Introduction

This introductory chapter provides an overview of the relationship between welfare and religion. The relationship between welfare and religion, as it developed during the 20th century, was shaped during the formative ‘golden years’ following 1945. Welfare became part of a modernity in which the relationship between religion and societal institutions—such as school, health, and social care—was weakening rapidly or in some cases had ceased to exist. Studies of different welfare regimes have revealed, however, that their roots lie in contrasting political, social and religious circumstances. These circumstances function as a historically based ‘glue’ that helps to explain the subtle values that connect religion and welfare within these different systems. The chapter then presents the project Welfare and Values in Europe: Transitions Related to Religion, Minorities and Gender (WaVE), which formed the background to the project featured in this volume.

Religion, welfare and gender: the post-communist experience

This chapter looks at the complex situation in post-communist Europe, where the transition from a command economy to a neoliberal system has created new forms of exclusion, with rudimentary or conservative welfare regimes that have great difficulty in providing social coverage for every citizen. Post-communist countries have different degrees of familism and different degrees of civil society activism. Both Croatia and Poland—with their dominant Catholic churches and welfare charities—are somewhat similar to Italy, while Romania—with its dominant Orthodox Church—shares some similarities with Greece, but with a weaker social and religious organisation. In Latvia, there are Lutheran, Catholic and Orthodox churches that are related to different ethnic and language groups. In all post-communist cases, religious minorities are more or less welcomed, but their welfare activities are mostly directed towards their own members. This is exemplified by the neo-Protestant minorities in Poland and Romania that have developed extensive social assistance networks.

Social cohesion: from research to practice

This chapter highlights the need to put research results into practice through policy recommendations. This was a key concept in the WaVE project; it is a multi-layered idea, characterised by at least four dimensions: people's trust, help and cooperation with each other; people's tolerance towards each other; people's sense of belonging in the social system; and people's manifestation of these values through behaviour. The chapter then presents the idea of a ‘circle of social cohesion’ in welfare where knowing and doing is the relationship between a better understanding of diversity and the transformation of this understanding into crucial skills in everyday practices. However, in order to convert the ideal of cohesion into everyday practice, the ‘circle of social cohesion’ is dependent on political values and financial resources. This is one of the major themes addressed in the WaVE project.

Afterword

This concluding chapter highlights the overall significance of the WaVE project: first, within the rapidly changing situation currently discovered in Europe; and second, within the development of a new field in European research, that is, the interconnectedness of religion and welfare, and the need to examine—both historically and sociologically—the effect of each on the other. At one level, the events of the past half-decade have undermined the relative optimism on which WaVE was based—that solutions could be found to the difficult questions facing an expanding Europe at the turn of the millennium. But at another, it has rendered the approach adopted by WaVE all the more relevant if one is to probe beneath the stereotypes presented by the media and to discover the all-too-human issues that lie beneath the headlines—issues that must be resolved at the level of everyday life in real communities the length and breadth of Europe.

Religion as a resource or as a source of exclusion? The case of Muslim women’s shelters

This chapter demonstrates, through a case study on women's shelters in Sweden, that it is not only the north–south divide that stands out in Europe, but also the conflictual notions of religion, and especially Islam, and secularity. It points to an assimilationist discourse that is widespread in Europe, which results in Muslim women being treated as victims of an oppressive religion. Such a normative secularism is dissolving religion as a resource and turning it into a source of exclusion. The shelter known as Somaya in Stockholm has been obliged to ‘tone down’ its Muslim profile by emphasising the idea of intersectionality as its political goal. The chapter then raises interesting questions about two frequently competing human rights, namely the freedom of religion and the rights of women—including those from minority religions.

Understanding religious minority communities as civil society actors

This chapter argues that research in the field of religious minorities needs to move away from the perspective of the majority society in favour of a civil society approach in which the interests of the religious minorities are built into the research design. The younger generation is under pressure not only to assimilate the values of the majority culture when it comes to professional development, but also to maintain the family's traditional—that is, religious—values. Integrating the perspectives of the religious minority communities into the research design itself permits markedly more nuanced findings, offering a more in-depth and accurate picture of the new ecology of religion.

The intersections of state, family and church in Italy and Greece

This chapter discusses the fragile organisation of welfare in southern Europe, with Italy and Greece as examples. In the Mediterranean countries, it is the idea of ‘familism’ that best captures a system where the family—more especially women—is the basic unit of care for dependent family members, migrants, and refugees. Although a state welfare system does exist, it is essentially a stopgap when the family is no longer able to cope with the demands of a particular situation. The religious majorities, in this case the Catholic Church in Italy and the Greek Orthodox Church in Greece, have different approaches to social care. In both cases, church organisations participate locally in order to reduce poverty and exclusion. The Greek tradition has, however, resulted in a much weaker civil society in terms of ‘voice’. In Italy, Caritas is involved both in local activities and in social advocacy work, alongside other social movements in support of migrants.

The WaVE project as a record of religious and social transformations in northern Europe

This chapter explores the idea of secularisation or religious change and the increasing visibility of religion in northern Europe. In the 20th century, the links between welfare and religion were thought to be fading. Today, however, it is clear that this assumption was based on a definition of religion as something for ‘others’, for those deviating from a dominant secular culture. In the Nordic countries, culture is understood as broad, ‘cool’, or inclusive. It is based on the rule of law and is linked to modernisation and the emancipation of the individual rather than close family ties. This is also true of religion, which is similarly perceived. This provides the basis for a broad culture of trust to which minority as well as majority religions can adhere.

The moral and gendered crisis of the Italian welfare system seen through the prism of migrant women’s reproductive health

This chapter focuses on reproductive health among migrant women in Italy. The welfare crisis in Italy and southern Europe has not only had negative effects on women, but is also a sign of the siege mentality of the European social model. Populist political movements are using religion, especially Islam and Muslim women, as a scapegoat to avoid dealing with the underlying issues of social and economic solidarity in Europe and indeed beyond. Despite the fact that this study is based on reproductive health among Muslim women, it reveals broader tensions: between conservative and progressive Catholics in Italy, and between religious and secular values in the gendered and moral crisis of the Italian welfare system. The chapter also illustrates a novel form of research dissemination—that is, the production of a video in order to raise awareness of the social rights of migrant women.

Striving to live the good life: the tension between self-fulfilment and family obligations for women in northern England

This chapter shows that migrant women in Darlington, England, who strive both for self-fulfilment and to maintain family responsibilities, face a values clash. This clash, however, is not specific to women from religious minorities, but is inherent in more general tensions between individual freedoms and family responsibilities. In practice, this very often means that the same individual holds contradictory values simultaneously. This mirrors the findings of the German study in the previous chapter. In both cases, therefore, the women from minority communities are reflecting a broader value conflict typical of late modernity in which the content and meaning of a good life is constantly renegotiated.