Religion, Civilization, and Civil War ─ 1945 Through the New Millennium

Investigating datasets of domestic ethnic conflict from 1945 to 2000 and ethnic wars, mass killings, and civil wars between 1948 and 2001, Fox (political studies, Bar-Ilan U., Israel) seeks to find quantitative statistical measures on the role of religion in domestic conflict. He finds that the role of religion in conflict has been growing over the time period tested, especially since the 1980s. He also uses the data to test Samuel Huntington's "clash of civilizations" thesis, concluding that it distorts factors like religion, nationalism, and culture, which should be studied in their more "traditional" forms. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Jonathan Fox is Lecturer in the Political Studies department of Bar-Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel. He has been the recipient of the Israel Science Foundation grant and has written numerous articles on the influences of religion on politics.