ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that one reason for the ongoing significance of new atheism has been its political arguments, which have in turn provoked political responses in a context of contrasting trends in the role of religion in social and political life. It argues that new atheism consists of diverse political viewpoints, which include both more progressive and less progressive strands, despite often coalescing around identifiably secularist political goals. The interventions of prominent new atheists on issues such as Donald Trump's election and Brexit perhaps serve to remind us of why their anti-religious books became best-sellers. The character of that new atheist reaction has been the subject of both much praise and disgust, but it appears to have attracted attention because it broke with conventions around how one should criticise religion in a way that chimed with wider social and political concerns.
