My research interest in this class is to study and understand the role that religion plays in conflict to unite or further divide. This is something that I find especially puzzling because in some circumstances religion is used as an essential key to creating lasting peace, while in other cases religion further cleavages populations and must be removed from the equation in order to achieve peace. Does religion have a role in peacebuilding? Why does the influence of religion differ depending on the conflict? When is religion successful in peacebuilding?
I choose the topic of religion and conflict for several reasons. First, religion has played an important role within my own life and identity, and is something that I am interested in expanding my knowledge on. Second, I personally find religion incredibly interesting because it acts as personal identity on the micro-level, but it also plays a major role in the overarching level within the international community. I am hoping to understand the how individual identity contributes to the decisions made on the macro-level of international affairs.
In Professor Mohammed Abu-Nimer’s article “Conflict Resolution, Culture, and Religion: Toward a Training Model of Interreligious Peacebuilding”, he explores the intersectionality and success between culture, religion, and peacebuilding.[1] Especially, considering the importance religion and culture plays in conflicts. This article creates interesting questions about identity and peacebuilding and has encouraged me to further research the intersectionality. Overall, I am hoping to gain a greater understanding of influence of religion in both a positive and negative circumstances, especially within peacebuilding.
[1] Mohammed Abu-Nimer. “Conflict Resolution, Culture, and Religion: Toward a Training Model of Interreligious Peacebuilding.” Journal of Peace Research 38, no. 6 (2001), pp. 685-704.
Bibliography
Abu-Nimer, Mohammed. “Conflict Resolution, Culture, and Religion: Toward a Training Model of Interreligious Peacebuilding,” Journal of Peace Research 38, no. 6 (2001), 685-704.
Religion and its influence is definitely an interesting topic regarding IR – as you said yourself it can play a dual role in both amplifying and reducing conflict, as well as influence it has on the paths taken by certain powers, big and small when it comes to their decisions. Regarding a methodology, one would be inclined towards an interpretive approach, comparing and contrasting the role of religion in government and seeing if there was a common denominator between them, which would involve looking into the legal, historical and governmental documents – which could make an interesting case for the role religion plays in how leaders make decisions and even, when combined with some demographic data, how influential it is in electing a new leader. Furthermore, one could look deeper into the role religion plays post-conflict, studying rhetoric used and how actors may use them to influence their allies.
I think another “puzzle” you could look into is the role that religion plays in aid itself, specifically regarding what it says about the country that has sent it, and the message that it sends to the world around it, as well as its links to the west and colonialism. Furthermore, you could take a more positivist approach and look into the economics of aid, and what effect religion has on the development of the country economically, governmentally and even pedagogically.
Resources:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/09614524.2012.685862 – The role of a transnational religious network in development in a weak state: the international links of the Episcopal Church of Sudan
Structure, Context, and Ideological Dissonance in Transnational Religious Networks – https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs11266-013-9418-x
I look forward to watching your project develop over the coming year and what methodology you end up examining your topic through!
I am so jealous of you; Professor Abu-Nimer is an incredible professor and true expert in his field. Having him for my first-year seminar has shaped my views of the world, especially in regard to the topic you’re exploring. I personally enjoyed and found particularly interesting, and think you might as well, Professor Abu-Nimer’s discussions on bringing religious leaders in to conversations of peace-building in places where religion is fundamental to way of life.
The argument, for lack of a better word, is that too often do we in the west – because of our deep rooted norms of the separation of church and state – exclude religious leaders in discussions of peace. We lack the recognition that though religious leaders may not be a part of our government structures and way of life, they are for a vast majority of the world, including in the west. Therefore, we might find more success in not only conflict deescalation, but legitimate sustainability of peace if we bring in leaders that people truly listen to and receive guidance from.
As a non-religious person myself, I immediately questioned this position. But in attempting to take my biases about religion out of it and just sitting down to think, I realized how correct Professor Abu-Nimer is. Who are we as westerns to tell other cultures and governments that there shouldn’t be religious leaders at the table just because for our particular world view, it works. If we are truly engaged in the quest for peace, we must let the most viable solutions for the cultures involved be discussed, not skew it in a way that better shapes how we were raised.
Again, you are in store for an incredible learning experience with Professor Abu-Nimer. His experience in the field is unmatched and being his mentee will undoubtedly provide great incites in to the topics you want to study.
Savannah,
Your topic sounds very interesting! My topic, looking at how theocracies deal with global climate initiatives, also ties in religion in the international sphere, so I am very interested in hearing more about your research!
It would be interesting to see it narrowed down by region, as certain regions of the world seem to be more religious than others, and also see more conflict than others. For example, the Middle East, where almost every country considered a theocracy is located that also sees immense conflict, or Western Europe, where religiosity does not seem as strong, and where there is minimal conflict. It would also be interesting to study discourse by religious officials in high-conflict areas. If somehow you could figure out how to quantitatively categorize countries based on religiosity, it would be interesting to see how that corresponds to religiously driven conflict in that country/region. Because religion is hard to measure concretely, it can be hard to find reliable, valid quantitative data on how ‘strong’ or ‘weak’ someone’s religiosity is in methods other than polls, so it might be tricky doing it quantitatively. I found a Gallup Poll from 2009 in which people were asked how much religion plays a roll in their daily life, and then ranked by country on importance of religion. If you could find something like that, it might be easier to coincide it with high conflict regions, and look into connections between the two.
You could look into it in the United States, where the recent rise of ethnonationalism has also seemingly come with a rise of religiosity, and religiously driven hate speech/conflict. For example, in the recent “Straight Pride Parades” seen in cities like Boston, many participants used Bible verses and other religious quotes to condemn homosexuality, which caused unrest not just in Boston, but all over the United States. It is interesting to see how a religion in one part of the world can be linked to conflict, but in other regions the same religion can promote peacefulness and play a part in reducing conflict.
Your topic is so intriguing and allows you to have many ways you can approach it when researching. I look forward to seeing which direction you decide on taking your project!
Overall you are off to a good start here, Savannah, and you also have received some excellent suggestions from your classmates (so be sure to note those down!). I think that you can start to answer some of the background questions you pose (the “Does…?” or “When…?” questions) now with some background research so that you can keep moving towards that more defined explanatory question. The “why…?” question that you have in the first paragraph is a good starting point, but keep researching and reading to further develop the empirical and conceptual dimensions of your puzzle. I look forward to seeing how your research develops!