ABSTRACT
Conventional wisdom assumes that religion is on the decline in western societies – that the forces of modernisation and particularly secularisation are simply too strong, and so the once dominant force of religion in public life has now been radically curtailed. Despite this, it is very hard to understand the modern world without understanding the major religious traditions and influences that cut across global boundaries and feed into and shape global politics. The most obvious example of the way in which the twenty-first-
century world is being shaped by religion is the public prominence of Islam and Muslims in the early twenty-first century, particularly since the September 11th attacks in 2001. But it is not only Islam, and in particular political extremist interpretations of Islam, that have significance in the contemporary world. Other major religious traditions have also had a strong impact in the world in which we now live. At many different levels religious practices are shaped by, and also shape, the global political landscape. In this final chapter I will explore some of the ways in which religions are very much part of the processes of modernity, and need to be analysed within these frameworks
There are many ways in which one can describe and account for the structure of global politics and economics at the beginning of the twenty-first century. In Europe and North America the past decades have generally been peaceful, despite relatively small-scale conflicts such as in Afghanistan, Serbia, and Iraq. There are high standards of living in the west, and stable governmental systems. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union around 1991, and the end of the Cold War, the USA is now the single world superpower, which attempts to maintain and enforce order across the globe. Western prosperity and general interests are also strongly defended through economic tariffs, sanctions, and political actions in other nations as and when necessary. Prior to the middle of the twentieth century, global politics were
shaped rather differently. For over a century, until roughly 1950, Britain was a major global power which directly controlled large areas through colonisation. At its height, at the end of the nineteenth century, the British Empire included much of Africa, the Indian subcontinent, and many other territories. The passage from that colonial era to the present-day post-colonial world happened with almost breathtaking speed, with severe repercussions that are still being worked out. Areas of substantial European settlement, such as North America and Australia, are now principal global powers. In contrast, the areas where colonial rule relied on economic exploitation rather than settlement, such as Africa and India, are now considered as the ‘Third’ or ‘Developing’ World. Such countries at the beginning of the twenty-first century are no longer subject to direct colonial rule, but the global economic order still makes them strongly indebted to the ‘First World’, to the extent that some argue the post-colonial world of independent nations is a continuation of the colonial era (see Sardar and Davies 2002). Present-day global structures were clearly produced by recent
colonial history, and most aspects of contemporary life – including contemporary religions – can only be understood with reference to that history. The term globalisation refers to the complexities of this new world order, of which there are a number of facets: such as economics (for example, high volumes of trade and other money flows), high-speed communications (internet, email, telephone, and
fax), and travel, along with sophisticated technologies (genetic engineering, cloning, and industrial by-products). Together, these all make national boundaries extremely porous and hard to define. Globalisation is primarily about the flows of people, goods,
information, and ideas across boundaries and continents, and the particular local responses to these flows. These experiences of globalisation open up individuals, cultures, and countries in unprecedented ways, and lead to unique challenges and opportunities which are unlike any that have been in the past. Every part of the world and all religious traditions are embedded within the forces of globalisation. For some, globalisation is seen merely as a form of westernisation and Americanisation – as an extension of colonialism into a new global context. But many of the drivers of globalisation are in the non-European world; for example, globalisation is happening as much out of and through cities such as Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore, and Dubai as it is through London, New York, and Vancouver. Globalisation also works in many directions; this is demon-
strated very clearly by the economic dependence of the US on imported materials and goods from China, and on oil and gas fuel supplies from South Arabia and the Gulf. The means by which the US seeks to control this international interdependence is in itself a major driver of some of the processes of globalisation, but it does not wholly explain the complexity of the forces at work. Arjun Appadurai (1996) talks of various levels and locations
within which the experiences of globalisation are at work in all contexts. These he labels as ‘scapes’, which are broadly elements of activity in which flows of people, goods, and ideas are experienced in specific local contexts. The five scapes he identifies as i) ‘ethnoscapes’ (clusters of social identities), ii) ‘mediascapes’ (the flow of ideas and images through various media such as television and the internet), iii) ‘technoscapes’ (the ways in which technologies and knowledge, along with access to knowledge through education play out on a globalised level), iv) financescapes (the flows of money and commerce, and the means by which such flows are controlled and regulated), and v) ‘ideascapes’ (the flows of ideas across boundaries, often through social networks and particular media). An interesting question that I often put to my students when we
discuss these ‘scapes’ is which particular element of globalisation
they feel to be the most prominent and which ‘drives’ the forces of globalisation most strongly. For some, globalisation is often seen as primarily economic, with the economic power of the US being the most influential factor, but it is interesting that it is very difficult to find any real agreement overall. Some students argue that it is technology – in particular information technologies – that make the difference, whilst others argue for the significance of media which creates the framework for how we understand the worlds in which we live. Indeed, others argue again for the flows of people – the movement of individuals across boundaries quickly and easily, which in itself creates the framework for the media, and the flows of other things such as goods and finance. What is clear from such discussions is that there is no single dimension of globalisation – it is multifaceted and it is necessary to look at a variety of aspects and causes for us to understand the specifics of globalisation in any particular context. One further ‘scape’ that we could perhaps add to Appadurai’s list
is ‘religionscapes’, to highlight the significant role that religious groups, ideas, and identities have within the dynamics of globalisation. Religion is in itself an aspect of these global forces, as it is of course mediated through the other forces such as media, ideas, finance, ethnicity, and technology. In the twenty-first century, even more than at the time that Appadurai first wrote his analysis of globalisation, global religious communities such as Hindus, Sikhs, Muslims, Buddhists, and Christians have impacted in substantial ways on the flows and forces of globalisation.
