ABSTRACT

This chapter looks at various conceptual frameworks for classifying the myriad religious phenomena. The chapter refers to Weber's theory of Protestantism and capitalism. It tests the hypothesis that countries with a great deal of religious fragmentation differ in terms of outcomes from countries with little religious fragmentation. The chapter examines regions within one country where the various regions display different religious creed in order to find out what impact religion may have on the support for political parties. It inquires into the impact of religion on micro-level outcomes or individual behaviour. S. Huntington's The Clash of Civilisations reintroduced the concept of a civilization into political discourse. The profound process of secularization, so often emphasized in social analysis has not affected two of the world religions, Hinduism or Islam, as it has mainly concerned Christianity, especially Protestantism, or Buddhism. The interesting thing about Weber's approach to religion is that he combines the two perspectives the dogmatic and the functionalist.