RELIGION AS A HEURISTIC IN INTERNATIONAL AND NATIONAL

DECISION-MAKING

Assignment submitted towards the fulfilment of Continuous Assessment-I in the subject of

Political Science - III

SUBMITTED TO: SUBMITTED BY:

Ms. Manisha Mirdha Revati C. Sohoni
Assistant Professor, Roll No. 1932
Faculty of Political Science Semester: V, Section: B
National Law University, Jodhpur B.A., LL.B. (Hons.)

NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY,

JODHPUR

SUMMER SESSION

(JULY – NOVEMBER, 2022)

 TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................. 3
THE INFLUENCE OF RELIGION ON POLITICAL DECISION-MAKING ............. 3
I. Belief Systems Influence Policymakers ................................................................................... 3
II. Decisions Must Align with the Beliefs of Constituents ........................................................ 4
CASE STUDY: RELIGION IN THE INDIAN CONTEXT ............................................ 4
History and Background ........................................................................................................................ 4
I. Vedic Times: Brahminical Supremacy ..................................................................................... 5
II. Post-Independence: Blurring Lines ......................................................................................... 5
III. 70s, 80s and 90s: The Rise of the Right Wing ................................................................... 5
IV. 2000s Onwards: Saffron Waves ........................................................................................... 6
CONCLUSION ................................................................................................................... 7
REFERENCES ................................................................................................................... 8
 INTRODUCTION
Most states’ foreign policies are secular in orientation and focus. A few make religion a prominent
component of their ideological approach to foreign policy. States whose foreign policies are
consistently or irregularly informed by religion include Egypt, Iran, India, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and
the United States. In each case, these states’ foreign policies feature domestic religious actors
seeking to have regular or intermittent involvement in foreign policymaking. 1
The impact and capacity of such religious actors is linked to the ideological and/or national interest
priorities of incumbent governments. That is, religious actors may have an input into foreign
policymaking, which reflects a concern more generally with the association between material
concerns—including national security issues—and religious and ethical ideas, norms, and values.2
The assertion that religion can influence our views is not new or in dispute. Religion is often part
of people’s worldviews and influences their perception of events and their actions.3 While it is clear
that some or even many individuals today do not give much weight to religion, it is indisputable
that there are those who do and that at least some policymakers fall into this category.
Most scholars who discuss the influence of religion on human beings argue that it somehow
influences how we think. Even some of those social scientists who inspired the trend of replacing
religion with rationalism acknowledge that religion influences beliefs.4 Thus, this article shall, firstly,
study the two reasons why religion has an influence on international relations; and secondly, analyse
the impact of religion on India, with particular emphasis on its history.

THE INFLUENCE OF RELIGION ON POLITICAL DECISION-MAKING

There are two potential ways in which religious belief systems can influence international politics.5
Firstly, religion has the potential to influence policymakers – their outlooks and behaviours; and
secondly, policymakers are constrained to take decisions acceptable to the beliefs of their
constituents.

I. Belief Systems Influence Policymakers

The first way religion can play a role in decision making is through the fact that these belief systems
can influence the outlook and behaviour of policymakers. Religiously inspired views held by
policymakers and the policies based upon them could result in nearly intractable policies, which
can lead to international incidents, including war.6

1 Tanya B. Schwarz & Cecelia Lynch, Religion in International Relations, OXFORD RESEARCH ENCYCLOPAEDIA OF
POLITICS (Nov. 22, 2016),
https://oxfordre.com/politics/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780190228637.001.0001/acrefore-9780190228637-e-
122#acrefore-9780190228637-e-122-bibliography-0002.
2 Vendulka Kubalkova, The “Turn to Religion” in International Relations Theory, E-INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS (Dec. 3,

2013) https://www.e-ir.info/2013/12/03/the-turn-to-religion-in-international-relations-theory/#_ftn1.
3 Hassner, R. (2011). Religion and international affairs: The state of the art, in Patrick James, ed., Religion, identity,

and global governance: Ideas, evidence, and practice, Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
4 Jonathan Fox, Religion as an Overlooked Element of International Relations, WILEY ONLINE LIBRARY (May 30, 2003)

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1521-9488.00244.
5 David Carment and Patrick James: “The International Politics of Ethnic Conflict: New Perspectives on Theory and

Policy,” Global Society 11, No. 2 (1997), p. 207.

6 R. Scott Appleby, Religious Fundamentalisms and Global Conflict (New York: Foreign Policy Association Headline

Series #301, 1994), pp. 7–8.

An excellent example of the influence of religious worldviews on policy is the Arab–Israeli conflict
in its many manifestations during the past century.7 Both sides of the conflict have made exclusive
claims to the same territory, based at least partly on religion. This dispute has led to several major
wars that have involved superpowers and a series of terrorist attacks and violent uprisings. The
conflict also has resulted in a “peace process,” which has involved the United States and other
major powers, the United Nations, and various states in the region. Even if the peace process is
eventually successful and results in a settlement, it is probable that there will be religious-based
opposition on both sides. While some observers note that both sides have often relied on secular
ideologies to guide them, the religious claims of both sides cannot be denied.
The troubles that resulted after Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon’s visit in September 2000 to the
Temple Mount in Jerusalem, a site considered holy by both Jews and Muslims, are a case in point.
Furthermore, scholars like Anthony Smith trace the origins of secular ideologies like nationalism
to religion.48 It is also telling that many, if not most, of those on both sides who object to the
Arab–Israeli peace process are members of the religious nationalist camps.

II. Decisions Must Align with the Beliefs of Constituents

This example also brings to light the second way religion can directly influence the decisions of
policymakers via constraints placed on policymakers by widely held beliefs within the population
they represent. That is, even in autocratic governments, policymakers would be unwise to make a
decision that runs directly counter to some belief, moral, or value that is widely and deeply held by
their constituents. Thus, both Israeli and Arab leaders have had to weigh very carefully what their
populations would accept when making agreements.8
In another example of this phenomenon, while purely realist concerns dictated that Arab states
like Saudi Arabia and Egypt would side with the United States in its military opposition to Iraq
during the Gulf War, religious concerns made the decision more complicated. There was much
opposition in the Arab world to an Islamic state siding with a non-Islamic state against another
Islamic state. There was also considerable opposition to allowing a non-Muslim army on what was
considered to be holy Islamic territory. Not only do religious-based attitudes among constituents
on specific issues constrain policymakers, but religion also influences the political and cultural
mediums in which they act.

CASE STUDY: RELIGION IN THE INDIAN CONTEXT

HISTORY AND BACKGROUND

In recent years, religiously inspired nationalist movements have gained prominence in several
countries around the world. Few cases are more worthy of greater study than India—thanks both
to its size and its democratic longevity. As the world’s largest democracy, India is home to one-
quarter of the world’s voters and one-sixth of humanity.9 Political developments in India,

7 Sharkansky, I. (1995) 'Religion and politics in Israel and Jerusalem', Judaism: A Quarterly Journal of Jewish Life and
Thought, 44(3).
8 Haynes, Jeffrey. “Religion and Foreign Policy Making in the USA, India and Iran: Towards a Research Agenda.” Third World

Quarterly 29, no. 1 (2008): 143–65.

9 Milan Vaishnav, When Crime Pays: Money and Muscle in Indian Politics (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017).
therefore, are likely to have broader repercussions throughout South Asia and across the
democratic world.
India is not alone in facing the challenges that accompany religious nationalism: many democracies
worldwide are witnessing a rise in such political movements. The widespread use of religiously
inspired political appeals can be detected in places as diverse as Turkey, Latin America, Western
Europe, and the post-Soviet states.10 In India, the commingling of religion and politics is hardly
novel – beginning from Vedic times, stretching up to modern day India.

I. Vedic Times: Brahminical Supremacy

This mixing first began with state patronage of the Brahminical Vedic tradition in which state
backing of religion ensured that clerical leaders would, in turn, protect the state.11 In India’s earliest
state formations, the rajas (kings) wielded political power but were reliant on the legitimation of
brahmins (priestly caste) whom they compensated with guarantees of safety and material resources.
One unique aspect of India’s development is the degree of moral authority brahmins enjoyed
independent of the power of the state—a stark contrast to China, for instance, where religious
authorities were subservient to elites possessing coercive and economic power.12

II. Post-Independence: Blurring Lines

When India obtained independence following the ouster of the British Raj in 1947, the country’s
new constitution established a secular republic that did not feature a strict church-state separation,
as in many Western democracies, but rather a “principled distance” between religion and the
state.13 The government, under this rubric, endeavoured to maintain a measured embrace of India’s
disparate religious communities without unduly favouring any one group.14
Over the decades, politicians frequently have violated this (admittedly blurry) line, often cynically
and out of calculated political compulsion. The leadership of the Indian National Congress (or
Congress Party), which ruled India for much of the post-independence period, traditionally has
championed its commitment to secular nationalism.15 But, in practice, the Congress Party often
has invoked religious sentiments to suit its changing political interests—a tendency that grew in
intensity under the reign of former prime minister Indira Gandhi.16

III. 70s, 80s and 90s: The Rise of the Right Wing
Secularism in India began to face turbulent weather with the revival and strengthening of religion-
leaning political parties in the country. The pro-Hindu strategies of the ruling Congress reminded

10 Daniel Nilsson DeHanas and Marat Shterin, “Religion and the Rise of Populism,” RELIGION, STATE AND SOCIETY, no.
3 (2018): 177–185.
11 Peter Friedlander, Hinduism and Politics, in ROUTLEDGE HANDBOOK OF RELIGION AND POLITICS, ed. Jeffrey

Haynes (Abingdon: Routledge, 2016) 70–71.

12 Francis Fukuyama, The Origins of Political Order: From Prehuman Times to the French Revolution (NEW YORK: FARRAR,

STRAUS AND GIROUX, 2011): 159.

13 However, it was not until the Forty-Second Constitutional Amendment, ratified in 1976, that the word “secular”

was added to the preamble of the Constitution to describe the Indian republic.
14 Michael Gottlob, India's Unity in Diversity as a Question of Historical Perspective, ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL WEEKLY 42,

no. 9 (March 3, 2007): 779–789.

15 Ornit Shani, How India Became Democratic: Citizenship and the Making of the Universal Franchise (New York: Cambridge

University Press, 2017).

16 Sunil Khilnani, The Idea of India (New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1998).
the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Vishwa Hindu Parishad
(VHP) of its actual role for which they had been struggling in the previous decades. Earlier in the
'70s, several proposals were made for a judicious deradicalization of the BJP's slogans from groups
inside the party itself.
The decade also witnessed communal propaganda bring in a few dividends and the irreversible
decline of the Jana Sangh.17 At this juncture, it was felt inside the party that it should subtly shift
its appeal to the middle-class. Instead of the traditional appeal to Hindu chauvinism, it should try
to project itself as a substitute for the Congress, asking for support not because of its ideological
differences with the Congress, but because of its similarities—offering a cleaner, more efficient,
less corrupt government.
After the dramatic success of the rath yatras (public processions in a chariot), its own agenda was
rewritten in a retrograde direction, but it is remarkable how clearly the party has not rejected its
other, more secular constituency.18 From the early '80s, Hindu communal organisations increased
the scale, aggressiveness and violence of their operations under the general direction of the militant
Hindu right-wing party RSS and its mass fronts: the VHP, which coordinates religious bodies, and
the BJP, its electoral wing.19
Again, in the mid-1980s, elections were held to the Lok Sabha in 1984 after Indira Gandhi's
assassination, and the BJP, under the presidentship of Atal Bihari Vajpayee, got only two seats.
Vajpayee resigned and LK Advani, considered a hawk in the party, took over and gave BJP new
hope and a decision was taken by the leadership of BJP to promote Hindu militancy to snatch the
Hindu vote bank from the Congress. Since the late 1990s, India’s electoral milieu has seen a surge
of religious content with the electoral success of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party
(BJP).20

IV. 2000s Onwards: Saffron Waves

Although the BJP’s star dimmed for much of the 2000s, it has undergone a renaissance over the
past eight years under Prime Minister Narendra Modi.21 The BJP’s electoral resurgence of late has
once more brought an alternative nationalism to the fore, one based not on secular principles but
rather on the premise that Indian culture is coterminous with Hindu culture.22,23 This departure
from India’s secular tradition, which itself was initially damaged by the self-inflicted wounds of the
Congress Party, raises difficult questions about India’s political future and its long-standing
commitment to the credo of “unity in diversity.”24,25

17 Kanchan Chandra, The Triumph of Hindu Majoritarianism, FOREIGN AFFAIRS, November 23, 2018.
18 Walter K. Andersen and Shridhar Damle, The RSS: A View to the Inside (Gurgaon: Penguin Random House India,
2018), 237.
19 Christophe Jaffrelot, ed., Hindu Nationalism: A Reader (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007): 9.
20 Pradeep K. Chhibber and Rahul Verma, Ideology and Identity: The Changing Party Systems of India (New Delhi: Oxford

University Press, 2018): 244.

21 Christophe Jaffrelot, The Modi-centric BJP 2014 Election Campaign: New Techniques and Old Tactics, CONTEMPORARY

SOUTH ASIA no. 2 (2015): 160–161.

22 Suhas Palshikar, Towards Hegemony: BJP Beyond Electoral Dominance, Economic and Political Weekly no. 33 (August

18, 2018): 36–42.

23 Saba Naqvi, Shades of Saffron: From Vajpayee to Modi (New Delhi: Westland, 2018). It is worth pointing out that

resistance to Modi remains, within both the BJP and the RSS, although it has rarely surfaced publicly during his
government’s first term in office.
24 Diana L. Eck, India: A Sacred Geography (New York: Harmony, 2012).
25 Shashi Tharoor, Dear Troubled Liberal, Don’t Fear the Congress Party, THE PRINT (Nov. 30, 2018)

https://theprint.in/opinion/dear-troubled-liberal-dont-fear-the-congress-party/156690/.
 CONCLUSION
Although secularism is proceeding rapidly in many of the world’s societies, and although this trend
seems connected in some way to the process of economic development, nevertheless religion
continues to be an important political phenomenon throughout the world, for multiple reasons,
particularly in India. Even the most secularized countries (Sweden is typically cited as a prime
example) include substantial numbers of people who still identify themselves as religious, and thus
decisions taken must include them in deliberations. Moreover, many of these societies are currently
experiencing immigration from groups who are more religious than native-born populations and
who follow religions that are alien to the host countries’ cultural heritage. These people are often
given substantial democratic rights, sometimes including formal citizenship. And the confrontation
between radical Islam and the West shows few signs of abating anytime soon. Consequently, the
issues arising as a result of religion’s confluence with politics above will likely continue to be
important ones for political philosophers in the foreseeable future.
 REFERENCES

• Ahmed, D. I. and Ginsburg, T.’s Constitutional Islamization and Human Rights: The Surprising Origin
and Spread of Islamic Supremacy in Constitutions
• Balmer, R., Thy Kingdom Come’s How the Religious Right Distorts the Faith and Threatens America
• Eliezer Don-Yehiya’s Conflict Management of Religious Issues: The Israeli Case in Comparative
Perspective
• Andrew P. Cortell and James W. Davis’s Understanding the Impact of International Norms: A Research
Agenda
• Seymour M. Lipset’s Political Man: The Social Bases of Politics
• Jonathan Fox’s Religious Causes of International Intervention in Ethnic Conflicts