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Electoral behavior in the United States is shaped by more than geography and economics as it is deeply intertwined with cultural identity. Here, we quantify how voting patterns in the 2016, 2020 and 2024 presidential elections cluster not only across neighboring counties but also along shared religious and socioeconomic lines. By computing Moran’s I, a standard measure of spatial autocorrelation, under four distinct “neighborhood” definitions (physical borders, dominant religion, income bracket and urbanization level), we show that counties sharing a majority faith vote in strikingly similar ways, second only to contiguous geography. In contrast, grouping by household income or urban status yields markedly weaker clustering. These findings reveal that cultural networks, embodied by religious affiliation, exert a stronger influence on aggregate voting behavior than class differences or the urban–rural divide. Our approach highlights the power of simple network models grounded in social traits to illuminate the dynamics of political polarization and suggests new pathways for understanding how cultural identity shapes large scale electoral outcomes.

Foreign policy objectives can be achieved through religious institutions as a form of soft power. However, empirical evidence on this form of soft power is limited. In this study, we provide rigorous empirical evidence of electoral influence through the channel of religious institutions. To test the efficacy of this channel of influence, we study the Chinese government's attempts to influence Taiwanese elections through religious institutions. By leveraging spatial regression methods, we demonstrate that Mazu temples influence electoral behavior through a localized process. The density of urban Mazu temples in Kaohsiung, Taiwan, which are subject to influence from China, is associated with an increase in vote share for the pro-China party in their neighborhoods. However, the influence on voters in urban and village areas is not homogeneous. In contrast to urban temples, the relationship between village Mazu temples and the electoral results is insignificant. Los objetivos en materia de politica exterior pueden alcanzarse a traves del uso de las instituciones religiosas como una forma de poder blando. Sin embargo, la evidencia empirica sobre esta forma de poder blando es limitada. En este estudio aportamos evidencia empirica rigurosa con respecto a la influencia electoral que se ejerce a traves del canal de las instituciones religiosas. Estudiamos, con el fin de probar la eficacia de este canal de influencia, los intentos por parte del Gobierno chino de influir en las elecciones taiwanesas a traves de las instituciones religiosas. Demostramos, a traves del uso de los metodos de regresion espacial, que los templos Mazu influyen en el comportamiento electoral mediante un proceso localizado. La densidad de templos Mazu urbanos que existe en Kaohsiung, Taiwan, y que estan sujetos a la influencia de China, se asocia con un aumento en la proporcion de votos para el partido pro-China en sus vecindarios. Sin embargo, la influencia sobre los votantes en las zonas urbanas y rurales no es homogenea. A diferencia de lo que sucede con los templos urbanos, la relacion entre los templos Mazu rurales y los resultados electorales es insignificante. Les objectifs de politique etrangere peuvent etre atteints grace aux institutions religieuses; c'est une forme de << soft power >>. Neanmoins, les donnees empiriques la concernant sont limitees. Dans cette etude, nous fournissons des donnees empiriques rigoureuses sur l'influence electorale du canal des institutions religieuses. Pour evaluer l'efficacite de ce canal d'influence, nous etudions les tentatives du gouvernement chinois d'influencer les elections taiwanaises par les institutions religieuses. En utilisant des methodes de regression spatiale, nous demontrons que les temples de Mazu influencent le comportement electoral par le biais d'un processus localise. La densite des temples de Mazu urbains a Kaohsiung, qui sont soumis a l'influence de la Chine, est associee a une augmentation de la proportion des votes favorables au parti pro-Chine dans leur quartier. Neanmoins, nous remarquons une heterogeneite de l'influence sur les electeurs dans les zones urbaines et rurales. Contrairement aux temples urbains, la relation entre les temples de Mazu dans les villages et les resultats electoraux est negligeable.

Persons of faith are now seeking religious exemptions from laws concerning sex, reproduction, and marriage on the ground that the law makes the objector complicit in the assertedly sinful conduct of others. We term claims of this kind, which were at issue in Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, complicity-based conscience claims. Complicity-based conscience claims differ in form and in social logic from the claims featured in the free exercise cases that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) invokes. The distinctive features of complicity-based conscience claims matter, not because they make the claim for religious exemption any less authentic or sincere, but rather because accommodating claims of this kind has the potential to inflict material and dignitary harms on other citizens. Complicity claims focus on the conduct of others outside the faith community. Their accommodation therefore has potential to harm those whom the claimants view as sinning. Today complicity claims are asserted by growing numbers of Americans about contentious \"culture war\" issues. This dynamic amplifies the effects of accommodation. Faith claims that concern questions in democratic contest will escalate in number, and accommodation of the claims will be fraught with significance, not only for the claimants, but also for those whose conduct the claimants condemn. Some urge accommodation in the hopes of peaceful settlement, yet, as we show, complicity claims can provide an avenue to extend, rather than settle, conflict. We highlight the distinctive form and social logic of complicity-based conscience claims so that those debating accommodation do so with the impact on third parties fully in view. We show how concern about the third-party impact of accommodation structured the Court's decision in Hobby Lobby and demonstrate how this concern is an integral part of RFRA's compelling interest and narrow tailoring inquiries. At issue is not only whether but how complicity claims are accommodated.

This article refers to the role and importance of religious beliefs in decisions related to the electoral and political involvement of the Polish young precariat. Based on qualitative research conducted using asynchronous interviews, it shows the importance of declared religious values when selecting candidates for parliamentary chambers on the example of Poland. The research results presented in the article refer to the last parliamentary elections in Poland held in 2023. They show the increased interest of the young Polish precariat in political life, as evidenced by the large participation of its representatives in the last elections and voting taking into account a pragmatic approach to the selection of a given candidate to the parliamentary chamber where his competences and effectiveness are more important than his worldview or the religious values of their voters. An interesting conclusion from the conducted research is that the Polish young precariat consciously chooses candidates for the Polish parliament and is aware of their advantages and disadvantages as well as the limitations that exist in politics, which makes it difficult for populists to appear in political life. The article uses a mixed research methodology, combining various methods of solving research problems, including the collection, analysis, interpretation and presentation of quantitative and qualitative data.

Background While overall COVID-19 vaccine uptake is high in the Netherlands, it lags behind in certain subpopulations. Aim We aimed to explore the characteristics of groups with lower COVID-19 vaccine uptake at neighbourhood level to inform the strategy to improve uptake and guide research into barriers for vaccination. Methods We performed an ecological study using national vaccination register and socio-demographic data at neighbourhood level. Using univariate and multivariable generalized additive models we examined the (potentially non-linear) effect of each determinant on uptake. We focused on those aged 50 years and older, since they are at highest risk of severe disease. Results In those over 50 years of age, a higher proportion of individuals with a non-Western migration background and higher voting proportions for right-wing Christian and conservative political parties were at neighbourhood level univariately associated with lower COVID-19 vaccine uptake. In contrast, higher socioeconomic status and higher voting proportions for right-wing liberal, progressive liberal and Christian middle political parties were associated with higher uptake. Multivariable results differed from univariate results in that a higher voting proportion for progressive left-wing political parties was also associated with higher uptake. In addition, with regard to migration background only a Turkish background remained significant. Conclusion We identified determinants associated with COVID-19 vaccine uptake at neighbourhood level and observed heterogeneity in uptake between different subpopulations. Since the goal of vaccination is not only to reduce suffering and death by improving the average uptake, but also to reduce health inequity, it is important to focus on subpopulations with lower uptake.

The growing political influence of evangélico Christians in traditionally Catholic Brazil has caught the attention of social and political scientists as well as theologians. Among others, the reasons for two-thirds of the mainly Pentecostal and Neo-Pentecostal electorate voting for Jair Messias Bolsonaro include a moral agenda concerning human sexuality and the “traditional family,” namely the rejection of abortion under any circumstance and same-sex marriage. This conservative agenda is shared in other countries and churches and shows as “traditionalist” (Benjamin Teitelbaum), especially in Brazil, the USA under Trump, and Russia. At the same time, other, more social aspects of Christian diaconia in caring for the integrity of the body are left aside, although they are foreseen in those churches’ declarations of faith and ethical catechisms. The 2019–2022 government’s blatant failure to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic, the appalling rise of hunger, and the destruction of the Amazon rainforest should give rise to what I call an “evangélico sense of shame” as a consequence of the incompatibility of many of the faith convictions of that part of the electorate with Bolsonaro’s stances and actions, retrieving shame as an ethical category. To this end, I analyze biblical notions and theological reflections on shame, as well as publications of evangélico churches with a focus on the largest of its churches in Brazil, the Assemblies of God. Thus, I intend to reclaim an integral diaconia for evangélico churches.

Research into Citizenship Education has become increasingly important in recent years. It deals with the promotion of social cohesion, democracy and human rights. This article examines the interfaces between Citizenship Education and Religious Education, particularly from the perspective of Islamic religious teachers in Austria. The empirical basis is a qualitative study conducted as part of the author’s dissertation, which includes group discussions with 41 Islamic Religious Education teachers. The results were analyzed using the documentary method. The analysis focuses on two key aspects: first, the role of Islamic Religious Education in supporting the integration, participation and identity formation of young people, and second, challenges of Religious Education in a social context.

This Article explains and analyzes a recent trend in the Supreme Court’s cases regarding unintentional discrimination, where the argument is that a law has the effect of producing a disadvantage on members of a particular group. In religious discrimination cases, the Court has held that a law is presumptively unconstitutional if the law results in a comparable secular activity being treated more favorably than religious activity. Yet in racial discrimination cases, the Court has said the mere fact that a law more severely disadvantages racial minorities as a group does not suffice to establish unlawful discrimination. The two tracks for unintentional discrimination claims can be understood through the lens of political process theory. One part of political process theory maintains that courts should be skeptical of laws that negatively affect discrete and insular minorities who may be politically powerless and face prejudice. One reason the Court more carefully scrutinizes laws that burden conservative, (often) Christian religious groups may be that the Court views those groups as socially powerless because their views no longer command majority support and because their views are not treated with the respect the Court thinks they deserve. And the Court’s decisions have the effect of redistributing power to or reinforcing power in the groups the Court believes to be socially powerless. Identifying the jurisprudential worldview that may plausibly drive these trends helps to identify the potential implications and assess the merits of the new doctrinal approach that the Court has taken in (some) antidiscrimination cases. The Court’s new approach to religious discrimination claims has some virtues; in particular, the Court is probably right to consider facts from the private sphere, such as a group’s economic or social power, in deciding the appropriate scope of judicial review. But the selectivity with which the Court has applied this approach, as well as the Court’s odd assessments of various groups’ power, has resulted in a problematic jurisprudence of conservative victimization that judicially protects backlash against advances in equality and antidiscrimination law.

In Latin America, unlike in Europe, religion is not a variable commonly used to alyse electoral behaviour in constitutiol referendums, where theoretical approaches such as systematic political reasoning, heuristic approaches, and economic voting predomite. However, religion matters even in countries with high levels of secularisation. Chile’s Constitutiol Referendum 2022, in which citizens were to approve or reject the proposed new constitution, is a good example. Four findings indicate the relevance of the religious cleavage. First, religion affected voting intentions, even after controlling for theoretically more powerful variables such as ideology. Second, Evangelicals were more homogeneous than Catholics, who were divided according to the content of the constitutiol proposal. Third, rejection responds to the opposition to the five axes of the constitutiol proposal: pluritiolity, gender parity, elimition of the sete, abortion, and the creation of a public tiol Health System. Fourth, Evangelicals rejected abortion across the board, so much so that Evangelicals on the left and right opposed it in almost equal proportions.