home of the pragmatists – said that India would be better off leaving the WTO. Pragmatism and ideological zeal not only coexist, they are found in unexpected locales. To make the situation even more complex, the BJP only led a disparate coalition into power, with members having strong regional and even ideological interests opposed to the BJP’s official line. Perhaps all that can be said of the BJP in power is that its economic policy showed a slightly greater emphasis on the rhetoric of the supposedly (Hindu) cultural roots of selfsufficiency, than was the case with Congress and left parties in previous governments. They tended to look for justification in political ideology (socialism) and economic theory (the mixed economy with the state holding the ‘commanding heights’). There was therefore some irony involved when L. K. Advani (then the President of the BJP, later Home Minister in the Vajpayee cabinet) claimed that ‘the BJP’s principal success has been in making ideology relevant to electoral verdicts’.83 I will explore the tensions within Hindu nationalism, and in the section after that, suggest that the very nature of Hindutva ideology limits its forms of expression, especially in international affairs.

The Bharatiya Janata Party: May 1996 Broadly, one can make a distinction between a hard and a soft version of Hindu nationalism. It is often terribly difficult for Hindu nationalists to make up their mind as to which form they are peddling. For example, in his 1991 Presidential Address to the BJP, Murli Manohar Joshi stated: ‘India has not only to keep up cordial relations with its neighbours but has to make positive efforts in the direction of friendship. We have not only to reassure our neighbours but expedite the process of friendship.’84 He then goes on to talk loosely of a ‘confederation’ from ‘Afghanistan to Indonesia’, leaving one to wonder whether this is not somehow tied up with the vague notion of greater undivided India (Akhand Bharat);85 surely this is not the best way to proffer the hand of friendship. But that is not all. Next, he says, ‘The latest information on Pakistan’s atomic programme is a matter of grave concern. The warnings given by our party in this regard are coming true. In the light of this situation, mere statements would serve no purpose. An Indian atomic bomb is the need of the hour.’ After the tests, BJP leaders remained unfazed by the accusation that it was their testing that had triggered Pakistan’s. The response was that Pakistan’s eventual testing confirmed what India had long suspected, and justified India’s

166 C. Ram-Prasad

own tests; in effect, India’s tests were pre-emptive, insofar as Pakistan was concerned! Most BJP leaders claim that they are just as committed to Hindutva ideology, the aim of making India a Hindu state – whatever that means – as the RSS or the VHP or the Shiv Sena. There is undoubtedly an ideological kinship between them, especially when Hindutva, considered as an abstract concept, is involved. The rhetoric of the BJP, for all that, often comes out more muted – one could even say nuanced in its way – than that of the more ideological groups; often collectively dubbed the ‘Sangh’ (organization) brotherhood in the Indian media. Clearly, Vajpayee is a moderate to such an extent that it has always been a puzzle as to why he built his career on a Hindu nationalist platform. He is a Hindu nationalist more by staunch association rather than inflammatory rhetoric. Balraj Madhok, once president of the old Jana Sangh (the predecessor of the BJP) and inchoate ideologue of Hindu nationalism put it brutally: ‘Vajpayee’s prime ministership spells disaster for the country. He is basically a Congressman.’86 Just before the BJP’s brief sojourn in power, when it was thought likely that it would be in government for longer, Vajpayee’s expected accession to office was not universally feared in the region; it was thought that his brand of ‘liberal’ Hindutva pragmatism would not be too problematic for India’s neighbours.87 In so decisively acting to make India a declared nuclear power, Vajpayee confounded both anti-Hindutva optimists and hardline Hindutva critics, the former of whom had hoped – and the latter expected – that he would not noticeably change the policies of previous governments. It can still be said that, the tests apart, Vajpayee had continued being a lowkeyed and barely ideological leader, so much so that within months of his accession to the prime ministership for the second time, he was being accused even by former admirers of remoteness and ineffectiveness. L. K. Advani, who strategically withdrew from being the BJP candidate for prime minister in favour of Vajpayee some time before the 1996 elections and became Home Minister in the 1998 cabinet, is much more illustrative of the elusiveness of BJP ideology. He led the ultimately successful and bloody campaign to destroy the mosque at Ayodhya and was unyielding in his pronouncements on Kashmir. Yet, at the same time, he entered into careful negotiations with Farooq Abdullah, the Muslim Chief Minister of Kashmir, to calm the religious and nationalist tensions there. (This is not to give him credit for doing so; and Pakistan dismissed Abdullah as an Indian stooge.) As some journalists pithily put it, using the Ayodhya issue as the litmus test of

The International Relations of India 167

Hindutva commitment, ‘Ayodhya and Advani are inseparable; Ayodhya and Vajpayee remain incompatible.’88 Yet, as Home Minister, he shelved the Ayodhya issue, close though it is to Hindutva hearts. The BJP, in the form of Advani, thrives on ambiguity, and in this, its strategy is very different from the Shiv Sena or the RSS but very like the Congress Party. Advani’s use of ambiguity in enunciating Hindu nationalist aims is evident, for example, in his grand idea of South Asian politics. He is willing to revive the concept of Akhand Bharat or Greater India, originally a concern of the Jana Sangh in the 1950s. At that time, the Hindutva ideologue Deendayal Upadhyaya put forward the thesis that while Hindu nationalists should accept the reality of an Islamic Pakistan carved out of an original (of course Hindu) India, they should adhere to the hope that ideally there would be an eventual and voluntary reunification. Of course, that is an irresponsible thesis for anyone in an Indian government to put forward for the obvious reason that there has never been much evidence of Pakistanis’ desire to lose their identity in an India with pre-partition borders. It is a calculated move on the part of the BJP to use the emotive term again; it is a mark of the ideological commitment of the BJP vis-à-vis the Congress. But having evoked the term, Advani draws back into vagueness: ‘Today, if I have to interpret “Akhand Bharat”, I would think in … terms [of a confederation]. Why not a confederation of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, perhaps even Sri Lanka?’89 This means very little. If a confederation is a large trade and political alliance, that is just to reiterate the ultimate aim of the already existing South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC). On the other hand, if it is to be a closer political entity, then the proposal becomes a much more politically irresponsible call for control over the region. The nuclear tests, of course, have completely changed the dynamics of the system, and it will take some years to see what new modes of interaction emerge. In the same way, the BJP is careful to muddy the waters on economic liberalization. Advani says, ‘As far as internal liberalization is concerned, we are for it. We have differences on its pace. There is a vast area where there is no difference with the [Congress] government. But on issues like MNCs’ entry into the consumer sector, we have reservations. [We will not stop] those who have already come in. But we will use a yardstick for those who will be coming in the future.’90 But when pushed by the interviewer on this threat, Advani becomes evasive: ‘Q: One or two MNCs have even threatened they will stop investing in India if the BJP ever comes to power. A: It is basically our domestic adversaries who are trying to give that impression, here and abroad.’91

168 C. Ram-Prasad

The nuclear tests have made the task of winning investment to India to counteract official US sanctions pressing. If the BJP coalition continued to be wary of swift economic reform, it was not any different from its predecessors. The BJP attitude on the new ‘swadeshi’ is really a search for distinguishing itself on specific policies like limiting foreign involvement in consumer industries, which it could afford to do with little cost when in opposition. In government in the state of Gujarat, it did little to change the inward flow of foreign investment and, more notably of course, it renegotiated the contract with Enron in Maharashtra (or more precisely, while working with the Shiv Sena, despite being the junior partner there). Moreover, its domestic calculations now factor in alliances, even very unlikely ones, in the search for power. For example, it works with the Akali Dal, the flexible but nonetheless communally based party of Sikhs in the Punjab. The reasoning that it is not unnatural for two parties with communal bases to work together is specious. If they truly believed in their own ideologies, the Sikh Akali Dal ought to be worried about doctrinally exclusivist Hindu nationalism and the BJP ought to deny the very political legitimacy of the former. But ideological cynicism is perhaps the best pragmatic strategy in a democracy, and one of its surest safeguards. The BJP in power can only be the BJP in coalition:92 hence the alliances with not only the Akali Dal but also, for a while, the Bharatiya Samajwadi Party (BSP) with its ‘backward’-caste power-base so different from (but complementary to) that of the upper-castes BJP. In the General Elections of 1998, the BJP could command a majority only through an extraordinary coalition, cobbled together from parties that, on the whole, joined only out of selfinterest. Apart from the Shiv Sena, the supposedly hardline Hindutva party in Maharashtra, none of the other parties was committed to Hindu nationalism. The Akali Dal continued to be an ally as in the previous election. But others were stranger still. The Samata Party ended up having its George Fernandes, left-wing trade unionist, human right activist and campaigner for Tibet, become the Defence Minister. And the final Parliamentary majority was given by the erratic J. Jayalalitha of the AIADMK in Tamil Nadu, who was concerned with the politics of her state alone. Within two months of the nuclear tests, within 100 days of coming to power, the government already was in trouble, as the alliance unravelled, the AIADMK moving away from the government, the rival DMK (that had been a partner in the previous, United Front government) moving towards the BJP and various other parties realigning themselves.93

The International Relations of India 169

Purely electoral calculations dictate Indian politics at century’s end; only radical coalition politics, in which groups form and re-form while parties float according to power equations, seems possible any longer in India. In such a situation, and with the experience of the grim, compromising reality of office, the BJP really does not seem to have very much scope or will left for policy dictated by a distinctively religious ideology. The hardline groups, however, still seem to make a different calculation. Their Hindu nationalism is much more raw and immediate. Bal Thackeray, the Shiv Sena supremo, for example, is not so much concerned with eventual strategic political relations with Islamic Pakistan as with an immediate expression of his detestation for the country which he thinks claims the prime allegiance of Indian Muslims. He threatened the Pakistani cricket team (thereby aiming his campaign, as The Economist noted, at the one ‘religion’ which unites all Indians, cricket).94 Advani expressed his electoral strategy thus: ‘I know there is no such thing as the Hindu vote bank. But I know that there is such a thing as patriotism, such a thing as nationalism.’95 Thackeray, in contrast, has said, ‘We are fighting this election for the protection of Hinduism. We do not care for the Muslim votes.’96 But, once this distinction is established, further divisions open up within the more extreme groups. On foreign presence in the economy, the RSS has a pure conception of ‘swadeshi’ in which globalization is seen as new imperialism, and foreign capital is claimed to bring in missionaries and form the vanguard of a cultural invasion.97 At the same time (in the very same issue of India Today), Thackeray says of the Shiv Sena position, ‘If you take the swadeshi idea too far, you’ll have to live in darkness, because the electric bulb was invented by Edison … It is a multinational world today and one needs collaborations.’98 Presumably with the likes of Enron. The differences in ideological motivation become even more marked in the context of religious belief. For the RSS and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), religious beliefs are absolutely central. For the VHP, for example, the banning of the slaughter of cows is a major aim, because the cow is considered holy by most Hindus. Even although the VHP uses this as an electoral gimmick (‘We hope this agitation [against cow slaughter] affects the elections,’ said V. H. Dalmia, president of the VHP),99 it is noticeable that this is the sort of issue it lights on. The RSS does likewise. The contrast with Thackeray is striking. He openly confessed to being agnostic if not atheistic (apparently in reaction to his wife’s death), although oddly, he still insisted that his ‘Hinduism [was] nationalism’.100

170 C. Ram-Prasad

The issue which concerned western governments about the BJP’s accession to power, of course, was nuclear policy. The Indian consensus seemed to be that India would not join any nonproliferation regime that preserved the current distinction between the declared nuclear powers and the rest. Instead, it wanted an eventual total global ban. The consensus broke down with regard to actual conduct of policy. The more dovish line, favoured by the foreign policy establishment, the United Front–Left Front coalition of 1996–98, and some elements in Congress, was to not go nuclear although it was widely believed that India possessed the ability to do so. Retired Chief of Army Staff, Gen. K. Sundarji, enunciated the presumably official thinking that India did not have the wherewithal to have multiple nuclear strike weapons, which would be needed to destroy dispersed Pakistani missiles and win a nuclear war. India apparently would call Pakistan’s nuclear bluff in case of open war and deploy conventional forces. If finally forced to go nuclear, India would only do it over days, not hours or minutes.101 The ‘hawkish’ line, favoured in parts of the defence establishment and by the BJP, was to go openly nuclear and negotiate from there. That was the official BJP position. The common lines of argument were always two: claims to the nuclear status of China, Russia and the three western nuclear powers, and (but perhaps less weightily) military calculation regarding Pakistan’s Chinese-assisted nuclear potential on the other.102 The senior defence analyst, K. Subrahmanyam, stated hardheadedly that India had to be a nuclear power eventually (except in the highly unlikely event of a total global ban).103 In the middle of the BJP’s first, fortnight-long government, K. K. Nayar, retired Vice-Admiral and founder of the Forum for an Indian Nuclear Deterrent, urged the ‘hawkish’ line and argued that if the BJP government decided to declare that it would go nuclear, ‘the succeeding government, irrespective of the parties constituting it, cannot go back on it, lest their nationalist credentials be questioned’. There were unconfirmed reports that this was supported by defence ministry officials.104 At about the same time as the BJP was being exhorted to put its promises into action, the US government took seriously the possibility that the BJP would indeed keep this promise. State Department official Nicholas Burns said in a press conference that the US would shortly be issuing a strong warning about the perils of ignoring the US commitment to nonproliferation if the BJP government proceeded with its stated aim of building a nuclear weapon.105 In the event the BJP never brought up the issue at all.

The International Relations of India 171

There was more talk with regard to defence spending. Narasimha Rao had quietly let defence spending decrease during his Congress government from 1991 to 1996. By 1995–96, defence’s share of government expenditure was only 14.7 per cent, in comparison with the figure of 26.9 per cent for Pakistan. Another statistic that was noted was that India had been ranked in 1995 at 25th of 37 Asian countries in terms of defence spending as a percentage of GDP, while Pakistan was 8th. These sorts of figures were used by ‘hawks’ in the defence establishment to urge the BJP to honour its commitments to raise defence spending. The BJP defence minister in the shortlived first cabinet, Pramod Mahajan, immediately promised a rise in defence spending but quickly retracted it, realizing that the BJP would not stay in power for long.106 An anonymous official in the Ministry of External Affairs – a section of government generally associated with dovish pragmatism – was quoted giving a calmly cynical view of the BJP attitude to defence spending: the BJP could not, in the middle of desperately trying to get the support of uncommitted parties, emphasize divisive domestic issues, so ‘the best way to retain the BJP’s image as the most nationalistic party … [was] for the Vajpayee government to talk of national security, an issue that was relatively neglected during the Rao regime.’107 The striking thing about the BJP’s expansionist plans for defence spending plans after the nuclear tests was that it was not expansionist at all. True, defence expenditure was boosted by 14 per cent in the posttests budget of June 1998.108 On some calculations, this was an increase from 2.3 per cent to 2.45 per cent of GDP. On other calculations, it remains unchanged due to economic growth.109 The government did its best to put a strategic gloss on what were, in fact, economic constraints. The Finance Minister, Yashwant Sinha, said of this: ‘The budget is pegged to India’s self-defence and not to any aggressive intent.’110 This ingenious justification, naturally, had to be balanced by claims that more would be spent if necessary,111 and that there would be ‘no compromise’ in preparedness.112 In any case, all Indian governments would remain keenly aware of China’s vastly higher spending.113 It is reasonable to think that nuclear warheads will have a negligible impact on defence spending because India’s strategy (such as it is) is based on a minimum deterrent posture. About, say, 60 warheads will be the maximum number built, compared with the 300 that the Chinese (and the 1000 the Americans) have.114 In fact, the pressure on defence spending will come through modernization and personnel. Some of it may have been unavoidable, but the nuclearization of the subcontinent will surely

172 C. Ram-Prasad

increase the pressure; so, the tests could well have an indirect impact on the defence budget, leaving successor governments in trouble. The BJP’s talk of going openly nuclear, it was thought, would not translate into action, since not even Russia would supply technology to an openly nuclear India. (In the event, the Russians went ahead with their plans to help India build a nuclear reactor for civilian use, and refused to stop any of their other arrangements with India.) Clearly, there was always going to be a major impact on America’s steadily growing interest in India’s economy. On a more psychological level, it was bound to destroy India’s careful mixture of selfinterest and moral piety in being a nation with nuclear capability but without nuclear weapons.115 With regard to China, going openly nuclear was not seriously going to offset Chinese military superiority and was bound seriously to jeopardize slowly warming relations with China. Whatever may have been the worries about and the hopes of the Hindutva movement in relation to India’s international relations, many things changed with the nuclear tests of May 1998 (and many did not). Pakistan conducted its own tests within three weeks of India’s. The statements of Hindutva ideologues characteristically combined a worry about India’s vulnerability with a snarling assertion of its power. ‘We need real bombs and not crackers to take on neighbours like Pakistan and China,’ said Bal Thackeray of the Shiv Sena.116 Typically, hardline ideologues without much knowledge of world affairs seem to have thought that the immediate object of the tests was to dominate Pakistan. Khusabhau Thakre, President of the BJP, said after India’s but before Pakistan’s tests: ‘We will soon bring Pakistan to its knees.’117 In fact, the strategic thinking in the Indian defence establishment has been for a long time that it was China that was the major threat to India. The immediate factor in this perception is the number of unresolved border disputes between the two countries. The longer-term thinking is more complex. To China, India alone represents a possible twenty-first-century counter to its role as Asia’s dominant power. It makes strategic sense for it to keep India militarily under stress. The way it has done so is by giving deep and wide support to Pakistan, which has a real and immediate fear of Indian domination on the subcontinent. It has extended extensive military support to Pakistan. India therefore had to continue with its rocket technology research and development, even within a non-nuclear peace strategy.118 Such an argument, although often made as a party-neutral defence strategy, had an ideological appeal to the BJP.

The International Relations of India 173

So long as India is seen primarily in terms of its rivalry with comparatively weak Pakistan, so long will it not seem a credible counterweight to mighty China. This strategy – considerably helped by the inept economic policies of successive Indian governments that have kept India out of the race for economic preponderance – has been successful. The Americans, importantly, spend a lot of energy learning to live with China because they do not think India – despite a polity much more like America’s – is a credible counterweight. There is a fundamental tension in India’s policy towards China, in the context of its great power aspirations. It needs to break away from the hold of the thought that it is primarily locked into a merely local (but dangerous) rivalry with Pakistan. It can do so only by focusing attention on its claim that its real rivalry is with a great power, namely, China. That makes for bad relations with China. At the same time, India might benefit from better relations with China, because (a) it could then divert resources from anti-China measures to its other, pressing, infrastructural needs, and (b) it could balance China’s overt inclination towards Pakistan, at least in noncontentious areas. For this reason, successive Indian governments worked on improving relations with China despite making only very little progress. Separate elements in the BJP-led government had a curious convergence of interests in pursuing the anti-China line. George Fernandes, the defence minister from the Samata Party, had a long left-liberal political career that included campaigning for Tibet. From the perspective of human rights and political freedom, he had a wellworn antipathy to China. This was therefore based on a rather different consideration than the traditional Hindutva reasoning that India’s greatness could only come out of challenging and equalling Chinese (or any other) power. In the weeks before the nuclear tests, Fernandes went on record to say that China was India’s major threat. It has never been clear as to whether the inner core of BJP decision-making centring on Vajpayee had used Fernandes, with his knowledge, to send out a signal before the tests, or whether they made use of his statements, without his knowledge, as a fortuitous preface to their nuclear policy. In any case, by identifying China as the primary threat and by claiming that the nuclear tests had the strategic purpose of responding to that threat, the government immediately raised the ante in Sino-Indian relations. A Pakistani official noted: ‘The BJP has been foolish in raising the Chinese bogey to such a pitch. The Indians have soured their relationship with the Chinese for a long time to come, and that has only helped us.’119 China immediately said that India was using the tests to

174 C. Ram-Prasad

dominate South Asia (again, localizing the matter and refusing to see it as a challenge to it). It claimed that India was ‘slandering’ China; the Indian claim that China was provoking an arms race was ‘groundless’.120 But the Indians had calculated that things could not get worse with China. It would continue to help Pakistan in any case. And because of its own superpower aspirations, it would not react with more than words. It had to promote its image as a responsible, declared nuclear power; it had to continue its strategy of remaining above and immune to India; it had to keep western investors happy. So it did not immediately go for a renewal of nuclear testing or even for mobilizing forces on the Indian borders. (It continued to have nuclear missiles pointed at India.) The Indian leadership maintained its policy of claiming that Pakistan was not the object of India’s nuclear tests. Indeed, it was hoped that the tests would goad Pakistan into testing, thereby diverting attention away from India and bringing sanctions down on it which would hurt its smaller and more fragile economy far more than they would India’s. That was precisely what happened. Disingenuously, the Indian government argued after Pakistan’s explosions that these explosions proved precisely that Pakistan had the nuclear capability that partly justified India’s own programme! In other words, India’s tests had been preemptive rather than provocative. That, indeed, was the extent of the leadership’s response to Pakistan, in keeping with the strategy of being high and mighty with regard to Pakistan and claiming to really be the equal of China. In contrast, as we have seen, more ideological but less strategically aware Hindutva figures did not understand this game of tag. They remained, as always, focused on Pakistan; challenging China was always of secondary concern. For them, Pakistan’s own tests seemed to have come as a surprise, as their wild talk of dominating their neighbour showed, although it should not have. In any case, having led with a dramatic anti-China pose before and immediately after the tests, the BJP-led government decided that it was time to soften its stance. Clearly, too, the longstanding Indian concern to present foreign policy in moral terms was one they could not give up. So, despite calling attention to US intelligence reports on China’s aid to Pakistan and even Iran, a government statement by Vajpayee said that India’s ‘tests did not target any country’. At the time of writing, months after the explosion, it remains to be seen whether this softening of the stance towards China will have any longterm gains. But the signs are not good, since, as I have argued, China has a powerful reason for keeping India off-balance. Indeed, this might well make

The International Relations of India 175

China see a threat where there is none. According to Bonnie Glaser, an American China analyst, Chinese officials privately expressed their suspicion that the Americans had secretly been pleased that the Indian texts have provided a counterbalance to China. ‘Beijing does not believe the US intelligence community had been caught off guard,’ she said. ‘They apparently think that the US knew and opted to do nothing about it.’121 The Indian government must fervently hope that, appearances to the contrary notwithstanding, this was true. As already mentioned, Russia remained, somewhat surprisingly, given its dependence on western aid, a steadfast ally of India after the tests. A nuclear plant, a possible aircraft carrier, artillery, and so on continued to be on the agenda; military visits to the US, UK, and Australia were cancelled, but not to Russia.122 In any case, the UK and France did not impose sanctions. It is not just relations with Pakistan but those with the Islamic world which have been affected. From the very establishment of India, the Islamic world has looked in suspicion at its secular polity, in contrast to the avowedly Islamic state of Pakistan. But the redefinition of India as a Hindu state will make matters even more complex. India has always had difficulties in this regard; indeed it is here that religion has played a major part. On the one hand, the presence of such a large Muslim population has always meant that the Indian government of the day has had to define some of its policies, like towards Palestinian selfrule, on the basis of Muslim sentiment. On the other, the very basis of India’s existence has been secularism. It was a notable that during the wars with Pakistan, a contrast was made between Pakistan’s conception of them as holy wars and India’s as a national war in which people of all religions fought side by side. Indira Gandhi’s use of the Hindu vote subsequently was seen as a betrayal of this ideal. India’s need to keep relations with the Muslim world has not only been motivated by its large Muslim population, but by the need to keep supplies of oil flowing and to preserve the welfare of Indian workers in the Gulf states. When the mosque at Ayodhya was destroyed, for example, Saudi Arabia threatened to deport its Hindu Indian guest workers.123 Saudi Arabia, in particular, is a difficult country for India, since the former has had close ties with Pakistan.124 In response to these imperatives, India has worked hard on not seeing its approach to the Islamic world as an extension of its Pakistan strategy. For one thing, it undertakes periodic diplomatic lobbying with Islamic states;125 for another, it exploits differences within the Islamic world,

176 C. Ram-Prasad

turning to Iran for oil when the Arabs (especially Saudi Arabia) expressed support for Pakistan or building up military relations with Sunni Oman worried about Shia Saudi Arabia.126 The Janata Dal government, according to Inder Kumar Gujral (later India’s Prime Minister, then the foreign minister), misread the depth of the divisions in the Muslim world over the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. It was conciliatory towards Saddam Hussein apparently because it feared the anger of Indian Muslims.127 Throughout the Gulf War, the Indian government vacillated, now conciliating Saddam, now allowing American planes to refuel in Bombay, then withdrawing the support; never knowing how its actions would affect the communal situation at home. India’s relationship with the Arab world, therefore, was always fraught and the BJP-led government’s actions after the tests turned out to be very interesting. Predictably, there was strong support in the newspapers of many Gulf states for Pakistan’s nuclear programme. The Saudi Al-Riyadh newspaper opined, ‘It is the duty of Muslims to support Pakistan, which could become the first Islamic deterrent force.’128 Interestingly, Pakistan was very cautious and did not talk of an ‘Islamic bomb’, clearly influenced by the need not to alienate the US more than strictly necessary and, more so, not to offend China (which has rebellious Muslim-dominated provinces bordering Islamic states). The situation, however, was more ambiguous than such reports might suggest. In pursuance of its longterm strategy of not alienating the Arab world, India, under earlier governments, had increased security relations with Arab sheikhdoms. Regional exercises with the United Arab Emirates began in 1995, and continued under the BJP-led government. More tellingly, naval exercises with Iran and Kuwait and one-day manoeuvres with Oman and even Saudi Arabia were carried out in the weeks after India’s tests.129 Actually, the arrangements for these had been made under previous governments, but the BJP had no intention of cancelling them. Interestingly, the Arab states agreed. They seem to have decided, behind the rhetoric of their media, that a BJP government in India was no different from any other; and an India with nuclear capacity was certainly an India to be treated cautiously. On its part, the BJP was, in the first instance, happy to have any propaganda victory that would help counter international condemnation of the tests. But for the longer term, cooperation with Islamic states as part of Indian geostrategy always had an appeal for Vajpayee, and he seems to have seen no reason to let domestic Hindutva polemic affect the pursuit of a rational foreign policy. How well this strategy plays with the ideologues back home is another matter.

The International Relations of India 177

Iran’s activities in this context are interesting too. On the one hand, it was the first country to make a state visit to Pakistan after the latter’s own tests. It thereby hoped to throw the Arab states out of balance. (Moreover, it shares Pakistan’s friendship with China.) It does the same with India, using Arab support for Pakistan to better relations with India. The continuity of Indian foreign policy is evident in India’s gingerly approach to Iran. Despite the naval exercises, the BJP-led government reaffirmed the earlier decision to refuse to repair Iranian submarines. Israel substantially improved its ties with India after the establishment of diplomatic ties in 1992 (even supporting India’s territorial claims on Kashmir).130 Thereafter, cooperation deepened swiftly, with Israel offering military and counterinsurgency training.131 After India’s nuclear tests, the Arab press reported that the Indian low-yield devices were Israeli, a claim that is given no credence either by western intelligence nor, interestingly, by Pakistan.132 Nevertheless, there is little doubt that India has hardware support, for example with missile technology from Israel, despite all the basic research being completely Indian. Israel planned to increase cooperation with India after the tests, because, as David Bar-Illan, aide to the Israel Prime Minister, Binyamin Netanyahu said: ‘We’re worried that Pakistan’s tests will encourage Teheran and Baghdad to acquire nuclear weapons.’133 Israel, even under the right-wing Likud government, did not comment on any correlation between its growing alliance with India and the accession to power of the BJP. Its India-strategy is dictated by its constant worries about the Islamic world, and it does not much notice the ideological stripe of the Indian government. On the Indian side, the calculation was made sometime before the BJP came to power that an anti-Israeli policy such as that pursued in the first forty years or so of Israel’s (and independent India’s) existence brought no special benefits in relations with Islamic states. Reasonably nonhostile relations could be established with these states and there was an upper limit beyond which India could not advance in friendliness with them. Once these limits were understood, there seemed no reason not to reap the benefits of cooperation with Israel, which, for all its complex negotiations with its Islamic neighbours, would be quite pleased to have an Asian power as a friend. Given this reasoning, the traditional Hindutva hostility to Islam, which might inform the BJP in power, was at best redundant, at worst an impediment. It would be redundant because India’s Israel policy would have its own rational momentum to which a supposed shared dislike of the Islamic world would add little. It would

178 C. Ram-Prasad

be an impediment to the pursuit of quiet cooperation because of two reasons. On the side of the Islamic states, it would only deepen antipathy towards both countries and scotch their independent pursuit of better relations with those states. On the side of Israel and India, both countries have strong political and civil groupings that would be opposed to explicit anti-Islamic sentiment and would therefore be unhappy with policies in themselves neutral to religious ideology. So, even when apparently marked by Zionist and Hindutva considerations respectively, the Israel Likud and Indian BJP governments kept religion out of their relations. Those relations are likely to hold with new governments in both countries, having, after all, been initiated by parties in power (Labour and Congress respectively) that were not committed to some form of religious nationalism. The BJP has so far stayed with the hardest line any Congress government and Indian thinkers could follow: to give up any part of Kashmir is to give up India’s sovereignty. Since no government has in fact ever suggested otherwise, and since actual policies have always been dictated by immediate considerations like elections and US pressure and the like, it might seem unlikely that there would be much practical difference with a BJP government in power. But the rhetoric of the past may already have altered this scenario. There is much appeal for Islamic parties in Pakistan to whip up emotions against insults to Islam in India. At the time of the destruction of the mosque in Ayodhya, the Jamait Ulema Islam, a religious party, coordinated agitation in Pakistan against the ‘Hindu genocide’ of Muslims in India.134 But of course this attention in Pakistan given to Indian Muslims only reinforces the Hindu nationalist contention that Indian Muslims are really bound by pan-Islamic loyalties to Pakistan rather than by national ones to India. As anyone would have predicted, the nuclear tests immediately raised the temperature on Kashmir. It is very likely, in fact, that the BJP-led government used Kashmir to make sure that Pakistan remained provoked after India’s tests. I have already mentioned that it may well have been that Hindutva ideologues without a proper assessment of Pakistan’s capabilities thought that India’s declaration of itself as a nuclear weapons state would decisively establish domination over Pakistan. This speculation cannot possibly hold with L. K. Advani, Home Minister in that government. Apart from having official intelligence, Advani has never shown signs of being less than keenly aware of global realpolitik. Yet, he said, after the Indian tests: ‘Islamabad should realise the change in the geostrategic situation in the region and the world [and] roll back its anti-India policy, especially with

The International Relations of India 179

regard to Kashmir.’135 The suggestion that India’s nuclear muscle would affect the situation in Kashmir was bound to provoke Pakistan. The Pakistani government could have seen this for the deliberate provocation it was, but the popular reaction to it would only have increased pressure on the Pakistani government to conduct its own tests. While the tactic worked, and Pakistan brought international reactions upon itself that are likely to affect it disproportionately more than India, Advani’s was an act of brinkmanship. As I write, a few months after the tests, claims and counterclaims are still being made on whether (and which of) the two countries were prepared to launch attacks over Kashmir. Pakistani suspicion over any Indian government’s Kashmir policy was markedly strengthened with Advani taking special charge of Kashmir within the Home Affairs portfolio.136

Conclusion It should be clear by now that Hindu nationalism, whatever its ideological purity, is considerably muddied by the flow of power. Not only are aims that would have been exemplary of Hindutva thought not been followed through in government, policies that were explicitly stated as being inimical to Hindutva thought been followed. I wish to make the case here that even with nuclearization, which undoubtedly happened under a Hindu nationalist-led government and which was a clearly stated aim of Hindu nationalists, the break with Indian foreign policy was not as radical as might be thought. Of course, the BJP-led government did not start or carry out the nuclear weaponization programme; it merely ordered the crucial test. And it is now unlikely that a future non-BJP government will completely roll back the weaponization programme, although it would very probably slow it down, even if the BJP were not forced out of economic necessity to do so. But the conduct of the test itself was not a uniquely bold Hindu nationalist action. Former President R. Venkatraman, who was then defence minister under Indira Gandhi, confirmed that preparations for an underground test had been completed in 1983, but had to be ‘abandoned under international pressure after satellites determined their progress’.137 V. P. Singh, Prime Minister of the strongly anti-BJP Janata Party-led government in the late 1980s, appointed a senior scientist from the original test of 1974 (conducted under Indira Gandhi) to be minister of state for defence and push on with the programme. In both 1995 and 1996, P. K. Narasimha Rao, Congress Prime Minister, called off planned tests that had been preceded by

180 C. Ram-Prasad

an expanded nuclear programme. Of Indian prime ministers, only I. K. Gujral, who preceded Vajpayee, had a systematic dislike for conducting nuclear tests, believing that refusing to sign the CTBT was sufficient to guarantee the country’s security.138 Both the technical side of the tests and the calculation of the economic and strategic price for conducting them were ongoing concerns of successive governments. Here too, the BJP had precedents to draw on. In 1995, under Narasimha Rao, a confidential study of the cost to the economy of testing had been commissioned. The Vajpayee government only had to update it in the weeks before testing.139 The tests in May 1998 were carried out in highly successful secrecy. The protocol for the tests, in fact, were planned and practised for some two years before the tests, under previous governments. The very fact that such elaborate preparations were made to evade US surveillance satellites and the plans kept from all but an inner core of decisionmakers indicates that the government expected – and was unhappy at the prospect of facing – pressure. Yet, the odd thing is that US Admiral David Jeremiah, head of a commission set up to investigate the failure of US intelligence, said: ‘I don’t think you were going to turn them around’ even in the event of detection.140 Why should this have been the case? Perhaps it was an overestimation of the ideologically driven determination of the BJP leaders. Perhaps it was an acceptance that India had been pressurized one time too many in the past and that this particular government had enough grounds for deciding to go ahead regardless of what anyone said or even did. This brings us to the issue of the relationship between this particular BJP-led government and the fact that the nuclear tests were finally conducted under its orders. Certainly, it has been conceptually easy for the BJP to be associated with nuclear tests. Nevertheless, it is difficult to know whether that association is more than contingent, whether it says something definitive about Hindu nationalism. Clear connections were made in the Pakistani media between the tests and Hindu nationalism, and it was pointed out that what was held to be a Hindu nationalist government had been aggressive on Kashmir and had taken India nuclear.141 Yet it must be asked whether this amounted to a specific correlation between Hindu nationalism and an aggressive Indian foreign policy. Much the same view of India as threatening and intransigent held in major sections of Pakistani opinion long before the BJP-led government came to power, although, admittedly there have been periods of comparatively less fraught relations (for example, through the personal contacts between I. K. Gujral and his Pakistani

The International Relations of India 181

counterpart, Nawaz Sharif) that seem not to be possible with a BJP government. On the other hand, it must be noted that urgent plans were being made on both sides, soon after they had declared their nuclear status, for working out a post-tests policy to minimize the threat of accidental nuclear warfare. It must be remembered that neither country is near proper weaponization of its nuclear power, for example, assembling the nuclear tip for longer-range missiles, having a command and control structure, and so on. As with many another country, domestic exigencies have strongly influenced the BJP-led government’s decisions on international relations. The strong suggestion is that this was the case with the timing of the nuclear tests. In order to get an idea of why this may be so, we should look at the nature of Hindu nationalist electoral calculations. For all its chaotic procedures and rampant political corruption, the practice of democracy is strong in India. It means that whatever the Hindu nationalist parties do, they must do it on the basis of electoral calculation, and this builds limiting mechanisms into the political process. This is evident in the policies that Hindu nationalists have followed. Broadly, there are two tendencies in the movement, the soft and the hard. The BJP moderates like Vajpayee, and usually Advani, exemplify the former. Their calculation is to approach the centreground of believing Hindus who think of themselves as politically secular and usually vote for Congress. Characteristically, they argue that their notion of Hindutva is compatible with secularism, that their worry about Muslims has to do with whether the latter are committed to India and not to a transnational Islam that points to Pakistan. They are concerned that it is the supposedly secular Congress which has pandered to Muslim minority interests in its search for votes. They direct these arguments at Hindus who feel aggrieved with Congress policies which are held to have discriminated unjustly in favour of minorities. It is no coincidence that the BJP also has support from the middle- and upper-castes which feel they have lost out to lower castes and religious minorities in the reservation of jobs and educational places. But this electoral strategy for gaining a putative middle ground has clear limits. The BJP cannot afford to alienate just these people in the middle ground. People here still think of themselves as secular and support the BJP only if they think it will make a better deal of securing a secular order in which they do not feel discriminated. These people are not social liberals, but they do have a selfimage as being ‘tolerant’. They are also those who seem to be benefiting from economic liberalization, hence the muddle the BJP gets into on its version of a swadeshi

182 C. Ram-Prasad

economy. A resolution of its national executive tries to build a sober economic case against letting foreign firms into the consumer sector by arguing that this will only further lower India’s savings rate (already fallen from 24 per cent of GDP in 1991 to 21 per cent in 1995) by drawing people into going on a ‘spending spree’.142 It also stresses that it welcomes foreign investment in hi-tech and infrastructure sectors.143 Clearly, it not only wants to reassure foreign investors, it also wants to reassure India’s emerging middle classes that there will be skilled work – and increasing pay – in these sectors. These considerations in turn have consequences in foreign policy, because India can continue to pursue its geopolitical end of becoming a ‘great power’ only if it has economic strength, and to do this it must preserve good relations with investing countries like the US. The ‘hard’ version of Hindu nationalism works on a different electoral calculation. It takes as its starting point the sheer demographic preponderance of those who consider themselves Hindus, and concludes that power – or at least sufficient influence on those in power – can be gained through wholly ignoring non-Muslims and (both genuine and purportedly) secular Hindus. Its appeal lies wholly with those who are waiting to express their membership of a clearly defined Hindu religion. Hardline Hindutva looks to be expert at tapping into the uncertainty among those Hindus who are looking for a full political articulation of what they take to be their deepest collective psychological needs.144 These are the people willing to march on a disused mosque built on an old temple because they genuinely believe that its destruction is demanded by their literal faith in ‘Lord Rama and His birthplace’. Characteristically, they decry secularism and want to replace it with a Hindu polity in which Muslims and others are not tolerated and must either become Hindus or leave. Of course, they have a limited electoral appeal as well. In fact, so limited is this appeal that it is noticeable that the groups which adhere to it are mostly nonparliamentary. Their best hope is to deliver votes to the BJP and hope to gain something in return. The March 1998 elections showed that a pure BJP government was not likely. (BJP strategists thought briefly of calling a snap election after the tests, to cash in on overwhelming domestic support for the tests, but drew back for a variety of reasons.) The government that was formed and was in office during the tests was a fractious coalition. The cynical conclusion was that it was this situation that prompted the decision to test at this point, although ‘hawkish’ commentators tended to see Pakistan’s testing of the IRBM Ghauri as the catalyst. Unnamed

The International Relations of India 183

‘military officials’ were reported as saying that the timing of the tests was significant. The BJP coalition had been ‘paralysed after assuming office in March’. ‘The BJP needed to make a dramatic statement to strengthen itself within the coalition’, an officer was reported as saying.145 In the event, if this was the calculation (and we must balance it against Vajpayee’s longheld commitment to make India a nuclear power), it went awry. Within months, the government was in just as much trouble – if not more – as it would have been if it had never tested. Other governments have been in crisis before. Others have used diversionary tactics. Others have tried to assert their authority over troublesome allies, partners and subordinates by a show of power. In general, the BJP coalition was typical of a government in that situation. But the specific case of nuclear testing needs to be analysed further (that is, that was not the option previous governments had taken, even when some came close). Here, something more than pure opportunism must be granted to Vajpayee and his associates. In their long search for power, Hindutva politicians had argued unequivocally for nuclear weapons. It had a fundamental appeal to their sense of a strong and important India, an India that would be a modern version of the glorious land of Hindu legend. As the history of India’s nuclear programme shows, the Hindutva parties did not have a monopoly on the idea that India had the right to just those modes of military power that the ‘great powers’ had. Nor were they alone in thinking that India had to attain a status in the world supposedly appropriate to its history and achievements. But they were notably different in taking the possession of nuclear weapons to be a sine qua non of that pursuit for status, not a mere strategic alternative. Tactically, the insistence on nuclearization allowed them to press (mostly Congress) governments over an issue that was subject to many strong constraints and that only a ruling party would have to handle. They themselves, looking unlikely to have national power, could afford to use high rhetoric in this regard. Upon coming into office, but only with recalcitrant partners, they had a historically ready-made way of trying to stamp their authority on the polity. This was by way of carrying out the tests. They could do so for two major reasons. First, they had not been in office when the programme was less than sophisticated enough to be pursued to its conclusion immune from external pressure. (We can remember what a noticeably emollient foreign minister Vajpayee made in the Janata government of 1977–79.) Other governments had taken India to the point of being able to carry out the tests without detection and with sufficient scientific precision. So, from technical and intelligence

184 C. Ram-Prasad

points of view, they could carry out the tests with fewer structural problems than any previous government. Second, they alone had the rhetoric behind them. They alone could do it without that intellectual inconsistency that would have made them look nakedly opportunistic. Even better, they could carry it out with the flourish of a ‘told you so!’ A Congress government, in contrast, would have had to provide tortuous justification (which Narasimha Rao must characteristically have considered when making his own, abortive plans in 1995–96) for a change in a policy that it had made its own in the long years in office. At one stroke, Vajpayee could demonstrate his own consistency; keep his more extreme colleagues in the ‘Sangh Parivar’, or Hindutva family of organizations, happy; dominate his largely regional (and thus geopolitically unlettered) allies; and dare the opposition to oppose a viscerally popular move. Perhaps the best and shortest way of putting the point I wish to make is to ask an unanswerably counterfactual question. If the BJP had come to power with a safe majority, would it have acted so swiftly to conduct the tests? If one thinks it would still have, then one must also think that the idea of a nuclear India as a worthy descendant of a glorious ancient (that is, pre-Islamic) nation is so intrinsic to the BJP that Hindu nationalism explains the fact of India going nuclear. In other words, one must be inclined to reject entirely the argument from opportunism that the anonymous officer made and that, with qualifications, I have endorsed. It must be noted, by the way, that, in the somewhat elusive dialectic between ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ Hindu nationalism (which I myself have used, if only as a heuristic device), Vajpayee took the decision to allow very little domestic exploitation of the tests by the hardliners. So he utterly rejected the proposal to build a temple dedicated to India’s nuclear power. Sensibly, he also quashed the lunatic idea of distributing sand from the Pokhran test site (which could well have been radioactive, despite the depth at which the tests were conducted). For all that the nuclear tests do not leave us with a very clear idea of the nature of Hindu nationalism in power, we could still engage in some speculation on how a less constrained Hindu nationalist government would proceed on an ideological agenda. Let us, then, leave aside the tumultuous events of May 1998 and end with a more theoretical look at the nature of Hindutva politics and its relationship with a certain dominant, Indian conception of India. In an exit poll conducted by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi,146 it was found that the BJP’s support base was

The International Relations of India 185 Table 7.1 Analysis of Vote in 1998 General Election Congress

BJP and allies

United Front

By groups Upper castes ‘Backward’ castes Muslims

29% 21% 39%

56% 42% 17%

11% 21% 30%

By education Illiterate Low High

31% 27% 29%

31% 37% 45%

21% 21% 17%

Source: Yadav, Y. et al. ‘Who Voted for Whom?’, India Today, 16 March 1998, pp. 49–52.

narrow in comparison with Congress. Given that its share of the vote in 1996 was 23.5 per cent and taking that to be its average share of votes according to religion, gender, and level of education, only among young male Hindu graduates did it do better than average. The situation improved for the BJP in the 1998 elections, for before that, it had strongly been identified as the party of upper-castes and the urban educated. Across a range of categories (even, from an understandably nonexistent base, with Muslims), the BJP and its allies made advances, without losing their traditional support.147 The moot point is the attitude of this segment of the electorate: does the ‘hard’ or the ‘soft’ strategy most appeal to them? The answer to the question probably is: the ‘hard’ in specific areas, the ‘soft’ to a larger extent in diverse parts of the country, but neither wholly. As my earlier point about the irreversible onset of radical coalition politics suggests, the form of a government that contains the BJP can be anything, depending on the calculations of many parties. It is true to say ‘that the 1998 election offered no endorsements for Hindu civilisation’148 as construed by Hindutva ideologues. If the BJP cannot command nationwide support barely months after the most spectacular step it could have taken, there seems little reason to think that it can break out of coalition politics any time in the near future. The divide between ‘soft’ and ‘hard’ versions of Hindu nationalism is very similar to other such divides as in the tension between right-wing and far right parties in Europe or the mainstream (‘we-are-not-Pat Buchanan’) Republican Congressional Party and the Christian Coalition. But in the context of the Hindu tradition, the divide may specifically be traced to two versions of the conception of Hindutva or Hinduness.

186 C. Ram-Prasad

We have already looked at the general theory of Hindutva. The crucial thought there was that those intent on identifying the essence of Hinduism made two moves: the first was to claim that Hinduism was marked by a universalism in which all other religions were anticipated, and the second was to claim that the historical Hinduism was the religion of the political India. But there have always been two disparate conceptions of this essentialism. The ‘soft’ option has been to interpret the essence of Hinduism as a doctrinal pluralism in which other religions are consciously accepted and therefore found a place in the Hindu conceptual scheme. The ‘hard’ option has been to identify the essence of Hinduism as a doctrinal universalism which carries in it all the teachings of the other religions and, therefore, makes them redundant in India. Taking the ‘soft’ option has meant that Hindu nationalism, while affirming India as culturally and historically a Hindu nation, has to make space for the coexistence of a plurality of religions. In this it has appeal for those who take the distinguishing mark of Hinduism to be a doctrinally enjoined toleration of a plurality of religious traditions. Taking the ‘hard’ option has meant denying the legitimacy of other religions in the conceptual and physical space of India. This has an appeal only to those for whom the assertion of Hindu faith is made as a native response to the historically encountered exclusivism of Islam (and to a lesser extent, Christianity). So, Hindutva has meant different things to different people and it is obvious how this has affected the different types of Hindu nationalism. This is not the place to put the argument for why neither of these conceptions, or indeed any conception of pure Hinduness, is coherent. I have argued elsewhere that the history of the Hindu tradition merely reveals a factual plurality, a myriad of groupings and sects and philosophies which are recognized in contrast to other, more determinate, religions but not through any essentializing definition.149 But whatever ideological construction Hindu nationalists come up with, it is unclear as to what relationship it will or can have with India’s international relations. The essentializing drive occurs in the Hindu tradition precisely because there is nothing obviously essential to it. The very conception of Hinduism is an amorphous one. Famously, there is no native tradition for the term ‘Hinduism’; it is a derived merely from the Greek for the people beyond the river Sindhu (itself now in Pakistan, in a nice little irony). Of course, this is not to say that we cannot now call a body of beliefs and practices ‘Hinduism’. But it is an indication of the

The International Relations of India 187

nature of the tradition. As we have seen, lacking a determinate or fundamental set of identifying beliefs, Hindu ideologues developed an indirect account of the Hindu essence: a doctrine of plurality which establishes the inclusivistic anticipation of other religions within Hinduism, and a particular history of a native Hindu land. These two features of Hindu nationalism lead straight to an explanation for the marginal nature of its role in India’s international relations, bar Pakistan. There is no motivation to spread a particular religious or cultural view across the world, because the very nature of Hindu religion and culture is interpreted as pluralistic. The sense of moral selfsufficiency that this feeling engenders does not require the exporting of a particular religion and culture. Indeed, it stands in opposition to it, because it is derived from the satisfaction that one ‘accepts’ other religions and cultures and that is what makes one ‘special’ as a Hindu. This is so even if one recognises that those of other religions, in other parts of the world, do not have access to that conscious, embracing universalism which is essential to Hinduism. Policies driven by this ideology do not take the form of extending influence to new parts of the globe. The contrast with the exportative ideological (if not always actual) orientation of many Muslim fundamentalists is clear. This lack of extroversion is reinforced by the derivation of essential ‘Hinduness’ from the same nexus as ‘Indianness’ (regardless, as we have noted, of the direction of dependence between Hinduness and Indianness). The identification of the religion as the religion of a country, and now of a nation-state, also removes any extrovertive tendency. The securing of the Indian space of Hinduism is the prime motive rather than the establishment of a larger physical and figurative space for Hinduism. It is characteristic of Hindu nationalism that it looks to exploit popular worries about MNCs being vanguards of a cultural invasion. But it does not seek so much to combat this through a counterexpansion of Hindu cultural influence as through an isolationist plan to make India ‘pure’ again. Here again, there can be no intrinsic conception akin to Christendom or Dar-ul-Haq.150 When there is concern for Hindus abroad, it is presented in a way which hints at the projection of power, but even in theory (let alone in practice), the thrust of the proposed policy is essentially conciliatory. The BJP thus ‘demands that the government of India should formulate a clear policy in regard to persons of Indian origin settled in foreign countries, so that effective steps may be taken to resolve their problems satisfactorily’.151 But the BJP cannot do very much that is different

188 C. Ram-Prasad

from what any government can do. An example is the attitude of all Indian governments towards Fiji. There, a coup by a native Melanesian soldier overthrew the popularly elected government which was dominated by Indian descendants of workers transported by the British in the last century. With many of Indian origin now having left, taking their economic and professional knowhow with them, the Fijian government made a deal with the Indian-led party and agreed on a transition to democratic elections. But Fiji’s reapplication to join the Commonwealth was opposed by India and Mauritius exactly on grounds of sympathy with Fijians of Indian origin.152 Apart from gestures like these, what could any Indian government do? So, there is very little even in a ‘hard’ Hindu nationalism which could translate into an ideology of expansion, even if the economic situation were more propitious. It should, however, be noted that this does not apply to Kashmir and Pakistan. Here, there are two contradictory tendencies. The original idea of a Hindu nation was developed in opposition to the Indian National Congress’ idea of a secular India in the 1920s and 1930s. V. D. Savarkar, the original Hindutva ideologue, claimed that India was not a unitary nation but two: Hindu and Muslim.153 It has been pointed out154 that this was just what the founder of Pakistan, Muhammad Ali Jinnah, said in arguing for a Muslim nation.155 Yet, in the same speech, Sarvarkar had already said, ‘Let the Indian state be purely Indian … Let no cognisance be taken of a man being Hindu or Mohammedan, Christian or Jew.’156 It was the followers of Sarvarkar who understood this latter view to mean that the ideal was an undivided India, opposed partition, and declared after it became a reality that they would still hold an undivided India – Akhand Bharat – as their goal.157 There are, then, two different, incompatible attitudes here: one is that if India is the Hindu land, then Pakistan should be a legitimate entity because it is an Islamic nation. The other is that since the Hindu land is the historical India, Pakistan has no legitimacy because it is really part of that original India, and the Muslims of this historical land really part of the Hindu nation. The same applies to Kashmir, and Hindu nationalists do not usually appreciate the contradiction inherent in their attitude. They argue that Kashmir should be kept as part of India, but since Kashmir is the only Muslim-majority state and since they want India to be a Hindu nation, should not Kashmir be separated from India? It is probably in connection with this that they try to keep a focus158 on the Kashmiri Hindus and their suffering at the hands of the Kashmiri Islamic militants.159

The International Relations of India 189

Hindu nationalists swing between these two incompatible views of Pakistan and Kashmir. But it is not always evident that this is so because in either case, they are willing to engage in aggressive rhetoric. If Pakistan is a legitimate Islamic state, then it must be approached as an enemy of the Hindu state. If Pakistan is an illegitimate state, then too it must be approached thus because the ultimate aim is to reassimilate it into India. We have seen, of course, that this is in the realms of the highly hypothetical. In any case, this is an exception to the general Hindutva attitude to the world which we have explored and which may be illustrated by the words of one of the chief ideologues of the 1980s and 1990s: ‘It is natural that the growing movement of all-round rejuvenation of the cultural values of Bharat (India) spearheaded by swayamsevaks (Hindutva volunteers) should have its reverberations abroad. In fact, whenever Bharat raised itself to cultural eminence, the same was invariably echoed in foreign lands.’160 Recognition rather than power abroad. Indeed, one may even say that the pluralistic nature of the Hindu religious tradition, even if it is not incoherently essentialized but left as an irreducible historical and cultural fact,161 has had the effect of making India a generally introverted nation. That, however, does not mean that Indians, Hindu nationalists and secularists, are happy with India being ignored. Even the most gentle secularist accepts the vision of India as a ‘great power’. There is very little questioning of the legitimacy of the presupposition that the aim of Indian foreign policy is ultimately to gain India recognition as such. This is surely derived from a sense of the history of the land, one that there is no need to be a Hindu nationalist to appreciate. The collective identity of every nation in the end depends on some broad and general conception of its uniqueness. For India, it is its cultural and intellectual history, most clearly expressed in the Hindu past, especially seen in contrast to the ‘Semitic’ civilizations and ‘Confucian’ China. The widest aim of Indian policy, in so far as there is any influence of the Hindu tradition in it, is to secure the approbation of the world rather than control of it. India has not been confident enough of its position in world affairs to adopt the take-it-orleave-it attitude of China, sure of its millennial destiny as the ‘Middle Kingdom’.162 It may not be too much to speculate that the unreadiness of Indians to adopt this attitude is related to the general Hindu need to seek recognition of India’s moral strength as the very legitimization of the Indian (Hindu) genius for plurality and toleration. It is not very satisfactory to be tolerant if others do not acknowledge this, and it is

190 C. Ram-Prasad

not very much use articulating one’s identity in terms of a pluralist mentality if others are not aware that it is they about whom one is being plural. Or at least, no nation, with its real imperatives of a contented and prosperous populace – and certainly not a poor country of nearly a billion people – can afford not to think this way. To that extent at least, what Indians take as the Hindu tradition may be thought to contribute to India’s relations with the rest of the world.

Afterword Someone said of their work on contemporary affairs that readers should include their own newspaper cuttings while reading it. It is so with this essay. It has a many-layered archaeology. Its central ideas on Hindu nationalism were presented at a conference in early 1996, and the first draft reflected the position of the BJP at that time. The second draft was written just after India’s fiftieth anniversary of Independence, when retrospection was in the air, and the BJP had had an abortive fortnight in power. The final version came after the formation of the BJP coalition in March 1998 and soon after the nuclear tests of May. At each stage, I have had to rewrite the essay in lesser or greater measure. I have little cause to think that events will not have moved on by the time the first reader comes to this essay, leave alone in a few years time. I have tried to take the long view, setting the activities of the first properly BJP-led government not only against the party’s (and its related organizations’) plans and rhetoric, but also the ideology and views of its Hindu nationalist predecessors. On the whole, I have tried to relate Hindu nationalism to the Indian polity, especially, of course, in the area of international relations. Some judgements have been possible; but too much is current history for more than description and analysis to be possible. In the end, I can only conclude with the hope that the vast potential and infinite richness of its people and culture will not be misused or wasted by those whom democracy allows to say they speak for India.

Notes 1. Two particularly well-known pieces are: Nandy 1985; Madan 1987. 2. So, too, does the emergence of the coalition of broadly left and regional parties which finally came to power after the 1996 general elections. Many of the national parties in the coalition have a good record on secularism, although not on caste and other socially divisive issues.

The International Relations of India 191 13. On the pluralistic nature of India with particular regard to religion, see Embree 1990, esp. chs 3 and 4. 14. As the Rudolphs put it, the notion of a Hindu majority is an ‘artifact of categorisation’; Rudolph and Rudolph 1987, p. 37. 15. In the 1931 Karachi Resolution of the Indian National Congress, it was declared, ‘The state shall observe neutrality in regard to all religion.’ 16. But religious sentiments could not always be controlled in the nationalist movement. For a survey and analysis of nationalist religious sentiments among Hindus, Muslims and Sikhs, see Balachandran 1996. 17. Jawaharlal 1980, p. 224. 18. As reported in Karanjia 1966, p. 19. 19. See Article 25(1) regarding the individual freedom of religion and Article 26 regarding collective freedom of religion. For a sophisticated study and considered defence of the secularist constitution and its role in the Indian polity, see Galanter 1984; he concludes that the Indian system is one of ‘principled eclecticism’, p. 567. 10. There are innumerable instances of Nehru’s expression of this idea in Karanjia 1960. Stretching the concept of religion to include any ‘ultimate concern’, Robert Baird even makes the provocative claim that Nehru’s secularism was a form of religion; Baird 1978. 11. Golwalkar 1959, p. 77. Golwalkar is referring to the Buddhist emperor of the 2nd century BC. He accuses the Muslims of having theocratic states in India as well, contrasting this with the claim that the 16th century Hindu Maratha leader Shivaji restored a secular state. 12. Vallabhai Patel in Gandhi 1991. This is from an unpublished letter cited by Rajmohan Gandhi, grandson of the Mahatma. 13. For a detailed study of the Jana Sangh, especially its electoral history, see Graham 1990. 14. Expressions of Hindu nationalism in the period just before Independence, in the speeches of Hindu ideologues, are collected in Mathur 1996. 15. A liberal inclusivism of this form can be found expressed in Radhakrishnan 1968. 16. For example, Vivekananda 1970/3, p. 223. 17. Ram-Prasad 1993. 18. For example, by Hindutva journalist Girilal Jain, interviewed in Elst 1991, p. 365. 19. Cf. Thapar 1989. 20. The first expression of this idea is found in Savarkar 1942a. ‘A Hindu means a person who regards this land of Bharat Varsha [India] … as his Fatherland as well as his Holy Land, that is, the cradle land of his religion’ (p. 4). But also, ‘with the Hindus, they being the people whose past, present and future are most closely bound with the soil of Hindustan [literally, Land of the Hindus] … they constitute the foundation … of the Indian state’ (p. 116). 21. Manifesto and Programme of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, Delhi, 1957. 22. For example, Rajagopalachari 1957 and 1960. 23. Harrison 1960, p. 313. 24. For a close study of the Swatantra Party at the time of its flourishing, see Erdman 1967.

192 C. Ram-Prasad 25. 26.

27.

28. 29.

30. 31.

32. 33.

34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41.

42.

43. 44. 45. 46.

47.

Organiser, 31 December 1951, p. 5. Girilal Jain, interview in Elst 1991, p. 365. In this he is assiduously following the interpretation of Indian history given by the first ideologue of Hindutva, V. D. Savarkar; see Savarkar 1971. However, they lacked conceptual and political weight in the years after Independence. This is revealed in their virtually total absence in the literature on the foreign policy of that time. Even wide-ranging studies have nothing to say about them. For example, Nanda 1976. Deshpande 1949, p. 15, argued that if need be force should be used to reunite Pakistan with India. ‘What passes for secularism today, however, is only an euphemism for the policy of Muslim appeasement.’ Manifesto and Programme of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, December 1958. There were dissident voices in both parties, supporting the other’s line; Erdman 1966. The Americans thought so: see references to American newspaper editorials in Nayar 1977. The Chinese thought so: ‘Indian General Election and Soviet Setback in South Asia’, Peking Review, 8 April 1977, p. 23. Tretyakov 1977, p. 21. Congress politicians, throughout the brief time in which they were out of power, continued to believe that Vajpayee, with the backing of his PM, Morarji Desai, did indeed tilt India towards the west; but they could provide no real evidence for this. For example, Chavan 1979, p. 48. Times of India (New Delhi), 8 April 1977. The Peking Review of the same day obviously did not pick this up. Joint Communique, Soviet Review, 14, 21–2 May 1977, pp. 14 –18. Alva 1978, p. 19. Kuwait Times, 23 July 1977. Indian Express, 11 October 1978. The Hindu, 10 April 1977. For examples, Gangal 1979, p. 50. One of them in the government drew attention to these reasons in describing the Janata government policy’s continuity with its predecessor; Limaye 1984. There is a confession from Vajpayee about his time as Minister for External Affairs: ‘In 1977, the Janata Party had fought the elections almost entirely on domestic issues, and so, after winning the elections, emphasised the need for continuity in foreign policy.’ ‘India at the Cross Roads’, BJP Pamphlet 5, 1980, p. 17. Appadorai 1981, pp. 140 –8, presents the conventional Indian case for not holding a plebiscite in Kashmir by appealing to secularism. Varshney 1992, p. 223. Pasha 1992, p. 382. Pakistan was cited as a national supporting terrorism in this regard by the US Department’s Annual Report on Global Terrorism in 1991. Indian government and opposition alike seized on this. ‘Pak backing J and K ultras: US report’, The Hindustan Times, 4 May 1992. Gordon 1995, p. 208. In doing this, the BJP was following the sturdy example of Rajiv Gandhi, one of whose 1984 Congress campaign slogans,

The International Relations of India 193

48. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 54. 55.

56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62.

63.

64.

was, ‘Do you want India’s borders to come to your doors?’ In Hewitt 1992, p. 136. See, for example, the absurd yet virulent writings of Rai 1994, esp. chs 1 and 5. Vyas 1992. Advani 1995. For example, ‘Deport Bangladeshis from India: BJP’, Hindustan Times, 24 August 1992. So, for example, argued Mulkani 1991, pp. 22–3. ‘Passage Pains’, India Today, 15 December 1991, p. 83. Gordon 1995, p. 343. UNDP Human Development Report, Oxford University Press, New York, 1991, tables 17 and 19; see also the 1992 report, which shows an increase in the difference. International Institute of Strategic Studies, The Military Balance, 1996/97, Oxford University Press, Oxford, for IISS, 1997. Mattoo 1996, p. 51. Koch and Sidhu 1998, p. 36. Ibid, p. 37. Ibid. Advani 1987, p. 20. The Far Eastern Economic Review has marshalled data released by the CIA to show that China has assisted Pakistan substantially from the very inception of the latter’s nuclear programme in 1974. See Chanda 1998a, p. 21. The depth and extent of North Korean collaboration in and help with Pakistan’s development of missile capabilities also came to be understood in India and the west. See Bermudez 1998. Party official quoted in ‘The Nuclear Risk Shifts to South Asia’, The New York Times, 31 January 1993. In an earlier version of this chapter, written before the tests, I wrote: ‘One can only assume that this is mere nationalist rhetoric, because if the BJP is to be a serious party of government, then it must surely recognise the disbenefits of this strategy.’ I was in good company. Amitabh Matto argued that domestic and economic concerns would not permit testing even under the BJP (Mattoo 1996). D. J. Karl stated, ‘there is no indication that [India’s] nuclear weapons programme will be significantly expanded in the future, even if the hawkish BJP comes to power’; Karl 1997, p. 206. The CIA’s failure to spot the tests became infamous in the aftermath; we will look at that later in the context of relations with the US. Sagan 1997, p. 199. I had private confirmation from well-connected sources that defence scientists had been pushing successive governments to validate their (the scientists’) work and conduct tests and make India a nuclear weapons state. The accession to power of the BJP in April 1998 was seen – correctly as it emerged – as likely to make their wish a reality. Comparatively few scientists involved in nuclear and weapons programmes strongly supported the policy of nuclear ambiguity by the time BJP-led government ordered the tests. Twenty-odd years of intense but clandestine preparation seemed to have eroded confidence in the success of the old policy favoured by the foreign policy establishment. Thus,

194 C. Ram-Prasad

65. 66.

67. 68. 69.

70. 71.

72.

73. 74.

75.

76. 77. 78. 79. 80.

professional impatience and psychological strain made many eager for a BJP government; the BJP’s larger ideology seems, here too, to have played virtually no role. Bedi 1998c, p. 44. Former defence minister, K. C. Pant, said: ‘we very seriously proposed a 15-year plan for the phased elimination of N-weapons in 1988’, but there were no takers; Joshi 1998a, p. 16. India therefore justified itself by referring to the failure to achieve a nuclear ban. Ironically, The Economist, strong in its condemnation of the tests, itself had nothing else to recommend than to say: ‘the proper response … [for the original nuclear powers] is to shed some, if not all, of their nuclear weapons’; The Economist, ‘The New Nuclear Stand-Off’, 30 May–5 June 1998, p. 18. Quoted in Bedi 1998c, p. 43. Bender 1998, p. 7. The other major features of that environment have hardly changed in a long while. This comparative stability in foreign policy goals is evident when we look at the literature from the 1980s; for example, Jain 1987. Interestingly, nobody at that time gives the slightest hint of anticipating either the collapse of the Soviet Union (like the rest of the world) or the compulsions towards economic liberalization. The latter was going to be as much of a shock to the system as the former. Advani 1991. Of course, this is very simplistic; for example, the flotation of the Indian rupee cannot be categorized in this way. But it will do for what I have to say next. Like protectionism elsewhere, it was motivated by a desire to appeal to special interests; the BJP opposed the Dunkel proposals for trade liberalization within the last GATT round because it claimed (falsely, but perhaps sincerely) that Indian farmers would lose their subsidies. This was done as part of a strategy to move from its urban base to rural areas. ‘BJP Makes Inroads into Jat Heartlands’, The Hindu, 20 April 1993. Quoted in Singh 1995, p. 60. The soft drink giants incurred the wrath of Bal Thackeray, the leader of the extreme Shiv Sena, since end-1995 the senior partner of the government in Maharasthra. If Coke and Pepsi sponsored sporting events in Pakistan, they would be ‘bundled out of India’; in ‘MNCs and Liberalisation’, The Economic Times, 4 October 1995. This is illustrated by the fact that Kentucky Fried Chicken, the American junkfood company that had opened in India only in the previous year, was closed down on fairly flimsy grounds to do with health and safety not only in Delhi in November 1995 by the BJP local government, but in Bangalore in September by the left-wing Janata Dal state government. KFC got court orders against the closures. Singh 1996b, p. 25. Jain 1996, pp. 68–9. ‘Taking Turns’, The Economist, 25–31 May 1996, p. 86. The Economist, ‘So Much for Hopes of Reform’, 6 June 1998, p. 80. The Economist sarcastically wondered about policies tilted towards NRI investment whether ‘their dollars are more valuable to Indian industry than anybody else’s’; The Economist, ‘India’s Other Test’, 6 June 1998, p. 18.

The International Relations of India 195 81. 82. 83. 184. 185. 186. 187. 188. 189. 190. 191. 192. 193. 194. 195. 196. 197. 198. 199. 100. 101. 102.

103. 104. 105. 106. 107. 108. 109. 110. 111. 112. 113.

114. 115.

116. 117.

Sidhva 1998, p. 72. Chakravarti and Rekhi 1998, p. 24. Quoted in Singh 1996a, p. 23. Presidential Address, Jaipur, BJP Pamphlet 110, 1991, p. 22. Joshi here uses the term used by RSS ideologues to indicate a region dominated by a Hindu India. See Anderson and Damle 1987, p. 77. ‘A Dove Among Hawks’, India Today, 31 May 1996, p. 16. Pathek 1996. Dasgupta and Singh 1997, p. 26. Interview in The Hindu (International Edition), 27 April 1991. Interview in India Today, 15 April 1995. Ibid. Bhaumik 1997, pp. 22–3. Dasgupta et al. 1998. ‘King of Mumbai’, The Economist, 3–9 February, 1996. Frontline, 27 April – 10 May 1991. India Today, 15 January 1996. Singh 1995. Interview, ‘Yes, I’m the Remote Control’, India Today, 15 December 1995. Dhillon and Singh 1996. ‘Yes, I’m the Remote Control’, India Today, 15 December 1995. Rosen 1996, p. 252. As K. Subramanyam, founding director of the (Indian) Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis once remarked on the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) which would freeze the situation in which only the five current and declared nuclear powers would have nuclear weapons, ‘I find our politicians are more interested in not signing the NPT than in the Pakistani threat.’ Quoted in McDonald 1992. Subrahmanyam 1990, p. 134. Times of India, New Delhi, 24 May 1996. The Economic Times, Bombay, 23 May 1996. ‘Image-building Exercise’, India Today, 15 June 1996, p. 39. Times of India, New Delhi, 21 May 1996. Chanda 1998a, p. 20. The Economist, ‘So Much for Hopes of Reform’, 6 June 1998, p. 80. Bedi 1998d. The Economist, ‘So Much for Hopes of Reform’, 6 June 1998, p. 80. Bedi 1998d. China urged India to make a ‘wise’ move and not have (the one-off) hike of 14 per cent (in its hitherto static defence budget) after the tests. China’s own far higher budget shows a minimum of 12 per cent increase, year on year, for most of the 1990s; The Economic Times (Mumbai), PTI report, 7 June 1998, p. 3. Joshi 1998c. For an incisive survey of the situation up to the early 1990s (and things have not changed dramatically in the following years) see Smith 1994, esp. pp. 192–200. Quoted in Chanda 1998b, p. 19. Lifschultz 1998, p. 30.

196 C. Ram-Prasad 118. 119. 120. 121. 122. 123. 124. 125. 126. 127. 128. 129. 130. 131. 132. 133. 134. 135. 136. 137. 138. 139. 140. 141. 142.

143. 144. 145.

146. 147. 148. 149. 150.

Sondhi and Paranjpe 1995, p. 33. Quoted in Rashid and Sidhva 1998, p. 29. Bedi 1998a. In Chanda 1998a, p. 22. Bedi 1998e. ‘Plea Not to Deport Indians from Saudi’, The Hindu (International edition), 12 June 1993. The Saudis have in recent times accused Pakistan of harbouring opponents to the regime, but that is another story. For example, ‘India Moves to Pre-empt Pak Diplomacy in Kashmir’, The Hindu, 25 May 1991. Gordon 1995, p. 286. Reported in Chadda 1993, p. 225. Rashid and Sidhva 1998, p. 28. Bedi 1998f. Interview with Shimon Peres, then Foreign Minister, India Today, 15 June 1993, p. 23. Rashid and Sidhva 1998, p. 28. Ibid. Blanche 1998, p. 22. ‘Countrywide Rallies Against Anti-Muslim Riots in India’, The Pakistan Times, 22 December 1990. Quoted in Chanda 1998c, p. 28. For example, Salaria 1998. Bedi 1998b. See the helpful summary in Joshi 1998b. Chanda 1998c, p. 30. Bender 1998. Arif 1998: see also the leader on the same page. There is, however, a case against this. Savings tended to be high in India because of an absence of good-quality ordinary consumer items, and because of limited opportunities for purchase of property. The reasons for higher savings in the tiger economies (35– 45 per cent) are many, but mainly involve incentives and compulsory schemes, rather than, obviously, the absence of consumer goods. ‘Swadeshi Economy’, The Times of India, 10 November 1995. Kakar 1996. Bedi 1998c, p. 44. It was also, in the context of India’s tradition of a studiously nonpolitical military, somewhat startling to have this punchy assessment attributed to a military officer; it certainly gave some weight to this judgement that such a person should have risked making it. V. B. Singh and Yogendra Yadav coordinated the poll for the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies. Reported by Yadav 1996. Yadav et al. 1998. Manor and Segal 1998, p. 62. Ram-Prasad 1993. Devout Hindus abroad do interpret the country of their presence as being part of their religious topography (Kees Bolle has talked of this sense of relating land to faith as ‘topographical religiosity’; see Bolle 1969). But

The International Relations of India 197

151. 152. 153. 154. 155. 156. 157. 158. 159.

160. 161.

162.

this process is clearly one of transference of Hindu sacrality rather than an extension of it. For example, the ‘Asian Indian Caucus booklet’ at the 1984 Republican convention at Dallas claimed that Indian immigrants, having come to the US ‘by their free will’ and become ‘full participants in socio-economic and political processes’ took it to be ‘the “karmabhumi” – the land of karma or action’. Naipaul (1984, p. 5) thought of this as a form of Hindu fundamentalism, but clearly this is the relocation of the sacred meaning of Hindu India in the US rather than an assimilation of the US into Hindu space. National Executive of the BJP, Resolution, Jaipur, February 1991, BJP Pamphlet 111, p. 23. ‘Fiji: Sorry About That’, The Economist, 16 August 1997, p. 57. Savarkar 1942b, p. 26. Smith 1963, pp. 459–60. See Jinnah’s views in Ahmad 1947; esp. vol. 2. Ibid, p. 18. Deshpande 1949. For example ‘Statement of the BJP National Exectutive, Madras, July 1990’, BJP Pamphlet 105, 1990, p. 13. This is an undoubted part of the tragedy of Kashmir although it does not in any way mitigate Indian Army brutality against Kashmiri Muslims. See Kanhya and Teng 1992. Since September 1990, Amnesty International and Asia Watch have both dealt extensively with militant killing of Kashmiri Hindus as well as Army atrocities; see ‘Kashmir: A Pattern of Impunity’, Asia Watch, New York, 1993. Seshadri 1988, p. 297. For a patient if over-elaborate exploration of the irreducible plurality and ‘hybrid discourse’ of Indian culture, see Larson 1995. For a more ambitiously moral formulation of this plurality, see Dube 1983. Cf. Gordon 1995, p. 353.

8 The Political Consequences of Large-Scale Religious Change in China and the Asia-Pacific Region K. R. Dark

Introduction This contribution aims to outline and examine some of the implications of contemporary religious change in China and the wider AsiaPacific region.1 This may begin by examining, in brief, some of the changes affecting indigenous Japanese and Chinese religions, Buddhism and Hinduism in the twentieth century. However, the focus will be on introducing into broader debates in International Relations some discussion of the unprecedented growth of Christianity and Islam in this region over the last few decades, and the possible political implications of this. This appears, inexplicably, to have gone unnoticed by academic analysts of world politics.2 Then, it will discuss a few of the possible political consequences of these changes. It is important from the outset to appreciate the historically unique character of contemporary religious change in this region. This is especially significant because it will be argued here that it has the potential to bring about similarly unique changes in political attitudes and values.3 In view of the political and economic importance of the Asia-Pacific region, this may have consequences of world political significance. First, it is necessary to justify the claim that unprecedented religious changes are occurring in the Asia-Pacific region. This can be demonstrated most simply by discussing changes affecting those religions (here I shall refer to them as traditional) which have, for centuries, been held to by the majority of the population of East and South East Asia. These are also of special interest here, as it is in this area that unprecedented changes are underway at present.

198

Political Consequences of Religious Change 199

The dramatic decline and increasing regionalization of traditional East Asian religions Most Europeans and North Americans probably associate East and South East Asia in religious terms with Taoism, Shintoism, Buddhism, traditional Chinese religions and perhaps Confucianism.4 However, while historically these religions have been by far the most widespread, they have been in steep decline during the twentieth century. Shintoism is almost exclusively a Japanese religion, and closely associated with Japanese imperial history.5 It encompasses such a wide range of beliefs and practices that it is debatable whether it can be strictly classified as a religion at all.6 But whether or not it is a religion as such, Shintoism is not showing any indication of growth outside Japan and may be declining in Japan itself in the face of growing religious diversity.7 Buddhists remain the single largest religious group in Japan, but Japanese Buddhism is also not showing significant domestic or international growth.8 While Japan has been changing rapidly since the 1950s, therefore, this has not been accompanied by large-scale religious change, although some diversification and secularization has occurred.9 Nor have distinctively Japanese religious beliefs spread more widely. Elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific region, which is 87.8 per cent Buddhist, and Thailand which is 93.4 per cent Buddhist,10 the traditionally Buddhist states of Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam continue to have large number of Buddhists among their populations.11 But, although strongly associated with the state in Myanmar and Thailand, elsewhere in the AsiaPacific region Buddhism is neither significantly growing nor increasing in its political significance.12 Although there has been some degree of growth in Buddhism among the populations of what were until recently communist (although previously majority Buddhist) states and, to a slight extent, in the People’s Republic of China, there are no indications that Buddhism is gaining large numbers of converts. In South Korea, Buddhism is in steep decline.13 So, while once missionary in intent, Buddhism appears to be likely to remain a majority religion only in the north-west of the South East Asian peninsula and (perhaps) Japan – outside of the Asia-Pacific region it is only a majority religion in Sri Lanka in the Indian Ocean.14 Traditional Chinese religions have fared even more poorly than Buddhism in the twentieth century. Only in Taiwan, Macao and Singapore are traditional Chinese religions the beliefs of the majority

200 K. R. Dark

of the population and again they are not gaining new adherents.15 In China, traditional beliefs are the religion only of a large minority of the population: comprising probably 27 per cent of the population of the People’s Republic. Thus, evidence suggests that the number of believers in traditional Chinese religion has dramatically declined in the twentieth century and may be still in decline. There are millions of Hindus in South Asia – India, for example, contains about 98.6 per cent of all the world’s 750 million Hindus – but in the Asia-Pacific region only Bali is strongly Hindu.16 Although small Hindu communities exist in several states in the Asia-Pacific region, this religion does not seem to be spreading outside specific ethnic minorities within these states. To summarize: traditional Chinese religion seems to be in steep decline, and other characteristically South and East Asian religions – Hinduism, Buddhism, and Shintoism – look as if they will be specific to one or a few states or to existing ethnic communities in coming decades. This is not to say that communities of adherents to these religions may not be more widely distributed (due to population movement) throughout the region, but nowhere else are they likely to form even large minorities of the total population of any state. Nor are these religions gaining large numbers of new adherents among populations with different religious backgrounds.17 There is no evidence of expansion or large-scale growth in any of these religions within the region, although there is some evidence of postcommunist Buddhist revival in traditionally Buddhist states.18 However, none of these states is likely to become as thoroughly Buddhist as in previous centuries. Of course, the principal factor in the decline of traditional Chinese religions and Buddhism has been the role of communism in East Asia during the later twentieth century. Attempts to replace religion by atheism have had the effect of undermining traditional religions in China and South East Asia, but not of undermining religion in general, as we shall see. By the 1990s, the only states in the region where the majority of the population professed no religious belief were North Korea and the People’s Republic of China.19 These were also the last remaining communist governments in the region. It is doubtful whether in the People’s Republic of China the majority of the population was strictly atheist or, more accurately, not committed to any particular belief system in the 1990s, although some officials may remain strongly opposed to religion.20 Western sources from the Humanist movement suggest that only 10 –15 per cent of the population of the People’s Republic were committed atheists in the 1990s,

Political Consequences of Religious Change 201

and that (worldwide) only in North Korea was a larger percentage of atheists present.21 Consequently, it would appear that atheism has not proved popular in East Asia. Nor has modernization brought with it increasing apathy toward religion. On the contrary, dramatic religious change has been taking place throughout the region during the 1980s and 1990s. However, this has mostly been associated with the growth of East Asian Christianity, the Protestantization of previously Roman Catholic Christian populations, and the consolidation of South East Asian Islam.

The unprecedented rise of Christianity in East Asia Christianity has experienced unprecedented growth in the Asia-Pacific region in the twentieth century. This has been most striking in the People’s Republic of China and in South Korea, but there is a general, and probably accelerating, trend towards Church growth in the region. There were 58 million Protestants in the People’s Republic of China, Korea and Indonesia in 1980. This had risen to 127 million in 1990, and even by 1987 there were more Evangelical Protestants in Asia than in North America. The number of Roman Catholics had also increased dramatically – if not quite as dramatically – in this time: from 69 million in 1980 to 82 million in 1990. That is to say, the number of members of the two largest Christian groups had risen in Asia by 82 million over a decade. Needless to say, even in the fastgrowing populations of Asia, this is far more rapid than the rate of population growth.22 In the People’s Republic of China, Church growth has been especially remarkable. In 1949, when Mao took control of China, there were 3 million Roman Catholics and 1.5 million Protestants in what is today the People’s Republic. By the 1990s, this had grown substantially: in 1992, for example, there were about 12 million Roman Catholics and about 63 million Protestants. However, while the People’s Republic of China is undergoing rapid religious change, at present the effects of this are only beginning to emerge. The Chinese population remains predominantly comprised of those professing state-sponsored atheism, with about 59.1 per cent of the population adhering to this.23 But it is perhaps surprising to find that the next most numerous group is not Buddhists (accounting for about 3 per cent of the population) or even Muslims (accounting for around 2.4 per cent) but Christians. Christians now comprise approximately 6.1 per cent of the Chinese population, and this percentage is growing extremely rapidly, perhaps at 7.7 per cent overall.

202 K. R. Dark

The Protestant Churches in the People’s Republic are showing the fastest growth at 7.1 per cent from 5.1 per cent of the current population, but the Roman Catholic Church also shows 10.8 per cent growth from 0.77 per cent of the population. Current processes of Christianization have especially affected the majority ethnic group, the Han Chinese, who make up 92 per cent of the population. In 1992, 6.5–7.5 per cent of Han Chinese were Christian.24 However, overall, the impact of ongoing Christianization on Chinese society is startling – more citizens of the People’s Republic are now members of Christian churches than are members of the Communist Party!25 It is difficult to see how such a major change can fail to have major impact on future political and cultural values in China. This level of Church growth would be extremely rapid in a society without opposition to Christianity. However, both other religions and (especially in the past) official ideology have tried to resist the rise of the Christian churches in China. This may have had the opposite effect to that which those hoping to restrict Church growth sought. This can be seen by comparing variations in religious change with local political histories involving explicitly anti-religious policies. For example, Wengzhou city in Zhejang, which was a ‘model city’ for antireligious campaigns in the past, is now arguably the most Christian city in China.26 In Wengzhou there were 300 000 Christians in 1992, according to official estimates. Another example is Dazhai, which was another ‘model community’ of the 1960s, when, officially, the Party was strongly opposed to religion. Western visitors in the 1990s recorded walls in the village bearing overtly Christian slogans, such as ‘Come to Christ and you will have peace’, suggesting a strongly Christian component among the local population.27 These are, of course, simply two striking examples to illustrate the general point that the strength of opposition may have been a stimulus to the extent of current Christianization. The rapid rise of the Christian Church under persecution finds, of course, many historical analogies, for example in the early Roman Empire. The size and increasing growth of the Christian population suggests that persecution or suppression is likely to be counter-productive if the government’s main concern is to ensure political stability. Such an accommodation may be politically possible, given the current Chinese constitution and programme of reform. A factor that may facilitate further state reconciliation with the Christian Church is that the Chinese Church has made great efforts to keep itself free from any possible accusation of promoting overseas interests or of fostering

Political Consequences of Religious Change 203

anti-government sentiments.28 Instead, it is surprisingly apolitical, loyalist and non-Western in character, even if not all individual members always share these views.29 The prospects for stability, if such a reconciliation of Church and state can be achieved, are promising. They, of course, also find historical analogy in the Roman Empire, where the Church went from being a persecuted and marginal minority to the mainstay of stability and a basis for state-survival in the Eastern Roman Empire (the ‘Byzantine’ Empire, as it is now known), where the state survived for approximately a millennium after it had fallen in the Roman West. While direct analogy may not be exact, it is at least suggestive that Church–state reconciliation and mutual support can be a strategy promoting increased stability and state strength, after a period of uneasy relations. The framework for such a political reconciliation may already be partly in place. The 1982 Constitution of the People’s Republic of China ensures religious freedom for all Chinese citizens, and the government adheres to the principle of religious tolerance.30 But, in practice, local administration in the People’s Republic is not always as tolerant towards religious believers as official policy requires.31 This is regrettable, of course, and may also derive mostly from a misunderstanding of the intentions and character of most Chinese Christian organizations and believers. Western European and North American experience suggests that there is no strong reason to suppose that the existence of Christian organizations or believers intrinsically present any risk whatsoever to public order, to popular loyalty to the state, or to national security. In fact, the Christian Churches could provide valuable grassroots support for the government, as they have for centuries in Europe and the Americas. Rather, it is when Christianity is suppressed, rather than promoted, by the state, that the more anti-statist forms of Christian belief tend to flourish.32 Alternatively, in states where Christianity and the state are strongly aligned, the forms of Christianity most strongly supportive of the state tend to flourish.33 So, if the government of the People’s Republic wants to avoid the possibility of political risks being posed by the growth of the Christian Church, it might consider avoiding any act which could be seen by Chinese Christians as persecution or oppression, and instead offer them active support. Persecution, if it occurs, might be sowing the seeds of future disorder (and even destruction), if the Christian component of the Chinese population continues to grow rapidly, as seems almost certain to occur.

204 K. R. Dark

Further evidence that circumstances specific to the People’s Republic may have prompted this rapid religious change comes from comparison with Chinese communities elsewhere. Taiwan, with its historically and culturally Chinese population, shows no such pattern of growth. In Taiwan, Christianity is growing, but at a much slower rate. Protestant Churches accounting for only 3.1 per cent of the population are growing at 1.6 per cent, and the Roman Catholic Church, accounting for 1.6 per cent of the population, is growing at only 0.6 per cent. A lower rate of religious change than in the rest of People’s Republic has also been seen in Hong Kong during the 1990s.34 There, the percentage of Christians in the population held relatively steady at 14.1 per cent as the former colony approached reunification with China, with emigration balancing growth at 3 per cent. Fearing religious persecution, around 20 per cent of Evangelical Christians emigrated from Hong Kong, although article 32 of the Basic Law ensures religious freedom. So, rapid growth may derive from circumstances specific to the People’s Republic, rather than the contemporary aspects of Chinese society or culture in general. The growth of Christianity in the People’s Republic of China is remarkable and unprecedented in Chinese history. As we have seen, it may be due to the specific circumstances created by the local politics, recent history and culture of the People’s Republic. But one would be mistaken to see the dramatic growth of Christianity in China as an isolated phenomenon. This is also seen elsewhere in the AsiaPacific region. The most analogous pattern of growth is in South Korea, a majority Buddhist land at the time of the Korean War in the 1950s.35 In South Korea, Christianity has grown to become the religion of 34.6 per cent of the population, and has been consistently doubling in size every decade. These growth rates are so high that South Korea – if current Church growth rates continue – may well become a majority Christian state in the early part of the twenty-first century. Already, it has the largest congregations of Methodists, Presbyterians and Pentecostals anywhere in the world, and the largest church congregation (with 500 000 members). To compare with the typical British or North American church of the 1990s, with one or a few clergy, this church (which holds multiple services, and employs radio and television broadcasts) has more than a hundred pastoral staff. Nor is it the only church organized on an unusual scale. For example, at Yongnak, by 1986, the church already had 60 000 members and 22 ordained ministers.

Political Consequences of Religious Change 205

Of course, in addition to these cases of rapid Church growth, the Asia-Pacific region also contains several states which have long had majority Christian populations, even if one excludes the Americas. In the Phillippines 88.5 per cent of the total population is Christian, mostly Roman Catholic. Unsurprisingly, given their predominantly Europeanderived populations, Australia is 70.6 per cent Christian and New Zealand 69.8 per cent Christian. However, by far the most Christianized states in this region are the Pacific Islands. There, often 90 per cent or more of the population describe themselves as Christians. To give a few examples to illustrate this, Samoa is 98 per cent Christian, Micronesia 90 per cent, the Solomon Islands 94 per cent, Tuvalu 96.6 per cent, and the Wallis and Futuna Islands 98.9 per cent. In the latter case, ‘almost the whole population’ are church-going Roman Catholics!36 So, parts of Oceania, rather than Europe or the Americas, are probably now the most Christianized areas of the globe. Even in areas where missionary activity is relatively recent, such as Papua New Guinea, extensive Christianization has occurred, and over 60 per cent of the population call themselves Christians. If the Pacific Islands are heavily Christianized, and North East Asia rapidly Christianizing, what about South East Asia? Here a different pattern of religious change is found. Some South East Asian states have sizable Christian minorities, such as that in Singapore, where 12.6 per cent of the total population are Christians, or Indonesia with perhaps 12.5 per cent of its population Christians. Minorities of this size can, however, be of considerable political importance. In Singapore for instance, although the state is against religious involvement in politics, and 52.4 per cent of the population follow traditional Chinese religions, Christians are a politically important group. This especially requires explanation, as there are other religious minorities (such as Muslims, making up 15.4 per cent of the population and Hindus making up 3.3 per cent) which do not have equivalent political leverage. One factor may be that the Christian segment of the Singaporean population is growing rapidly, at 5 per cent overall growth (the number of Protestants is growing annually at 7 per cent, that of Roman Catholics 1.85 per cent and Orthodox Christians at 1.9 per cent). However, probably more important in political terms is that adherence to Christianity closely correlates, in Singapore, with the level of education. There are far higher proportions of Christians in professional and governmental careers, and 30 per cent of high-school leavers, 41 per cent of university students

206 K. R. Dark

and 73 per cent of medical students are Christians.37 So, the role of Christianity among the better-educated and professional groups is disproportionate to the number of believers in society as a whole. In the majority of South East Asian states, Christianity is also a minority religion. In Laos only 1.5 per cent of the total population are Christian, in Malaysia the percentage is 7.3 per cent of the total, in Vietnam the percentage is 9.8 per cent of the total population, and in Myanmar it is 6.5 per cent. Even in these states, however, Christianity is growing rapidly. In Vietnam, Church growth is at 6.2 per cent and in (87.8 per cent Buddhist) Myanmar, for instance, the number of Christians shows a 5.1 per cent growth rate. This is mostly among Protestants, whose numbers are growing from 5.2 per cent at 6 per cent annually. However, the growth is not evenly distributed among all Christian denominations – for example, Roman Catholicism is growing at only 1.3 per cent. Nevertheless, in all these states the Christian minority is growing in size faster than any other minority religious group. This is clearly illustrated in Malaysia, which has a 55 per cent Muslim population. Christians represent only a small percentage of the population today, but the size of the Christian community is increasing (for Protestants at 5.5 per cent and for Roman Catholics at 3.5 per cent). Other religious minorities (such as the Buddhists, accounting for 3.5 per cent of the population, and the Hindus accounting for 6 per cent) are not showing equivalent growth in their numbers. Church growth has again been associated with oppression and persecution. Persecution of Christians seems to have been increasing across the region through the 1980s and 1990s. Atheist, Buddhist, Hindu and Islamic states were all involved in antiChristian persecution during the 1980s and 1990s.38 This is not simply in response to similar behaviour by Christians, as there is no well-attested case of state-sponsored Christian persecution of religious minorities in the region in the late twentieth century. Religious change affecting Christians seems to be increasing in already strongly Christianized states also. For example, in the Philippines the percentage of Protestants has been increasing at 5 per cent – from 7.5 per cent of the population – in a 65 per cent Roman Catholic state. Across the Pacific, South and Central America have experienced a partial shift from Roman Catholicism to Protestantism during this period.39 Thus, nowhere in the Asia-Pacific region are numbers of Christians declining, and everywhere they are rising. However, in South East Asia and China, Islam is also growing – if not as rapidly or as widely, and for different reasons.

Political Consequences of Religious Change 207

Islam in East Asia In the People’s Republic of China, there is a reassertion of traditional Islam among ethnic minorities, along perhaps with some growth in Islam more generally.40 In South East Asia, there are also long partially Islamicized zones which are experiencing a growth in Islam or intensified Islamicization.41 There are also intensified attempts to spread Islam into previously non-Islamic areas of South East Asia, but with scant effect. Most Chinese Muslims, who number in total perhaps 20 million, are concentrated in provinces in the west of the People’s Republic.42 This has recently led to a regional separatist movement, based on a combination of Islam and ethnic nationalism. The clearest example of this is in the western Chinese province of Xinjiang.43 In Xinjiang, despite large-scale migrations, there are only 38 per cent Han Chinese and 47 per cent of the (predominately Muslim) Uighurs. In the 1990s this ethnic and religious group, numbering about 8 million, has become increasingly militant and nationalistic, perhaps looking outwards at the newly independent former Soviet republics of Central Asia. However, Central Asian governments may themselves be concerned that any eruption of nationalist violence and territorial claims might affect their own territory and so are less supportive than these separatists might have hoped. Chinese government policy has attempted to protect the rights of minorities, and it is clearly hard for the Chinese government to tolerate the rise of nationalism in this province.44 This has prompted antiIslamic government action, with the intention of limiting the political movement for separatism and restoring internal order. Islam is more politically established in other parts of the Asia-Pacific region. In South East Asia, three states – Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei – hold Islam to be their state religion, and some South East Asian populations were heavily Islamicized by the start of the twentieth century.45 Malaysia has a large Islamic population, but although by far the largest single religious group (55 per cent of the population), this is not such an overwhelming majority as found in several Middle Eastern or North African Islamic states.46 However, Malaysia is an officially Islamic state and – although not employing Islamic law – the Malaysian government strongly supports Islam in practice.47 In Brunei, by far the largest religious group is also the Muslim community. This forms 71 per cent of the population and Islam is the state religion. Other religious communities are all small minorities: Chinese religions account for only 9 per cent of the population, while 8 per cent are Christians.

208 K. R. Dark

The most populous Islamic state in the Pacific – and worldwide – is Indonesia. This has a 79.4 –82.9 per cent Islamic population, and is undergoing state-sponsored Islamicization.48 The principal difficulty with this policy is that Indonesia has very substantial non-Islamic minorities, especially Christians. This has led to serious conflicts of interests between those intending to Islamicize Indonesia, and those local people who are not Muslims. It has also led to allegations of the religious persecution of Christians by the state. Population geography does not suggest that it would be easy to Islamicize Indonesia at all. The relative proportion of Muslims to other believers is not evenly distributed among the islands and territories claimed by Indonesia. For example, while Sumatra has an 85.9 per cent Muslim population and a 10.7 per cent Christian minority, 75 per cent of the Batak people are Christian. In Java, there are fewer Muslims – only 46 per cent of the population – but only a 3.6 per cent Christian minority. Yet, in the main city in Java, Jakarta, 13 per cent of the population are Christian. In Kalimantan, 73.8 per cent of the population are Muslims, and 19.3 per cent Christians, and in Sulawesi 71 per cent are Muslims but 27.6 per cent Christians. So, while Muslims are in the majority in general, the size of this majority varies. The most problematical areas are those where state policy is confronted by non-Muslim majority populations, but which have a large number of Muslim migrants. This has occurred widely, because, in Indonesia, economic growth has been accompanied by the territorial expansion of the Islamic part of the general population into areas formerly occupied by non-Islamic groups. This has led, for example, to clashes in Borneo between the indigenous Christian Dayaks and Indonesian Muslim settlers from Madura. It has also intensified political problems in East Timor, where the indigenous population is predominately (85.1 per cent) Christian and in Irian Jaya, where once again there is a substantial Christian majority, in this case 83.4 per cent of the population. In such cases, forcing ahead an Islamicization programme is likely to prompt international disapproval and, perhaps, political action.49 Perhaps the most striking aspect of the growth of Islam in South East Asia is, however, that it has grown mostly through demographic factors.50 The birthrate in an already Muslim population has been high enough to lead to an increase in numbers through the twentieth century. However, nowhere in the region is large-scale conversion to Islam taking place among populations which were not substantially Muslim in the early twentieth century. It might be claimed that this is less of a

Political Consequences of Religious Change 209

surprise when one recalls that Asian societies have proved very resistant to centuries of Christian and Islamic missionary activity. If so, this makes the rapid growth of Christianity in East Asia in the twentieth century all the more surprising.

The pattern of contemporary religious change in the Asia-Pacific region A very clear pattern of large-scale religious change can, therefore, be ascertained. Buddhism, Hinduism, and other indigenous South Asian religions have been in decline in the Asia-Pacific region in the late twentieth century. East Asian religions, such as Shintoism and traditional Chinese religions have also changed in a similar way. These have largely become minority religions in this area. In particular, traditional Chinese religion has dramatically declined in the twentieth century and looks set to be a minority religion even in China in the twenty-first century, even if no further decline occurs. There seems no prospect of a revival of any of these religions to a sufficient extent to reverse their current decline in popularity among the peoples of East and South East Asia. Even the 1980s and 1990s Buddhist revival in South East Asia is unlikely to restore that religion to majority status in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam. None of them is spreading to any new areas in such a way as to establish themselves as majority religions. Throughout the region, atheism too has been in steep decline since the 1980s. Only the People’s Republic of China and North Korea have large non-religious populations, and even among these atheism is not a majority belief-system. So, while state-sponsored atheism probably dealt a fatal blow to traditional Chinese religion in the People’s Republic, it has not replaced this. Currently, neither looks like a politically credible option for a future state-sponsored religion in China, and Buddhism – also, of course, non-Chinese in origin – commands less public support in China than either Christianity or Islam. Two further trends are noteworthy, both also relating to much wider global trends. Islam has been growing rapidly in the region (especially through demographic change) and has been promoted by South East Asian governments as a state religion, in Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei. Islam has also been resurgent among traditionally Islamic peoples in China, where it has been linked to separatist ambitions. However, there has been no general movement toward Islam in the region among previously non-Islamic peoples.

210 K. R. Dark

This may suggest that states and areas which already have large Muslim communities may become more intensely Islamicized. That might lead to political separatism or nationalist movements, as in China, and to the strengthening of religious and cultural differences (where cultural characteristics derive from a religious basis) in many parts of the region. So, an intensification of Islamicization might promote regionalism or sub-regionalism on a cultural, and so possibly political, level.51 Moreover, one might expect the states experiencing this growth to be more affected by values and perceptions deriving from Islam. If states and areas already with large Islamic communities become more intensively Islamicized, then this may raise political problems in South East Asia. There, problems may arise from the juxtaposition of authoritarian and militaristic states in a situation of differential economic success, technological progress and natural resources.52 These have majority Islamic and Buddhist populations, and substantial religious minorities, sometimes with separatist ambitions. The degree of military expenditure and preparedness undertaken by some of these states (combined with internal nationalistic and demographic pressures operating on them) may be politically dangerous in a context of minority separatism and juxtaposed and contrasting majority religions. Non-religious factors may be much more likely to cause inter-state war in this region, were this to occur.53 However, the treatment of religious minorities by states in South East Asia is likely to be a source of internal political instability in this area.54 Current political oppression in East Timor and Irian Jaya has both a violent, and partly religious, content. In the north-west of South East Asia, and perhaps not strictly within the Asia-Pacific region, the war by the government of Myanmar against the (mostly Christian) Karen population is a further example of such a conflict. Islam is growing in this region mostly through demographic factors but, in contrast, Christianity has been winning large numbers of converts in the People’s Republic of China and in South Korea, where the growth in Christianity has been rapid and extensive. In almost all other areas of East Asia Christianity has also been growing, if not as rapidly or widely. In previously Christianized parts of the region, especially South and Central America, there are indications of a growth in Protestantism. If these trends were sustained over many decades the implications for the religious character of the Asia-Pacific region would be profound. With the numbers of Christians increasing very rapidly (for example, doubling every decade in some parts of the region), previously

Political Consequences of Religious Change 211

non-Christian states would soon develop substantial Christian minorities – and a few would gain Christian majorities. During the early twenty-first century the former seems probable in the People’s Republic of China, the latter in Korea. The populations of the Philippines, Pacific Islands, Australasia and the Americas are likely to remain predominantly Christian. So, long-established contrasts between predominantly Christian parts of the region, such as the Americas and Philippines, and those with few Christians, such as China and Korea, may become much more blurred. Contrasts between predominantly Roman Catholic areas, such as the Philippines, Central and South America, and those with large Protestant communities may also become less clearcut. These changes can be seen both in terms of the global growth of Christianity, increasing individualism (leading to more freedom of religious choice), and the growth of diversity under circumstances of globalization. They can also be understood as having potentially profound political effects. If Christianity, possibly especially Protestantism, helps promote values such as liberal democracy and individual freedom, then these changes may lead to the growth of greater personal and political freedom in these areas.55 However, while it may promote political change, the growth of Christianity in the region need not destabilize any state or area in the course of bringing about these political advances. This is a particular issue in China, because the growth of Christianity has been misperceived by some as representing a threat to internal stability. But Christianity is not associated with ethnic identity or separatism in China, nor do any of the main Christian denominations advocate anti-state activities, unless the state acts to oppose them. Conversely, Christian communities exist, and have existed, in states with a very wide range of political systems without causing political disorder or antigovernmental action. As already noted, historical evidence suggests that Christianization only represents a threat to political order where it is met with persecution or injustice. Under those circumstances, as in the early Roman empire or in the Soviet Union, the most anti-governmental forms of Christianity grow. Whereas with government support, as in the Byzantine empire or Victorian Britain, the most pro-governmental forms of the Christian Church flourish and can help support the state. In the contemporary Asia-Pacific region, this issue of religious policy is seen very clearly in the potential choices facing the government of the People’s Republic in relation to its rapidly growing Christian community. If it pursues an official policy of complete tolerance (or even

212 K. R. Dark

decided to promote Christianization) then it is unlikely to find the growth of this religion a political threat. But, persecution and intolerance may turn an intrinsically benign religious community into a political opposition which has already, in the view of some scholars, played a significant part in sweeping communism from eastern Europe. Similarly, religious tolerance and reconciliation on the part of state governments in South East Asia is clearly required to accommodate religious minorities, as in Myanmar and Indonesia. There, the situation is different, as histories of religious persecution and political oppression have already turned some of these communities into separatist groups. Whether such groups can ultimately be defeated by these states must be doubtful given the duration of the existing conflicts. So, at this stage, the acknowledgment of their separatist ambitions may be the only political option likely to resolve these problems. Thus, again, we can see the destabilizing and political disruptive effects of religious persecution by the state. The spread of Christianity in this region may also have other political effects. For example, the emergence of shared values and perceptions through the spread of shared religious beliefs may also enhance greater political understanding between states and ethnic communities. If differential Christianization of social groups produced professional and governmental élites in China sharing – to some degree – a common religious background with those of Australasia and the Americas, this might facilitate the emergence of shared norms of international behaviour, of international regimes governing conduct and of regional cooperation. One could argue that this is already occurring in Singapore. That is, the growth of Christianity in this region may begin to erode existing barriers to understanding, by lessening cultural differences and establishing shared values and identities. Likewise, the religious convergence between different parts of the Americas might have similar effects. This is not to say that shared religious beliefs and values need promote political understanding and the growth of cooperative international politics. It is merely to note that shared beliefs and values offer a potential basis for political changes in these ways. While many aspects of cultural and economic globalization may also promote international regimes and political cooperation, religious change operates on an especially deep psychological level. This is especially so when the religion in question requires a high level of personal intellectual and emotional commitment, and carries with it a strong sense of transnational identity and shared values. The growth of

Political Consequences of Religious Change 213

Christianity (and perhaps Protestantism in particular) in the AsiaPacific region could, therefore, be seen as a possible source of new political cooperation and understanding. But we should remember that such shared values and beliefs do not lead inevitably to specific political outcomes. They can form a basis for cooperation and the emergence of regimes, but much will depend (as it has in European political history) on how these beliefs and values are translated into political policy and action.

Conclusion So we can see that profound religious changes are taking place in the Asia-Pacific region and these are likely to have important implications for world politics. Buddhism, Shintoism and traditional Chinese religions seem to be set to become minority beliefs. It seems unlikely that any future regional identity could be forged around these religions, and they are unlikely to remain politically important except in a very few states. Islamicization has been intensifying in traditionally Islamic states and areas. This may have the consequence of promoting sub-regional identities and increasing the political pressure on minority religious groups in states pursuing Islamicization as official or semi-official policies. It may also be promoting ethnic nationalism in China. The growth of Christianity in East Asia may lead to intra-state changes in political values and could have the effect of breaking down long-established cultural barriers, facilitating cooperation both within states and in relation to international understanding. Its future political impact may depend principally on the extent of persecution and oppression directed against it. If this is eliminated and Christianity is not opposed by states, then the Christian Church may form a source of political support. If the rise of Christianity is met with hostility, then the most anti-governmental forms of Christianity may flourish and political problems for states might arise from this. Problems resulting from such oppression are already found in some parts of South East Asia, although these are exacerbated by ethnic tensions. Thus, the consequences of these religious changes differ drastically from one religion to another and from one area and state to another. Yet, they may play a significant role in the political future of the region both within states and in the relations between states. This is not to say, of course, that political changes in general can be explained in general by reference to religious change alone. Nor does it mean that

214 K. R. Dark

non-religious factors cannot act to limit or enhance the effects of these changes. Non-religious factors, left undiscussed here, will doubtless play an important role in the resolution of these conflicting trends. However, it would also be folly to underestimate the potential significance of these unprecedented religious changes. Some of the religious changes at present underway could play a central role in facilitating the future political and economic development of the region. Others may bring with them the risk of intensified conflict, oppression and even inter-state war. Of course, these changes are taking place in conjunction with much broader transformations in society, economy, culture and political life, and the varying contexts that all of these aspects of global change present for each other inevitably have some reflex for each. Nevertheless, it is clear that the Asia-Pacific region is exhibiting a scale, rate and extent of religious change unique in its modern history, and that this is likely to have important consequences for its future.

Notes 1. Here, I define the Asia-Pacific region as comprising those contemporary states which have one or more Pacific Ocean coasts. By East Asia I mean the continental landmass to the west of this region, in which lies the People’s Republic of China (which I shall also geographically refer to as simply China, without any political implication). South East Asia is used here to refer to the part of this area to the south of China. 2. Although it is playing an increasingly visible role in policy formation: for example, Laris, Wehrfritz and Clemetson 1997. 3. For the possible consequences of religious-based value change in international politics see Dark, this volume, Chapter 3. 4. Howell 1992a. For the distribution of these religions: O’Brien and Palmer 1993. Statistical data (to 1993) are collated in Johnstone 1993, especially pp. 41–5 and 78–82. From the latter source I derive all statistics given in this contribution unless otherwise referenced. This source has proved particularly useful in assessing religious change in the Asia-Pacific data, as it collates not only statistics collected by states and other secular agencies, but also data from church records and other religious organizations and informants, some of which is probably unavailable to official census makers. 5. Norbeck 1971; Howell 1992a, esp. p. 503; Howell 1992b, p. 55. 6. Reader 1991; Byron 1982; Hori 1968; Kitagawa 1987. 7. Reader 1991; O’Brien and Palmer 1993. 8. Reader 1991; Byron 1982; Hardacre 1984; Kitagawa 1987. For the broader context Kornicki and McMullen 1996. 9. Van Bremen and Martinez 1995; Yoshida 1987; Hori 1968; Hendry 1998. There has, however, been some religious innovation: Hardacre 1986.

Political Consequences of Religious Change 215 10. Howell 1992a, 1992b; O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 26–7 and 32–3. 11. Ling 1993; Vatikiotis 1996, pp. 147, 150 and 159–66. 12. The politics of Buddism in Myanmar are examined in: Smith 1991b; Smith 1965; Gravers 1996; Bekker 1989. A useful outline of Burmese religious life is given in Aris 1991, ch. 2. 13. For Korea, see note 35 below. For Sri Lanka: Matthews 1996; Tambiah 1992. 14. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 26–7. 15. Macinnis 1989; O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 103– 4. 16. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 24 –5. 17. See Dark, this volume, Chapter 3. 18. Vatikiotis 1996. 19. O’Brien and Palmer 1993. 20. This may be based on an erroneous assumption that it was the existence of religious groups, not their oppression or other factors, which caused the collapse of communism in eastern Europe: Johnstone 1993, p. 164. 21. O’Brien and Palmer 1993, pp. 32–3. 22. Hunter and Rimmington 1996; Pas 1989; Küng and Ching 1989. 23 Macinnis 1989. 24. Johnstone 1993, p. 166. 25. According to official figures (which probably underestimate the number of Christians very greatly) in 1992 there were 75 million Christians in contrast to 55 million party members. In one province (Henan) the number of Christians may have doubled between 1989–91: Johnstone 1993, pp. 165–6. 26. Johnstone 1993, p. 164; Xu 1997. 27. Laris, Wehrfritz and Clemetson 1997, p. 47. 28. Peng 1996. 29. Runcie 1996. 30. Christiansen and Rai 1996, p. 18; Johnstone 1993. 31. Xu 1997; Johnstone 1993, p. 166. 32. As in the former Soviet Union and its allies: Weigel 1993b; Bordeaux 1992; Goekel 1990. 33. As in South America and in western and southern Europe, where – in many cases – established Churches have supported the state for centuries: Haynes 1998, chs 3 and 4. 34. Lam 1997; Johnstone 1993. 35. Kim 1995. 36. Johnstone 1993, p. 581. 37. Ibid, p. 488. 38. Vatikiotis 1996. 39. Stoll 1990; Stoll and Burnett 1993. 40. Gladney 1993; Ferdinand 1994; Christiansen and Rai 1996, pp. 305–6. 41. For example: Vatikiotis 1996, pp. 127 and 138. 42. Gladney 1996; Pilsbury 1981. 43. Ferdinand 1994; Gladney 1994; Herber 1989. 44. ‘China’s Rebellious West’, The Economist 15 February 1997, pp. 69–70; Hijari 1997. 45. Vatikiotis 1996; Hooker 1988. For the relationship between Islam and the emergence of new élites in Malaysia, see Sloan, 1998.

216 K. R. Dark 46. 47. 48. 49. 50.

51. 52. 53. 54. 55.

Mutalib 1990; Nagata 1980. Muzaffar 1988; Nair 1997. Cribb and Brown 1995. Johns 1987; Johnstone 1993. That is, there has been no large-scale conversion to Islam in any part of South East Asia in the post-1945 period, but rapid population growth in already-Islamicized communities. For example, in the People’s Republic of China or in Indonesia. Dark 1996, pp. 215– 42. Ibid. Vatikiotis 1996, pp. 137–66. For this argument, see Dark, this volume, Chapter 3, and works cited there on links between liberal democracy and Christian values.

9 The Church of England in International Affairs: 1979 to mid-1997 Roger Williamson

Introduction It is salutary that serious academic scholars are once again turning their attention to the religious dimension of social and international conflict.1 In 1989, in a paper for a seminar organized by the Life and Peace Institute, Uppsala, Sweden, I argued that ethno-religious factors would play an increasing role in internal conflicts in the Third World.2 Since then, there has been an explosion of publications particularly on ethnic conflict, but also increasingly on the role of religion in conflict situations.3 There is a considerable literature on the wider political impact of religion in Third World contexts and increasingly on the study of religious fundamentalism. However, it is surprising that there is little systematic treatment of the Church of England and international affairs in recent studies.4 In this chapter, I am writing in a personal capacity but by no means as a detached observer. Here, I seek to assess some of the responses of the Church of England to some of the issues of international relations which emerged under the Conservative governments of Britain between 1979–97, and which will continue to be of importance as we approach the new Millennium. The time period is taken for the sake of convenience, as marking a clearly defined phase of British politics, rather than in a party political sense. It is already clear that the approach of ‘critical solidarity’, involving the criticism of government on specific issues (such as the arms trade) will continue under the Labour government elected in 1997. The chapter does not cover a number of possible areas: environment and development;5 domestic immigration policy, refugees and asylum seekers (since this is a Home Office issue);6 the presence of the ‘World 217

218 Roger Williamson

Church’ within Britain, or the international affairs dimension of the work of missionary societies and ‘twinning arrangements’ with partner dioceses in other parts of the world. Thus, international Anglicanism and ecumenical organizations are necessarily given cursory treatment. The investment policies of the Church Commissioners are also not discussed (except for brief comments in the section on South Africa), although at various points (for example, concerning the role of specific transnational corporations), they do impinge on international affairs. Issues of security policy are treated in the UK as defence and have not been debated with comparable ferocity in the 1990s to that which they were debated in the early 1980s. Thus, no sustained discussion of current Anglican thinking on international security or nuclear strategy is given here, although a short summary of the debate of the 1980s is provided. It would indeed be hard to say what views are currently held, since there has been no opportunity in Synod in the 1990s to articulate these views. The particular case of the former Archbishop of Canterbury’s envoy Terry Waite is also left undiscussed here.7 The issue of conventional arms transfers is treated at some length, since it was the subject of a 1994 report and Synod debate and has been a continuing theme. In broad terms, ‘international affairs’, for the purposes of this chapter are issues dealt with by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Many of the illustrative and thematic examples are taken from the most recent work, that of the mid-1990s.

Beyond the stereotypes The first, and most significant point, is that Anglicanism is not adequately described by two of the most popular stereotypes, namely that of the Church of England as ‘the Conservative Party at prayer’ or worldwide Anglicanism as ‘the English abroad’. It is questionable whether these stereotypes ever were helpful. The increased tensions between the Church of England and the government in the period of Mrs. (now Baroness) Thatcher’s term of office as Prime Minister call into doubt the first stereotype. The case is eloquently overstated, by Ian Bradley: More clearly than any other twentieth-century Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher … believed that the business of the church was to preach personal morality, not to involve itself in more general social and economic issues. … The lack of any effective political opposition to the Conservatives also helped to thrust the churches into the

Church of England in International Affairs 219

limelight. It is hardly too much to claim that in many ways the churches, and the Church of England in particular, provided the most consistent and spirited opposition to the Tory governments of the 1980s. The experience of that decade scotched once and for all the old notion that the Church of England is just the Tory party at prayer.8 The confrontations on social and political issues, while hardly making the Church of England the ‘effective political opposition’, were nonetheless dramatic. Lord Gilmour stated; ‘As Thatcherism divided the country, the Church tried to hold it together.’ 9 It is only necessary to recall such issues as the British Nationality Bill of 1981; The Church and the Bomb,10 the report on nuclear deterrence which led to a televised General Synod debate in the runup to the 1983 general election; the arguments over the thanksgiving service for the Falklands War of 1982, on which Gilmour comments; ‘Instead of giving a jingoistic address suitable for quotation on political platforms or at regimental dinners, the Archbishop went so far as to treat the service as a religious occasion, preaching on the need for reconciliation and peace;’11 the report on the inner cities Faith in the City12 on which Gilmour says ‘the government tried to rubbish Faith in the City in advance, one Cabinet source dubbing it “Marxist”, in the belief, perhaps, that concern for the poor could not be Christian;’13 and the miner’s strike.14 However, having overestimated the extent of the political impact of the Church of England in the 1980s, Bradley concludes his chapter on the confrontations by knocking down what he had first built up: With their almost set-piece confrontations between Mrs Thatcher and the bishops … the 1980s gave the established churches a last illusion of power and influence. Ironically, they owed this to the fact that the Prime Minister they criticized so much actually cared what they said and wanted their support. In the foreseeable future at least, the churches are almost certainly going to have to deal with political leaders who are not so bothered about them.15 The public confrontations became less marked, more because of the lower-key approach of Mr Major as Prime Minister, than because policies relating to social and political matters such as unemployment or immigration issues under Mr Major were more acceptable to the bishops or the Church of England generally. This more sober atmosphere was manifested in the election campaign of 1997, when the

220 Roger Williamson

ecumenical report Unemployment and the Future of Work16 was launched. Party political debate, even in the runup to a general election, was robust rather than dismissive, as had been the case with Faith in the City.17 The second stereotype is that of the Anglican Communion as the ‘English abroad’. A worldwide Church with such outstanding peacemakers as Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu, or the much less well-known Bishop Dinis Sengulane (Mozambique), is not adequately understood by looking only at the Church of England. Similarly, an analysis of the Anglican response to the 1991 Gulf War must look not only at the responses of English bishops, lay people and synods, but also at the response of Middle Eastern Anglicans (with a tension evident between Anglicans from, or based, in the Gulf states and other Arab Anglicans) and the reaction of US Presiding Bishop Edmond Browning – now retired, and the critical stance which led to him being replaced by President Bush as de facto chaplain to the White House, to have his place taken by Billy Graham, when support for American military action was required.18

Worldwide Anglicanism Even the main institutional expression of worldwide Anglicanism, the Lambeth Conference, a gathering of diocesan bishops and their spouses every ten years (presumably in 1998 husbands of the few women bishops were invited to attend), does not adequately reflect the composition of the Anglican communion in the countries of the South. The former Bishop of Winchester and distinguished missiologist John V. Taylor comments:19 Any international meeting of bishops or clergy is bound to give a disproportionate presence to the metropolitan and older churches for the simple reason that the poorer churches have fewer clergy. Consequently the Lambeth Conference, for example, continues to look a great deal whiter than the Anglican Communion actually is. … None the less, in spite of this factor, the African voice and presence exercised a powerful influence upon the Lambeth Conference of 1988, presaging an even greater ascendancy in the future.20 The Anglican Communion is rightly so named because of the ‘requirement of communion with the see of Canterbury’. It has bishops in the ‘historic’ or ‘apostolic’ succession and a ‘dispersed’ form of authority

Church of England in International Affairs 221

since ‘scripture, tradition and reason’ are regarded together as the sources of authority.21 Compared with the central structures of the Roman Catholic Church in the Vatican, the Archbishop’s personal staff and the separate permanent staff of the Anglican Consultative Council are very small indeed and the central authority exercised very lightly.22 Indeed, it is personal, not juridical.23 In this chapter, the focus will be on the international affairs work of the Church of England rather than Anglicanism worldwide, the role of the Lambeth Conference or the Anglican Consultative Council.

Anglican mission agencies The best known of the missionary societies of the Church of England are CMS (Church Mission Society) and USPG (the United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel) – both of which have roots reaching back to the eighteenth century. The recent report on mission (A Growing Partnership) took up with approval a definition developed in the Lambeth Conference 1988: Mission is characterized by five marks: To proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom To teach, baptise and nurture new believers To respond to human need by loving service To seek to transform unjust structures of society To safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the earth.24 As well as the direct impact of their work abroad, the extensive network of diocesan links and returned staff (including some bishops) provides a further dimension to the international work of the Church of England. There are coordinating bodies between the Church of England and Anglican mission agencies (the Partnership for World Mission) and a wider ecumenical cooperation through the Churches’ Commission on Mission which brings together Church mission departments and mission agencies ecumenically.

Ecumenical relations The Church of England is involved in a wide network of ecumenical working relationships. We will here consider briefly four levels of approach.

222 Roger Williamson

Christian Aid This is the official aid agency of over forty British Churches. It works closely together with the official aid agencies of the Roman Catholic Church (CAFOD – England and Wales; SCIAF – Scotland; and Trocaire for Ireland). Initially, the work of Christian Aid after the Second World War was to help to address the crisis of refugees and displaced people within Europe. Rather than allowing the mobilized goodwill to disappear once this issue had largely been resolved, attention turned from the late 1950s onwards to the issue of development in Asia, Africa, Latin America and other parts of the ‘Third World’. Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland (CCBI) and the Churches’ Commission on Mission These have a wide range of thematic and area-related committees which provide the opportunity for consultation on international and other issues. Until his retirement, the former Archbishop of York (Lord Habgood) was one of the Presidents of the CCBI. In February 1995, he led an ecumenical delegation to the then Foreign Secretary, Douglas Hurd, to emphasize the importance which the Churches attach to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The Treaty was extended. The delegation primarily served to reinforce government intentions and to ask some critical questions, not to confront government. As a further example of work coordinated by the CCBI, this time in an interfaith context, the Bishop of Lichfield, the Rt Revd Keith Sutton, was a member of a Christian–Muslim delegation which went to the Russian Embassy to support the Christian–Muslim appeal by the Russian Orthodox Patriarch Alexei II and the Muslim Mufti Alsabekov of Chechnya for an end to the war in Chechnya (16 January, 1995). At European level The Church of England plays an active part in ecumenical activity with such organizations as the Brussels-based European Ecumenical Commission on Church and Society (EECCS)25 and the Geneva-based Conference of European Churches (CEC).26 Thus, the Archbishop of Canterbury attended the Second European Ecumenical Assembly in Graz ( June 1997), and the official Church of England delegation to that meeting (and to the Assembly of the Conference of European Churches which immediately followed it) contained two Bishops (London and Swindon) and the Dean of Durham, the retiring President of CEC, John Arnold. The Archbishop of Canterbury has made a

Church of England in International Affairs 223

number of high-profile addresses on European themes.27 The Anglican Chaplaincies, including those in Strasbourg and Brussels, as well as the wider framework of the Diocese in Europe, play their role in increasing the European vision of the Church of England. The World Council of Churches The Church of England is also actively involved in the World Council of Churches (also based in Geneva). While such figures as J. H. Oldham, Bishop G. K. A. Bell (a friend of Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s) and Archbishop William Temple played an important formative part in the international affairs of the World Council of Churches in its formative years, the impact of British Church leaders, certainly of Anglicans, has been less marked in recent years. This formative role was underlined in the address to the Synod in late 1995 by the General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, Professor Dr Konrad Raiser.28 However, the Bishop of Bristol (the Rt Revd Barry Rogerson) is a member of the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches. Tensions between the Church of England and the World Council of Churches have centred around such issues as the Programme to Combat Racism (particularly grants to liberation movements and some of the grants made in Britain), and the handling of the debate and the position taken over the Gulf War at the 1991 Canberra Assembly. The predominant tone of contributions by members of the Church of England delegation to that meeting was much more ready to countenance use of military force (based on argument from just war criteria such as ‘last resort’) to remove Saddam Hussein from Kuwait than was the general mood of the meeting.29 Other more far-reaching criticisms of what van der Bent calls ‘liberation ecumenism’30 have been made by such figures as the former Archbishop of York, Lord Habgood and Ronald Preston.31 The grounds for these criticisms, which embrace theological method and ideological presuppositions, attitudes towards science and technology as well as a perceived simplistic and unhelpful rejection of market economics, are outlined in the statement of a distinguished group of ecumenists made in 1992.32

The ‘international affairs’ role of the Archbishop of Canterbury The Archbishop of Canterbury is spiritual leader of the Anglican communion and is clearly the focal point of media attention. His

224 Roger Williamson

role is described in the Turnbull Commission report, Working as One Body:33 The Archbishop of Canterbury is Diocesan Bishop of Canterbury. He is also spiritual leader of the 70 million-strong Anglican Communion worldwide. The office of the Archbishop is key to the sense of identity of the Anglican Communion and to the capacity of its churches and their provinces to act and speak together. He is one of the world’s prominent religious leaders with a special influence on relationships between Anglican and other Christian denominations and faiths around the world. Lambeth Palace handles pleas for intervention on behalf of vulnerable groups and individuals on every continent.34 The Archbishop’s foreign travel is carefully planned to achieve, over the period of a number of years, a number of objectives including developing the cohesiveness of the Anglican Communion, pastoral support to situations of particularly acute suffering, and contacts with other Church and religious leaders, international organizations and ecumenical bodies. To give an example from just one year, visits during 1995 included three contexts of civil war: Rwanda, a second visit to Sudan, and Bosnia. In Rwanda, the Anglican Church, as well as other Churches, not only were unable to prevent the genocide, but a number of the Church leaders stand accused, not only by their ordinary members, of having deserted their flock or even of complicity with the massacres. The gravity of the overall situation and such accusations in particular meant that a visit by the Archbishop was a powerful signal of pastoral support and a clear indication of the need to resolve the internal difficulties of the Anglican Church in Rwanda.35 In the case of Sudan, the country has been in a situation of civil war or uneasy peace for much of the past 40 years. The All Africa Conference of Churches and the World Council of Churches were able to assist in the negotiation of an end to the first civil war of 1955–72, but war broke out again in the early 1980s.36 There are many reasons for the conflict, which centre around economic, religious, cultural and ethnic divisions between the government in the north and the people of the south. Whereas the government looks primarily to the Arab world, and is seeking to impose a form of Islamic rule over the whole territory of Sudan, the Christian and animist people of the south feel in no way represented or fairly dealt with.37 The Archbishop’s 1995

Church of England in International Affairs 225

visit, following on from his visit to Egypt, led both to robust exchanges with government representatives and a welcome by huge crowds in the south. To the people of the south, the Archbishop’s message was: ‘You are not forgotten.’ The Times (1995) commented: Addressing some 75 000 Sudanese Christians at an open-air service in the war-scarred town of Juba, Dr Carey demanded religious tolerance from the regime in Khartoum. He castigated the Islamic Government of General Omar Hassan al-Bashir for its policy towards Christians – one of ‘torture, rape, destruction of property, slavery and death’, as well as forcible conversion to Islam. And he challenged those responsible to stop. ‘It is no part of any creed to treat fellow human beings with such disrespect and cruelty,’ the Archbishop said. Dr Carey deserves the greatest support and encouragement in his crusade on behalf of Sudan’s subjugated Christians. The Archbishop’s Christmas 1995 message to the Anglican Communion emphasized the situations of refugees and displaced people in the countries which he had visited during the year: In Rwanda in May, we found people scattered from their homes both inside and outside the country, struggling to come to terms with the unbelievable cruelty which nearly destroyed their country in 1994. In Sudan later in the year, we realised the awful suffering of thousands of people, pushed from camp to camp, further and further out into the desert, discarded and unwanted and with so little help and support.38 The Bosnia visit (December 1995), which had been planned for some time, found its ‘window of opportunity’ immediately after the signing of the Dayton Peace agreement. The visit provided an opportunity for substantive talks with President Alija Izetbegovic and leaders of religious communities, with the unfortunate exception (despite serious efforts by the Lambeth staff to bring it about) of the Serbian Orthodox Church. As is often the case, the Archbishop’s visit served a number of purposes – visits to other religious leaders, meeting with government representatives and, on this occasion, also a pre-Christmas visit to British troops involved in the international peacekeeping effort. Alongside such high-profile foreign visits, naturally there are many speaking and preaching engagements which require the development of important themes relating to international affairs. One recurrent

226 Roger Williamson

theme of the present Archbishop of Canterbury has been Christian– Muslim relations. The Archbishop has consistently stressed the importance of dialogue with Islam, but this has not prevented him from making robust criticisms in situations like Sudan where this is necessary.

The Bishops in the House of Lords The presence of 26 bishops in the House of Lords provides a unique opportunity for issues of concern to the Church of England to be raised in Parliament. This is done either by the duty bishop or another bishop with a particular concern for the issue under debate. The bishops receive briefing from staff at Lambeth Palace or Church House, or agencies such as Christian Aid, depending on the issue and the expertise required. During 1995, such interventions on international affairs included statements on the incorporation of the European Bill of Human Rights into domestic legislation, South Africa’s readmission into the Commonwealth, Nigeria and Sudan. In 1996, interventions included speeches on the Chemical Weapons Convention, the human rights of the Syrian Orthodox minority in Turkey and the Scott Inquiry. Later in 1996, the then Bishop of Worcester (Rt Revd Philip Goodrich), who formerly chaired the Church of England’s Development Affairs Committee, used the opportunity of his last speech in the Lords to stress the importance of international poverty relief and the aid budget and the Bishop of Bristol spoke on the human rights situation in China. In January 1997, the Bishop of Oxford spoke clearly in favour of an international criminal court. Immediately following the Labour election victory, the Queen’s speech was addressed by the Bishop of Oxford, who commented on the international debt crisis, the complexity of establishing a foreign policy consistently based on human rights and the need for transparent and rigorous limitations on conventional arms exports. He later spoke in a debate on reform of the United Nations. The comments by the former Archbishop of York, now Lord Habgood, on the work in the House of Lords give a rationale for the distinctive role of the Bishops in Parliament: Both Houses of Parliament, of course, contain many lay Christians of all denominations who do not hide their Christianity. The bishops are not, and do not pretend to be, the only Christian spokesman. They do, however, constitute a visible and permanent reminder of

Church of England in International Affairs 227

the relationship between Church and State. The fact that they are not peers in the ordinary sense but form part of a distinct section of the House, the Lords Spiritual, the fact that they sit on separate benches and, unlike other peers, wear robes when attending debates, emphasize the point that it is their presence as bishops which is significant. Many bishops have in the past, and still do, make a valuable contribution as individuals to the work of the House.39 The role of the bishops in foreign policy debate can be further illustrated by an example. It became a feature of British political life in the period under consideration that the foreign aid budget regularly came under pressure and further cuts were threatened. Bishops in the House of Lords could be relied upon to speak against this – and there is a widespread support within the Churches for the commitment by the new government to reverse the downward trend in the aid budget. The bishops in the House of Lords are a distinct group – well-educated, humane and well-travelled. They have wide experience of overseas contacts, some have lived and worked abroad in missionary work, ministry or teaching capacities. Their diocese may well have a partner diocese in an African country, or elsewhere in the South. They may have personal friends from a Third World context as a result of priests working in their diocese who have returned home, or as a result of friendships made at ecumenical or Anglican conferences. This combination of factors, as well as longstanding missionary links and over 50 years of commitment to aid and development work by Christian Aid and a substantial groundswell of support for aid among congregation members, all predisposed most of the bishops to oppose further cuts to the aid budget. Thus, for example, in Autumn 1996, in advance of the annual anticipated cut in the aid budget, a number of the main aid agencies including Christian Aid and CAFOD together prepared a manifesto entitled The Case for Aid.40 A part of the agencies’ concerted campaign, this manifesto was sent to all diocesan bishops in the Church of England – many of whom wrote to the then Chancellor of the Exchequer opposing further reductions in the aid budget. The Chairman of the International and Development Affairs Committee (the Bishop of Selby) added his signature to a letter printed in The Times (9 October 1996) signed, among others by a Catholic bishop, the Director of Save the Children and the General Secretary of the Trades Union Congress. The then Bishop of Worcester, as was mentioned above, spoke on the subject in the House of Lords, using briefing

228 Roger Williamson

provided by Christian Aid. In the less polarized atmosphere of the debates in the House of Lords, given that coming from the Bishops defence of the aid budget was not a ‘party political’ statement, a reasonable hearing for such views was guaranteed, although one has to be realistic about the severely limited possibilities of dissuading the former government from cutting the aid budget when they were determined to do so.

Church of England policy formation The deceptively simple question ‘What is the Church of England’s policy on issue x?’ often cannot be readily answered. There are various sources from which an answer could emanate, for example from a major debate in the General Synod, a statement by the House of Bishops or a statement from the Archbishop of Canterbury or one of the senior bishops. There seems to be a widespread consensus that ‘the Church’ should ‘speak out’ or ‘say something’ or ‘give a lead’. Significantly, the former Archbishop of York took as the opening words of the introduction to his book Church and Nation in a Secular Age, the following words from a letter to The Times, by David Martin, the eminent sociologist of religion: ‘A Bishop should “speak out”, but what can he say?’41 Some clue, as regards themes, is given in the sociological analysis of returns to a questionnaire analysing the attitudes of the three Houses (Laity, Clergy and Bishops) of the General Synod, 1990 –95. ‘Third World’ issues figured prominently among the top concerns in all three houses – scoring highest in the Houses of Laity and Clergy and third highest among the bishops.42 The authors of the survey comment: There is, it seems, strong support right through the Synod – for the House of Laity’s response was matched by the other two houses – for the Church’s prophetic voice and over a dauntingly wide range of issues. The churches should indeed speak out. But, as is so often the case, the consensus melts away when it comes to what, precisely, they are going to say.43 Given that the Church of England is a major Church, it is hardly surprising that there is a considerable spread of opinion within it. A full study of the political effect of the Church of England would have to take into account the indirect impact of Anglicans within their work situations, their professional bodies, trade unions and non-Church

Church of England in International Affairs 229

voluntary organizations. Such a methodologically complex task is far beyond the scope of this chapter. In this overview some of the recent statements of the General Synod will be addressed. The International and Development Affairs Committee (IDAC) was chaired by the then Bishop of Coventry (the Rt Revd Simon BarringtonWard), a former General Secretary of the Church Missionary Society with a wide range of international experience and particular expertise on African issues. He ceased to chair the Committee in 1996 and retired from his diocese in September 1997. His successor as chairman of IDAC is the Bishop of Selby, the Rt Revd Humphrey Taylor, who also has led a missionary society, USPG. The Committee is composed of Anglican and ecumenical specialists. A representative of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office also attends, thereby facilitating communication to and from government. This Committee reports to the Board for Social Responsibility (chaired until February 1996 by the former Bishop of Liverpool, the Rt Revd David Sheppard and subsequently by the Bishop of Oxford, the Rt Revd Richard Harries). It is through this committee (IDAC) that the main reports on international affairs are prepared.

Responses to regional issues Southern Africa Until the end of apartheid, South Africa was a central priority for the Church of England, as well as other British Churches. Since the imposition of apartheid in 1948, Churches have felt particularly challenged by the apartheid system, since its architects claimed Christian legitimation for it. Early attention was attracted by (later Archbishop) Trevor Huddleston’s book Naught for Your Comfort.44 Huddleston took sides clearly and early, publicly identifying with the Freedom Charter, mixing easily with ANC leaders such as Nelson Mandela and Oliver Tambo. Unsurprisingly, the Anglican leadership in South Africa was more cautious. The World Council of Churches’ Programme to Combat Racism45 sparked controversy in 1970 by awarding grants for humanitarian purposes to liberation movements engaged in armed resistance to the white minority governments of Southern Africa (South Africa, Namibia,46 Rhodesia,47 Mozambique and Angola). This was subsequently backed up by an appeal for an investment stop and use of the economic leverage of sanctions against South Africa. Giles Ecclestone, who headed the staff of the Board for Social Responsibility during the late 1970s and early 1980s while the investment issue was hotly debated in the

230 Roger Williamson

Church of England, has given a short but illuminating account of the division between the Board for Social Responsibility’s own Working Party Facing the Facts48 and the positions adopted by such influential figures as the Board Chairman (the Rt Revd Graham Leonard) and the (then) First Church Estates Commissioner, Sir Ronald Harris, who rejected the case for disinvestment. In 1982, the Synod passed a resolution in favour of disinvestment. The Church Commissioners’ response was a policy not to invest in companies operating ‘wholly or mainly’ in South Africa, which did not affect holdings with many of the key multinationals. Ecclestone comments: When the option of economic disengagement from South Africa was first mooted in a British context, there was a good chance that the Labour Government, in power for most of the 1970s, would be responsive to this approach. With the election of a Conservative Government, it rapidly became apparent that the chances of the British Government and industry adopting a disengagement policy were dwindling rapidly. … I draw from this the conclusion that on major issues where the choices are complex and there is no obvious moral imperative pointing judgement in one direction rather than another, there are great difficulties in getting the Church of England’s institutions to arrive in time at a decision.49 In 1986, a further report Prisoners of Hope was debated.50 The Bishop of Coventry, as Chairman of the relevant committee, moved the resolution which was passed on that occasion. It reads as follows: That this Synod, in the light of the resolutions of July 1982 and of the serious deterioration in the South African situation since that time, (a) is convinced of the urgent need to establish as peacefully as possible ‘a new South Africa’ which will be ‘non-racial, democratic, participatory and just’ (Desmond Tutu); (b) calls upon the Church by prayer and action to offer support to all who are attempting to bring this about; (c) urges Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the failure of the mission of the Eminent Persons’ Group, to deploy effective economic sanctions against South Africa; and (d) requests banking and financial institutions, transnational corporations, and all bodies with significant links in South Africa, to take whatever steps are in their power – including acts of disengagement – to increase the pressure on that economy, and urges the

Church of England in International Affairs 231

Church’s financial bodies to give a clear lead in this direction. This message was reinforced with a similar resolution in February 1987. It has to be said that the Churches in South Africa and the member Churches of the British Council of Churches (with the Church of England being, perhaps unsurprisingly, somewhat more conservative and slower to adopt a clear position on economic disengagement) had a better reading of the South African situation than the Conservative government of the 1980s. A full consideration would also have to take into account the extensive work of the British Council of Churches (and, indeed, the work of the Catholic Institute for International Relations) on this issue and the positions of Church of England representatives vis-à-vis ecumenical partners in Britain and abroad.51 Sub-Saharan Africa The acute suffering of much of sub-Saharan Africa as a result of war, drought, famine and the debt crisis led to the General Synod holding a debate on the situation in February 1993, supported by the report Rejoicing Amidst Suffering.52 The resolution accompanying the debate called on government to move towards the 0.7 per cent of GNP target for the aid budget, to improve the terms of trade for African nations and to ‘press for full implementation of the Trinidad Terms’ for debt relief. In February 1996, Archbishop Khotso Makhulu (Central Africa) was a member of a team of distinguished African leaders (of whom the most eminent was Kenneth Kaunda, former President of Zambia) who visited Britain to call attention to the impact of the debt crisis and structural adjustment programmes on sub-Saharan Africa.53 The Bishop of Coventry in his capacity as chair of the International and Development Affairs Committee was among those who met with the delegation during its extensive programme. Europe On 1 December 1994, the General Synod of the Church of England debated the report Europe.54 It is an indication of the importance attached to the issue that the then Archbishop of York (Dr Habgood) introduced the debate. The report identifies four broad aims. 1. The first is to work with other Churches in seeking to ensure the most effective presentation of the Christian Gospel in contemporary Europe (para. 147). 2. The second aim is to promote the unity of the Church wherever opportunity affords. This means acting with other Churches

232 Roger Williamson

wherever possible, whether through bilateral links or through ecumenical organisations (para. 148). 3. The third aim is, through the Diocese in Europe, to support and minister to Anglicans on the mainland, in concert with our partners in the Anglican Communion (para.149). 4. The fourth aim – which must be carried out in conjunction with other Christian Churches – is to help articulate a Christian voice in the shaping of the new Europe (para. 150). There has been a considerable tradition of ecumenical response to the challenges of Europe, east and west. This has resulted in such contributions as the two editions of Discretion and Valour,55 the classic study on religious conditions in eastern Europe under communism and the 1993 symposium Christian Values in Europe with contributions from both Archbishops (Carey and Habgood).56

Former Yugoslavia Concern about the war in former Yugoslavia has been a challenge to the Churches from the moment war broke out. While it is not true that the Churches have been silent or inactive, the responses of the Churches, whether individually, at the British ecumenical level or through the Conference of European Churches and the Council of European Bishops’ Conference, or through the World Council of Churches, faced many of the same dilemmas as the policy of governments. The dilemma of a religious response can be seen if one recognizes that the divide between eastern (Orthodox) and western (Catholic) Christendom of 1054 runs through former Yugoslavia – it still has its effects with a Catholic affinity for Croatia and an Orthodox affinity for Serbian perspectives – as does the faultline between Christian and Muslim Europe. One can make too much of this, because Bosnia was attempting to be a secular European state and defend itself against aggression, but the ‘deep history’ does play some role. Foremost among the critics of Church responses has been Professor Adrian Hastings, who wrote in 1994: Reflecting on the response of the churches in Britain and within the ecumenical movement to Bosnia once more, this time in 1994, I remain appalled by how little they have done at the level of leadership to recognize without ambiguity what has been happening, to condemn evil and above all to offer any significant support

Church of England in International Affairs 233

to a European nation oppressed in a way unprecedented since 1945.57 In that short piece he criticized a report of a delegation of the Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland (CCBI), the Central Committee of the World Council of Churches in Johannesburg ( January 1994) and a speech by the then Bishop of Worcester, the Rt Revd Philip Goodrich, in the House of Lords.58 Bosnia remained an important ecumenical theme throughout 1995. The Church of England participated fully through its representatives in the Balkans Working Party of the CCBI. Close ecumenical cooperation was maintained throughout the year. This involved contacts with the Conference of European Churches and the World Council of Churches. A letter was sent to The Times (published 14 July 1995) from the Archbishop of Canterbury, Cardinal Hume, the Moderator of the Free Church Federal Council (Kathleen Richardson) and the Chief Rabbi. The letter criticized the ‘barbarity of those who murder, terrorise and oppress people in Bosnia’. Shortly afterwards (in August 1995), the Bishop of Oxford joined Rabbi Hugo Gryn and Muslim scholar Rana Kabbani (among others) as patrons of ‘The Sarajevo Charter’. The Bishops of Hereford and Barking also signed. The central message was: ‘We say NO to “ethnic cleansing” and we say not enough is being done to prevent it’ (Sarajevo Charter 1996). Christian Aid made available appeal materials including a letter from the Bishop of Rochester (the Rt Revd Michael Nazir-Ali – an Anglican Christian Aid Board member) recounting some of his strongest impressions from his recent visit – including Christian–Muslim cooperation in relief work. He wrote: Near Tuzla, I visited a reception centre for refugees from Srebrenica. It was a pitiful place, with babies, old men and women all living together in overcrowded classrooms. For days they had eaten little more than bread and milk. While I was there a church group supported by Christian Aid supplied some milk and sacks of potatoes. The refugees welcomed this like manna from heaven. (Christian Aid News, August 1995) In August 1995, the Bishop of Coventry addressed a letter to all fellow diocesan bishops, providing a full dossier of information, analysis and Church statements. A number of bishops sent replies to the approach outlining their own perceptions of the situation.

234 Roger Williamson

On 10 November an ecumenical hearing (jointly sponsored by the Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland and the Council on Christian Approaches to Defence and Disarmament) was held on former Yugoslavia with speakers from the Bosnian, Croatian, Serbian, Russian and American Embassies, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, the Overseas Development Administration, the Refugee Council and the World Council of Churches. The subject was introduced by Sir David Hannay, former British Ambassador to the United Nations. Over 60 participants – mainly Church representatives involved in policy formulation – took part. Shortly after the consultation, the Dayton Peace Agreement was signed. The Archbishop of Canterbury’s visit followed immediately afterwards. The peace process in the Holy Land The issue of peace in the Holy Land is, at one and the same time, a matter of international relations, as well as a concern for Christian– Jewish and Christian–Muslim dialogue. Within the Christian world it should also be noted that there is now an increasing literature on the issue by Palestinian Christians in both Arabic and English.59 Anglican involvement is longstanding, both in terms of the Arab Church congregations, educational and social provision. It is quite possible to trace the deep concern of those involved with the area – for example through the reports of the relevant area secretaries of the Church Missionary Society – well before the second World War. Reference is made to these concerns in the official history of the CMS.60 Following the November 1982 debate on the report Towards Understanding the Arab/Israeli Conflict,61 Synod expressed its opinion as follows: Praying for the Peace of Jerusalem and believing that Christians, Jews and Muslims are called to live in brotherhood; (i) urges members of the Church of England to seek a deeper understanding of the communities of the Middle East, Muslim, Jewish and Christian; (ii) expresses both respect and love for the Jewish and Islamic communities in the British Isles and urges Christians to promote friendship and understanding with them in every possible way; (iii) affirms the right of the Israeli nation to live within secure borders and similarly the right of the Palestinian people to nationhood in a secure homeland – and believes mutual recognition of these rights to be necessary for a just peace;

Church of England in International Affairs 235

(iv) believes that while forthright criticism of Israeli policies can be a sign of friendship, anti-Semitism, open or veiled, must be guarded against and vigorously condemned. … The resolution concludes with a call for further ecumenical cooperation and consideration by the Church of England of further steps to be taken. In July 1991, the Synod again turned its attention to the Holy Land and considered a brief report on The Intifada.62 Consistent with the previously articulated position, moderate pressure for a resolution to the conflict was maintained: That this Synod, mindful that the Holy Land is sacred to the three great Monotheistic religions, and concerned at the troubled situations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, supports HM Government in its use of its influence to persuade the State of Israel to negotiate a just and peaceful settlement with the Palestinian people. Much of the response to the situation has been ecumenical in nature. Recent examples which can be given are: 1) The ‘Principles for Response’ on ‘The Holy Land, the Peace Process and the British and Irish Churches’ approved by the Church Representatives’ Meeting on 20 November 1996, following a presentation by Anglican Bishop Riah Abu el-Assal from the Holy Land; 2) the sermon in Jerusalem preached by the Archbishop of Canterbury during the meeting of Anglican primates which was widely interpreted as supporting the justice of the call for a Palestinian state;63 3) the press statement by the CCBI expressing the danger to the peace process represented by the Har Homa/Jabel Abu Ghuneim settlement just outside Bethlehem.64

Hong Kong In July 1992, General Synod debated a report entitled Hong Kong and British Responsibility.65 Included in the resolution, alongside a series of pastoral and church-related concerns, Synod addressed the following requests to the British and Hong Kong governments: (i) take all steps to sustain the confidence of the people of Hong Kong in the rule of law and the administration of justice; (ii) move more quickly towards its declared desire of introducing directly elected government in Hong Kong;

236 Roger Williamson

(iii) make available within the Hong Kong budget further financial and educational resources to promote a democratic climate in Hong Kong. Given that the main decisions relating to the handover were taken some time ago, there was no major Church initiative to try to achieve a reconsideration. There was, however, an ecumenical delegation which went to Hong Kong and China, on which Canon Peter Price (General Secretary, USPG) was the Anglican representative (2–15 May 1997). The purpose of this visit was to show ecumenical solidarity with and support for the Churches.66

Thematic issues World development and the global economy The Church of England, along with the other Churches organized in the Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland, conducts most of its directly practical development work through officially recognized Church development agencies (Christian Aid, CAFOD – Catholic Fund for Overseas Development, and SCIAF – Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund). A substantial number of evangelical parishes prefer to support Tear Fund. In order to provide analysis and a theological rationale for continued involvement with such lifesaving commitment, the Church of England periodically reviews current development issues. A consistent (and unmet) demand has been that successive governments should progress towards achieving the United Nations’ target for development assistance by industrialized countries – 0.7 per cent of gross national product. In 1981, the General Synod carried a motion supporting the Brandt Report’s message of the mutual interdependence between rich and poor on the planet.67 The resolution passed in July 1981 stated that Synod: ‘shares with the Brandt Commission the belief that, as a matter of common humanity and of our mutual interest in survival, the world requires a new and more equitable system of economic relationships between nations’. A report on Development Education and a study entitled Let Justice Flow were published and debated by Synod.68 The latter provided a farreaching critique of the current economic system, pointing out the misery resulting from the international debt crisis and the deterioration in terms of trade which had led to poor countries receiving less and less for their commodities. The report said: ‘No more powerful

Church of England in International Affairs 237

mechanism, except perhaps for slavery, for transferring wealth from the poor to the rich has ever been invented in the history of this planet.’69 Clearly, individual generosity and grant-aided projects alone cannot achieve the structural change required to correct this systematic injustice. As a response to the UN Social Summit, Copenhagen, March 1995, the Board for Social Responsibility prepared a paper, British Economic Priorities and the UN Social Summit,70 arguing that fundamental restructuring of the British economy would be required in order to address the needs of the poor in Britain and overseas. Studying the global economy from mid-1995, a Working Party of the Church of England produced Faith in a Global Economy? Report of the Church of England Working Party, CofE, London, 1998, for the mid-1998 Lambeth Conference. The Church of England continues to regard the issue of sustainable economic development as of abiding importance. This commitment is expressed through the aid agencies and partnership through mission agencies, through the international structures of the Anglican Communion, its own studies and structures (for example, the World Development Advisors/Diocesan Development Representatives), continued local support for One World Week in October each year and initiatives at parish and individual level. At the November 1995 session of Synod, a Newcastle Diocesan motion on the issue of Fair Trade was passed.

The debt crisis and Jubilee 2000 In November 1991, a Synod motion on the Jubilee Principle and Third World debt welcomed partial debt-relief plans initiated by the Prime Minister and called upon commercial banks to take further initiatives. The principle of ‘Jubilee’ (cf. Leviticus 25) was invoked to provide a theological rationale for providing release from unjustly imposed and unpayable debt.71 This was followed up in November 1996 by a private members’ motion (introduced by David Webster, Rochester Diocese), the core of which was that Synod should: ‘endorse the aims of the Jubilee 2000 campaign to work for the comprehensive and one-off remission of unpayable debts owed by countries on terms acceptable to both creditors and debtors on a case-by-case basis’. The motion also stressed the importance of integrating this approach fully into Anglican and ecumenical plans for the Millennium. In Anglican terms this is being done through the Archbishops’ Millennium Advisory Group (chaired by the Bishop of Maidstone, the Rt Revd

238 Roger Williamson

Gavin Reid). This group has produced a position paper, A Chance to Start Again, which was subsequently adopted by Churches Together in England. It contains a strong emphasis on international debt relief. The ecumenical campaign Jubilee 2000 has gathered considerable momentum. As well as British Church endorsement, it has been supported by the Kirchentag – a massive lay gathering in Germany, has been launched in the USA and endorsed in the Final Message of the Second European Ecumenical Assembly in Graz, Austria in June 1997. The proposals developed for addressing the debt crisis featured prominently in the 1998 Lambeth Conference and the World Council of Churches’ jubilee assembly in Harare in late 1998.72 An Anglican Bishop, Peter Selby, now Bishop of Worcester, has recently completed a book on Grace and Mortgage: The Language of Faith and the Debt of the World,73 with a foreword by the new Archbishop of Cape Town, Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane, who is preparing the case, as the chair of the relevant section of the Lambeth Conference, for this to be a high-profile issue there.74 It should be noted too that this issue fits well with the Millennium message of the Roman Catholic Church. As the Pope said in Tertio Millennio Adveniente: in the spirit of the Book of Leviticus (25:8–12), Christians will have to raise their voice on behalf of all the poor of the world, proposing the Jubilee as an appropriate time to give thought, among other things, to reducing substantially, if not cancelling outright, the international debt which seriously threatens the future of many nations.75 In July 1997, the Bishop of Oxford, one of the Anglican Board members of Christian Aid and the Chairman of the Board for Social Responsibility, introduced a debate on Jubilee 2000 in the House of Lords. This initiative met with a positive response in the House, from, among others, former Prime Minister Lord Callaghan. Other speakers with active Anglican involvement included the Bishop of Leicester, Lord Judd and the Earl of Sandwich, a former staff member of Christian Aid and current member of the International and Development Affairs Committee.76 Nuclear deterrence, arms control and the arms trade The Church of England has been involved in ongoing debate on the ethics of peace, deterrence and war.77 Between 1945 and 1989, the Cold War provided the political and security context in which the morality of nuclear deterrence was debated. In 1983, the report The Church and

Church of England in International Affairs 239

the Bomb78 was debated in Synod amid great publicity in the runup to the general election. Whereas the report recommended phasing out the independent British nuclear deterrent, Synod adopted a ‘middle way’ between this far-reaching proposal and government policy of retaining the British nuclear deterrent, namely a call for ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapons and further efforts towards multilateral disarmament. The resolution affirmed that ‘it is the duty of HM Government and her allies to maintain adequate forces to guard against nuclear blackmail and to deter nuclear and non-nuclear aggressors’. In 1988, a working party produced a report entitled Peacemaking in a Nuclear Age79 (chaired by the Bishop of Oxford and debated by Synod in November 1988). This anticipated the shift away from East–West confrontation to a more fragmented series of threats generated by the north–south divide and conflicts within nations. The resolution called upon the government to ‘take the initiatives necessary to achieve major reductions in nuclear and conventional armaments’. The call for a comprehensive test ban treaty was singled out. Since the end of the cold war, there has been no reconsideration by Synod of the place of nuclear weapons in British defence policy. Other recent issues of war and peace which the Church of England has addressed have included the Falklands War (1982) and the Gulf War against Iraq (1990 –91) where Church of England leaders were more ready than those of most other Churches internationally and in this country to consider the use of force as an unfortunate necessity. In November 1994, the General Synod debated and unanimously approved the main findings of the report Responsibility in Arms Transfer Policy.80 The report was prepared during a time of considerable public concern over the ‘arms-to-Iraq’ affair which led to the Scott Inquiry being established. The report called for a policy on conventional arms transfers which is ‘ethically responsible, transparent, publicly accountable and consistent’. In particular, said Synod, there should be an international ban on the production and use of antipersonnel mines (of which over 100 million have been deployed worldwide). According to the analysis of the report, arms are not like other goods, because they are designed to kill, injure and intimidate. It therefore seeks to outline a framework for the moral assessment of arms transfers: In summary, the following principles provide a framework for the assessment of which arms transfers are permissible: There is a right of self-defence.

240 Roger Williamson

There are legitimate uses, both threatened and actual, for weapons. Since not all countries produce weapons, some supply of weapons is acceptable, and indeed necessary. It is right to discriminate in the supply of weapons, in accordance with a realistic assessment of how they are likely to be used. Political judgement, informed by ethical evaluation, not commercial criteria, should play the key role in the decision whether to supply.81 The report called for ‘a policy which is generally acknowledged as being ethically responsible, transparent, publicly accountable and consistent’. This calls for such policy elements as ‘subordination of commercial criteria to political and ethical judgement’, ‘clear separation between arms transfers and provision of aid’, ‘refusal of arms transfers to countries engaged in, or likely to engage in, aggression’, ‘refusal of arms transfers to regions of tension – except to countries adjudged by the international community to be under threat and insufficiently armed to be able effectively to exercise the right of selfdefence (Article 51, UN Charter)’ and ‘rejection of arms transfers to countries guilty of grave and consistent patterns of human rights violations, or involved in unnecessarily high levels of arms spending (i.e. “good government” criteria)’.82 Following a wide-ranging debate in Synod, the resolution passed welcomed the UN arms register. It called for the desired reassessment of British arms transfer policy, approved the report, and strengthened the condemnation of, and proposed action on, the issue of antipersonnel mines.83 It also urged the government: ‘to seek ways of reducing dependence on arms production in areas in which it is heavily concentrated and to develop appropriate policies for retraining and industrial regeneration’. In February 1995, the then Bishop of Coventry was received by the then Foreign Secretary (Douglas Hurd) to discuss the analysis and recommendations of the report. That this policy is based on a consistently argued position, rather than party political considerations was shown early in the new Labour administration when the Foreign Secretary (Robin Cook) indicated that sales to Indonesia agreed under the Conservatives could go ahead. The Chairman of the International and Development Affairs Committee, noting that Nobel Peace Prize winner, Bishop Belo, had opposed arms sales which could assist in the further repression of illegally occupied East Timor, said: ‘Britain would not have supplied further arms to Iraq after the invasion of Kuwait. The Foreign Secretary’s

Church of England in International Affairs 241

statement on an ethical foreign policy based on human rights was widely welcomed. It must now be asked whether financial gain, or consistent concern for the victims of occupation, and for human rights, will gain the upper hand.’84 In the field of nuclear weapons, in the first half of 1995, the Church of England supported ecumenical initiatives in favour of the extension of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). The Archbishop of York (at that time Dr Habgood) led an ecumenical delegation to the Foreign Secretary on this issue and was a signatory of a letter to The Times criticizing the resumption of nuclear testing by France. In January 1996, the Bishop of Chelmsford spoke in the House of Lords welcoming the government’s position on the Chemical Weapons Treaty. The Commonwealth The Church of England Report From Power to Partnership (CofE 1991c) stresses the magnitude of the changes which have occurred in Britain’s transition from head of an empire to focal point of the Commonwealth. The report concludes that ‘the Commonwealth is a modest international agency, which by its history and character has the capacity to stand for some good and wholesome values in the contemporary world.’ 85 The report was followed up by a submission (April 1995) printed in the report of the Foreign Affairs Committee86 of the House of Commons on The Future Role of the Commonwealth. The submission covered the comparative advantage of the Commonwealth in terms of preventative diplomacy, the common ethos of the Commonwealth, the particular issues facing many of the island nations of the Commonwealth, democratic values and good government (cf. The Harare Declaration of 1991). Many of these points were borne out in late 1995 by the Nigerian crisis. This was addressed ecumenically through a statement of the Church Representatives’ Meeting of the Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland. The situation in Nigeria in general and Ogoniland, in particular, is of continuing concern to the Churches. The German aid agency, Bread for the World (Brot für die Welt), and the World Council of Churches87 have both published highly critical reports which assess the role of the Nigerian government and of the oil company Shell in a negative light. Shell have gone to considerable lengths to dispute this interpretation. Drawing heavily on Amnesty International material, the International and Development Affairs Committee made a submission on the subject of Nigeria to the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group

242 Roger Williamson

(April 1997) which prepared a position for the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting in Edinburgh in Autumn 1997.88 That there is a continuity of approach by the Church, following the change of British government, is shown by the response to the situation in Kenya. After riot police invaded the Anglican cathedral in Kenya, the Archbishops of Canterbury and Cape Town were among those who immediately sent messages of support to the Kenyan Archbishop, the Most Revd David Gitari. This was subsequently followed up by a message from the July 1997 General Synod, signed by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York.89

The marketing of breast-milk substitutes and the international code It is necessary at this point to consider the issue of the marketing of breast-milk substitutes, the International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes of 1981 and the Nestlé Boycott (imposed by Synod in July 1991 and suspended in 1994).90 The seriousness of this issue is indicated by the following statement by the director of the World Health Organization in 1993: ‘WHO estimates that some 1.5 million infant deaths every year could be averted through effective breastfeeding.’ 91 For a considerable time, this was a subject on which – according to a Board for Social Responsibility press release – ‘the jury is still out’.92 A brief report was made to the July 1995 Synod. The Board for Social Responsibility chose to work together with almost 30 other NGOs and agencies in the Inter-Agency Group for Breastfeeding Monitoring (IGBM) based at the UNICEF/UK office. This group conducted extensive research in four countries, Bangladesh, Poland, South Africa and Thailand. The report found that violations of the international code continued. These infringements included donation of free samples, the publication of information materials which undermine breast-feeding and unsolicited visits by company representatives to health facilities. The executive director of UNICEF worldwide, Carol Bellamy, welcomed the report as ‘a careful and sound analysis of the marketing practices of a number of breast-milk substitute manufacturers’. These conclusions have been contested by manufacturers, their coordinating bodies and allies. The issue was again debated in Synod in July 1997. The initial resolution was strengthened by an amendment by the former chairman of the International and Development Affairs Committee, the Bishop of Coventry, who persuaded Synod that the main conclusions of the

Church of England in International Affairs 243

report by the IGBM, Cracking the Code,93 should be endorsed. The text of the resolution reads as follows: That this Synod: (a) affirm the need to promote infant and maternal health by all available means; (b) affirm the conclusions of the report ‘Cracking the Code’, produced by the Interagency Group on Breast-feeding Monitoring, its emphasis on the International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes, and the subsequent resolutions of the World Health Assembly which clarify and amplify the Code; (c) endorse the efforts of UNICEF and the World Health Assembly to achieve universal implementation of the Code and Resolutions; (d) call upon all national governments to establish the legal basis and adequate instruments to ensure national compliance with the Code and Resolutions; and (e) call upon the manufacturers of breast-milk substitutes and health workers to adhere fully to the letter and spirit of the Code and Resolutions.

The future The overview given above has presented a sketch of certain dimensions of the Church of England’s international affairs work in the period 1979–97. The picture given is much more one of ‘influence’ than of ‘power’, and diffused influence at that. With figures such as former UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali often drawing attention to the need for values in international politics, and former European Commission President Jacques Delors having made his call for efforts to give Europe a ‘heart and soul’, it is clear that the Churches and religious organizations have a role in international affairs. Given the ‘revenge of God’ – as French commentator Gilles Kepel calls the resurgence of religion in political life – and the widespread estimate that religious fundamentalism is a threat to peace, it is necessary both for those within religious institutions and within academic life to analyse the extent to which religion can be a resource for peace, justice and human rights rather than a factor which exacerbates tension and hardens conflict.94 The Church of England, compared with, for example, such beneficiaries of substantial (albeit declining) quantities of Church tax money as the Protestant Churches of Germany or the Lutheran state Churches of

244 Roger Williamson

Scandinavia, has a minimal central staff for dealing with international affairs. Within the staff of the General Synod, there is one executive staff member specializing on international affairs, one on liaison with the missionary societies and one working on interfaith relations in Britain and further afield. The Archbishop of Canterbury has his own staff, but this too is small. The Bishops exercise a division of labour, but they have many other responsibilities as well as special interests such as an international affairs concern.95 At diocesan level, a world development adviser or diocesan development representative is nominated, but in almost all cases this work is done alongside other commitments, in an almost voluntary capacity. Much of the international work is, therefore, done by mission agencies supported by voluntary giving and by the official ecumenical aid agency (Christian Aid) or the evangelical agency, Tear Fund. The ecumenical development education initiative One World Week stimulated at least 500 different local events in October 1995. Having said this, however, the political awareness and commitment developed on issues such as nuclear deterrence, foreign aid and South Africa in recent years has had its impact not only in the debating chambers, synods and assemblies of the British Churches, in the activities of campaigning bodies such as the World Development Movement, but also in the corridors of power. Given the relatively small investment of the Churches in this work, the achievement is quite impressive. To end on a personal note, my own conclusion is that there is a disproportion in the Churches’ resource allocation with a relative underinvestment in staff to work on international affairs and social responsibility, compared with the size of aid agencies, in all of the main industrialized western countries. The minimal staffing devoted to international and political issues stands in no relation to the challenges in this area of work, nor to the damage resulting from war and human rights violations. Intensive work on preventive diplomacy, in which the Churches could also be involved, rather than reliance on emergency relief and development work, would pay dividends. This would be a form of ‘preventive medicine for the body politic’. Even without such an adventurous re-allocation of resources, of which, it has to be said, there is little sign in any of the main British denominations, the Churches nonetheless remain a significant non-party political, non-governmental, internationally committed constituency. The overview given has sought to provide an impression of the Church of England’s international work. Clearly, a more comprehensive study is required. An impression which can be derived from the

Church of England in International Affairs 245

work conducted is that the Church of England acts partly like a pressure group on certain issues (for example, on attempts to protect the aid budget) and partly helps to provide a non-party political framework in which debates can be conducted on other issues (for example the Church and the Bomb debate when dialogue within the wider society had all but broken down). Further research and methodological refinement would be required to ascertain just how significant the voice (or voices) of the Church of England is in its involvement, but with religion already identified as a ‘missing dimension of statecraft’,96 the issue should be pursued further.

Notes 1. This article was written in February 1996 and updated in August 1997 at the editor’s request. It is written in a personal capacity. 2. Williamson 1990. 3. Cf. for example Johnson and Sampson 1994; Juergensmeyer 1993; Frost 1991. 4. To take five examples: (a) The study by Ecclestone (1981) contains a short section on ‘Violence, Peace and War’ (pp. 25–33) covering Church responses to violence in Southern Africa and Northern Ireland, the arms trade and nuclear weapons and one on North-South economic issues. (b) The collection of essays (Moyser 1985) contains little more on international affairs than some short reflections on the Church of England and South Africa (Ecclestone, pp. 115–8), the debate on ‘The Church and the Bomb’ (Elford, pp. 176–200), some brief comments on the international dimensions of economics in the chapter by Sleeman (pp. 256–75) and Medhurst and Moyser’s (1988) discussion of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s (Lord Runcie) role on such issues as the Falklands War (pp. 94 –6), contacts with the World Bank (p. 96) and the Archbishop’s international political role (pp. 101–3). (c) Medhurst and Moyser 1988 contains brief considerations of a number of international topics, including the relationship between the Archbishop of Canterbury’s Lambeth Palace staff and the wider Anglican Communion (pp. 282– 4), nuclear issues (pp. 300, 317–8, 343– 4), contacts between Lambeth and the World Bank (p. 300), the Falklands War (pp. 301–2), the Archbishop’s international representational role (pp. 304 –5), Terry Waite (pp. 306–7), the World Council of Churches’ Programme to Combat Racism (pp. 325–6), South Africa (pp. 345–6) and the associated investment debate (pp. 346–8). This is a carefully researched book and it is therefore indicative that the relative lack of concentration and expertise on international ecumenical issues is seen from the misdating of the 1983 World Council of Churches’ Assembly (1983, given as 1984 on p. 305) and the misnaming of the Conference of European Churches (on p. 348). This amounts to a relatively brief and episodic concentration on the

246 Roger Williamson

5. 6.

7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15.

16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21.

22.

23.

international role of the Church of England in one of the most serious books on the Church’s political role. (d) Clark 1993 is primarily a discussion of UK domestic economic issues and only devotes a short section to the international economic studies (development issues and transnational corporation) of the Board for Social Responsibility (pp. 51–5). (e) The caustic and readable survey, De-la-Noy 1993, has some observations on the life of military chaplains and a short vignette of the Lambeth Conference 1988, but little more. In a relatively brief study of this kind, I have been unable to follow up exhaustively articles on the Church of England’s response to individual countries (for example South Africa) or particular issues (the Cold War). Cf Gosling 1992. Although London was chosen as the venue for the European launch of the Ecumenical Year of Churches in Solidarity with Uprooted People (1997), and the Bishop of Aston (Rt Revd John Austin), the Revd Theo Samuel (Moderator of the Churches’ Commission for Racial Justice, CCRJ) and the author were among Anglicans present at the launching conference (Mill Hill 6–9 March 1997); cf. WCC, 1996a. Cf. Waite 1993; Hewitt 1991; North 1987; North with Novak 1992; Bradlee 1988; Walsh 1994. Bradley 1992, p. 126; cf. Edwards 1990, p. 101. Gilmour 1993, p. 246. CofE 1982c. Gilmour 1993, p. 246. CofE 1985a. Gilmour 1993, p. 139. Bradley 1992, pp. 125–50. Bradley 1992, p. 150. For another view, see Humphrey Carpenter’s controversial biography of Robert Runcie, based on extensive interviews with the former Archbishop (Carpenter 1996). The present Archbishop, George Carey, succeeded Lord Runcie in 1991. CCBI 1997. CofE 1985a. For an overview of church responses, see Williamson 1991. Former General Secretary of the Church Missionary Society. Taylor 1993, pp. 654 –5. Words in quotation marks taken from the discussion by Edwards 1987, pp. 99–101. For a more technical discussion of the ‘Lambeth Quadrilateral’ – the four bases of accepted authority within Anglicanism: the Bible, the Nicene Creed, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, and the Historic Episcopate, cf. Edwards 1987, pp. 102–3. The entire chapter ‘One Church’s Experience’ gives an intelligent and accessible discussion of the Church of England and the wider Anglican Communion in terms of its historical development (Edwards 1987, pp. 75–111). See the two articles by Buchanan 1991a and 1991b. In terms of the exercise of authority on doctrinal matters, contrast the Catholic response to liberation theology, and well-known theologians such as Hans Küng and Edward Schillebeeck, with the Anglican response to the American Bishop Spong or Don Cupitt. I owe this formulation to Philip Giddings.

Church of England in International Affairs 247 24. 25. 26.

27.

28.

29.

30. 31. 32. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42.

43. 44. 45.

46.

47.

CofE 1994b, p. 8. The Secretary of the Board for Social Responsibility, David Skidmore, is a Vice-President of EECCS. The Dean of Durham, the Very Revd John Arnold, succeeded Metropolitan (now Patriarch) Alexei of the Russian Orthodox Church as President of CEC at the Prague 1992 Assembly. See, for example, the addresses to the European Parliament, the Council of Europe and the Assembly of the Conference of European Churches, in Carey 1993. Cf. Raiser 1991. For further analysis of the international role of the WCC, the reader is referred to the various studies on the work of the WCC in international affairs by authors such as Duff 1956; Hudson 1977; Koshy 1994; and van der Bent 1986a, 1986b and 1995. It is instructive to compare for example CofE 1979, pp. 23–37 which devoted over a third of the entire report to the Programme to Combat Racism, The Church of England and the World Council of Churches 1990 and After Canberra 1991. Van der Bent 1995, p. 184ff. Most notably in Preston 1994. ‘The Future of Ecumenical Social Thought’ (Berlin 29 May–3 June 1992) duplicated. Both Habgood and Preston were members of the group. The report of the group established by the two Archbishops to review the central structures of the Church of England. CofE 1995b, p. 77. McCullum 1994. Assefa 1987. Cranna 1994, pp 135–54. Carey 1995. Habgood 1981, pp. 100 –101. Owens 1996. Habgood 1983, p. 1. Davie and Short 1996, pp. 87, 89 and 91. Much of the press coverage contrasted personal morality versus social morality, with an explicit or implicit assumption that the Church of England should definitely be for the former rather than the latter in each case. Davie and Short 1996, p. 18. Davie and Short call attention to the Martin quotation in Habgood’s book. Huddleston 1977. For the early history, see Adler 1974. The Programme was established after the 1968 Uppsala Assembly. Martin Luther King had been invited to give a keynote address, but was killed shortly before the Assembly. Novelist James Baldwin issued a strong challenge to the Christian churches to oppose racism. Three Anglican bishops, two from Britain, Colin Winter and Richard Wood, and one American, were expelled from Namibia when it was under South African occupation. See Winter 1977. The two Ramseys, the Archbishop of Canterbury from 1961–74, Michael, and the Bishop of Durham from 1966–72, Ian, both took a clear moral position opposing the white majority regimes. David Edwards comments: ‘While Michael Ramsey incurred unpopularity by saying that the use of

248 Roger Williamson

48. 49. 50. 51.

52. 53. 54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59.

60.

61. 62. 63. 64. 65. 66.

67. 68.

69. 70.

force against the white settlers’ regime would be moral, Ian Ramsey led protests against any British identification with the white government in South Africa’ (Edwards 1978, pp. 377–8). CofE 1982a. Ecclestone 1985, pp. 116–17. CofE 1986b. BCC and CIIR 1986. The Anglican members of the delegation were Mrs Margaret Cornell, Chairman of the International Affairs Committee of the General Synod, and the Rt Revd John Taylor, recently retired Bishop of Winchester. See also BCC and Christian Aid 1989. See the contribution by the Bishop of Coventry, in: ibid. pp. 87–93. CofE 1993. The visit was organized by the Debt Crisis Network, a coalition of secular and church-based NGOs and churches. CofE 1995a. For a summary of the report and attendant debate, cf. Williamson 1995. Beeson 1982. Davie, Gill and Platten 1993. CAFE is the ecumenical network ‘Christianity and the Future of Europe’. Hastings 1994. Hastings 1994, pp. 242– 4. Only English language literature is listed here: see, for example, Ateek 1989, 1990, 1991; Ateek et al. 1992; Ateek et al. 1997; Chacour with Jensen 1992; MECC 1986; Rantisi with Beebe 1990; Prior and Taylor 1994; O’Mahony et al. 1995. Commenting on plans for partition for Palestine in 1937, this history says: ‘The African Secretary of CMS, the Rev. H. D. Hooper, visited Palestine at this time and reported: “For the Christian, partition spells loss of security whether power passes into the hand of Jews or Moslem Arabs.” He went on to say that the rank and file of the church had strong incentives to make common cause with their fellow-countrymen’ (Hewitt 1971, quote from p. 353). CofE 1982b. CofE 1991b. See: The Times ‘Archbishop Error: Carey was Unwise to Stray Beyond Matters Spiritual’ editorial, 12 March 1997, p. 19. CCBI, ‘Church Concern over Israeli Settlement’ Har Homa/Jabel Abu Ghunem, 19 March 1997. CofE 1992. P. Price, 1997, ‘Visit Report of Rev. Canon Peter B. Price: Visit to Hong Kong and China, 2nd–15th May 1997, as a member of the CCBI delegation’ (duplicated). CofE 1981. CofE 1985b: CofE 1986a. The main analytical contribution to Let Justice Flow was by priest and development economist Charles Elliott, who subsequently wrote Comfortable Compassion (cf. Elliott 1987). CofE 1986a, p. 8. CofE 1995, ‘British Economic Priorities and the UN Social Summit’, duplicated, Board for Social Responsibility, London.

Church of England in International Affairs 249 71. 72.

73. 74.

75. 76. 77.

78. 79. 80. 81. 82. 83. 84. 85. 86. 87. 88.

89. 90.

91. 92.

93. 94. 95. 96.

Cf. Vallely 1990: esp. ch. 7, ‘Towards a Theology of Debt’. For the full text of the Jubilee 2000 debate in Synod in November 1996, see CofE 1996, pp. 1001–18. For the position paper on the Millennium, cf. CTE 1996. For Jubilee 2000’s approach and campaigning goals, see Jubilee 2000, 1996. Selby 1997. Archbishop Ndungane devoted a key passage of his enthronement address in 1996 to this issue: W. Ndungane, 1996, ‘Enthronement Charge of the Most Reverend Njongonkulu Winston Hugh Ndungane’, Cape Town 14 September 1996 (duplicated). For further Catholic preparatory material on the Millennium, cf. CAFOD 1996; CAFOD/SCIAF et al. 1996; Donders 1996. See Hansard, House of Lords, 9 July 1997, col. 629–51, 660 –77. Reports in the period under consideration are CofE 1979, CofE 1982c, CofE 1984 and CofE 1988. For some of the debate generated by the issue, see Goodwin 1982; Martin and Mullen 1983; Gill 1984; Bailey 1984; Gladwin 1985; Davis 1987; Harries 1986. CofE 1982c. CofE 1988. CofE 1994c. CofE 1994c, p. 9. CofE 1994c, pp. 46–7. As a result of an amendment moved by a lay member of the Oxford Diocese. Meyrick 1997. CofE 1991c, p. 34. Foreign Affairs Committee 1996. Danler et al. 1996; WCC 1996b. CofE/IDAC (1997), Submission to the Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group on Nigeria by the International and Development Affairs Committee of the General Synod of the Church of England, April 1997. Ashworth 1997. For the Kenyan Archbishop’s ‘track record’ on these issues, cf. Gitari 1996. The issue has been debated in Synod on three occasions, in 1991, 1994 and 1997. See CofE 1991a, pp. 345–57 and CofE 1994a, pp. 328– 49. For other documentation see CofE (1995), Developments since the Motion (July 1994) on the Suspension of the Nestlé Boycott and the World Health Assembly Resolution, GS Misc 453 (duplicated); CofE (1997), Promotion of Breastmilk Substitutes, GS 1253, July 1997 (duplicated); IGBM 1997; and Church of England Press Release, ‘General Synod Welcomes Study on Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes’, 18 July 1997. Quoted in: IGBM 1997, p. 2. For the full account: CofE (1995), Developments since the Motion (July 1994) on the Suspension of the Nestlé Boycott and the World Health Assembly Resolution, GS Misc 453 (duplicated). IGBM 1977. Kepel 1991. On the administrative burdens on bishops: cf. De-la-Noy 1993, pp. 61–3. Johnson and Sampson 1994.

Bibliography Abdulaziz, S., Little, D. and Kelsey, J. E., 1988, Human Rights and the Conflict of Cultures: Western and Islamic Perspectives on Religious Liberty, Columbia. Aboulmagd, K. A., 1992, ‘Islam in the Postcommunist World’, Problems of Communism 412, pp. 38– 43. Abrahamian, E., 1992, ‘Khomeini: A Fundamentalist?’, in Kaplan, L. (ed.) Fundamentalism in Comparative Perspective, Amherst, Mass., pp. 109–25. Abrahamiam, E., 1993, Khomeinism: Essays on the Islamic Republic, Berkeley. Abu-Amr, Z., 1994, Islamic Fundamentalism in The West Bank and Gaza: Muslim Brotherhood and Islamic Jihad, Bloomington, Ind. Adams, J., 1993, ‘West Fears Worldwide Havoc from Muslim Extremists’, The Sunday Times, 22 August, p. 12. Adler, E., 1974, A Small Beginning: An Assessment of the First Five Years of the Programme to Combat Racism, Geneva. Advani, L.K., 1987, ‘Presidential Address, Vijaywada, January 1987’, BJP Pamphlet 73. Advani, L. K., 1991, The Hindu (International edition), 27 April. Advani, L. K., 1995, ‘Interview’, India Today, 15 April. Afrachteh, K., 1981, ‘Iran’, in Ayoob, M. (ed.), The Politics of Islamic Reassertion, London, ch. 6. Afshari, R., 1994, ‘An Essay on Islamic Cultural Relativism in the Discourse of Human Rights’, Human Rights Quarterly 16.4, p. 249. Ahmad, J. (ed.), 1947, Some Recent Speeches and Writings of Mr Jinnah, Lahore. Ahmed, A. S. and Dornan, H. (eds), 1994, Islam, Globalization and Postmodernity, London. Ajami, F., 1995, ‘The Sorrows of Egypt’, Foreign Affairs 74.5, September/October, pp. 75–6. Akehurst, M., 1984, ‘Humanitarian Intervention’, in Hedley Bull, H. (ed.), Intervention in World Politics, Oxford, pp. 95–118. Akenson, D. H., 1992, God’s Peoples: Covenant and Land in South Africa, Israel, and Ulster, Ithaca, N.Y. Akhavan, P., 1993, ‘Implications of Twelver Shi’ih Mihdism on Religious Tolerance’, in Vogt, K. and Lindholm, T. (eds), Islamic Law Reform and Human Rights, Challenges and Rejoinders, p. 213. Akiner, S., 1989, ‘Muslims of the Soviet Union’, in Mews, S. (ed.), Religion in Politics, Harlow, pp. 281–5. Akiner, S., 1996, ‘Islam, the State and Ethnicity in Central Asia in Historical Perspective Religion’, State and Society 24.2/3, pp. 11–16. Akiner, S. (ed.), 1997, Political and Economic Trends in Central Asia, London. Allen, P. D., 1987, ‘The Bahá’ís of Iran: A Proposal for Enforcement of International Human Rights Standards’, Cornell International Law Journal 20.337, p. 338. Almond, G., 1990, ‘The Study of Political Culture’, in Almond, G. (ed.), A Discipline Divided, London, pp. 138–56. 250

Bibliography 251 Alsdurf, J. and Alsdurf, P., 1990, Battered into Submission: The Tragedy of Wife Abuse in the Christian Home, Crowborough. Alton, D., 1991, Faith in Britain, London. Alva, M., 1978, ‘Janata’s Foreign Policy: A Critique’, Peace and Solidarity, 9:9, September, pp. 15–21. Ambler, R., 1990, Global Theology: The Meaning of Faith in the Present World Crisis, London. Amin, S. H., 1985, Islamic Law in the Contemporary World, Glasgow. Amir, A. S., 1988, The Turban for the Crown: The Islamic revolution in Iran, Oxford. Amstutz, M., 1987, Christian Ethics and United States Foreign Policy, Grand Rapids. Anderson, N., 1984, Christianity and World Religions, Leicester. Anderson, W. K. and Damle, S. D., 1987, The Brotherhood in Saffron: The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh and Hindu Revivalism, Boulder, Colo. Appadorai, A., 1981, The Domestic Roots of India’s Foreign Policy 1947–1972, Oxford. Arif, Gen. K. H., 1998, ‘Flashpoint in South Asia’, Dawn, 30 June 1998, p. 19. Aris, M. (ed.), 1991, Aung San Suu Ky: Freedom From Fear and other writings, London. Arjomand, S. A., 1988, The Turban for the Crown, Oxford. Ashford, S. and Timms, N. (eds), 1992, What Europe Thinks, Aldershot. Ashworth, P., 1997, ‘Riot Police Invade Cathedral’, Church Times, 11 July, p. 1. Assefa, H., 1987, Mediation of Civil Wars: Approaches and Strategies – The Sudan Conflict, Boulder, Colo. Ateek, N. S., 1989, Justice, and Only Justice: A Palestinian Theology of Liberation, Maryknoll. Ateek, N. S., 1990, The New Consciousness, CMS Annual Sermon, London. Ateek, N. S., 1991, ‘The Basic Principles of Dialogue in the Israeli-Palestine Conflict: Respect, Honesty, Sincerity, Humility’, in Gordon, H. and Gordon, R. (eds), Israel/Palestine: The Question for Dialogue, Maryknoll, pp. 59–73. Ateek, N. S. et al. (eds), 1992, Faith and the Intifada, Maryknoll. Ateek, N. S. et al. (eds), 1997, Jerusalem: What Makes for Peace – A Palestinian Christian Contribution to Peacemaking, London. Auda, G., 1991, ‘An Uncertain Response: The Islamic Movement in Egypt’, in Piscatori, J. (ed.), Islamic Fundamentalisms and The Gulf Crisis, Chicago, p. 111. Audi, R. and Wolsterstorff, N., 1997, Religion in the Public Square, Rowman and Littlefield. Avery, P., 1965, Modern Iran, London. Ayubi, N., 1991, Political Islam: Religion and Politics in the Arab World, London and New York. Azar, E., 1988, ‘Terrorism: A Global Perspective’, in Yonah Alexander, ‘Middle East Fundamentalism and Terrorism: Interdisciplinary Perspectives’, Terrorism 11.5, p. 349. Babiuch, J., 1994, ‘Church and Society in Post-communist Eastern Europe’, The World Today, 50.11, pp. 211–15. Bailey, S. D., 1984, Christian Perspectives on Nuclear Weapons, London. Baird, R. D., 1978, ‘Religion and the Legitimation of Nehru’s Concept of the Secular State’, in Smith, B. L. (ed.), Religion and the Legitimation of Power in South Asia, Leiden, pp. 73–87. Bakhash, S., 1985, The Reign of the Ayatollahs, London.

252 Bibliography Balachandran, G., 1996, ‘Religion and Nationalism in Modern India’, in Basu, K. and Subrahmanyam, S., (eds) Unravelling the Nation: Sectarian Conflict and India’s Secular Identity, Delhi. Barber, B., 1992, ‘Jihad vs. McWorld’, The Atlantic Monthly, March, pp. 55–63. Barber, B., 1995, Jihad vs. McWorld, New York. Barclay, O. R. (ed.), 1984, Pacifism and War: Eight Prominent Christians Debate Today’s Issues, Leicester. Bardos, G. N., 1992, ‘The Serbian Church against Miloševic´’, in RFE 1.31, 31 July, pp. 11–12. Baril, A. and Mori, G. A., 1991, ‘Declining Church Attendance’, Canadian Social Trends, pp. 21– 4. Barker, E.,1995, ‘The Cage of Freedom and the Freedom of the Cage’, in Barker, E. (ed.), LSE on Freedom, London, pp. 103–118. Barr, J., 1977, Fundamentalism, London. Barr, J. 1984, Escaping from Fundamentalism, London. Barylski, R., 1994, ‘The Russian Federation and Eurasia’s Islamic Crescent’, Europe–Asia Studies, 46.3, pp. 389– 416. Bassiouni, C. (ed.), 1982, The Islamic Criminal Justice System, New York. BCC and CIIR, 1986, Whose Rubicon? Report of a Visit to South Africa by Representatives of the British Churches, London. BCC and Christian Aid (British Council of Churches and Catholic Institute for International Relations), 1989, Standing for the Truth: Britain and Southern Africa, London. Beale, D. O., 1986, In Pursuit of Purity: American Fundamentalism since 1850, Greenville, S.C. Bedi, R., 1998a, ‘India Becomes Sixth Nuclear Weapons State’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.20, p. 4. Bedi, R., 1998b, ‘New Delhi’s Secret Test Site Escaped Satellite Detection’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.22, p. 5. Bedi, R., 1998c, ‘Eyes on Asia’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.22, pp. 43– 4. Bedi, R., 1998d, ‘India’s “Static” Spending Shows Self-defence Aim’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.23, p. 4. Bedi, R., 1998e, ‘India Cancels State Visits as Sanctions Tighten’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.24, p. 13. Bedi, R., 1998f, ‘Indian Cruise Raises Profile in Persian Gulf’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.24, p. 14. Bediako, K., 1983, ‘Biblical Christologies in the Context of African Traditional Religions’, in Samuel, V. and Sugden G. (eds), Sharing Jesus, London, pp. 115–75. Bediako, K., 1995, Christianity in Africa: The Renewal of a Non-Western Religion, Edinburgh. Beeson, T., 1982, Discretion and Valour: Religious Conditions in Russia and Eastern Europe, Glasgow (2nd rev. edn). Bekker, S. M., 1989, ‘Changes and Continuities in Burmese Buddhism’, in Silverstein, J. (ed.), Independent Burma at Forty Years: Six Assessments, Ithaca, pp. 51–61. Bellah, R. N., 1992, The Broken Covenant: American Civil Religion in Time of Trial, Chicago 2nd edn. Bender, B., 1998, ‘US Misread Signals of the Indian Tests’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29–23, p. 7.

Bibliography 253 Berger, S. (ed.), 1982, Religion in West European Politics, London. Berger, S., 1996/7, ‘Secularism in Retreat’, The National Interest, Winter, pp. 3–12. Berger, P., 1997, ‘Against the Current’, Prospect, March, pp. 32–6. Berkes, N., 1998, The Development of Secularism in Turkey, London. Bermudez, J., 1998, ‘A Silent Partner’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.20, pp. 16–17. Beter, P., 1997, ‘Religious Vitality in Canada: The Complimentarity of Religious Market and Secularization Perspectives’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36.2, pp. 272–88. Beyer, P., 1990, ‘Privatization and the Public Influence of Religion in Global Society’, Theory, Culture and Society 7, pp. 373–95. Beyer, P., 1994, Religion and Globalisation, London. Bhaumik, S. N., 1997, ‘Power Bonding’, India Today, 7 July, pp. 22–3. Bielefeldt, H., 1995, ‘Muslim Voices in the Human Rights Debate’, Human Rights Quarterly 17.4, pp. 587–617. Blanche, E., 1998, ‘Nuclear Reactions’, Jane’s Defence Weekly, 29.24, p. 22. Bolle, K., 1969, ‘Speaking of a Place’, in Kitagawa, J. M. and Long, C. M. (eds), Myths and Symbols: Essays in Honour of Mircea Eliade, Chicago. Booth, W. C., 1995, ‘The Rhetoric of Fundamentalist Conversion Narratives’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), Fundamentalisms Comprehended, the Fundamentalism Project, Chicago, vol. 5, pp. 367–95. Borciurkiw, B. R., 1990, ‘The Ukrainian Catholic Church in the USSR under Gorbachev’, Problems of Communism, Nov.–Dec., pp. 1–19. Bociurkiw, B. R. and Strong, J. W. (eds), 1975, Religion and Atheism in the USSR and Eastern Europe, London. Bordeaux, M., 1992, The Role of Religion in the Fall of Soviet Communism, London. Boyle, K. and Sheen, J. (eds), 1997, Freedom of Religion and Belief: A World Report, London. Bradlee, B. Jnr, 1988, Guts and Glory: The Rise and Fall of Oliver North, London. Bradley, I., 1992, Marching to the Promised Land: Has the Church a Future? London. Braybrooke, M., 1990, Time to Meet: Towards a Deeper Relationship Between Christians and Jews, London. Braybrooke, M., 1992, Stepping Stones for a Global Ethic, London. Brierley, P., 1991, ‘Christian England’: What the 1989 English Church Census Reveals, London. Brown, C. G., 1992, ‘A Revisionist Approach to Religious Change’, in Bruce, S. (ed.), Religion and Modernization, Sociologists and Historians Debate the Secularization Thesis, Oxford, pp. 31–58. Brown, S., 1995, New Forces, Old Forces and the Future of World Politics, London. Bruce, S., 1988, The Rise and Fall of the New Christian Right: Conservative Protestant Politics in America 1978–1988, Oxford. Bruce, S., 1989, God Save Ulster: The Religion and Politics of Paisleyism, Oxford. Bruce, S. (ed.), 1992, Religion and Modernization, Sociologists and Historians Debate the Secularization Thesis, Oxford. Bruce, S., 1993, ‘Fundamentalism, Ethnicity, and Enclave’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), Fundamentalisms and the State, London, pp. 50 –67. Bruce, S., 1995, ‘The Truth about Religion in Britain’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 34, pp. 417–30. Brûlé, J. C. and Mutin, G., 1982, ‘Industrialisation et Urbanisation en Algérie’, Maghreb-Mashrek 96, April–June, p. 65.

254 Bibliography Brumberg, D., 1991, ‘Islam, Elections, and Reform in Algeria’, Journal of Democracy 2.1, Winter, pp. 63–5. Buchanan, C., 1991a, ‘Anglican Communion’, in Lossky, N. et al. (eds), Dictionary of the Ecumenical Movement, Geneva, pp. 18–20. Buchanan, C., 1991b, ‘Anglican Consultative Council’, in Lossky, N. et al. (eds), Dictionary of the Ecumenical Movement, Geneva, p. 20. Burgat, F., 1993, The Islamic Movement in North Africa, Austin, Texas. Burnett, S., 1994, ‘Implications for the Foreign Policy Community’, in Johnston, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), Religion, The Missing Dimension in Statecraft, New York, pp. 285–305. Byron, E. H., 1982, Japanese Religion, Unity and Diversity, Belmont. CAFOD, 1996, The Millennium Jubilee: Theological Reflections towards the Year 2000, London. CAFOD, SCIAF et al., 1996, The Coming of the Third Millennium: Popular Version of the Apostolic Letter of Pope John Paul II Tertio Millennio Adveniente on the Jubilee of the Year 2000, London. Capps, D., 1992, ‘Religion and Child Abuse: Perfect Together’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 31.1, pp. 1–14. Carey, G., 1993, Sharing a Vision, London. Carey, G., 1995, ‘The Archbishop of Canterbury’s Christmas Message to the Anglican Communion’, Anglican World 80, p. 3. Carlton, E., 1990, War and Ideology, London. Carnell, E. J., 1958, ‘Fundamentalism’, in Halverson, M. and Cohen, A. A. (eds), A Handbook of Christian Theology, Cleveland, pp. 142–3. Carpenter, H., 1996, Robert Runcie: The Reluctant Archbishop, London. Casanova, J., 1994, Public Religions in the Modern World, Chicago. Casanova, J., 1997, ‘Globalizing Catholicism and the Return to a “Universal” Church’, in Rudolph, S. H. and Piscatori, J. (eds), Transnational Religion and Fading States, Boulder, Colo. Cassandra, 1995, ‘The Impending Crisis in Egypt’, Middle East Journal 49.1, Winter, pp. 12–13. Cassels, A., 1996, Ideology and International Relations in the Modern World, London. CCBI, 1997, Unemployment and the Future of Work: An Enquiry for the Churches, London. Cederroth, S., 1996, ‘Islamism in Multireligious Societies: The Experience of Malaysia and Indonesia’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State: The Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London, pp. 356–91. Chacour, E. with Jensen, M., 1992, We Belong to the Land: The Story of a Palestinian Israeli who Lives for Peace and Reconciliation, San Francisco. Chadda, M., 1993, ‘From an Empire State to a Nation State: the Impact of EthnoReligious Conflict on India’s Foreign Policy’, in Malik, H. (ed.), Dilemmas of National Security and Cooperation in India and Pakistan, New York, pp. 207–29. Chakravarti, S. and Rekhi, S., 1998, ‘Shaken and Stirred’, India Today, 13 July, pp. 24 –8. Chanda, N. et al, 1998a, ‘The Race is On’, Far Eastern Economic Review, 11 June, pp. 20 –22. Chanda, N. et al, 1998b, ‘Unholy Act’, Far Eastern Economic Review, 21 May, pp. 18–20.

Bibliography 255 Chanda, N. et al, 1998c, ‘Nuclear Fallout’, Far Eastern Economic Review, 28 May, pp. 26–30. Chavan, Y. B., 1979, India’s Foreign Policy, Bombay. Christiansen, F. and Rai, S., 1996, Chinese Politics and Society, London. CofE (Church of England), 1979, Defence and Disarmament: Christians in a Violent World, London. CofE, 1981, The Brandt Commission Report: A Report by the Board for Social Responsibility, London. CofE, 1982a, Facing the Facts: The United Kingdom and South Africa, London. CofE, 1982b, Towards Understanding the Arab–Israeli Conflict: Introductory Report by the Board for Social Responsibility to the Report of the British Council of Churches Delegation to the Middle East, London. CofE, 1982c, The Church and the Bomb: Nuclear Weapons and Christian Conscience, London. CofE, 1984, Nuclear Arms: Report by the Board for Social Responsibility, London. CofE, 1985a, Faith in the City: A Call for Action by Church and Nation, London. CofE, 1985b, Development Education: Report by the Board for Social Responsibility, London. CofE, 1986a, Let Justice Flow: Report by the Board for Social Responsibility International Affairs Committee, London. CofE, 1986b, Prisoners of Hope: Report by the Board for Social Responsibility International Affairs Committee, London. CofE, 1988, Peacemaking in a Nuclear Age: A Report of a Working Party of the Board for Social Responsibility of the General Synod of the Church of England, London. CofE, 1991a, General Synod: July Group of Sessions 1991: Report of Proceedings, 22.2, London. CofE, 1991b, The Intifada, General Synod Misc 372, London. CofE, 1991c, From Power to Partnership: Britain in the Commonwealth and the Church of England in the Anglican Communion, London. CofE, 1992, Hong Kong and British Responsibility: Prepared under the Auspices of the Hong Kong Steering Group of the CCBI, London. CofE, 1993, Rejoicing Amidst Suffering: The Anglican Communion in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Church of England, London. CofE, 1994a, General Synod: July Group of Sessions 1994: Report of Proceedings, 25.2, London. CofE, 1994b, A Growing Partnership: The Church of England and World Mission, London. CofE, 1994c, Responsibility in Arms Transfer Policy: Report by the Board for Social Responsibility, London. CofE, 1995a, EUROPE: A Paper Reviewing some Aspects of the Church of England’s Involvement in Mainland Europe (General Synod 1135), London. CofE, 1995b, Working as One Body: The Report of the Archbishops’ Commission on the Organisation of the Church of England (The Turnbull Commission Report), London. CofE, 1996, General Synod November Group of Sessions 1996, Report of Proceedings, 27.3. Cigar, N., 1995, Genocide in Bosnia, Texas. Clark, H., 1993, The Church under Thatcher, London.

256 Bibliography Clemens, C., 1989, Christian Democracy: The Different Dimensions of a Modern Movement, Brussels. Cohen, A., 1997, ‘Feeding the Flock’, Time 25 August, pp. 36–8. Cohen, N. J. (ed.), 1991, The Fundamentalist Phenomenon, Grand Rapids, Mich. Cohen-Sherbok, D., 1991, Issues in Contemporary Judaism, London. Cohen-Sherbok, D., 1992, Israel: The History of an Idea, London. Cole, J., 1990, ‘The Bahá’ís of Iran’, History Today 40, pp. 24 –9. Coleman, S., 1996, ‘Conservative Protestantism, Politics and Civil Religion in the United States’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State: The Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London, pp. 24 – 47. Coll, S. and LeVine, S., 1993, ‘A Global Militant Network: Support for Radical Islamic Groups is Far Flung’, Washington Post National Weekly Edition, 16–22 August, pp. 6–7. Conway, M., 1997, Catholic Politics in Europe 1918–1945, London. Cooper, R., 1985, The Baha’is of Iran, A Minority Rights Group Report, rev. edn, London. Copley, A., 1993, ‘Indian Secularism Reconsidered: From Ghandi to Ayodhya’, Contemporary South Asia 2.1, pp. 47–65. Costas, O. E., 1983, ‘Proclaiming Christ in the Two Thirds World’, in Samuel and Sugden (eds), Sharing Jesus in the Two Thirds World, Bangalore, pp. 1–15. Courbage, Y. and Fargues, P., 1997, Christians and Jews Under Islam, London. Cox, H., 1989, Many Mansions: Christianity’s Encounter with other Faiths, Boston. Cox, H., 1996, Fire From Heaven: The Rise of Pentecostal Spirituality and the Reshaping of Religion in the Twenty-first Century, London. Cranna, M. (ed.), 1994, The True Cost of Conflict, London. Cribb, R. and Brown, C., 1995, Modern Indonesia, London and New York. CTE ( Churches Together in England), 1996, A Chance to Start Again, London. Cudrey, A., 1987, ‘The Vanishing Jews’, New Society, 2 October, pp. 23–5. Curry, D. C., 1990, A World Without Tyranny: Christian Faith and International Politics, Westchester, Ill. Dalacoura, K., 1998, Islam, Liberalism and Human Rights, London. Danler, D., et al. 1996, Shell in Nigeria: Multinational Companies in the Third World – A Case Study of Shell in the Niger Delta, Stuttgart. D’Antonio, W. V., Davidson, J. D. and Wallace, R. A., 1989, American Catholic Laity in a Changing Church, Kansas City. Dark, K. R., 1996, ‘China and post-Cold War security in the Asia–Pacific region’, in Dark, K. R. (ed.), New Studies in Post-Cold War Security, Aldershot, pp. 215– 42. Dark, K. R., 1998, The Waves of Time, London. Dark, K. R. with Harris, A. L., 1996, The New World and the New World Order, London. Dasgupta, S. and Singh, N. K., 1997, ‘Genial Giant’, India Today, 15 May, p. 26. Dasgupta, S. et al, 1998, ‘New Chemistry … New Equations’, India Today, 13 July, pp. 12–17. Davidson, B., 1992, Black Man’s Burden: Africa and the Crisis of the Nation-State, New York. Davie, G. 1990a, ‘An Ordinary God: The Paradox of Religion in Contemporary Britain’, British Journal of Sociology 41, pp. 395– 421. Davie, G., 1990b, ‘Believing Without Belonging: Is This the Future of Religion in Britain?’, Social Compass 37, pp. 455–69.

Bibliography 257 Davie, G., Gill, R. and Platten, S. (eds), 1993, Christian Values in Europe, Cambridge. Davie, G., and Short, C., 1996, Church of England General Synod 1990–95: Analysis of Membership, London. Davies, D., Watkins, C. and Winter, M., 1991, Church and Religion in Rural England, Edinburgh. Davis, H. (ed.), 1987, Ethics and Defence: Power and Responsibility in the Nuclear Age, London. D’Costa, G., 1985, ‘Bibliography: Christian Attitudes Towards Other Religions’, The Modern Churchman 17, pp. 37– 44. D’Costa, G., 1986, Theology and Religious Pluralism: The Challenge of Other Religions, Oxford. de Gruchy, J. W., 1985, The Church Struggle in South Africa, Grand Rapids. de Gruchy, J. W., 1996, Christianity and Democracy, Cambridge. de la Gorce, P. M., 1995, ‘En Algérie, Mobilisation Contre Le Compromis’, Le Monde Diplomatique, April, p. 23. De-la-Noy, M., 1993, The Church of England: A Portrait, London. d’Encausse, H. C., 1988, Islam and the Russian Empire: Reform and Revolution in Central Asia, London. Deng, F. M., 1998, ‘Africa’s dilemmas in the Sudan’, The World Today, pp. 72– 4. Denitch, B., 1992, After the Flood: World Politics and Democracy in the Wake of Communism, Hanover. Deshpande, V. G., 1949, Why Hindu Rashtra? Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha, New Delhi. Deutsch, K. W., 1981, ‘On Nationalism, World Religions and the Nature of the West’, in Torsvik, P. (ed.), Mobilization, Center-periphery Structures, and Nationbuilding: A Volume in Commemoration of Stein Rokkan, Bergen, pp. 51–9. Dhillon, A. and Singh, N. K., 1996, ‘Making Capital out of Cattle’, India Today, 31 January. Dobbelaere, K., 1981a, Secularization: A Multi-dimensional Concept, Beverly Hills, Calif. Dobbelaere, K., 1981b, ‘Secularization: A Multi-dimensional Model’, Current sociology 29.2, pp. 1–216. Dobson, E., 1987, ‘The Bible, Politics, and Democracy’, in Neuhaus, R. J. (ed.), The Bible, Politics, and Democracy, Grand Rapids, pp. 1–18. Donders, J., 1996, The Fullness of Time: Sunday Gospel Meditations in Preparation for the New Millennium, London. Douglas, M. J., 1984, The Persecution of the Bahá’ís of Iran 1844–1984, Toronto. Dube, S. C., 1983, ‘Harmonizing Dimension in Hindu Civilizational Processes’, in Dube, S. C. and Basilov, V. N. (eds), Secularization in Multi-Religious Societies, New Delhi, pp. 1–20. Duff, S. J., 1956, The Social Thought of the World Council of Churches, London. Dunn, M. C., 1994, ‘Algeria’s Agony: The Drama so far, The Prospects for Peace’, Middle East Policy 3.3, p. 148. Dyer, C. H., 1993, World News and Biblical Prophecy, Wheaton, Ill. Ecclestone, G. S., 1981, The Church of England and Politics, London. Ecclestone, G. S., 1985, ‘The General Synod and Politics’, in G. Moyser (ed.), Church and Politics Today: The Role of the Church of England in Contemporary Politics, Edinburgh, pp. 107–27. Edwards, D. L., 1978, Leaders of the Church of England 1828–1978, London.

258 Bibliography Edwards, D. L., 1987, The Future of Christianity, London. Edwards, D. L., 1990, Christians in a New Europe, London. Ehteshami, A., 1995, After Khomeini: The Iranian Second Republic, London, pp. 48–51. Eickelmann, D. and Piscatori, J., 1996, Muslim Politics, Princeton. Elliott, C., 1987, Comfortable Compassion? Poverty, Power and the Church, London. Elliot, M. with Power, C., 1996, ‘The Things that Matter’, Newsweek 15 January, p. 2. Ellis, J., 1986, The Russian Orthodox Church: A Contemporary History, Beckenham. Elst, K., 1991, ‘Interview of G. Jain, “Ayodhya and After: Issues Before Hindu Society”’, Voice of India, New Delhi, p. 365. Embree, A. T., 1990, Utopias in Conflict: Religion and Nationalism in Modern India, Berkeley. Entelis, J. P., 1995, ‘Political Islam in Algeria: The Nonviolent Dimension’, Current History 94.588, January, p. 16. Entelis, J. P. and Arone, L. J., 1992, ‘Algeria in Turmoil: Islam, Democracy and The State’, Middle East Policy 1.2, p. 28. Erdman, H. L., 1966, ‘The Foreign Policy Views of the Indian “Right”’, Pacific Affairs, 39.1–2, pp. 5–18. Erdman, H. L., 1967, The Swatantra Party and Indian Conservatism, Cambridge. Esposito, J. L., 1984, Islam and Politics, 3rd edn, Syracuse. Esposito, J. L., 1997, Political Islam, London. Esposito, J. L. and Piscatori, J. P., 1991, ‘Democratization and Islam’, Middle East Journal 45.3, Summer, p. 428. Esposito, J. and Voll, J., 1996, Islam and Democracy, Oxford. Ester, P., Halman, L. and Du Moor, R. (eds), 1993, The Individualizing Society, Tilburg. Evans, A. B., 1994, Soviet Marixm–Leninism, New York. Falwell, J., 1980, Listen America!, New York. Fandy, M., 1994, ‘Egypt’s Islamic Group: Regional Revenge?’ Middle East Journal 48.4, Autumn, pp. 607–25. Farer, T., 1991, ‘Israel’s Unlawful Occupation’, Foreign Policy 82, Spring, pp. 37–58. Farsoun, S. K. and Mayshayeki, M. (eds), 1990, Iran: Political Culture in the Islamic Republic, London. Ferdinand, P., 1994, ‘Xinjiang: Relations with China and Abroad’, in Goodman, D. C. and Segal, G. (eds), China Deconstructs, London and New York, pp. 271–85. Ferris, E. G., 1993, Beyond Borders: Refugees, Migrants and Human Rights in the post-Cold War Era, Geneva. Findaly, J. F., 1998, Church People in the Struggle, Oxford. Finke, R. and Stark, R., 1986, ‘Turning Pews into People: Estimating 19th century Church Membership’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 25, pp. 186–92. Finke, R. and Stark, R., 1992, The Churching of America 1776–1990, New Brunswick, N.J. Finn, J., 1993, ‘Morality and Foreign Policy’, in Cromartie, M. (ed.), Might and Right After the Cold War: Can Foreign Policy be Moral?, Wash. Fischer, M. M. J., 1980, Iran: From Religious Dispute to Revolution, Cambridge, Mass. Fleet, M. and Smith, B. H., 1997, The Catholic Church and Democracy in Chile and Peru, Notre Dame.

Bibliography 259 Fogarty, M., 1957, Christian Democracy in Western Europe 1820–1953, London. Foreign Affairs Committee, 1996, The Future Role of the Commonwealth Vol. II, Minutes of Evidence and Appendices, London (House of Commons). Fowden, G., 1993, Empire to Commonwealth: the Consequences of Monotheism in Late Antiquity, Princeton. Frost, B., 1991, The Politics of Peace, London. Fuller, G. E, 1991, The ‘Centre of the Universe’ – The Geopolitics of Iran, London. Fuller, G. E. and Lesser, I. O., 1995, A Sense of Siege: The Geopolitics of Islam and The West, London. Fuller, M., 1996, Political Stability and Religion: Fundamentalism in Perspective, London. Furlong, P. and Curtis, D. (eds), 1994, The Church Faces the Modern World, Winteringham. Galanter, M., 1984, Competing Equalities, Berkeley, Calif. Gandhi, R., 1991, ‘Patel, Nehru and the Mahatma’, Indian Express Sunday Magazine, 20 January. Gangal, S. C., 1979, ‘Trends in India’s Foreign Policy’, in Misra, K. P. (ed.), Janata’s Foreign Policy, New Delhi, pp. 27–56. Ganslen, F., 1986, ‘Culture and Decision making in China, Japan, Russia and the United States’, World Politics 39, pp. 78–103 . Gardell, M., 1996, ‘Behold I Make all Things New! Black Militant Islam and the American Apocalypse’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State: The Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London, pp. 48–74. Garrett, W. and Robertson, R. (eds), 1991, Religion and Global Order: Religion and the Political Order, vol. 4, New York. Garvey, J. H., 1993, ‘Fundamentalism and American Law’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby R. S. (eds), Fundamentalisms and the State, London, pp. 28– 49. Gautier, M. L., 1997, ‘Church Attendance and Religious Belief in Postcommunist Societies’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36, pp. 289–96. Gifford, P., 1994, ‘Some Recent Developments in African Christianity’, African Affairs 93.373, pp. 513–34. Gill, R., 1984, The Cross Against the Bomb, London. Gill, R., 1993, The Myth of the Empty Church, London. Gilmour, I., 1993, Dancing with Dogma: Britain under Thatcherism, London. Gitari, Bishop D., 1996, In Season and Out of Season: Sermons to a Nation, Carlisle. Gladney, D., 1993, ‘The Muslim Face of China’, Current History 92.575, pp. 275–80. Gladney, D., 1994, ‘Ethnic Identity in China: The New Politics of Difference’, Joseph, W. J. (ed.), China Briefing, Boulder, Colo., pp. 171–82. Gladney, D., 1996, Muslim Chinese, Cambridge, Mass. (2nd edn). Gladwin, J. (ed.), 1985, Dropping the Bomb: The Church and the Bomb Debate, London. Goekel, R., 1990, The Lutheran Church and the East German State, Ithaca. Goldsmith, M., 1989, What About Other Faiths? London. Goldstein, J., 1996, International Relations, 2nd edn, New York. Golwalkar, M. R., 1959, Justice on Trial: A Collection of the Historic Letters between Sri Guruji and the Government, 1948–49, Bangalore. Goodwin, G. (ed.), 1982, Ethics and Nuclear Deterrence, London. Gordon, S., 1995, India’s Rise to Power in the Twentieth Century and Beyond, New York.

260 Bibliography Gosling, D., 1992, A New Earth: Covenanting for Justice, Peace and the Integrity of Creation, London. Graham, B., 1990, Hindu Nationalism and Indian Politics: The Origins and Development of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh, Cambridge. Graham, B., 1992, Storm Warning, Milton Keynes. Grant, E., 1997, The Foundations of Modern Science in the Middle Ages, Cambridge. Gravers, M., 1996, ‘Questioning Autocracy in Burma’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State, London, pp. 297–322. Gray, J., 1998, ‘Global Utopias and Clashing Civilizations: Misunderstanding the Present’, International Affairs 74.1, pp. 149–64. Graybill, L. S., 1996, Religion and Resistance Politics in South Africa, Greenwood Press. Greeley, A., 1990, The Catholic Myth: The Behaviour and Beliefs of American Catholics, New York. Greeley, A., 1992, ‘Religion in Britain, Ireland and the USA’, in Jowell, R., Brook, L., Prior, G. and Taylor, B. (eds), British Social Attitudes, Aldershot, pp. 51–70. Gurr, E. R., 1994, ‘Peoples Against States: Ethnopolitical Conflict and the Changing World System’, International Studies Quarterly 38, pp. 347–77. Haafkens, J., 1991, Christianity and Islam in Africa, Mombasa. Habgood, J., 1981, ‘Theological Reflections on Compromise’, in Sims, N. A. (ed.), Exploration and Ethics in International Relations, London, pp. 111–20. Habgood, J., 1983, Church and Nation in a Secular Age, London. Habib, A., 1995, ‘Un fil religieux relie l’armée et les Islamistes’ in Le Monde: L’Algérie, De L’Indèpendence à La Guerre Civile, Le Monde, 16 November, iv. Hadar, L. T., 1993, ‘What Green Peril?’ Foreign Affairs 72.2, Spring, p. 27. Hadden, J. and Schupe, A. (eds), 1989, Secularization and Fundamentalism Reconsidered, New York. Hallencreutz, C. F. and Westerlund, D., 1996, ‘Introduction: The Anti-secularist Policies of Religion’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State: The Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London, pp. 1–23. Halliday, F., 1995, Islam and the Myth of Confrontation: Religion and Politics in the Middle East, London. Halsell, G., 1987, Prophecy and Politics: Militant Evangelists on the Road to Nuclear War, Bullbrook, Aust. Hamad, W., 1994, ‘The Dialectics of Revolutionary Islamic Thought and Action’, The Arab Review 2.3, Winter, p. 40. Hammond, P. (ed.), 1985, The Sacred in a Secular Age, Berkeley. Hank, J., 1992, ‘Religion and Nationalist Subcultures in the Baltics’, Journal of Baltic Studies 23.2, pp. 133– 48. Hank, J., 1993, ‘Religio-nationalist Subcultures under the Communists: Comparisons from the Baltics, Transcaucasia and the Ukraine’, Sociology of Religion 54.3, pp. 237–55. Hanley, D. (ed.), 1994, Christian Democracy in Europe: A Comparative Perspective, London. Hanson, E. O., 1987, The Catholic Church in World Politics, Princeton, N.J. Hardacre, H., 1984, Lay Buddhism in Contemporary Japan, Princeton, N.J. Hardacre, H., 1986, Kurozumikyo and the New Religions of Japan, Princeton, N.J. Harding, S., 1994, ‘Imagining the Last Days: The Politics of Apocalyptic Language’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), Accounting for Fundamentalisms: The Dynamic Character of Movements, Chicago, pp. 57–78.

Bibliography 261 Hardy, F., 1984, ‘How ‘’Indian’’ are the new Indian religions in the West?’ Religion Today 1. 2/3, pp. 15–18. Harries, R., 1986, Christianity in a Nuclear Age, London. Harris, H. A., 1998, Fundamentalism and Evangelicals, Oxford. Harrison, P., 1998, The Bible, Protestantism and the Rise of Natural Science, Cambridge. Harrison, S., 1960, India: The Most Dangerous Decades, Princeton. Hastings, A., 1990, ‘Pluralism: The Relationship of Theology to Religious Studies’, in Hamnett, I. (ed.), Religious Pluralism and Unbelief: Studies Critical and Comparative, London and New York, pp. 226– 40. Hastings, A., 1994, ‘SOS Bosnia 28 February 1994’, Theology, July/August, pp. 242– 4. Hastings, A., 1997, The Construction of Nationhood: Ethnicity, Religion and Nationalism, Cambridge. Hay, D., 1990, Religious Experience Today: Studying the Facts, London. Haynes, J., 1994, Religion in Third World Politics, Boulder, Colo. Haynes, J., 1995, Religion, Fundamentalism and Ethnicity: A Global Perspective, Geneva. Haynes, J., 1998, Religion in Global Politics, London. Heath, A., Taylor, B. and Toka, G., 1993, ‘Religion, Morality and Politics’, in Jewell, R., Brook, L. and Dowds, L. (with D. Arendt) (eds), International Social Attitudes, Aldershot, pp. 49–80. Hellman, E., 1996, ‘Dynamic Hinduism: Towards a New Hindu Nation’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State: The Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London, pp. 237–58 . Hendry, J. (ed.), 1998, Interpreting Japanese Society, London, 2nd edn. Henry, C. F. H., 1947, The Uneasy Conscience of Modern Fundamentalism, Grand Rapids. Herber, T., 1989, China and its National Minorities: Autonomy or Assimilation, New York. Hermida, A., 1994, ‘Talk of a Truce’, Middle East International 483, 9 September, p. 12. Herrin, J., 1987, The Formation of Christendom, Oxford. Hertzke, A. D., 1988, Representing God in Washington: The Role of Religious Lobbies in the American Polity, Knoxville, Tenn. Hewitt, G., 1971, The Problems of Success: A History of the Church Missionary Society 1910–1942, vol. I, London. Hewitt, G., 1991, Terry Waite: Why Was He Kidnapped? London. Hewitt, V. M., 1992, The International Politics of South Asia, Manchester. Hijari, N., 1997, ‘Simmering Discontent’, Time, 21 April, pp. 58. Hirst, D., 1994, ‘Chaos Closes in on Old Regimes’, The Guardian, 15 March. Hocking, B. and Smith, M., 1990, World Politics, London. Hoffman, P. and Miller, A. S., 1997, ‘Social and Political Attitudes among Religious Groups: Convergence and Divergence over Time’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36.1, pp. 52–70. Hogg, A. and Berger, C., 1993, ‘Hardline Mubarak Losing War with Islamic Militants’, The Sunday Times, 22 August, p. 13. Holsti, K. J., 1992, International Politics: A Framework For Analysis, Englewood Cliffs. Holt, M. P., 1995, The French Wars of Religion, 1562–1629, Cambridge.

262 Bibliography Hooker, M. B., 1988, Islam in South East Asia, Leiden. Hori, I., 1968, Folk Religion in Contemporary Japan: Continuity and Change, Chicago. Hourani, A., 1967, Arabic Liberal Thought in the Modern Age, 1798–1939, Oxford. Howard, M., 1989, ‘Ideology and International Relations’, Review of International Studies 15, pp. 1–10. Howell, J., 1992a, ‘Religious Traditions of Asia in Eastern Asia’, in Mackerras, C. (ed.), Eastern Asia, London, pp. 51–68. Howell, J., 1992b, ‘The Role of Religions in Modernizing Asia’, in Mackerras, C. (ed.), Eastern Asia, London, pp. 498–509. Huddleston, J., 1976, The Earth is But One Country, Oakham. Huddleston, T., 1977, Naught for Your Comfort, London. Hudson, D., 1977, The World Council of Churches in International Affairs, Leighton Buzzard. Hudson, M. C., 1991, ‘After The Gulf War: Prospects for Democratization in The Arab World’, Middle East Journal 45.3, Summer, p. 414. Hunter, A. and Rimmington, D. (eds), 1996, All Under Heaven, Kampen, Netherlands. Hunter, S. T., 1987, ‘After the Ayatollah’, Foreign Policy 66, Spring 1987, pp. 77–8. Huntington, S. P., 1991, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century, Norman, Okla. Huntington, S. P., 1993a, ‘The Clash of Civilizations?’ Foreign Affairs 72.3 (Summer), pp. 22– 49. Huntington, S. P., 1993b, ‘If Not Civilizations, What? Paradigms of the PostCold War World’, Foreign Affairs 72.5 (November/December), pp. 186–94. Huntington, S. P., 1996, The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of the World Order, New York. Husain, M. Z., 1995, Global Islamic Politics, London. Hussein, S., 1991, Islam and Human Rights, Petaling, Jaya. Iannaccone, L. R., 1993, ‘The Economics of American Fundamentalists’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), Fundamentalisms and the State: Remaking Polities, Economies, and Militance, Chicago, pp. 342–66. IGBM (Interagency Group on Breastfeeding Monitoring), 1997, Cracking the Code: Monitoring the International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes, London. Ilesanmi, O., 1995, ‘The Myth of a Secular State: A Study of Religious Politics with Historical Illustrations’, Islam and Christian Muslim Relations 6.1, pp. 105–17. Iqbal, M., 1986, Islamic Economy, Needs Fulfilment and Distributive Justice, London. Jain, B. M., 1987, South Asian Security: Problems and Prospects, New Delhi. Jain, S., 1996, ‘Victory More Illusory Than Real’, India Today, 31 January, pp. 68–9. Janke, P. (ed.), 1994, Ethnic and Religious Conflicts: Europe and Asia, Aldershot. Jansen, T., 1991, ‘European Union: A Spiritual Adventure’, European Vision 11. Jawaharlal, N., 1980, ‘The Question of Kashmir’, in Gopal, S. (ed.), Nehru: An Anthology, New Delhi, p. 224. Jelen, T. G. and Wilcox, C., 1998, ‘Context and Conscience: The Catholic Church as an Agent of Political Socialization in Western Europe’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 37, pp. 28– 40.

Bibliography 263 Jennings, J., 1997, The Business of Abolishing the British Slave Trade 1783–1807, London. Jewell, R., Brook, L. and Dowds, L. (with D. Arendt) (eds), 1993, International Social Attitudes, Aldershot. Johns, A. H., 1987, ‘Indonesia, Islam and Cultural Pluralism’, in Esposito, J. L. (ed.), Islam in Asia: Religion, Politics and Society, Oxford, pp. 202–9. Johnson, D., 1994a, ‘Introduction: Beyond Power Politics’, in Johnson, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), Religion, The Missing Dimension of Statecraft, Oxford, pp. 3–7. Johnson, D., 1994b, ‘The Churches and Apartheid in South Africa’, in Johnson, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), Religion, the Missing Dimension of Statecraft, Oxford, pp. 177–207. Johnston, A. I., 1995, Cultural Realism, Princeton. Johnston, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), 1994, Religion, The Missing Dimension in Statecraft, New York. Johnstone, P., 1993, Operation World, Carlisle. Joll, J., 1985, ‘Two Prophets of the Twentieth Century: Spengler and Toynbee’, Review of International Studies 11, pp. 91–104. Jones, H. B., 1997, ‘The Protestant Ethic: Weber’s model and the Empirical Literature’, Human Relations 50.7, pp. 757–78. Joshi, M., 1998a, ‘Nuclear Shock Waves’, India Today, 25 May. Joshi, M., 1998b, ‘Slow March’, India Today, 25 May. Joshi, M., 1998c, ‘Marginal Costing’, India Today, 1 June, pp. 22–3. Jubilee 2000 (1996), The Debt Cutter’s Handbook, London. Jurgensmeyer, M., 1993, The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State, Berkeley, Calif. Kakar, S., 1996, ‘The Construction of a New Hindu Identity’, in Basu, K. and Subrahmanyam, S. (eds), Unravelling the Nation: Sectarian Conflict and India’s Secular Identity, Boulder, Colo. Kalimullah, N. A. and Frazer, C. B., 1990, ‘Islamic Non-Governmental Organisations in Bangladesh with Reference to Three Case Studies’, The Islamic Quarterly 34.2, pp. 71–92. Kalyvas, S. N., 1996, The Rise of Christian Democracy in Europe, Cornell. Kalyvas, S. N., 1998a, ‘From Pulpit to Party: Party Formation and the Christian Democratic Phenomenon’, Comparative Political Studies 30.3, pp. 293–312. Kalyvas, S. N., 1998b, ‘Democracy and Religious Politics’, Comparative Political Studies 31.3, pp. 292–330. Kanhya, K. L. and Teng, M. K., 1992, ‘Human Rights Violations of Kashmiri Hindus’, in Thomas, R. G. C. (ed.), Perspectives on Kashmir: Roots of Conflict in South Asia, Boulder, Colo., pp. 174 –88. Kapil, A., 1995, ‘Algeria’s Crisis Intensifies: The Search For a “Civic Pact”’, Middle East Report 192, January–February, p. 5. Kaplan, J., 1995, ‘Right-wing Violence in North America’, Terrorism and Political Violence 7.1, pp. 44 –95. Kaplan, J., 1996, ‘Absolute Rescue: Absolutism, Defensive Action and the Resort to Force’, in Michael Barkun, (ed.), Millennialism and Violence, London, pp. 128–63. Karanjia, R. K., 1960, The Mind of Mr Nehru: An Interview with R. K. Karanjia, London. Karanjia, R. K., 1966, The Philosophy of Mr Nehru: As Revealed in a Series of Talks with R. K. Karanjia, London.

264 Bibliography Karl, D. J., 1997, ‘Proliferation, Pessimism and Emerging Nuclear Powers: Reply’, International Security, 22.2, pp. 202–7. Katzenstein, P. J., 1996a, Cultural Norms and National Security, Ithaca. Katzenstein, P. J. (ed.), 1996b, The Culture of National Security, New York. Keating, M., 1998, ‘Principles Clash in Afghanistan’, The World Today 54.5, pp. 131–2. Kedourie, E., 1979, ‘Religion and Politics; Arnold Toynbee and Martin Wight’, British Journal of International Studies 5, pp. 6–14. Kedourie, E., 1980, Islam in the Modern World, London. Kedourie, E., 1994, Democracy and Arab Political Culture, London. Kegley, C., 1969, Politics, Religion and Modern Man – Essays on Reinhold Niebuhr, Paul Tillich and Rudolf Bultmann, Quezon City, Philippines. Kegley, C. (ed.), 1995, Controversies in International Relations Theory, London. Kegley, C. and Wittkoph, E., 1997, World Politics: Trend and Transformation, 6th edn, New York. Keleher, S., 1997, ‘Orthodox Rivalry in the Twentieth Century: Moscow versus Constantinople’, Religion, State and Society 25.2, pp. 125–38. Kelsay, J. and Twiss, S. B., 1994, Religion and Human Rights, New York. Kennan, G., 1985/6, ‘Morality and Foreign Policy’, Foreign Affairs 64, Winter, pp. 205–18. Kent, P. C. and Pollard, J. F. (eds), 1994, Papal Diplomacy in the Modern Age, New York. Kent, R. C., 1987, Anatomy of Disaster Relief: The International Network in Action, London. Kepel, G., 1991, La Revanche de Dieu, Paris. Kepel, G., 1993, Muslim Extremism in Egypt: The Prophet and The Pharaoh, Berkeley, Calif. Kepel, G., 1994, The Revenge of God: The Resurgence of Islam, Christianity and Judaism in the Modern World, trs. Alan Braley, Cambridge. Kepel, G., 1997, Allah in the West: Islamic Movements in America and Europe, Cambridge. Kidron, M. and Segal, R., 1995, The State of the World Atlas, London, 2nd edn. Kiecolt, J. K. and Hart, N. M., 1988, ‘The Structuring of Political Attitudes among Liberal and Conservative Protestants’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 27, pp. 48–59. Kim, A. E., 1995, ‘A History of Christianity in Korea: From its Troubled Beginnings to its Contemporary Success’, Korea Journal 35.2, pp. 34 –53. King, R., 1987, The Iran–Iraq War: The Political Implications, Adelphi Paper Number 219, Spring. Kirk, A. (ed.), 1988, Handling Problems of Peace and War: An Evangelical Debate, Basingstoke. Kitagawa, J. M., 1987, On Understanding Japanese Religion, Princeton, N.J. Kitromilides, P. M., 1994, Enlightenment, Nationalism, Orthodoxy: Studies in the Culture and Political Thought of South-Eastern Europe, Aldershot. Klein, E., 1996, Lost Jews, Basingstoke. Knott, K., 1992, The Changing Character of the Religions of the Ethnic Minorities of Asian Origin in Britain: Final Report of a Leverhulme Project, Leeds. Koch, A. R. and Sidhu, W. P. S., 1998, ‘South Asia goes Ballistic, then Nuclear’, Jane’s Intelligence Review, 10.6, pp. 36–7.

Bibliography 265 Kornicki, P. F. and McMullen, I. J. (eds), 1996, Religion in Japan: Arrows to Heaven and Earth, Cambridge. Koshy, N., 1994, Churches in the World of Nations: International Politics and the Mission and Ministry of the Church, Geneva. Kramer, G., 1997, ‘Islamist Notions of Democracy’, in Beinin, J. and Stork, J. (eds), Political Islam, London, pp. 71–82. Kramer, H., 1996, ‘Turkey under Erbakan: Continuity and Change toward Islam’, Aussen Politik 47.4, pp. 379–88. Kratochwil, F. V., 1993, ‘The Embarrassment of Changes: Neo-Realism as the Science of Realpolitik Without Politics’, Review of International Studies 19.1, pp. 63–80. Kreeft, P., 1996, Ecumenical Jihad: Ecumenism and the Culture War, San Francisco. Küng, H., 1993, Global Responsibility, London. Küng, H., 1995, Christianity and the World Religions, London. Küng, H. (ed.), 1996, Yes to a Global Ethic, London. Küng, H. and Ching, J., 1989, Christianity and the Chinese Religions, New York. Küng, H. and Kuschel, K-J. (eds), 1993, A Global Ethic: The Declaration of the Parliament of the World’s Religions, London. Kuper, L., 1985, The Prevention of Genocide, Yale. Labat, S., 1995, ‘Le FIS à l’Épreuve de la Lutte Armée’ in Leveau, R. (ed.), L’Algérie Dans La Guerre, Brussels, p. 98. Lam, A., 1997, ‘The Catholic Church in Hong Kong’, China Review 6, pp. 15–16. Lamberts, E. (ed.), 1997, Christian Democracy in the European Union (1945–1995), Leuven. Landau, J. M., 1994, The Politics of Pan-Islam: Ideology and Organisation, Oxford. Lapid, Y. and Kratochwil, F. (eds), 1996, The Return to Culture and Identity in IR Theory, Boulder, Colo. and London. Laris, M., Wehrfritz, G. and Clemetson, L., 1997, ‘Pray for China’, Newsweek 9 June, pp. 46–7. Larson, G. J., 1995, India’s Agony over Religion, Albany, N.Y. Laub, F., 1982, Die Begegung des fruhen Christentums mit der antiken Slaverei, Stuttgart. Lawrence, B. B., 1990, Defenders of God: The Fundamentalist Revolt against the Modern Age, London. Lebow, R. N., 1994, ‘The Long Peace, the End of the Cold War and Failure of Realism’, International Organization 48.2, pp. 249–77. Lechner, F., 1989 ‘Cultural Aspects of the Modern World System’, in Swatos, W. H., Jr. (ed.), Religious Politics in Global and Comparative Perspective, New York, pp. 11–27. Lechner, F., 1991, ‘The Case against Secularization: A Rebuttal’, Social Forces 69, pp. 1103–19. Leibman, R. C. and Wuthnow, R. (eds), 1983, The New Christian Right: Mobilization and Legitimation, New York. Lewis, B., 1961, The Emergence of Modern Turkey, London. Liebman, C. S., 1983, ‘Extremism as a Religious Norm’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 22.1, pp. 75–86. Lifschultz, L., 1998, ‘Doom thy Neighbour’, Far Eastern Economic Review, 4 June, pp. 30 –34. Limaye, M., 1984, The Problems of India’s Foreign Policy, New Delhi.

266 Bibliography Linabury, G., 1992, ‘Ayatollah Khomeini’s Islamic legacy’, in Amirahmadi, H. and Entessar, N. (eds), Reconstruction and Regional Diplomacy in the Persian Gulf, London, ch. 2. Lindsey, H., 1980, The 1980s: Countdown to Armageddon, King of Prussia, Pa. Lindsey, H., 1990, The Late Great Planet Earth, London. Ling, T. (ed.), 1993, Buddhist Trends in Southeast Asia, Singapore. Lipman, V., 1990, A History of the Jews in Britain Since 1858, Leicester. Little, D., 1988, Human Rights and the Conflict of Cultures: Freedom of Religion and Conscience in the West and Islam, Columbia. Little, R. and Smith, S. (eds), 1988, Belief Systems and International Relations, Oxford. Lovatt, D., 1997, ‘Islam, Secularism and Civil Society’, The World Today, pp. 226–8. Luttwak, E., 1994, ‘The Missing Dimension’, in Johnston, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), Religion, The Missing Dimension in Statecraft, New York, pp. 8–19. Luxmoore, J., 1995, ‘Eastern Europe 1994: A Review of Religious Life in Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland’, Religion, State and Society 23.2, pp. 213–20. Luxmoore, J., 1997, ‘Eastern Europe 1996: A Review of Religious Life in Albania, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland’, Religion, State and Society 25.1, pp. 89–102. Lynch, E. A., 1991, Religion and Politics in Latin America, New York. Lynch, E. A., 1993, Latin America’s Christian Democratic Parties, New York. McCall, T. S. (ed.), 1976, America: In History and Bible Prophecy, Chicago. McCloud, A. B., 1995, African American Islam, London. McCullum, H., 1994, The Angels Have Left Us: The Rwanda Tragedy and the Churches, Geneva. McDonald, H., 1992, ‘Destroyer of Worlds: Concerns Grow over Nuclear Arms Potential’, Far Eastern Economic Review 155: 17, 30 April. Macinnis, D. E., 1989, Religion in China Today, New York. Mackinnon, D. M., 1980, ‘Power Politics and Religious Faith: The Fifth Martin Wight Memorial Lecture’, British Journal of International Studies 6, pp. 1–15. Madan, T. N., 1987, ‘Secularism in its Place’, The Journal of Asian Studies 46: 4, November, pp. 747–59. Maddy-Weitzman, B. and Inbar, E. (eds), 1997, Religious Radicalism in the Greater Middle East, London. Madeley, J., 1991, ‘Politics and Religion in Western Europe’, in Moyser, G. (ed.), Politics and Religion in the Modern World, London, pp. 28–66. Maitland, S., 1992, ‘Biblicism: A Radical Rhetoric?’ in Sahgal, G. and YuvalDavis, N. (eds), Refusing Holy Orders: Women and Fundamentalism in Britain, London, pp. 26– 44. Malcolm, N., 1998, Kosovo: A Short History, London. Maley, W. (ed.), 1998, Fundamentalism Reborn? London. Mango, C., 1980, Byzantium, London. Manor, J. and Segal, G., 1998, ‘Taking India Seriously’, Survival, 40.2, pp. 53–70. Mansbach, R. W., 1997, The Global Puzzle: Issues and Actors in World Politics, 2nd edn, Boston. Marsden, G. M., 1980, Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth Century Evangelicalism 1870–1925, New York.

Bibliography 267 Marshall, I. H., 1992, ‘Are Evangelicals Fundamentalists?’ Vox Evangelica, pp. 7–24. Marshall, P., 1984, Thine is the Kingdom: A Biblical Perspective on the Nature of Government and Politics Today, Basingstoke. Martin, D., 1987, A General Theory of Secularization, Oxford. Martin, D., 1990, Tongues of Fire: The Explosion of Protestantism in Latin America, Oxford. Martin, D. and Mullen, P. (eds), 1983, Unholy Warfare: The Church and the Bomb, London. Martin, J. D., 1984, The Persecution of the Bahá’ís of Iran 1844–1984, Canada. Martinez, L., 1995, ‘L’Envirement de La Violence: “Djihad” Dans La Banlieue d’Alger’, in Leveau, R. (ed.), L’Algérie Dans La Guerre, Brussels, pp. 39– 46. Martin-Muñoz, G., 1995, ‘Egypte et Algérie: Convergences et Divergences’, Politique Étrangère 60.2, Summer, p. 406. Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), 1993, Fundamentalisms and Society, Chicago. Mathur, S., 1996, Hindu Revivalism and the Indian National Movement, Jodhpur. Matthews, B., 1996, ‘Buddhist Activism in Sri Lanka’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State, London, pp. 284 –96. Mattoo, A., 1996, ‘India’s Nuclear Status Quo’, Survival, 38.3, pp. 41–57. Mayer, A. E., 1991, Islam and Human Rights: Tradition and Politics, London. Mayer, J-F., 1995, Religions et Securite Internationales, Berne. Mayeur, J-M., 1980, Des parties catholiques à la démocratie Chrétienne XIXe–XXe siecles, Paris. MECC (Middle East Council of Churches), 1986, Who are the Christians of the Middle East? Limassol. Medhurst, K. N. and Moyser, G. H., 1988, Church and Politics in a Secular Age, Oxford. Meek, J., 1997, ‘Sour Bill for the Milk Sect’, The Guardian, 22 July. Menashari, D. (ed.), 1990, The Iranian Revolution and the Muslim World, Boulder, Colo. Mews, S. (ed.), 1989, Religion in World Politics, London. Meyendorff, J., 1996, Rome, Constantinople and Moscow, Crestwood, N.Y. Meyer, T., 1989, Der Fundamentalismus: Aufstand gegen die Moderne Reibek bei, Hamburg. Meyrick, S., 1997, ‘Arms Sales come under Fire’, Church Times, 1 August, p. 1. Michel, P., 1991, Politics and Religion in Eastern Europe, Oxford. Miller, J., 1993, ‘The Challenge of Radical Islam’, Foreign Affairs, 72.2, Spring, p. 45. Mitra, S. K., 1991, ‘Descularising the State: Religion and Politics in India after independence’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 33.4, pp. 755–77. Mojzes, P., 1994, Yugoslavian Inferno: Ethnoreligious Warfare in the Balkans, New York. Momen, M., 1981, The Babi and Bahá’ís Religions 1844–1944: Some Contemporary Western Accounts, Hove. Montefiore, H., 1990, Christianity and Politics, London. Mortimer, E., 1982, Faith and Power: The Politics of Islam, London. Mowat, R. C., 1991, Decline and Renewal, Oxford. Moyser, G. (ed.), 1985, Church and Politics Today: The Role of the Church of England in Contemporary Politics, Edinburgh.

268 Bibliography Moyser, G. (ed.), 1991, Politics and Religion in the Modern World, London. Mulkani, K. R., 1991, ‘The Hindu Confederacy’, The Illustrated Weekly of India, 5 January. Mutalib, H., 1990, Islam and Ethnicity in Malay Politics, Singapore. Muzaffar, C., 1988, ‘Islamic Resurgence and the Question of Development in Malaysia’, in Ghee, L. T. (ed.), Reflections on Development in Southeast Asia, Singapore, pp. 1–25. Nagata, J., 1980, ‘The New Fundamentalism: Islam in Contemporary Malaysia’, Asian Thought and Society 5.14, pp. 128– 41. Nair, S., 1997, Islam in Malaysian Foreign Policy, London. Nakhoul, S., 1993, ‘Cairo Bombers Linked to Gang That Killed Sadat’, Independent, 20 August, p. 10. Naipaul, V. S., 1984, in New York Review of Books, 25 October. Nanda, B. R. (ed.), 1976, Indian Foreign Policy: The Nehru Years, Delhi. Nandy, A., 1985, ‘An Anti-secularist Manifesto’, Seminar 314, October, pp. 14 –24. Nayar, B. R., 1977, ‘India and the Superpowers: Deviation or Continuity in Foreign Policy’, Economic and Political Weekly, 12, 30 July. Nazir-Ali, M., 1989, ‘Fidelity, Freedom and Friendship: Christians in Plural Societies’, in Vinay Samuel and Albrecht Hauser (eds), Proclaiming Christ in Christ’s Way: Studies in Integral Evangelism, Oxford, pp. 85–100. Negrine, R. and Papathanassopoulos, S., 1990, The Internationalization of Television, London. Neill, S., 1964, A History of Christian Missions: Pelican History of the Church, vol. 6, London. Neuhaus, J. (ed.), 1986, Unsecular America, Michigan. Neuhaus, R. J. (ed.), 1987, The Bible, Politics, and Democracy, Grand Rapids. Neuhaus, R. J. and Cromartie, M. (eds), 1987, Piety and Politics: Evangelicals and Fundamentalists Confront the World, Wash. Newbiggin, L., 1995, The Open Secret, rev. edn, London. Nichols, A., 1995, ‘Projecting the Future: What will the World be Like in the Year 2020?’, Transformation 12.2, August, pp. 19–22. Nielsen, J., 1992, Muslims in Western Europe, Edinburgh. Nielsen, J., 1997, Christian–Muslim Frontier, New York. Noll, M. A., 1994, The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, Grand Rapids. Nonneman, G., Niblock, T. and Szajkowski, B. (eds), 1991, Muslim Communities in Europe, Reading. Noori, Y., 1988, Finality of Prophethood in Islam: Critical Analysis of Babism, Baha’ism and Qadiyanism, Glasgow. Norbeck, E., 1971, Religion and Society in Modern Japan: Continuity and Change, Houston. North, G., 1984, Backward, Christian Soldiers?: An Action Manual for Christian Reconstruction, Tyler, Tex. North, O., 1987, Taking the Stand: The Complete Testimony of Lieutenant Colonel Oliver L. North, New York. North, O. with Novak, W., 1992, Under Fire: An American Story, London. Norton, A. R. and Wright, R., 1992, ‘Islam by Profession’, The Middle East 218, December, pp. 16–18. Norton, A. R. and Wright, R., 1993, ‘The Islamization of Modernity’, The Middle East 220, February, p. 20.

Bibliography 269 Norton, A. R. and Wright, R., 1994/5, ‘The Post-Peace Crisis in The Middle East’, Survival 36.4, Winter. Nye, J., 1990a, ‘Soft Power’, Foreign Policy, 80, Fall, pp. 160 –64. Nye, J., 1990b, ‘The Changing Nature of World Power’, Political Science Quarterly Summer, pp. 177–92. O’Brien, C. C., 1988, Godland: Reflections on Religion and Nationalism, Cambridge. O’Brien, J. and Palmer, M. (eds), 1993, The State of Religion Atlas, London. Olivier, R., 1994, The Failure of Political Islam, London. O’Mahony, A. et al. (eds), 1995, The Christian Heritage in the Holy Land, London. Osmond, R., 1993, Changing Perspectives: Christian Culture and Morals in England Today, London. Ostling, R., 1996, ‘A Flock Going Astray’, Time 1 July, p. 26. Owens, B., 1996, The Case for Aid: A Manifesto, London. Packer, J. I., 1958, ‘Fundamentalism’ and the Word of God, London. Papini, R., 1996, The Christian Democrat International, Lichfield. Parker, G. (ed.), 1993, The Times Atlas of World History, London, 4th edn. Parland, T., 1996, ‘Christian Orthodoxy and Contemporary Russian Nationalism’, in Westerlund, D. (ed.), Questioning the Secular State: The Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London, pp. 117–39. Parsons, G. (ed.), 1988, Religion in Victorian Britain, Manchester. Pas, J. F. (ed.), 1989, Turning the Tide, Oxford. Pasha, M. K., 1992, ‘Beyond the Two-Nation Divide: Kashmir and Resurgent Islam’, in Thomas, R. G. C. (ed.), Perspectives on Kashmir: Roots of Conflict in South Asia, Boulder, Colo. pp. 369–387. Patel, K., 1998, ‘Mystic Beliefs Prevalent’, The Times Higher, 1 May. Pathek, R., 1996, ‘The BJP’s Neighbourhood’, Himal: South Asia 9: 1, March, pp. 42–5. Pazukhin, Y., 1995, ‘Charting the Russian Religious Renaissance’ (trs E. Watkins), Religion, State and Society 23.1, pp. 57–74. Pelletreau, R. H. Jr., Pipes, D. and Esposito, J. L., 1994, ‘Symposium: Resurgent Islam in The Middle East’, Middle East Policy 3.2, p. 12. Peng, L., 1996, ‘Church and State Relations in China: Characteristics and Trends’, Journal of Contemporary China 5.11, pp. 69–79. Pilsbury, B., 1981, ‘The Muslim Population of China: Clarifying the Question of Size and Ethnicity’, Institute for Muslim Minority Affairs Journal 3.2, pp. 35–58. Pinnock, C. H., 1988, ‘The Finality of Jesus in a World of Religions’, in Noll, M. A. and Wells, D. F. (eds), Christian Faith and Practice in the Modern World: Theology from an Evangelical Point of View, Grand Rapids, pp. 152–68. Piscatori, J. (ed.), 1983a, Islam and Foreign Policy, Oxford. Piscatori, J. (ed.), 1983b, Islam in the Political Process, Cambridge. Piscatori, J. (ed.), 1991, Islamic Fundamentalisms and The Gulf Crisis, Chicago, Ill. Poewe, K. (ed.), 1994, Charismatic Christianity as a Global Culture, Columbia. Poliakov, S., 1992, Religion and Tradition in Central Asia, Armonk, N. Y. Pollis, A. and Schwab, P. (eds), 1980, Human Rights: Cultural and Ideological Perspectives, London. Power, C., 1997, ‘Secularist Radicalism’, Newsweek, 14 July. Preston, R. H., 1994, Confusions in Christian Social Ethics, London.

270 Bibliography Pridham, G., 1977, Christian Democracy in Western Germany, London. Prior, M. and Taylor, W. (eds), 1994, Christians in the Holy Land, London. Prodromou, E., 1996, ‘Paradigms, Power and Identity: Rediscovering Orthodoxy and Regionalizing Europe’, European Journal of Political Research 30.2, pp. 125–54. Pungur, J., 1993, ‘Contribution of the Reformed Churches to the Fall of Communism in Hungary and Romania’, in Weil, F. D., Huffman, J. and Gautier, M. (eds), Research on Democracy and Society: Democratization in Eastern and Western Europe, Greenwich, Conn., pp. 111–32. Radhakrishnan, S., 1968, The Hindu View of Life, London. Rai, B., 1994, Is India Going Islamic?, Chandigarh. Raiser, K., 1991, Ecumenism in Transition: Paradigm Shift in the Ecumenical Movement? Geneva. Rajagopalachari, C., 1957, Our Democracy and Other Essays, Madras. Rajagopalachari, C., 1960, Collected Speeches, Bombay. Ramet, P. (ed.), 1984, Religion and Nationalism in Soviet and East European Politics, London. Ramet, P. (ed.), 1988, Eastern Christianity and Politics, Durham N. C. Ramet, S. P. and Treadgold, D. W., 1995, Render Unto Caesar: The Religious Sphere in World Politics, Washington. Ramachandra, V., 1996, The Recovery of Mission: Beyond the Pluralist Paradigm, London. Ram-Prasad, C., 1993, ‘Hindutva Ideology: Extracting the Fundamentals’, Contemporary South Asia 2.3, pp. 285–309. Rantisi, A. with Beebe, R., 1990, Blessed are the Peacemakers: The Story of a Palestinian Christian, Guildford. Rapoport, D. C., 1993, ‘Comparing Militant Fundamentalist Movements and Groups’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), Fundamentalisms and the State, Chicago, pp. 429–61. Rashid, A. and Sidhva, S., 1998, ‘Might and Menace’, Far Eastern Economic Review, 4 June, pp. 17–29. Rauch, W. R., 1972, Politics and Belief in Contemporary France: Emmanuel Mournier and Christian Democracy 1932–1950, The Hague. Reader, I., 1991, Religion in Contemporary Japan, London. Reed, S., 1993, ‘The Battle for Egypt’, Foreign Affairs 72.4, September/October, pp. 95–7. Reeves, G., 1993, Communications and the Third World, London. Remond, R., 1997, ‘The Christian Churches in Europe 1918–1996’, Religion, State and Society 25.1, pp. 11–16. Richards, C., 1992, ‘Intifada’s Gentle Man of War’, The Independent, 15 December. Richards, C., 1994, ‘Algeria to Release Jailed FIS Leaders’, Independent, 9 September. Riche, P., 1976, Education and Culture in the Barbarian West, Sixth Through Eighth Centuries, (trs. J. Contreni), Columbia. Richmond, A. H., 1994, Global Apartheid, Oxford. Rizvi, M., 1994, The Roots of Islamic Fundamentalism, Lahore. Robbins, T. and Robertson, R. (eds), 1987, Church-State Relations: Tensions and Transitions, New Brunswick, N. J. Roberson, B. A., 1988, ‘The Islamic Belief System’, in Little, R. and Smith, S. (eds), 1988, Belief Systems and International Relations, Oxford, pp. 85–108.

Bibliography 271 Roberts, H., 1995, ‘Algeria’s Ruinous Impasse and The Honourable Way Out’, International Affairs 71.2, pp. 259–63. Roberts, M. W., 1998, ‘The Roman Catholic Church and Democracy in Poland’, Europe/Asia Studies 50.5, pp. 817– 42. Robertson, A. H. (revised by Merrills, J. G.), 1992, Human Rights in the World, Manchester. Robertson, R., 1987, ‘From Secularization to Globalization’, Journal of Oriental Studies 26, pp. 28–32. Robertson, R., 1989, ‘Globalization, Politics, and Religion’, in Beckford J. A. and Luckmann, T. (eds) The Changing Face of Religion, London, pp. 10 –23. Robertson, R., 1991a, Religion and Global Order, New York. Robertson, R., 1991b, ‘The Globalization Paradigm: Thinking Globally’, Religion and Social Order, pp. 207–224. Robertson, R., 1992, Globalization: Social Theory and Global Culture, London. Robertson, R. and Chirico, J., 1985, ‘Humanity, Globalization and Worldwide Religious Resurgence’, Sociological Analysis 46, pp. 219– 42. Ro’i, Y. (ed.), 1995, Muslim Euraisa, Tel Aviv. Rosen, S. P., 1996, Societies and Military Power: India and its Armies, Ithaca. Ross, F., 1995, ‘The Krishna Movement in Hungary’, Religion, State and Society 23.2, pp. 207–12. Rourke, J., 1993, International Politics on the World Stage, Sluice Dock, Conn. Roy, O., 1994, The Failure of Political Islam, London. Rubin, B., 1991, Islamic Fundamentalists in Egyptian Politics, New York. Rubin, B., 1994, ‘Religion and International Affairs’, in Johnston, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), Religion, The Missing Dimension in Statecraft, New York, pp. 20 –34. Rudolph, L. I. and Rudolph, S. H., 1987, In Pursuit of Lakshmi, Chicago. Rudolph, S. H. and Piscatori, J. (eds), 1997, Transnational Religion and Fading States, London. Runcie, R., 1996, ‘Reflections on a Visit to China’, China Review 4, pp. 21–3. Rusdoony, R. J., 1973, Institutes of Biblical Law, Nutley, N. J. Russett, B. and Starr, H., 1993, World Politics: The Menu of Choice, London. Sagan, S. D., 1997, ‘Proliferation Pessimism and Emerging Nuclear Powers: Correspondence’, International Security, 22.2, pp. 193–201. Sahliyeh, E. (ed.), 1990, Religious Resurgence and Politics in the Contemporary World, Albany, N. Y. Said, A. A., 1988, ‘Western Arrogance, Islamic Fanaticism and Terrorism’ in Alexander, Y., ‘Middle East Fundamentalism and Terrorism: Interdisciplinary Perspectives’, Terrorism 11.5, p. 382. Said, A. A., et al., 1995, Concepts of International Politics in Global Perspective, 4th edn, Englewood Cliffs, N. J. Said, E., 1981, Covering Islam, New York. Salamé, G., 1993, ‘Islam and the West’, Foreign Policy 90, pp. 22–37. Salamé, G. (ed.), 1994, Democracy without Democrats, London. Salaria, A. A., 1998, ‘India’s Aversion to Mediation on Kashmir’, Dawn, 29 June, p. 7. Samuel, V., 1995, ‘Strangers and Exiles in the Bible’, Transformation 12.2 (April/June), pp. 28–9. Samut, D., 1994, ‘Libya and the Islamic Challenge’, The World Today 50.10, pp. 198–200.

272 Bibliography Sandeen, E., 1970, The Roots of Fundamentalism: British and American Millennarianism 1800–1930, Chicago. Sanneh, L., 1993, Encountering the West: Christianity and the Global Culture Process: The African Dimension, London. Savarkar, V. D., 1942a, Hindutva, Poona. Savarkar, V. D., 1942b, Hindu Rashtra Darshan, Poona. Savarkar, V. D., 1971, Six Glorious Epochs of Indian History, Bombay. Saveed, J., 1994, Islam and Modernization, New York. Schaefer, U., 1986, The Imperishable Dominion: The Baha’i Faith and the Future of Mankind, Oxford. Schmid, A. P., 1989, Research on Gross Human Rights Violations, 2nd edn, Leiden. Schmitt, C., 1997, Roman Catholicism and Political Form, trs. G. L. Ulmen, London. Schroeder, P., 1994, ‘Historical Reality versus Neo-Realist Theory’, International Security 19.1, pp. 108– 48. Schultze, Q., 1993, ‘The Two Faces of Fundamentalist Higher Education’, in Marty, M. E. and Appleby, R. S. (eds), Fundamentalisms and Society: Reclaiming the Sciences, the Family, and Education, Chicago, pp. 490 –535. Schuman, R., 1963, Pour l’Europe, Paris. Selby, P., 1997, Grace and Mortgage: The Language of Faith and the Debt of the World, London. Seshadri, H. V., 1988, RSS: A Vision in Action, Bangalore. Shahak, I., 1997, Jewish History, Jewish Religion, London. Shirley, E. G., 1995, ‘Fundamentalism in Power: Is Iran’s Present Algeria’s Future?’, Foreign Affairs 74.3, May/June. Shupe, A. and Hadden, J. K. (eds), 1988, The Politics of Religion and Social Change, New York . Sider, R. J., 1987, Completely Pro-life, Downers Grove, Ill. Sider, R. J., 1988, Exploring the Limits of Non-Violence, London. Sider, R. J., 1990, Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger, expanded edn, London. Sider, R. J., 1993, Evangelicalism and Social Action, London. Sider, R. J. and O’Donovan, O., 1985, Peace and War: A Debate about Pacifism, Bramcote, Notts. Sidhva, S, 1998, ‘Afraid of Sanctions?’ Far Eastern Economic Review, 28 May, pp. 71–2. Silver, E. and Hadi, A. A., 1995, ‘Breakaway Hamas Group Renounces Violence’, Independent, 14 August, p. 8. Simpson, J. H., 1991, ‘Globalization and Religion: Themes and Prospects’, in Garrett, W. and Robertson, R. (eds), Religion and Global Order, New York, pp. 1–17. Simpson, J. and Shubart, T., 1995, Lifting the Veil: Life in Revolutionary Iran, London. Sims, N. A. (ed.), 1981, Exploration in Ethics in International Relations, London. Singh, N. K., 1995, ‘Ideological Posturings’, India Today, 15 December, pp. 60 –3. Singh, N. K., 1996a, ‘Back on the Agenda’, India Today, 15 January, pp. 22–5. Singh, N. K., 1996b, ‘Operating oh so smoothly’, India Today, 15 May, p. 25. Skillen, J. W., 1981, International Politics and the Demand for Global Justice, Sioux Center, Iowa. Skillen, J. W., 1990, The Scattered Voice: Christians at Odds in the Public Square, Grand Rapids.

Bibliography 273 Sloan, P., 1998, Islam, Modernity and Entrepreneurship among the Malays, London. Smith, A. D., 1991a, National Identity, London. Smith, C., 1994, India’s Ad Hoc Arsenal: Direction or Drift in Defence Policy? Oxford. Smith, C. (ed.), 1996, Disruptive Religion: The Force of Faith in Social Movement Activism, London. Smith, D. E., 1963, India as a Secular State, Princeton. Smith, D. E., 1965, Religions and Politics in Burma, Princeton N. J. Smith, D. E., 1974, Religion and Modernization, New Haven, Conn. Smith, D. E., 1990, ‘The Limits of Religious Resurgence’ in Sahliyeh, E. (ed.), Religious Resurgence and Politics in the Contemporary World, Albany, N. Y., pp. 33– 44. Smith, G. S., 1989, God and Politics: Four Views on the Reformation of Civil Government, Phillipsburg, N. J. Smith, K. E., 1997, ‘An Old Cathedral for a New Russia: The Symbolic Politics of the Reconstituted Church of Christ the Saviour’, Religion, State and Society 25.2, pp. 163–76. Smith, M., 1991b, Burma: Insurgency and the Politics of Ethnicity, London. Smith, S., 1992, ‘The Forty Years Detour: The Resurgence of Normative Theory in International Relations’, Millennium 21.3, pp. 489–506. Sondhi, M. L. and Paranjpe, S., 1995, A Peace Agenda for Indian Foreign Policy, Conflict Management Group, Centre for Science Policy, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Song, R., 1997, Christianity and Liberal Society, Oxford. Spencer, C. 1994, ‘Algeria in Crisis’, Survival 36.2, p. 151. Steele, D., 1994, ‘Religion as a Fount of Ethnic Hostility or an Agent of Reconciliation?’, Religion and War, p. 172. Stoll, D., 1990, Is Latin America Turning Protestant? The Politics of Evangelical Growth, Berkeley. Stoll, D. and Burnett, V. G. (eds), 1993, Rethinking Protestantism in Latin America, Philadelphia. Stott, J. R. W., 1978, ‘Are Evangelicals Fundamentalists?’, Christianity Today, 8 September, pp. 44 –6. Stott, J. R. W., 1984, Issues Facing Christians Today, Basingstoke. Subrahmanyam, K., 1990, Security in a Changing World, New Delhi. Sugden, C., 1990, ‘Evangelicals and Religious Pluralism’, in Hamnett, I. (ed.), Religious Pluralism and Unbelief: Studies Critical and Comparative, London, pp. 148–65. Sutherland, S. R., 1995, ‘The Role of Religion in International Conflicts: The Task of Religious Studies’, in The Scottish Journal of Theology, pp. 89–102. Swain, T. and Trompf, G., 1995, The Religions of Oceania, London. Swatos, W. (ed.), 1989, Religious Politics in Global and Comparative Perspective, New York. Swatos, W. (ed.), 1994, Politics and Religion in Central and Eastern Europe, New York. Taheri, A., 1985, The Spirit of Allah: Khomeini and the Islamic Revolution, London. Tahzib, B. G., 1995, ‘Freedom of Religion or Belief: Ensuring Effective International Legal Protection’, International Studies in Human Rights 44, The Hague. Tambiah, S. J., 1992, Buddhism Betrayed? Religion, Politics and Violence in Sri Lanka, Chicago.

274 Bibliography Taylor, J., 1993, ‘The Future of Christianity’, in McManners, J. (ed.), The Oxford History of Christianity, Oxford, pp. 644 –83. Thapar, R., 1989, ‘Imagined Religious Communities? Ancient History and the Modern Search for a Hindu Identity’, Modern Asian Studies 23.2, pp. 228–9. Thomas, A., 1995, The Fractured Family: Fundamentalists, Evangelicals and ECONI, Belfast. Thomas, M. M. et al, 1977, Some Theological Dialogues, Bangalore. Thomas, S., 1995, ‘The Global Resurgence of Religion and the Study of World Politics’, Millennium 24.2, pp. 289–99. Thornberry, P., 1991, International Law and the Rights of Minorities, Oxford. Thornberry, P., 1995, ‘The UN Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities: Background, Analyses, Observations and an Update’, in Phillips, A. and Rosas, A. (eds), Universal Minority Rights, Finland, p. 22 . Tishkov, V., 1997, ‘Political Anthropology of the Chechen War’, Security Dialogue 28.4, pp. 425–37. Tretyakov, V., 1977, ‘On the eve of the General Election’, New Times, 6 February. Troyansky, I., 1991, Religion in the Soviet Republics, New York. Tschannen, O., 1991, ‘The Secularization Paradigm: A Systematization’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 30, pp. 395– 415. Tschannen, O., 1992, Les théories de la secularization, Geneva. Turley, D., 1991, The Culture of English Antislavery 1780–1860, London. Turner, B. S., 1991, Religion and Social Theory, London. Usher, G., 1995a, Palestine in Crisis: The Struggle for Peace and Political Independence After Oslo, London, pp. 27–34. Usher, G., 1995b, ‘What Kind of nation? The Rise of Hamas in The Occupied Territories’, Race and Class 37.2, October/December, pp. 72–3. Usher, R., 1997, ‘Revival’, Time, 5 May, pp. 51–3. Vallely, P., 1990, Bad Samaritans: First World Ethics and Third World Debt, London. Van Bremen, J. and Martinez, D. P., 1995, Ceremony and Ritual in Japan: Religious Practices in an Industrialized Society, London. Van Dartel, G., 1992, ‘The Nations and the Churches in Yugoslavia’, in Religion, State and Society 20.3/4, pp. 281–2. Van Dartel, G., 1995, ‘Towards a Culture of Peace: Remarks on the Religious Aspects of the War in Bosnia and Croatia’, Religion, State and Society 23.2, pp. 200 –204. van der Bent, A., 1986a, Christian Response in a World of Crisis, Geneva. van der Bent, A., 1986b, Vital Ecumenical Concerns: Sixteen Documentary Surveys, Geneva. van der Bent, A., 1995, Commitment to God’s World: A Concise Critical Survey of Ecumenical Social Thought, Geneva. van der Vyver, J. D., 1996, ‘Religious Fundamentalism and Human Rights, Journal of International Affairs 5.1, pp. 21– 40 . Varshney, A., 1992, ‘Three Compromised Nationalisms: Why Kashmir has been a Problem’, in Thomas, R. G. C. (ed.), Perspectives on Kashmir: Roots of Conflict in South Asia, Boulder, Colo., pp. 191–234. Vatikiotis, M. R. J., 1996, Political Change in Southeast Asia, London.

Bibliography 275 Vatikiotis, P. J, 1987, Islam and the State, London. Vendley, W. and Little, D., 1994, ‘Implications for Religious Communities: Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, and Christianity’, in Johnston, D. and Sampson, C. (eds), Religion, The Missing Dimension in Statecraft, New York, pp. 306–15. Vertzberger, Y., 1990, The World in their Minds, Stanford, Calif. Vickers, M. and Pettifer, J., 1997, Albania: From Anarchy to a Balkan Identity, London. Virgin, P., 1989, The Church in an Age of Negligence: Ecclesiastical Structure and Church Reform 1700–1840, Cambridge. Vivekananda, S., 1970/3, ‘My Plan of Campaign’, in The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, vol. III, Mayavati Memorial edn, Calcutta, pp. 207–27. Vlahos, M., 1991, ‘Culture and Foreign Policy’, Foreign Policy 82, Spring, pp. 59–79. Vorontsova, L. and Filatov, S., 1994, ‘The Changing Pattern of Religious Belief: Perestroika and Beyond’, Religion, State and Society 22.1, pp. 89–96. Vrcan, S., 1994, ‘The War in Former Yugoslavia and Religion’, Religion, State and Society 22.4, p. 376 . Vyas, A., 1992, ‘Caution on “Demographic Invasion” ’, Hindustan Times, 5 May. Waite, T., 1993, Taken on Trust, London. Wald, K. D., 1987, Religion and Politics in the United States, New York. Wallis, J., 1976, Agenda for Biblical People, New York. Wallis, J., 1981, The Call to Conversion, San Francisco. Wallis, R. and Bruce, S., 1991, ‘Secularization: Trends, Data and Theory’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 3, pp. 1–31. Walsh, L., 1994, Iran-Contra: The Final Report, New York. Walton, R., 1975, One Nation Under God, Washington. Ware, T., 1983, The Orthodox Church, Harmondsworth. Waterman, S. and Kosmin, B., 1986, British Jewry in the Eighties: Statistical and Geographical Guide, London. Watt, W. M., 1991, Muslim–Christian Encounters: Perceptions and Misperceptions, London. WCC (World Council of Churches), 1996a, A Moment to Choose: Risking to be with Uprooted People, Geneva. WCC, 1996b, Ogoni: The Struggle Continues, Geneva. Weber, T. P., 1987, Living in the Shadow of the Second Coming: American Premillennialism 1875–1982, enlarged edn, Chicago. Webster, Fr A. F. C., 1995, The Price of Prophecy: Orthodox Churches on Peace, Freedom, and Security, Washington. Weigel, G. (ed.), 1993a, A New Worldly Order: John Paul II and Human Freedom, a Centesimus Annus Reader, Washington. Weigel, G., 1993b, The Final Revolution: the Resistance Church and the Collapse of Communism, Oxford. Weigel, G., 1995, ‘What Really Happened at Cairo’, First Things, February. Wells, D. E., 1993, No Place for Truth; or, Whatever Happened to Evangelical Theology?, Grand Rapids. Westerlund, D. (ed.), 1996, Questioning the Secular State: the Worldwide Resurgence of Religion in Politics, London. White, S., McAllister, I. and Kryshtanovskaya, O., 1994, ‘Religion and Politics in Postcommunist Russia’, Religion, State and Society 22.1, pp. 73–88.

276 Bibliography White, S. and McAllister, I., 1997, ‘The Politics of Religion in Postcommunist Russia’, Religion, State and Society 25.3, pp. 235–52. Whyte, J. H., 1981, Catholics in Western Democracies, Dublin. Wilkinson, D., 1980, Deadly Struggles: Lewis F. Richardson and the Statistical Studies of Wars, Berkeley, Calif. Williamson, R., 1990, ‘Why is Religion Still a Factor in Armed Conflict?’, Bulletin of Peace Proposals 21.3, pp. 243–53. Williamson, R., 1991, Just War in the Gulf?, Uppsala. Williamson, R., 1995, ‘The Church of England and Europe’, in Nembach, U. (ed.), Informationes Theologiae Europae, Frankfurt am Main, pp. 265–78. Wilson, B., 1966, Religion in a Secular Society, London. Wilson, B., 1976, ‘Secularization in the West’, Japanese Journal of Religious Studies 3, pp. 259–76. Wilson, B., 1985, ‘Secularization: The Inherited Model’, in Hammond, P. (ed.), The Sacred in a Secular Age, Berkeley, pp. 9–20. Winter, C., 1977, Namibia: The Story of a Bishop in Exile, Guildford. Witte, J. (ed.), 1993, Christianity and Democracy in Global Context, Boulder, Colo. Witte, J. and van der Vyver, J. D. (eds), 1996, Religious Human Rights in Global Perspective: Religious Perspectives, The Hague. Wright, D., 1977, The English Amongst the Persians During the Qajar Period 1787–1921, London. Wright, R., 1992, ‘Islam, Democracy and The West’, Foreign Affairs 71.3, Summer, p. 134. Xu, X., 1997, ‘To Register or Not to Register? Unregistered Christians in China Under Increasing Pressure’, Religion, State and Society 25.2, pp. 201–8. Yadav, Y. and Singh, V. B., 1996, ‘Who Voted For Whom’, India Today, 31 March, p. 25. Yadav, Y. et al, 1998, ‘Who Voted For Whom?’, India Today, 16 March, pp. 49–52. Yamane, D., 1997, ‘Secularization on Trial: In Defense of a Neosecularization Paradigm’, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 36, pp. 109–22. Yannaras, C., 1992, Orthodoxia kai Dysi stin Neoteri Ellada, Athens. Yavuz, M. H., 1996, ‘Turkey’s Imagined Enemies: Kurds and Islamists’, The World Today 52, pp. 99–101. Ye’or, B., 1985, The Dhimmi: Christians and Jews under Islam, London. Yoshida, T., 1987, ‘Is Japan a Secular Society? A Report on the Third Japan Anthropology Workshop Conference’, Japan Foundation Newsletter 15.1, pp. 21–3. Young, C., 1993, ‘The Dialectics of Cultural Pluralism: Concept and Reality’, in Young, C. (ed.), The Rising Tide of Cultural Pluralism: The Nation-State at Bay, Madison, Wis., pp. 3–35. Zacher, M. W., 1992, ‘The Decaying Pillars of the Westphalian Temple: Implications for International Order and Governance’, in Rosenau, J. N. and Czempiel, E-O. (eds), Governance without Government: Order and Change in World Politics, Cambridge, pp. 59–101. Zakaria, R., 1988, The Struggle Within Islam: The Conflict between Religion and Politics, London. Zeller, A., 1991, ‘The Church and the European Community’, European Vision 11, pp. 16–24.

Bibliography 277

Newspapers and periodicals 1951, Organiser, 31 December, 4 –7. 1977, ‘Indian General Election and Soviet Setback in South Asia’, Peking Review, 8 April, 23. 1977, Times of India, 8 April, 1. 1977, The Hindu, 10 April. 1977, Kuwait Times, 23 July, 1. 1978, Indian Express, 11 October. 1980, ‘India at the crossroads’, BJP Pamphlet 5. 1990, ‘PM wants Paper on Gulf Options’, Times of India, 28 November. 1990, ‘Countrywide Rallies Against Anti-Muslim Riots in India’, Pakistan Times, 22 December, 16. 1990, ‘Statement of the BJP National Exectutive, Madras, July 1990’, BJP Pamphlet 105. 1991, ‘Presidential Address, Jaipur’, BJP Pamphlet 110. 1991, National Executive of the BJP, ‘Resolution, Jaipur’, BJP Pamphlet 111. 1991, India Today, 15 April. 1991, ‘India Moves to Preempt Pak Diplomacy in Kashmir’, Hindu, 25 May, 7. 1991, ‘Passage Pains’, India Today, 15 December, 83. 1992, ‘Against Sin’, The Economist, 15 February, 70. 1992, ‘Pak Backing J and K Ultras: US report’, Times, 4 May, 5. 1992, ‘Deport Bangladeshis from India: BJP’, Hindustan Times, 24 August, 24. 1993, ‘The Nuclear Risk Shifts to South Asia’, New York Times, 31 January. 1993, ‘The Islamization of Modernity’, The Middle East 220, February, 20. 1993, ‘Taking Responsibility’, The Middle East 222, April, 17 and 18. 1993, ‘Provoking the Peace’, The Middle East 222, April, 12. 1993, ‘BJP Makes Inroads into Jat Heartlands’, Hindu, 20 April, 3. 1993, ‘Plea Not to Deport Indians from Saudi’, Hindu, (international edn), 12 June, 1. 1993, ‘Algeria: Politically Bankrupt, Financially Embarrassed’, The Middle East 225, July, 20. 1993, ‘Algeria’s Assassins’, The Economist no. 2285, 23 December, 3. 1993, ‘Kashmir: A Pattern of Impunity’, Asia Watch. 1994, ‘Algeria’s Vicious Circle’, The Economist, 29 January, 57–8. 1994, ‘Lessons For Egypt’, The Middle East 233, April, 11. 1994, ‘Al Azhar joins the Vatican’, The Economist, 27 August, 44 –5. 1994, ‘What is Hamas?’, The Economist 2324, 20 October, 3. 1995, ‘A Whisper From The Cloisters’, The Economist, 14 January, 56. 1995, The Guardian, The Independent, The Financial Times and Ettelaat, 15 February. 1995, The Guardian, 16 February. 1995, India Today, 15 March, 41. 1995, ‘Algeria: Background Paper’, IMF Staff Country Report 95/54, July. 1995, ‘Men of God and Guns Come Down on Knin’, The Independent, 1 August. 1995, ‘The MNCs and Liberalisation’, Economic Times, 4 October, 8. 1995, ‘Canterbury and Khartoum: Dr Carey Stands Up for Sudan’s Christians’, The Times (editorial), 11 October, 17. 1995, Le Monde, 17 November, 3.

278 Bibliography 1995, ‘Swadeshi Economy’, Times of India , 10 November, 1. 1995, ‘A Flicker From Algeria’, The Economist, 25 November, 16. 1995, ‘Yes, I’m the Remote Control’, India Today, 15 December. 1995, ‘Arafat Rules’, The Economist, 23 December, 70. 1996, Frontline, 15 January. 1996, India Today, 15 January. 1996, ‘Palestinians Vote For Democracy But Will They Get It?’, The Economist, 27 January, 49. 1996, ‘The King of Mumbai’, The Economist 3–9 February, 50. 1996, The Economic Times, Bombay, 17 May. 1996, ‘Taking Turns’, The Economist, 25–31 May, 86. 1996, ‘A Dove Among Hawks’, India Today, 31 May, 16. 1996, ‘The Sarajevo Charter’, The Independent, 5 August, 9. 1997, ‘Archbishop Error: Carey was Unwise to Stray Beyond Matters Spiritual’, The Times (editorial), 12 March, 19. 1997, ‘Moslem Nations Join Forces’, Financial Times, 16 June, 4. 1997, ‘The Ethical Mantra’, Financial Times, 2/3 August, 7. 1997, ‘Fiji: Sorry About That’, The Economist, 16 August, 57. 1998, ‘India’s Other Test’, The Economist, 6 June, 18. 1998, ‘So Much for Hopes of Reform’, The Economist, 6 June, p. 80.

Index Abbas, Sha, 135 Abdullah, Farooq, 166 abortion, 40, 44, 45 abortion clinics, 39 Abu-Amr, Ziad, 106 Adrianople, 125 Advani, L.K., 165, 166, 167, 178, 179, 181 Afghan war, 103 Afghanistan, 17, 102, 104, 115 Afghans, 103 Africa(an), 2, 3, 20, 27, 28, 32, 40, 41, 49, 52, 53, 65, 66, 72, 78, 82, 207, 226, 229–31, 242, 244, 246 Afro-Asian People’s Solidarity Organization, 16 agnostics/agnosticism, 57, 77, 78 Ahl al-Kitab, 130, 131 AIADMK, 168 aid agencies, 51 aid agencies of the Roman Catholic Church see CAFOD, SCIAF, Trocaire AIS, 100 Akali Dal, 168 Akan, 32 Akhand Bharat, 165, 167, 188 Al Azhar University, 20 al-Azhar Declaration, 117 al-Bashir, General Omar Hassan, 225 al-Muntazar, Abdul Quasim Muhammad, 135 Albania(ns), 10, 78, 94 Albanian: riots and demonstrations, 93 Alexei, Patriarch, 97 Alexei II, 222, 247 Algeria, 17, 18, 100, 102, 104, 105, 107, 108, 109, 115 Algerian Army, 102, 103, 105 All Africa Conference of Churches, 224 Alsabekov, Mufti , 222 America see United States of America

American: Embassy, 234 foreign policy, 43 Indian, 3 Americas (the), 203, 211, 212 Amnesty International, 8, 241 Amor, 129 Amritsar, 7 ANC, 8, 229 Anglican Consultative Council, 221 Anglicanism/Anglicans, 218, 220 –6 Anglicans, viii Anglo-Saxons, 38 Angola, 229 anti-personnel mines, 239, 240 anti-racism, 5, 8 anti-semitism, 7, 235 Antillian, 28 apartheid, 229 apostasy/apostate, 121, 131 appropriation thesis, 115 Arab(s), 49, 104, 108, 154, 176, 177, 224 Arab countries/states, 16, 51 Arab–Islamic People’s Conference, 16 Arabia, 72 Arafat, Yasser, 105 Archbishops’ Millennium Advisory Group, 237 Argentina, 46 Armageddon, 43 Armed Islamic Group (GIA), 100, 103, 104, 105, 106, 111 Armed Islamic Movement (MIA), 100, 105 arms control, 238– 41 Arms Register: UN, 240 arms trade, 238– 41 Arnold, V. Revd. John, 247 Ashoka, 147 Asia, 17, 19, 20, 21, 27, 28, 52, 64, 65, 66, 67, 78, 144, 152, 167, 171, 174, 198–216, 222

279

280 Index Asia-Pacific, viii, 198–216 Assam, 143 Assembly of the Conference of European Churches, 222 assimilation, 115 Atanasije (Bishop), 95 atheism(s) (ism), viii, 57, 61– 4, 69, 77, 78, 85, 151, 200, 201, 206, 209 Austin, Rt Revd John, 246 Australia (Australasia), 205, 211, 212 Ayodhya, 155, 167 Ayodhya mosque, 157, 166, 175, 178 Ayodhya temple, 13 Azad Kashmir, 142 Azhar Draft constitution, 115, 116 Bab Ezzouar (University of), 104 Báb (Mirza Ali Muhammad), 125, 132, 134, 137 Bábí Faith, 121, 136 Baghdad, 177 Bahá’ís/Bahá’í, 81, 113–39 Bahá’u’lláh, 126, 132 Bahrain, 120, 121 Baldwin, James, 247 Bali, 200 Balkan rebel leaders, 125 Balkans, 6, 83, 84, 85 Balkans Working Party of the CCBI, 233 ballistic missile, 158 Bangladesh, 7, 142, 157–8, 167, 242 Bangladeshi migrants, 157 Bani-Sadr, 119 Banque d’Algérie, 103 Bar-Illan, David, 177 Barking, Bishop of, 233 Barrington-Ward, Rt Revd Simon, 229 Basic Law, 204 Batak, 208 Bazargan, 119 Ba’athist Government, 108 Ba’athist Party, 125 Beijing, 21, 175 Belgrade, 87, 93, 96, 97 Belhadj, Ali, 107 Bell, Bishop G. K. A., 223 Bellamy, Carol, 242

Belo, Bishop, 240 Bethlehem, 235 Bhagavadgita, 149 Bharath, 151, 189 Bharatiya Lok Dal, 153 Bharatiya culture, 149, 150 Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), 141, 148, 152, 153, 154, 155, 157–61, 163, 164, 165–97 Bharatiya Samajwadi Party (BSP), 168 Bible, 6, 41, 55 birth control, 21 birth rates, 65 Bishops’ Conference, 89, 90 BJP see Bharatiya Janata Party BJU see Bob Jones University Black North American Evangelicals, 28 Board for Social Responsibility, 229–30, 237, 242 Bob Jones University (BJU), 27, 36 Bombay, 143, 154, 176 Borneo, 208 Bosnia(n), 19, 93–6, 98, 102, 224, 225, 232– 4 Bosniac(s) (Bosnian Moslems), 90, 93, 94, 96 Bosnian: Bishops’ Conference, 90 Muslims, 5, 6; see also Bosniac Boutros-Ghali, Boutros, 243 Brandt Report/Commission, 236 Bread for the World, 241 breast-milk substitutes, 242–3 Bristol, Bishop of, 226 Britain, 16, 46, 55–7, 60, 79, 145, 175, 211, 217, 234, 237, 244 British: Consulate, 125 Empire, 5 rule, 145 British Nationality Bill, 219 Brot für die Welt see Bread for the World Browning, Bishop Edmond, 220 Brunei, 207, 209 Brussels, 223 BSP see Bharatiya Samajwadi Party Buddhism/Buddhist, viii, 3, 11, 14 , 40, 58, 62, 79, 81, 142, 146, 198,

Index 199, 200, 201, 204, 206, 209, 210, 213 Bureau of the Non-Aligned Movement, 154 Burns, Nicholas, 170 Bush, US President, 220 Byzantine Empire, 10, 203, 211 Byzantine (world), 52 CAFOD see Catholic Fund for Overseas Development Cairo, 20 Cairo Declaration, 115, 116, 129 caliphate (1924 abolition of), 7 Callaghan, Lord, 238 Cambodia, 199, 209 Canberra Assembly, 223 Canterbury: Archbishop of, 222, 223–6, 234, 235, 242, 244 See of, 220 Cape Town, Archbishop of, 242 capitalism, 5 Carey, Dr, 225, 232, 246 Catholic Church see Roman Catholic Church Catholic Fund for Overseas Development (CAFOD), 10, 222, 227, 236 Institute for International Relations, 231 Relief Services, 10 Caucasus, 64 CCADD see Conference on Christian Approaches to Defence and Disarmament CEC see Conference of European Churches Centre for the Study of Foreign Policy, 11 CEPAD see Evangelical Committee for Aid and Development Chara Siab, 110 Charismatic Christians, 27 Charter of the United Nations, 126 Charter of the Nuremberg Tribunal, 127 Chechnya, 67, 102, 222 Chelmsford, Bishop of, 241

281

Chemical Weapons Convention/Treaty, 226– 41 Chief Rabbi, 233 China, 20, 62, 66, 67, 77, 143, 144, 151, 152, 158, 159, 170 –7, 189, 193, 195, 198–216, 226, 236 China: Constitution of the People’s Republic of, 203 Chinese: control, 142 religions, viii, 62 Christ see Jesus Christ Christ’s Second Coming, 30, 43, 48 Christendom, 187, 232 Christian Aid, 10, 222, 226–8, 233, 236, 244 Church, 59 coalition, 188 Democratic movement, 58 fundamentalism(ists), 13 , 27, 37, 41, 70 Identity movement, 38 missionaries, 148 missionary groups, 10 /Muslim relations, 226 Christian(ity), 85, 95 Christians/Christianity, 2, 3, 6, 9–11, 13, 14, 21, 25, 26, 27, 31, 36, 37, 42, 45, 47, 50, 54, 55–8, 60 –2, 64, 68–75, 121, 123, 130, 133, 137, 142, 146, 186 , 198, 201–9 Christianity: growth of/spread of, 51, 65–7, 73 Christianization, 202, 205, 210, 211, 212 Christmas liturgy, 96 church attendance, 56–7 Church and the Bomb, 245 Churches Commision on Mission, 221, 222 Church Commissioners, 218, 230 Church of England, 217– 49 Church Missionary Society, 221, 229, 234, 246 Churches Together in England, 237 CIA, 193 Civil and Political Rights: International Covenant on, 130, 138 ‘civilizational rallying’, 6

282 Index Classical Greek religion, 63 clero-fascism, 92 Clinton, Bill (US President), 96 CMS see Church Missionary Society Coke, 163, 194 Cold War, 10, 11, 21, 43, 47, 61, 238, 239, 246 Colgate, 163 colonialism, 3, 13, 14, 17 Commonwealth (the), 226, 241–2 Commonwealth Ministerial Action Group, 241 communications, 6 communism/communist, viii, 14, 16, 43, 45, 61, 67, 78, 80, 85–8, 92, 93, 97, 200, 232 communism (collapse of), 61, 64, 215 Communist: Manifesto, 6 Party, 202 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, 159, 180 Conference: on Christian Approaches to Defence and Disarmament (CCADD), 46–7 of European Churches, 89, 222, 232, 233 of Islamic Foreign Ministers, 116 confessing Church, 4 conflict, viii, 1–23 confrontation thesis, 115 Confucianism, 11, 13, 20, 199 Congress Party, 141,149, 154, 155, 159, 163, 165, 167, 178, 184 Constantinople, 80 Constituent Assembly (The), 146 consumerism, 20 Contact Group, 95 Contras (in Nicaragua), 43, 44 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 126, 127 Cook, Robin, 240 Corinthians, 32 Cornell, Mrs Margaret, 248 Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland (CCCBI), 222, 230, 233, 235, 236, 241

Council of European Bishops’ Conference, 232 Council on Christian Approaches to Defence and Disarmament, 234 Coventry, Bishop of, 230, 231, 233, 240, 242 cows, ban on the slaughter of, 150, 169 Crescent (the), 6 Croat(s)/Croatian , 83–99 Croatia(n), 2, 5, 85, 95, 98 , 232, 234 Croatia (Independent State of), 84, 86, 89, 91 Croatian Catholicism, 84, 88 Croatian spring, 87, 88 Cross (the), 39 Cross-worshippers, 123 Cuba, 77 cultural imperialism, 26 Cultural Revolution (in China), 62 Cyprus, 3 Dal, Akali, 168 Dal, Janata, 153, 176 Dalai Lama, 151–2 Dalmia, V.H., 169 Dar-ul-Haq, 187 dar-ul-harab, 133 David (star of), 6 Dayaks, 208 Dayton Peace Accords, 19 Dayton Peace agreement, 95–6, 225, 234 Dazhai, 202 death camps, 91 Declaration on the Elimination of Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief, 126 defence spending, India’s, 171 Defence and Disarmament: Council on Christian Approaches to, 234 Delhi, 152, 156 Delhi Sultanate, 151 Delors, Jacques, 243 Denitch (Bogdan), 4 Desai, Morarji, 192 Developing Societies: Centre for the study of, 184 –5 Development Eight Group, 8

Index dharma, 150 Dhimma/Dhimmis, 130 DMK, 168 Draškovic´, Vuk, 97 drought, 231 East Timor, 208, 210, 240 Eastern Roman Empire, 203 Ecclestone, Giles, 229–30 ECONI see Evangelical Contribution on Northern Ireland Ecumenical Year of Churches in Solidarity with Uprooted People, 246 Edict of Nantes, 19 Edinburgh, 36, 242 education, 6, 10 EECCS see European Ecumenical Commission on Church and Society Egypt(ian), 16, 17, 18, 20, 72, 100, 102, 103, 106, 111, 121, 225 Egyptian: government, 104 Islamic movements, 5 el-Assal, Bishop Riah Abu, 235 Eminent Persons’ Group, 230 Enlightenment, 20 Enron, 163, 168 Eradicateur parties, 102, 107 ESA see Evangelicals for Social Action ethnic: cleansing, 3, 233 conflict, 217 identity, 83 nationalism, 207 ethnicity, 4, 14 Europe, viii, 6, 9, 14, 18, 50 –61, 64 –8, 72, 78, 80, 130, 145, 203, 215, 231–2 European: Bill of Human Rights, 226 Churches: Assembly of the Conference of, 222 Churches: Conference of, 222, 232, 233 Community, 49, 99 Ecumenical Assembly (Graz), 222, 238

283

Ecumenical Commission on Church and Society, 222 Union, 59 Evangelical: Committee for Aid and Development (CEPAD), 44 Contribution on Northern Ireland, 41 left/right, 27–8, 34, 37, 40 –2, 44, 46 missionaries, 27, 43 Protestantism/Protestants, 65, 68, 201, 204 Evangelicalism, 24 – 49 Evangelicals for Social Action (ESA), 42, 44, 46 evangelism, 10 Exportation de la Charte, 101, 108–9 Fajr (Dawn), 123 Falklands War, 219, 239 family planning, 21 famine, 231 fatwa, 18 Fernandes, George, 168, 173 France, 175 Fiji, 188 FIS See Islamic Salvation Front FLN, 17, 104, 110 foreign aid, 226, 227–8, 231, 244 foreign debt, 103 Foreign and Commonwealth Office, 229 Forum for an Indian Nuclear Deterrent, 170 France/French, 17, 19, 50, 55, 59, 64, 77, 102, 125 France: nuclear tests, 241 Free Church Federal Council, 233 Freedom Charter, 229 French Consulate, 124 fundamentalist(ism), viii, 7, 25–30, 35–7, 43– 4, 53, 61, 70, 74, 75, 81, 118, 156, 187, 217 fundamentalist separatists, 27 fundamentalists – Islam, viii Gama’a al-Islamiyya,100, 106 Gandhi, 10

284 Index Gandhi Foundation, 46 Gandhi, Indira, 152, 153, 154 –5, 175, 179 Gandhi, Mahatma, 151, 162 Gandhi, Rajiv, 143, 154, 160, 192 Gangetic river system, 143 Gaza, 102 Gaza Strip, 235 genocide, 62, 86, 118, 121, 124, 126–8, 137, 178, 224 Genocide: Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of, 126, 127 George V, King, 125 Georgia, 67 German Democratic Republic, 4 Germany, 47, 59, 62, 77, 78, 102 Ghana, 32 Ghauri, the, 158, 182 GIA see Armed Islamic Group Gitari, Most Revd David, 242 Glaser, Bonnie, 175 ‘global Christians’, 28 globalization, 5, 6, 14, 21, 35, 70 –1, 80, 81, 211, 212 God, 114, 126, 131, 132, 135 ‘Golden Rule’, 24, 26 Golden Temple, 7 Golden Temple (Amritsar), 13 Golgotha, 84 Golpaygani, Dr Seyyed Mohammad, 127–8, 138 Goodrich, Rt Revd Philip, 226, 233 Gospel, 28 Govindacharya, K.N., 163 Graham, Billy, 220 Graz, Austria, 222, 238 Greek Orthodox Church, 3, 10 Greek rebel leaders, 125 Greenpeace, 8 Greenville, 36 Gromyko (Foreign Minister), 154 Gryn, Rabbi Hugo, 233 Gujarat, 168 Gujral, Inder Kumar, 176, 180 Gulf Arab states, 17 Gulf War, 17, 109, 157, 176, 220, 223, 239 gun reform, 38

guns, 41 Gurumurthy, S., 164 Habgood, Lord, 222, 223, 226, 231, 233, 241 Haj Committee, 154 Halabi, 123, 136 Hamas (Harakat al-Muqawana al-Islamiyya or Islamic Resistance Movement), 8, 100, 101, 105, 106, 107, 108, 111, 112 Han, 66 Han Chinese, 202, 207 Hannay, Sir David, 234 Hapsburg empire, 83 Har Homa/Jabel Abu Ghuneim settlement, 235 Harakat al-Muqawana al-Islamiyya see Hamas Harare, 238, 241 Harries, Rt Revd Richard, 229 Harris, Sir Ronald, 230 Hekmatyar, Gulbuddin, 101, 110 Hereford, Bishop of, 233 heresy, 131 Herzl, Theodore, 6 Hezb-I-Islami, 101, 110 Hindu nationalism/ists, 140 –97 Hinduism/Hindus, viii, 7, 11, 13, 19, 40, 54, 58, 70, 71, 79, 81, 130, 140 –97, 198, 200, 205, 206, 209 Hindutva, 141, 148–51, 156, 161, 164 –8, 172, 173, 176–9, 181–6, 188, 189 Hispanic: Americans, 68 immigrants, 68 Hitler, 124 Hizb-I Islami, 17 Hizballah, 8 Hokumat-e Islami, 119 holy war, 2 Holy Land, 234 –5 Holy See in Rome, 9 Holy Spirit, 28 Holy Synod (of the Serbian Orthodox Church), 94, 95 Hong Kong, 78, 204, 235–6 House of Lords, 226, 233, 238, 241

Index human rights, 3, 5, 8, 9, 20, 25–39, 62, 72, 79, 113–39, 226, 240, 241, 243, 244 Human Rights: European Bill of, 226 International Conference on the Protection of, 115 Islamic Declaration of, 115, 116 UN Commision on, 127, 132, 138 UN Conference on, 20 UN World Conference on, 116 Universal Declaration of, 126, 138 Humanist movement, 200 Hume, Cardinal, 233 Hungary, 78 Hurd, Douglas, 222, 240 Hussein, Saddam, 108, 176, 223 IDAC see International and Development Affairs Committee IGBM see Inter-Agency Group for Breastfeeding Monitoring imperialism, 18 incompatibility thesis, 115 Independence, Declaration of United States of American, 38 independence (India’s), 142, 145 India, 6, 63, 64, 81, 102, 140 –97, 200 Indian: army, 7 Constitution, 140, 145 defence spending, 171 General Elections (1996), 155, 190 General Elections (1998), 168, 182, 185 General Elections (1998), analysis of, 185 National Congress, 145–6 Ocean, 144, 199 subcontinent, 16 Indians: non-resident, 164 Indonesia, 7, 142, 201, 205, 207, 208, 212, 216, 240 Indo-Pakistan wars, 142, 148, 175 Industrial Age, 63, 64 industrialization, 5 ‘infidels’, 2 Inter-Agency Group for Breastfeeding Monitoring (IGBM), 242, 243

285

International and Development Affairs Committee (IDAC), 227, 228, 231, 240, 241, 242 International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes, 242, 243 International Commission of Jurists, 127 International Conference on the Protection of Human Rights, 115 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 130, 138 Intifada, 108, 235 Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief: Declaration on the Elimination of, 126 Iran, 3, 6, 7, 16, 17, 18, 53, 101, 103, 108, 109, 113–39, 176, 177 Iran/Iraq War, 3, 108 Iranian: Christians, 116 Constitution, 109, 115, 116, 117, 119, 135 government, 126 legal system, 117 revolution, 17, 108, 109 Iraq, 17, 120, 121, 125, 239, 240 Iraqi invasion of Kuwait, 176 Ireland, 2 Ireland, Northern, 36 Irian Jaya, 208, 210 Isfahan, 139 Islam, 85, 113–39 Islam, growth of, 71–7 Islam, Nation of, 60 Islam(ic/ism/ist), vii, 2, 3, 7, 8, 10, 11, 13–21, 26, 28, 35, 37, 40, 41, 47, 58, 60, 61, 69, 70, 71, 79, 81, 82, 100 –12, 141, 198, 201, 206–9, 216, 224, 226 Islamabad, 157, 178 Islamic: Criminal Justice System, 115 Declaration of Human Rights, 115, 116 Development Bank (IDB), 10 Foreign Ministers: Conference of, 116

286 Index Islamic: – continued fundamentalism(ist), 13, 14, 17, 25–30, 35–7, 43, 44, 70, 71, 100, 104, 110, 156–7 government, 119 Jihad Movement, 100, 105, 106, 107, 112 law, 116, 117, 133 militancy, 2, 100 –12 Propaganda Bureau, 16 Resistance Movement see Hamas revolution, 18, 118, 135 Salvation Army (AIS), 100, 105 Salvation Front (FIS), 17, 100, 102, 104 –7, 111, 112 Islamicization, 207, 208, 210, 213, 216 Ismaelis, 121 Israel, 2, 6, 18, 34, 49, 61, 105, 106, 129, 154, 177, 178, 234, 235 Israel, Lost Tribes of, 38 Israeli occupation of Palestine, 102 Italian (press), 89 Italy, 59, 79 Ithna Ashariyah, 135 Izetbegovic, President Alija, 225 Ja’amat-I Islami, 10, 16 jahili, 105 Jahiliyya, 106, 111 Jains, 142 Jakarta, 208 Jamait Ulema Islam, 178 Jammu, 142 Jana Sangh, 148–55, 166, 167, 191 Janata, 154 –5, 158, 183 Janata Dal, 153, 176 Japan, 3, 11, 68, 144, 152, 199 Japanese religions, 198, 199 Java, 208 Jayalalitha, J., 168 Jeremiah, US Admiral David, 180 Jerusalem, 13, 234, 235 Jesus Christ, 20, 28, 30, 32, 33, 34, 39, 40, 41, 45, 48, 91, 92 Jevtic´ (Bishop Atanasije), 95 Jew(s), 6, 11 Jewish: fundamentalist(s), 18

population, 86 Jews, 50, 54, 60, 61, 62, 78, 116, 121, 123, 124, 130, 133, 137, 142, 234 jihad, 2, 20, 21 Jihad/New Jihad, 100, 105, 106 Jinnah, Muhammad Ali, 188 Jordan, 16, 18 Joshi, Murli Manohar, 165 Juba, 225 Jubilee Principle, 237 Jubilee 2000, 237 Judaism, 2, 3, 11, 58, 60, 71, 78, 79, 81 Judd, Lord, 238 Judgement Day, 41 Juric´ (Ante, Bishop of Split), 89 Jurists: International Commission of, 127 jurist’s guardianship, 109 JustLife, 44 Kabbani, Rana, 233 Kalimantan, 208 Kampuchea, 62 Karadzic´, Vuk, 84 Karadzic´, Radovan, 95 Karen, 210 karma, 197 karmabhumi, 196 Kashmir, 6, 142, 148, 151, 154, 156–7, 166, 177–80, 188, 189, 197 Kata’ib ‘Izz-al-Din al-Qassam, 105 Kaunda, Kenneth, 231 Kazakhstan, 67 Kebir, Rabih, 111 Kentucky Fried Chicken, 194 Kenya, 242 Khartoum, 225 Khomeini, 18, 41, 118, 119, 120, 122– 4, 127, 129, 133, 134, 135, 136, 139 Khomeini, Ayatollah, 108 King, Martin Luther, 247 Kirchentag, 237 ‘kith-and-kin’ syndrome, 6 Knin, 96 Koran/Qur’a¯ n, 6, 40, 114, 116, 124, 131, 132 Korea, 201, 211

Index Korean War, 204 Kosovo, 88, 93 Krajina, 90, 96 Krishna, 149 Kuharic´ (Cardinal), 85, 88, 89, 90, 91, 97, 98 Kuwait, 16, 120, 240 Kuwait, Iraqi invasion of, 176 Lambeth Conference, 220, 221, 237, 238 Lambeth Palace, 224, 226 Laos, 199, 209 Latin America, 20, 27, 28, 40, 41, 222 Latin American Theological Fraternity, 46 Lavrentije (Bishop of Šabac), 85, 99 Le Pouvoir, 107 Lebanon, 18 Leicester, Bishop of, 239 Leonard, Rt Revd Graham, 230 liberalism, 36 liberty, 50 Libya, 16 Life & Peace Institute, 217 Likud government, 177, 178 Local Council’s Law, 123 London, 47 Lutheran World Federation, 10 Lutheran State Churches of Scandinavia, 243– 4 Macao, 199 Macedonian Orthodox Church, 92 Madani, Abbasi, 106 Madhok, Balraj, 166 Madonna, 20 Madras, bishop of, 33 Madura, 208 Mahajan, Pramod, 171 Maharashtra, 154, 163, 168 Mahasabha, 148 Mahdi, 126 Mahrami, Dhabihullah, 139 Majles (Lower House), 123 Major, John, 219 Makhulu, Khotso, 231 Malaysia, 7, 20, 66, 144, 206, 207, 209, 215

287

Mandela, Nelson, 229 Manila, 36 Mao, 201 Marja’-I Taqlid, 119, 131 martyrdom, 84 Marx/Marxism, 6, 41, 62, 77, 136 Mashhad, 123 Maspok, 87 Matica Hrvatska, 87 Mauritius, 188 Mekhloufi, Said, 107 Methodists, 204 MIA, 105, 107; see Armed Islamic Group Micronesia, 205 Middle East, 6, 14, 19, 52, 65, 72, 100 –12, 115, 130, 207, 234 migrants, 143 migration, 59, 60, 68, 207 Miloševic´ (Slobodan), 93, 95, 97 missionaries, 9, 82 MNCs see multi-national corporations modernity/modernization, 13, 53, 81 Mohan, C. Raja, 160 monasteries, 91, 93 monotheism, 2 Montenegrin parliament, 95 Montenegro (Metropolitan of), 95 Moscow, 80 mosques, 90 Mozambique, 42, 229 Mughal empire, 151 Muhammad, 6, 20, 116, 126, 132 Muhammad, Mirza Ali, 125 Mujahidin, 17 mujtahids, 117 Multi-Faith and Multicultural Mediation Service, 46 multinational corporations (MNCs), 17, 162–3, 164, 167, 187 Mumbai, 143 Munshi, K.M., 150 Muntazari, Ayatollah, 119 murder, 62, 75, 127 Muslim(s), viii, 6, 8, 10, 15, 16, 17, 50, 54, 60, 62, 66, 67, 71–5, 82, 100, 113, 114, 116, 121, 130 –2, 134, 141, 142, 145, 146, 148, 150, 151, 156, 157, 166, 169, 175, 176,

288 Index Muslim(s) – continued 178, 182, 185, 201, 205, 207, 208, 210, 232, 234 Muslim: Aid, 10 Brotherhood, 5, 8, 16, 101, 106 fundamentalists, 187 League, 145, 151 migrants, 208 Myanmar, 199, 206, 210, 212 Nadu, 143, 168, Najafi, 125 Namibia, 229 Nantes, Edict of, 19 Nasser, 16 Nation of Islam, 60 National Front–United Front coalition, 155 nationalism(ists), 51, 84, 85, 87, 88, 89, 92, 94, 95, 97, 140 –97, 207 Nayar, K.K., 170 Nazi, 86 Nazi Germany, 4, 62, 79 Nazir-Ali, Rt Revd Michael, 233 NC/NCR see New Christian Right Ndungane, Archbishop Njongonkulu, 238 Nehru, Jawaharlal, 146, 147, 149, 151, 152, 191 Nepal, 143 Nestlé boycott, 242 Netanyahu, Binyamin, 143 Netherlands, 77, 78, 99 Newbigin, Lesslie, 33 New Christian Right, 27, 30, 31, 36, 43, 44, 48 New Testament, 39 New World Order, 35 New Zealand, 205 NGO see non-governmental organization Nicaragua, 43, 44 Nigeria, 226, 241 Nikolai (Metropolitan), 96 Nimeiri, 132 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), 8, 9, 10, 242 North, Gary, 42

North Korea, 78, 159, 193, 200, 201, 209 Northern Ireland, 2, 77 Novosti, Veéernje, 99 NPT see Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty NRIS see Indians: non-resident nuclear: arms, 44, 49 defence, 28– 49 deterrence, 219, 238– 41, 244 tests, 141, 144, 153, 157–61, 164, 167–8, 170 –1, 176–7, 179–81, 182– 4, 190, 193, 241 war, 43 weapons, 147, 152–3, 157, 158–9, 165, 170, 171– 4, 179, 181, 183, 193 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, 159, 195, 222, 241 Nuremberg Tribunal: Charter of the, 127 Oceana, 65, 66 Ogoniland, 241 oil, 17, 175, 176 oil reserves, 103 Oldham, J.H., 223 Oman, 176 One World Week, 237, 244 Organisation Congress, 153 Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), 7, 8, 10, 16 Orthodox Church, 52, 67, 84 Oslo peace accords, 18 Ottoman empire, 83, 125 Overseas Development Administration, 234 Oxford, Bishop of, 226, 233, 238, 239 Oxford Centre for Mission Studies, 46 Pacific, 3 Pacific Islands, 205, 211 Pacific Rim, 21 Padilla, Rene, 46 Pahlavi leaders, 125 Paisley, Ian, 36, 37, 41 Pakistan, 6, 7, 16, 17, 115, 121, 142–97

Index Pakistani cricket team, 169 Pakistan’s atomic programme, 165, 176, 177, 193 Palestine(ian), 17, 100, 101, 102, 104, 108, 154, 234, 235 pan-Africanism, 6 pan-Arab, 16 pan-Islam, 6 pan-Islamism, 14, 16 Papua New Guinea, 205 particularism thesis, 115 Partisan movement, 86 partition of British India, 142 Partnership for World Mission, 221 Patel, Vallabhai, 147 Pattaya, 46 Paul, St, 32 Pavle (Patriarch of), 94, 95, 96, 97, 98 Peace Council, 46 Pentagon, 43 Pentecostal Church, 65 Pentecostals, 26, 27, 41, 204 People’s Republic of China: Constitution of the, 203 Pepsi, 163, 194 ‘petropower’, 17 Philippines, 3, 43, 66, 205, 206, 211 PLO, 101, 104 Pokhran test site, 184 Pol Pot, 62 Poland/Polish, 4, 88, 242 Pope John Paul II, 9, 10, 20 Pope Paul VI, 85 Populations, UN Conference on, 20, 21 post-Caliphate period, 113 post-Imamate period, 113 post-millennialist, 48 Prabhu, Suresh, 163 pre-millennialist(s), 30, 42, 43 Presbyterians, 204 Preston, Ronald, 223 Price, Canon Peter, 236 Principles of International Law, 127 pro-life campaigns, 38 Programme to Combat Racism, 223, 229 Proletarian internationalism, 5

289

Protestant(s), viii, 59, 65, 68, 70, 74, 80 Protestant Churches of Germany, 243 Protestant Evangelicalism, 24 – 49 Protestant fundamentalism, 27, 29, 36, 41 Protestantism (American), 25 Protestantization, 201 Puerto Rico, 3 Punjab, 168 puranic text, 149 Qa’im, 119 Qomi, Ayatollah, 119 Qur’a¯n/Koran, 6, 40, 114, 116, 124, 131, 132 Rabbani, Burhanuddin (Government), 110 racism, 7, 102 Racism, Programme to Combat, 223, 229 Radovic´ (Amfilohije), 95 Rafsanjani ali Akbar Hashemi, 134 Raiser, Professor Dr Konrad, 223 Raj, 149 Rajagopalachari, C., 150 Rama, 149, 154, 182 Rao, Narasimha, 152, 171, 179, 180, 184 Rashtriya Swavayamsevak Sangh (RSS), 147, 148, 151, 155, 163, 164, 166, 167, 169 Reagan, Ronald (US President), 3, 43 Realist/Realism, ix, 28, 40 Reconstructionist(s), 27, 42–3, 48 Red Army, 103 Red Cross, International Committee of the, 8 Reformation, 30 Refugee Council, 234 refugees, 96, 143, 225, 233 Regiments of Izz-al-Din al-Qassam, 105–6 Reid, Rt Revd Gavin, 237–8 Rejectionist Front, 106 religious: change, 50 –82, 198–216 fundamentalism, 217

290 Index religious: – continued militancy, 53 resurgence, 24 – 49 symbols, 85 RENAME, 42 Republican Congress Party, 185 Rhodesia, 229 Richardson, Kathleen, 233 Right-Wing Syndicate Group, 153 Robertson, Pat, 43 Robin Cook (British Foreign Secretary), 2 Rogerson, Rt Revd Barry, 223 Roman Catholic(s)/Catholicism, viii, 4, 7–9, 11, 20, 52, 59, 67, 68, 77, 78, 81, 84 –92, 97, 98, 201, 204, 205, 206, 221, 222 Roman Catholic Church: aid agencies of the see CAFOD, SCIAF and Trocaire Roman Empire, 49, 51, 57, 202, 203, 211 Roman Empire (Eastern), 203 Romanism, 36 Romany (population), 86 Rome, 89 Rome Platform, 105, 107 RSS see Rashtriya Swavayamsevak Sangh Rule of the Jurist, 119 Runcie, Lord, 246 Rushdie, Salman, 18 Rushdoony, 42 Russia, 43 Russian Embassy, 222, 234 Russian Orthodox Church, 3, 10, 67, 97 Russians, 125 Rwanda, 224, 225 SAARC see South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation Šabac, 85 Sabor, 94, 96 Said, Mohamed, 104 Samata Party, 168, 173 Samoa, 205 Samuel, Revd Theo, 246 Sandwich, Earl of, 238

Sangh, 166 Sangh Parivar, 184 Sanskrit, 141 Sarajevo, 96, 97 Sarajevo Charter, 233 Saudi Arabia, 7, 16, 17, 109, 115, 175, 176 Saudi Basic Law, 115, 116 Save the Children, 227 Scandinavia, 59 ‘scapegoating’, 114, 118, 122 scheduled castes, 146 SCIAF see Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund Scotland, 77 Scott Inquiry, 226, 239 Scottish Catholic International Aid Fund, 222, 236 Searle, Peter, 48 Second Coming, 30, 43, 48 secularism, 50 –82, 140, 145–7, 181, 182, 189, 190 secularization, viii, 50 –82 secularization: definition of, 53–60 Selby, Bishop of, 227 Semnan, 122 Sengulane, Bishop Dinis, 220 Serbia(n), 86, 91, 98, 232, 234 Serbian: Academy of Arts and Sciences, 92 bishops, 84, 91, 94, 95, 96 Orthodox Church, 3, 89, 90, 91–7, 98, 99, 225 Orthodoxy, 84 Serbs, 5, 83–99 Shah, the, 118, 123, 125, 129, 136 Sharia, 109 Shariatmadari, 119 Sharif, Nawaz, 181 Shari’a, 116, 117, 119, 133 Shari’a law, 114, 130 Shell Oil, 241 Sheppard, Rt Revd David, 229 Shi’ite(ism), 6, 16 Shintoism, 11, 199, 200, 209, 213 Shiraz, 134, 137 Shirazi, Ayatollah Abdullah, 119 Shiv Sena, 154, 157, 163, 166, 167, 168, 169, 172, 194

Index Shi’a, 108 Shi’i(sm), 109, 114, 119, 120, 121, 122, 126, 134, 135 Shi’i ulama, 118 Shkaki, Fathi, 106 Sider, Ronald, 46 Sihk(ism), 7, 19, 54, 58, 79, 81, 141, 142, 145, 146, 168 Sindhu, river, 186 Singapore, 66, 199, 205, 212 Singh, Jaswant, 160 Singh, V.P., 179 Sinha, Yashwant, 171 Sinhala (government), 143 Sino-Pakistani axis, 152 sino-Soviet, 16 SJM see Swadeshi Jagran Manch Skidmore, David, 247 slavery, decline of, 51 Slavic-Orthodox Christianity, 11 Social Responsibility: Board for, 229–30, 237, 242 Socialist Party, 153 soldiers, 85 Solomon Islands, 205 South Africa, 2, 4 South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation (SAARC), 167 South Carolina, 36 South Korea, 43, 66, 67, 201, 204, 210 South Pacific, 27 Soviet Union, viii, 3, 10, 14, 17, 61, 65–7, 143– 4, 151, 153, 161, 170, 172, 175, 194, 211, 215 Spain, 55 Srebrenica, 233 Sri Lanka, 143, 167, 199 St Sava (cathedral of), 93 Stalinist USSR, 62 state secularism, 50 –82 states, formation of, 50 Stepinac (Alojzije, Archbishop – later Cardinal – of Zagreb), 86, 87, 88 Stevens, Cat, 10 Strasbourg, 223 Sudan, 7, 16, 115, 224, 225, 226 Sudanese government, 131 Sulawesi, 208 Sumatra, 208

291

Sundarji, Gen. K., 170 Sunni(sm), 16, 17, 108, 109, 114, 116, 120 Supreme Revolutionary Council, 127–81 Sutton, Rt Revd Keith, 222 swadeshi, 162, 168, 169 Swadeshi Jagran Manch (SJM), 163, 164 Swatantra Party, 149–50, 151, 152, 153, 191 Sweden, 78 Synod, 218, 219, 223, 228–31, 234 –7, 239, 240, 242– 4 Syria, 16 Syrian Orthodox Church, 226 Tabriz, 137 Taha, Mahmud Muhammad, 131 Taiwan, 199, 204 Tajikistan, 67, 102 Taliban, 101, 110 Tambo, Oliver, 229 Tamil Tigers, 143 Tamils, 143 Taoism, 199 Taylor, Rt Revd John, 248 Taylor, Rt Revd Humphrey, 229 Tear Fund, 236, 244 Teheran, 18, 123, 177 Temple, Archbishop William, 223 Temple Mount in Jerusalem, 13 Terrorism: US Department’s Annual Report on Global, 192 Test Ban Treaty, 159, 180 Thackeray, Bal, 169, 172, 194 Thailand, 46, 199, 242 Thakre, Khusabhau, 164, 172 Thatcher, Margaret, 218 Theresa, Mother, 10 Third Way magazine, 46 Third World, 5, 9, 10, 16, 17, 44, 217, 222, 228, 237 Tibet, 151–2, 168, 173 Tibetan refugees, 152 Tin Bigha, 158 Tito, 88 trade unions, 72 Trades Union Congress, 227

292 Index Transcaucasian republics (of former Soviet Union), 4 tribal animists, 142 Trinidad Terms for debt relief, 231 Trocaire, 222 Tudjman, Franjo (President of Croatia), 2 Turkey, 6, 7, 63, 72, 226 Turks, 93 Turnbull Commission, 224 Tutu, Archbishop Desmond, 10, 220, 230 Tuvalu, 205 Tuzla, 233 Twelfth Imam, 119, 125, 135 Twelver branch, 120, 135 Tyler, Texas, 42

UDHR see Universal Declaration of Human Rights Uganda, 79 Uighurs, 207 Ukraine, 67 ulama, 117, 119, 134 Ulema, 108 Ulster Protestants, 37 Ultimate, 34 Umma, 109 UK see Britain and United Kingdom UN: Arms Register, 240 Charter of the, 126 Commission on Human Rights, 127, 132, 138 Conference on Human Rights, 20 Conference on Population, 20, 21 Conference on Women, 21 High Commissioner for Refugees, 234 Social Summit (Copenhagen, March 1995), 237 World Conference on Human Rights, 116 unemployment, 103, 104 Uniate Church, 67 UNICEF, 242, 243 United Arab Emirates, 176 United Kingdom, 56

United Nations, 49, 129, 144, 226, 236; see also UN United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (USPG), 221, 229 United States of America, viii, 3, 18, 27, 30, 36–8, 40, 42–5, 47, 50 –1, 53–5, 57–60, 63–5, 67–8, 70, 72, 77–8, 80 –1, 102, 143, 145, 151, 153, 160, 168, 170, 172– 4, 176, 178, 182, 201, 206, 215, 238 UNITS, 42 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 126, 138 Upadhyaya, Deendayal, 167 Uprooted People: Ecumenical Year of Churches in Solidarity with, 246 urbanization, 5 Uruguay, 77, 78 US: Central Intelligence, 161, 180 Department of State, 11 Department’s Annual Report on Global Terrorism, 192 State Department, 138 see also United States of America USPG see United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel USSR see Soviet Union Ustaše, 86, 87, 93 Uzbekistan, 67 Vajpayee, Atal Behari, 153– 4, 160, 163, 165–7, 171, 173, 176, 180, 181, 183, 184, 192 Vatican, 8, 9, 20, 89, 90, 221 Vatican City, 9 ‘Vatican II’, 20 Vedas, 149 Velayat-e Faqih, 109 Vellicate, California, 42 Venkatraman, President R., 179 VHP see Vishwa Hindu Parishad Vienna, 20 Vienna Declaration, 116, 134 Vietnam, 199, 206, 209 Vilayat-I-Faqih, 118, 119, 120, 136 violence, 2, 37– 40, 43 Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), 155, 169

Index Vivekananda, Swami, 148 Vojvodina, 91 Wahhabism, 16 Wallis and Futuna Islands, 205 war, 37, 49, 51, 84 –5, 89, 90, 92–8, 104, 142–5, 175, 210, 214, 224, 231, 232, 238, 244 Webster, David, 237 Wengzhou, 202 West Bank, 102, 235 West Bengal, 157 WFP see Witness for Peace Windsor Castle, 46 Witness for Peace (WFP), 44 women, role of, 21 Women, UN Conference on, 21 Worcester, Bishop of, 227 World Conference of Relation and Peace (WCRP), 46 World Congress of Fundamentalists, 36 World Council of Churches, 10, 89, 223, 224, 229, 232– 4, 238, 241

293

World Development Movement, 244 World Evangelism, Consultation on, 46 World Health Organisation, 242–3 World Muslim League, 7, 10, 16 World Trade Organisation, 164 –5 World Vision, 11, 48, 66 World War II, 66, 86, 88, 91, 94, 130, 234 Xinjiang, 207 Yassin, Sheikh Ahmad, 101, 106 Yazd, 139 Yongnak, 204 York, Archbishop of, 228, 242 Yugoslavia/Yugoslavs, 4, 5, 83–99, 232– 4 Zagreb, 99 Zagreb (Archbishop of), 85, 86 Zeroual Government, 102 Zhejang, 202 Zionism(ists), 6, 122, 123, 124, 125 Zoroastrians, 116, 123, 130, 131, 137