Who Really Rules The World

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Religion

Religion Rules
What Is Religion?
What Is Power?
Bush The Believer
Everyone's Religious
Blessed Are The Meek

Religion Rules
Religion rules the world because it plays a major role in shaping the politics and culture of the most influential and powerful nation on the planet – the US.

At the same time, religion organises all of our lives and helps us to make sense of who we are and where we are going, even if that organising belief is the love of a football club or shopping.

Religion also has power in an inverted sense (anti-power power) because on a spiritual level the poor of the planet are considered to have greater favour with God because God is biased towards the materially weak.

So whether at the White House, on the football stands, in the shopping centre, or amongst the poverty-stricken ghettos, in one way or another, religion always rules.

Robert Beckford shows us why religion rules the world. He is a lecturer in African diasporan religions and cultures at The University of Birmingham and has presented several programmes for Channel 4, including Who Wrote the Bible?

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What Is Religion?
Religion matters in the world today. Across the world, commitment to religion is on the rise, although there are a few pockets of persistent disbelief, like the UK. Religion plays a major role in shaping national and international events and polices. But does religion actually rule the world today? The answer to this question depends upon how we understand the practice of' religion and the processes of power.

What do we actually mean by 'religion'? Theologians suggest two definitions of religion: narrow and broad.

The narrow definition describes religions as being integrated systems of belief, ritualised activities and institutional organisations – more than just belief in God. This definition encompasses the conventional organised religions and the New Age religious movements.

The broad definition considers a religion to be 'the central organising principles of a person’s life'. Whatever organises us becomes the 'ultimate concern' that provides direction and meaning in life. This much wider understanding recognises that religion operates on a variety of levels, including organised religions, social movements with religious themes, and the personal beliefs of individuals that are outside the umbrella of organised religion. This definition sees any activities that are meaningful to people, like devotion to a sports team or membership of a social movement, as a religion.

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What Is Power?
In order to show that religion rules the world, we must identify what we mean by 'power'. Because if something rules the world, then it must be powerful, or to be more precise, it has to be able to exercise power. The exercise of power can be explained in two ways.

Firstly, power can be explained as a coercive force, that is, coming from the top down, in the hands of a small group of people, be they politicians, technocrats or the wealthy. Within this system, only those who are part of that group can exercise any power and influence decision-making at all. For someone to get power, they must remove, change or join the ruling power elite.

The second way of explaining power is as a bottom up process. In this case, power is a consensual force, only permitted by the agreement of the masses. Here, power is a mosaic because everyday interactions are understood as a form of power broking. Power is exercised through the particular way that the people of a society choose to live and work; these arrangements can even influence how politicians make decisions.

In order for the masses to exercise power, they have only to change the way they deal with each other. For instance, if people chose to barter rather than use money when exchanging goods, this would have an effect on their power relations. In this case, to have power is to be able to influence the nature of the power relations that are in operation on a daily basis.

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Bush The Believer
George Bush's US presidency is an example of how religion in the narrow definition and power in the top down sense combine to rule the world. Bush is an Evangelical Christian.

As president of the US, Bush is perhaps the most powerful man on the planet. The US is the only global superpower; it accounts for a quarter of the world’s wealth and spends as much on its military as the 20 next wealthiest nations in total between them.

Bush is one of the first US presidents to use his faith in an explicit way, that is, as an ethical guide that shapes domestic and foreign policies. Bush’s regime is guided by its religious views. No matter how repugnant they may seem to others, they are employed in building economic and military policy.

On the international stage, an Evangelical Christian belief that the existence of a strong Israeli state is necessary to fulfil Biblical prophesy has led to an unwillingness of the US government to address Israel's intransigence in the Palestinian conflict.

On the social issues of abortion and homosexual marriage, Bush has adopted a traditional position consistent with Euro-American Evangelical Christianity.

Bush’s religious feeling is an indisputable example of how religion rules the world.

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Everyone's Religious
In the broad definition, a religion is seen as the guiding principle that governs our lives or 'grounds our being'. For instance, if shopping is the most important thing in someone’s life, providing their central focus, then it constitutes their religion.

Likewise, for some, football takes on a religious significance. Football fans are devoted to a team, engage in a form of worship on match days and collect religious paraphernalia like team strips and match programmes.

The old Soviet Union outlawed traditional religious worship, but at the same time constructed socialist practice as religion. In this case, the state was 'God' and the ruling elite were the 'saints'. Worship was expressed by devotion to the communist cause at home and abroad.

Within this broad view, everyone has religion; even an atheist must have some focus. Whether you are the Microsoft billionaire Bill Gates or a peasant farmer in Afghanistan, the principles that organise your life constitute your religion.

But is this type of religion powerful? If we see power as a bottom up force, then the way that people live is guided by their organising principles and is an exercise of power. These principles govern our day-to-day lives, therefore religion is involved in shaping everyday activities, events and practices. In this way, religion rules the world.

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Blessed Are The Meek
Finally, while it is clear that religion has influence in global power broking and through the ubiquity of personal belief, religion also exercises power in an inverted sense (anti-power power). The people who have real power are not those running governments or consumers spending billions everyday. Instead, real power is found amongst the dispossessed and disenfranchised of the world.

This may sound strange – how can people with no economic or social strength have power? Some believe that the poor are closer to God because God always sides with the marginalised and downtrodden. The Bible, for instance, refers to the 'preferential option for the poor', wherein God recognises that those without material wealth need to be protected and supported not only because they are poor but also because God cares about the weak.

Therefore the poor have power because their concerns make them closer to God than the rich. And given that most of the world is materially poor, we can argue they have the greater influence over God.

Added to this, real power is found amongst those who don't crave it, are willing to renounce it and who seek power in powerlessness. For example, Christianity, Islam and Buddhism all assert ascetic belief systems that promote simple living, self-sacrifice and even poverty as a means of seeking spiritual purity and awareness. Within these traditions, power is gained every time it is renounced or given away. By doing so, these people feel rich in spirit.

What all this adds up to is that religion rules the world because religious power is manifest at every level of human activity. This is so whether we consider religion in the narrow or broad definition, and whether we view power as a top down or as a bottom up force.

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