scholarly journals The role of religion and its influence on conflicts in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 107-124
Author(s):  
Boris Bursać
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Social Economic ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Colonial Rule ◽  
Political Crises ◽  
The North ◽  
Religious Extremism ◽  
Islam And Christianity ◽  
Role Of Religion

At the very end of colonial rule, UK established Islam and Christianity in Nigeria as the two dominant religions with the middle belt region of Nigeria as the battle ground. Before their final departure, they secured and formed several ethnic and religious lines, which in the postcolonial era were used by political elites as a way to fight for state power. As such, on the basis of the abuse of political and religious elites, and on the basis of ethnic, religious and regional divisions, a deeply fragmented Nigeria as we know it today emerged. With colonial domination, sudden transitions, the power of society was destroyed to such an extent that it became incapable of regulating human passion. The situation is further heated by leading elites who manipulate religious identity, where as a result appears that the north of Nigeria, mostly Muslim, tends to Islamize the whole Nigeria, and the south, mostly Christian, strives to defend Christianity and the constitutional secularism of the state. In such a situation, religion, instead of calming passions and tensions, thanks to its leaders, opens the way to conflict, violence, extremism, and, finally, terrorism. The central understanding of the formation of the identity of religion and its transformation from conflict to violence is the rise of religious extremism throughout the country. Extremist groups show significant intolerance towards members of their own and other religions, react to social, economic and political crises of Nigerian politics, of course in religious terms, which later leads to conflicts. The integration of religion into Nigerian politics, which we can thank the colonial rulers, is one of the leading problems and it is precisely this that stands behind religious violence and political instability in the country.

scholarly journals Religious Identity and National Conflict in the 20th Century Indonesia

2017 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 303
Author(s):  
Andreas Jonathan
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Critical Analysis ◽  
National Identities ◽  
Islamic State ◽  
Religious Identities ◽  
The Past ◽  
Religious Nation ◽  
Role Of Religion

This study attempts to discuss on how religious identities contribute to or was in conflict with the emerging national identities, with focusing issue on the struggle of Islam in its relation to Indonesian identity as a multi-religious nation and Pancasila state. Based on the critical analysis from the various literature, the result of the study showed that Islam did both contribute and was in conflict with the Indonesian national identity. The Islamist fights for the Islamic state, the nationalist defends Pancasila state. As long as Islam is the majority in Indonesia and as long as there is diversity in Islam, especially in the interpretation of Islam and the state, Indonesian national identity will always be in conflict between Pancasila state and Islamic state. Even though, the role of religion in society and nation change is very significant. The Islamist is always there, although it is not always permanent in certain organizations. In the past, NU and Muhammadiyah were considered as Islamist, but today they are nationalist. At the same time, new Islamist organizations and parties emerge to continue their Islamist spirit. Keywords: Islam, Religious identity, Pancasila, 

scholarly journals Migration and religiousness

2020 ◽  
pp. 486-493
Author(s):  
Nemanja Vukcevic ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Religious Practice ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Legislative Framework ◽  
Religious Factor ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Academic Authors ◽  
Role Of Religion

The subject of the research is the relationship between the phenomena of religion and migrations. The problem of their interaction has been inherent in human society since the ancient times; this problem is relevant one in nova days too. The consequences and prospects of development of this complex phenomenon in contemporary society are not sufficiently examined in science yet, especially in Sociology. In the paper, the role of religion in migration processes is studied based on the analysis of various sources, synthesis, induction, analogy, and abstraction. In course of research were analyzed numerous religious treatises, fiction works and classical sociological works, as well as works by foreign and Russian contemporary academic authors. The paper notes that the migration discourse has now shifted from the geographic and demographic to the socio-political domain. Religion has begun to play an important role at all stages of migration, both from the perspective of neoliberal and humanistic approaches. The paper aims to identify the role of the religious factor in the migration process and the role and logic of migration not only in inter-faith but also in intra-faith relations. It is shown that migration either serves as a catalyst for religious feelings and behavior or it strengthens the existing religious identity of migrants and enhances the quality of their religious feelings. The study highlights the need to improve the legislative framework of religious freedom, but also raises the question of how far religious communities can go in the process of advancing religious practice. In this regard, migrations often become a challenge for a secular state. Therefore, it is concluded that only an integrated approach would contribute to solving this problem.

Getting Religion? The Puzzling Case of Islam and Civil War

2007 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 97-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monica Duffy Toft
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Statistical Analysis ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
Petroleum Reserves ◽  
Religious Obligation

From 1940 to 2000, Islam was involved in a disproportionately high number of civil wars compared with other religions, such as Christianity or Hinduism. To help explain the overrepresentation of Islam in these wars, this article introduces a theory of “religious outbidding.” The theory holds that embattled political elites will tender religious bids when they calculate that increasing their religious legitimacy will strengthen their chances of survival. In combination with three overlapping factors—the historical absence of an internecine religious civil war similar to the Thirty Years’ War in Europe, proximity of Islam's holiest sites to Israel and large petroleum reserves, and jihad (i.e., defense of Islam as a religious obligation), religious outbidding accounts for Islam's higher representation in religious civil wars. The article includes a statistical analysis of the role of religion in civil wars and tests the logic of the argument of religious outbidding in the case of Sudan's two civil wars.

Russian Christ

2011 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor A. Shnirelman
Keyword(s):  
Religious Education ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Peaceful Coexistence ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Role Of Religion

Interest in the social role of religion, including religious education (RE), is on the increase in the European Union. Yet whereas Western educators focus mostly on the potential of religion for dialogue and peaceful coexistence, in Russia religion is viewed mostly as a resource for an exclusive cultural-religious identity and resistance to globalization. RE was introduced into the curriculum in Russia during the past ten to fifteen years. The author analyzes why, how, and under what particular conditions RE was introduced in Russia, what this education means, and what social consequences it can entail.

scholarly journals Is There a Role of Religion? The Moderation Role of Religious Identity and Religious Practice between Traditional Media Usage and Moral Evaluation

Religions ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 137
Author(s):  
Sheng Zeng ◽  
Zijian Peng ◽  
Lin Wu
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
General Social Survey ◽  
Religious Practice ◽  
Moral Evaluation ◽  
Situational Factor ◽  
Traditional Media ◽  
Media Usage ◽  
Chinese General Social Survey ◽  
Role Of Religion

Although the relationship between traditional media usage and moral evaluation has been studied in China, it is not clear what role religion plays in this relationship. The 2013 Chinese General Social Survey was used to examine the moderation role of religious identity and religious practice in this correlation. The STATA 15.1 and PROCESS macro for SPSS (Model 2) was employed. This research confirms that religion has a moderating role in the correlation between traditional media usage and moral evaluation. Specifically, religious identity, no matter whether it is polytheistic or monotheistic, will strengthen the correlation between traditional media usage and moral evaluation. However, religious practice will weaken the correlation between traditional media usage and moral evaluation, except the religious practice of monotheism in China. Furthermore, our findings prove that religion is an important situational factor in the correlation between traditional media usage and moral evaluation. We should take religious identity and religious practice as independent factors to conduct a richer study in the future. Most importantly, our findings further confirm that the rationalization of society does not necessarily lead to the secularization of religion.

Societal Level of Religiosity and Religious Identity Expression in Europe

2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (6) ◽  
pp. 959-975 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jolanda van der Noll ◽  
Anette Rohmann ◽  
Vassilis Saroglou
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Elevated Level ◽  
European Countries ◽  
Multilevel Analyses ◽  
Cultural Characteristics ◽  
Religious Symbols ◽  
Societal Level ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
Identity Expression

Growing diversity in terms of values and worldviews is one of the main challenges in current European societies. It is often argued that, in these societies, suspicion toward some aspects and forms of religion, if not religion in general is one of the main obstacles toward the acceptance of minority religious practices. In this article, we focused on the role of religion as a part of culture across European societies in allowing or inhibiting the expression of a religious identity by wearing visible religious symbols in the workplace. We examined the, intuitive but still to be tested, assumption that religious identity expression is more accepted in societies with an elevated level of societal religiosity in a European context. Using the 2006 data of Eurobarometer 65.4 on discrimination, we examined differences in the acceptance of religious identity expression through support for wearing visible religious symbols in 26 European societies. Results of multilevel analyses showed cross-societal variation in the acceptance of wearing visible religious symbols and that societal religiosity positively predicts the acceptance of religious identity expression. Our results showed that it is meaningful to differentiate between European countries when examining the role of cultural characteristics at the societal level when analyzing individual attitudes related to identity expressions and their acceptance.

REGIONAL DISPUTATION BETWEEN NORTH HALMAHERA AND WEST HALMAHERA REGENCIES, 2003-2010

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Liliane Mojau
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Dimension ◽  
Political Elites ◽  
The West ◽  
Historical Method ◽  
Administrative Region ◽  
The North ◽  
The Status ◽  
Long Time ◽  
The Government

Ideally, the proliferation of the administrative region is aimed at improving the welfare of society. In reality, the proliferation of the administrative region often triggers the regional disputation. The regional disputation between the North Halmahera and the West Halmahera regencies is one of the cases that took a long time. There are six villages that contested in this regional disputation, namely Dum-Dum, Gamsungi/Akesahu, Akelamo Kao, Tetewang, Bobane Igo, and Pasir Putih. At first, the government of the North Halmahera and the West Halmahera regencies coordinated to settle their region boundaries. But it develops to the status issue of the six villages: are the six villages part of the North Halmahera or the West Halmahera regencies. This research is aimed at explaining the regional disputation between the North Halmahera and the West Halmahera regencies, 2003-2010. The method used in this research is the historical method, which consists of four stages, namely heuristics, criticism, interpretation, and historiography. The result of this research indicates there are cultural dimension that colored this regional disputation and there is a role of local political elites (DPRD Halmahera Utara).

Reciting the Goddess

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Vantine Birkenholtz
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
Indian Subcontinent ◽  
Detailed Examination ◽  
Ruling Elite ◽  
New Perspective ◽  
Role Of Religion

This book presents a new perspective on the making of Hinduism in Nepal with the first book-length study of Nepal’s goddess Svasthānī and the popular Svasthānīvratakathā textual tradition. In the centuries following its origin as a short local legend in the sixteenth century, the Svasthānīvratakathā developed into a comprehensive Purana text that is still widely celebrated today among Nepal’s Hindus with an annual month-long recitation. This book interrogates the ways in which the Svasthānīvratakathā can be viewed as a medium through which the effects of important shifts in the political and cultural landscape that occurred among Nepal’s ruling elite were taken up by the general public and are evidenced within one decidedly local, lay tradition. Drawing on both archival and ethnographic research, the book begins with a detailed examination of Svasthānī (“the Goddess of One’s Own Place”) and the Svasthānīvratakathā within the shifting literary, linguistic, religious, cultural, and political contexts of medieval and modern Nepal from the sixteenth century to the present. It then widens its scope to explore the complementary and contentious dynamics between Nepal’s heterogeneous Newar Hindu and high-caste hill Hindu communities and those of Nepal as a Hindu kingdom vis-à-vis Hindu India. The Svasthānī tradition serves as a case study for a broader discussion of the making of Hindu religious identity and practice in Nepal and South Asia, and the role of religion in historical political change. This book brings to the fore a neglected vantage point on the master narratives of Hinduism on the Indian subcontinent.

Homophobia, transphobia, and the homonationalist gaze: challenges of young Bangladeshi homosexuals and transgenders in migration

2019 ◽  
pp. 101-124
Author(s):  
Raihan M. Sharif
Keyword(s):  
Urban Areas ◽  
Colonial Rule ◽  
Small Segment ◽  
Liberal Societies ◽  
Muslim Majority ◽  
British Colonial ◽  
Role Of Religion ◽  
State Protection

Homosexuals and transgenders in Muslim majority countries go through multiple struggles. In Bangladesh, the governments’ apparent indecision regrading a British colonial rule banning ‘intercourse against the order of nature,’ a problematic stance on fatwa, Islamic laws and, finally, the national abandonment of transgenders tend to shape societal attitudes to and reception of homosexuals and transgenders. This chapter examines some common challenges that young homosexuals and transgenders experience as they migrate from the rural to the urban areas in Bangladesh, particularly the role of religion and how they negotiate the absence of state protection on their rights. As a small segment of them manages to migrate to ‘queer friendly countries,’ this chapter also investigates the struggles of young Bangladeshi homosexuals and transgenders in liberal societies in the ‘queer friendly countries’ where their rights are perceived to be protected.

scholarly journals RELIGION AND THE PROBLEM OF NEW IDENTITIES IN THE CONTEMPORARY WORLD

2021 ◽  
pp. 126-135
Author(s):  
AZAMAT ZH. IDRISSOV ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Religious Identity ◽  
Public Discourse ◽  
Global Dimension ◽  
Religious Community ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Religious Communities ◽  
Religious Identities ◽  
Contemporary World ◽  
Role Of Religion

This article studies the role of religion in the formation of new identities. Religion is presented as an alternative to secular nationalism and the revival of new religious identities as a reaction to the crisis of the secular type of nation-building. The first part of the article shows the historical background of the crisis of the theory of secularization and the “religious renaissance”, which was an attempt to return religion to public discourse. Religious identity is considered as a strict construct that is formed by certain actors using various mechanisms. The types of construction of religious identity are considered from three sides using the terms of M. Castells as the problem of “legitimizing identity”, “resistance identity” and identity as a “project”. Analyzing the role of religion in the formation of new identities the author comes to the following conclusions: 1) religion acts as a factor of legitimacy in new religious communities, where religion offers a sacred justification for power; 2) religion acts as a factor of protection of one's own identity under the wave of globalization, which acts as a hostile dominant identity; 3) the religious community acts as a separate “imagined” construct, which in the global dimension erases linguistic and ethnic boundaries, but acts as a dividing factor in local conflicts...

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