Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective. By J. Christopher Soper, and Joel S. Fetzer,. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. x + 267 pp. $105.00 cloth, $29.99 paper.

Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective. By J. Christopher Soper and Joel S. Fetzer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2018. x + 267 pp. $105.00 cloth, $29.99 paper.

Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective offers an analysis of how countries adopt specific models of religion and nationalism, and why some countries adhere to more stable versions than others who adopt identical models. Drawing on a historically grounded theory and accompanying historical and empirical analyses, J. Christopher Soper and Joel S. Fetzer produce a timely theoretical contribution to the field of religion & politics. The authors begin with a paradox between the obvious connection that exists between religion and nationalism globally, and the presumption that a singular model of these variables’ relationship to one another is unattainable. The book questions whether this presumption is true, and further asks what explains state divergence in how closely national ideas are institutionally and ideologically linked to religious ones? The book further addresses why some countries’ models of religion-nationalism seem more stable than others.

The book's answer to these questions is three-fold. First, it claims that nations tend to develop dominant models of religion-nationalism. The authors posit three dominant models of civil religious nationalism, religious nationalism, and secular nationalism. Second, and crucially, the book argues that a state's formation period explains which religion-nationalism model a nation adopts and retains. The premise here is that whichever model of religion-nationalism a country adopts is the function of three historical factors: 1. the social and political power of religious and...