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Open research questions in Religion and Society Interactions

123 unresolved questions extracted from the limitations and future-work sections of 9,681 Religion and Society Interactions papers in our library. Each links back to the study that raised it.

What the literature leaves open

  • This article argues that the most important shortcomings of secularization theory is that it is too Western-centric due to its origins in Western Enlightenment thought and that it is insufficient to explain the increasing number of non-state religious actors and transnational religious networks due to globalization.

    RECONSIDERING SECULARIZATION THEORY IN INTERNATIONAL POLITICS · 2025 · DOI

  • By reviewing a wide array of theoretical frameworks, methodologies, and data collection strategies, this article identifies causes, consequences, and endogenous relationships, as well as key gaps in the literature on ethno-religious repression in non-democratic settings, providing a solid starting point for further research.

    Ethno-religious State Repression in Non-Democratic Regimes: A Systematic Literature Review · 2025 · DOI

  • After identifying an area of ambiguity in Arendt's thoughts that invites further investigation of religious forgiveness, this study seeks to relieve her misgivings about religion's role in politics by engaging with Dietrich Bonhoeffer's theology, which emphasizes worldliness and altruism in religious faith.

    The Political<i>vs</i>. the Theological: The Scope of Secularity in Arendtian Forgiveness · 2022 · DOI

  • This line of thinking with universalist claims leads us to question the validity of deterministic proposals that should already be limited to the western world and to European concerns - given their reductionism not only in the face of religious visions such as the one that Kierkegaard had about Christianity.

    Beyond Weberian Rationalization · 2021

  • In this article, we investigate whether this concern is warranted by examining how such judges handle claims that are brought under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits private discrimination in employment on the basis of religion.

    The Dogma Within? Examining Religious Bias in Private Title <scp>VII</scp> Claims · 2021 · DOI

  • Although racial-ethnic socialization (RES) within the African American communities includes faith/spirituality, Christian social workers have not explored this relationship in ways that explicitly integrate the two.

    Racial/Ethnic Socialization and Faith · 2021 · DOI

  • This year's twin challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and the explosion of racial justice protests following the video of George Floyd's murder going viral has exposed—among many other issues that warrant further research—the extent to which the broad spectrum of Orthodoxy shares this ethno-nationalist orientation, while [End Page 144] also highlighting some key differences that continue to distinguish its divisions.

    “Hands Up! Don't Shoot! We Want Summer Camp!”: Orthodox Jewry in the Age of COVID-19 and Black Lives Matter · 2020 · DOI

  • Are conservative Protestants distinct in their support for individualistic explanations of racial inequality in America? Past research has generated contradictory findings on this question, along with debates about the best measure of evangelicalism and the factors that moderate religious influences on racial attitudes.

    Distinctiveness Reconsidered: Religiosity, Structural Location, and Understandings of Racial Inequality · 2017 · DOI

  • Penney, Walt Disney, and the US Chamber of Commerce, came to the aid of the ebullient Los Angeles Congregationalist minister James Fifield and his understudied Spiritual Mobilization campaign.

    One Nation Under God: How Corporate America Invented Christian America · 2016 · DOI

  • While some have found that various aspects of theology and religious practices are responsible for lower levels of concern about the environment, the overall evidence is inconclusive, largely because the typical sample size is insufficient to gain insight into differences between religious traditions.

    The Role of Religion in Environmental Attitudes · 2015 · DOI

  • Content analysis data suggest that atheism is an understudied topic in psychological science (31% of the total articles were from psychology), and discourse on atheism is often presented from cognitive and social-psychology perspectives, rather than a counseling psychology lens.

    Arrantly Absent · 2014 · DOI

  • 1 Contributors to that issue argued that, while there are certainly religious interpretations and practices that condone or even promote violence, the fixation with the idea that religion causes violence needs to be examined because it shapes the kinds of questions we ask about reli- gion as well as the answers we expect to receive.

    A Neo-Weberian Approach to Studying Religion and Violence · 2014 · DOI

  • Notes [1] Psychological experiments that measure the presence of a "worshipper personality" hypothesized as common to both religious people and devoted fans remain inconclusive (CitationMaltby et al.

    “His Soul Was Wandering and Holy”: Employing and Contesting Religious Terminology in Django Fandom · 2013 · DOI

  • Prior to the revolution, the clergy's role had been officially limited to the realm of sacred affairs, but the post-revolution era fundamentally changed the relationship between state and religion in Iran by thrusting clerics into unprecedented positions of political power and laying the groundwork for the development of Iran's unique strand of religious authoritarianism.

    Iran's Regime of Religion · 2011

  • Contrary to Lebow's claim to be more attuned to change than existing IR theory, I contend that his exclusive focus on the recurrence of certain behavioural patterns in the course of history is insufficient as a foundation for a new grand theory.

    Culture, Change and the Meaning of History: Reflections on Richard Lebow's New Theory of International Relations · 2009 · DOI

  • There is little room for agency in her story (resisters to this prescriptive literature are limited to the book's final pages) and little differentiation between ideas promoted by Nativist ministers in the 1890s, 1950s advertisers, and twenty-first-century scientists researching ADHD.

    Conceiving Parenthood: American Protestantism and the Spirit of Reproduction (review) · 2009 · DOI

  • The findings are somewhat mixed: while conservative Protestants born since 1960 are no less likely to finish high school than their mainline counterparts, the negative effect of a conservative Protestant background on college completion remains virtually unchanged for cohorts born before 1940, between 1940 and 1959, and between 1960 and 1972, even when controlling for family background.

    Educational Attainment and Cohort Change Among Conservative Protestants, 1972–2004 · 2008 · DOI

  • Neither of these important studies, however, considers two areas that remain under-researched: the popular Enlightenment (‘Volksaufklärung’), that is to say, the diffusion of Enlightenment thought among uneducated people; and the Catholic Enlightenment which flourished particularly in Italy, Austria, and south Germany.

    Religion and the Enlightenment: A Review Essay · 2007 · DOI

  • (4) While this argument may be extreme, it is clear that articles written before September 11 in major international relations journals rarely addressed religion as a significant factor in international relations.

    Religious Discrimination: A World Survey · 2007

  • Henceforth it shall be the policy of the United States to protect and preserve for American Indians their inherent right of freedom to believe, express, and exercise the traditional religions of the American Indian, Eskimo, Aleut, and Native Hawaiians, including but not limited to access to sites, use and possession of sacred objects, and the freedom to worship through ceremonials and traditional rites.

    American Indian Religious Freedom Act after Twenty-five Years: An Introduction · 2004 · DOI

  • In a book published in the fall of 1997, James Pettifer and Miranda Vickers suggest that it is only a matter of time: It remains to be seen if Albanian separation of church and state can be maintained.

    A Stable Ecumenical Model? How Religion Might Become a Political Issue in Albania · 2000

  • Fascism 'has the rudiments of a new religion', wrote Schneider and Clough in 1929, but 'whether or not these will grow remains to be seen, but certainly there can be no doubt that already this new cult has taken some hold of the Italians' heart and imagination'.

    Fascism as Political Religion · 1990 · DOI

  • To develop this thesis, we will sketch certain benchmark theoretical options in comparative religious ethics, and we will indicate why it is important to extend the range of questions that need to be investigated if theoretical ethics is to make its own contribution to the development of this field.

    Cosmogony and the "questions of ethics" · 1986

  • INGRAM ditions by denying that there were any differences "from the point of view of enlightenment"69 Hisamatsu Shin'ichi, a master of the Soto tradition of Zen, is not well known in the West.

    The Zen Critique of Pure Land Buddhism · 1973 · DOI

  • Empirical studies of this nature, showing whether reformatory sectarian movements have produced an ethic congenial to economic activities, are lacking. See, for instance, Weber (1958b:337): "It was lacking in precisely that which was decisive for the economics of the Occident: the refraction and rational immersion of the drive character of economic striving and its accomplishments in a system of rational inner-worldly ethic of behaviour e.

    Religion and Economic Development · 1969 · DOI

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123 open questions have been extracted from the limitations and future-work passages of 9,681 Religion and Society Interactions papers in our library. Each one below links back to the study that raised it, so you can read the original claim in context.

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