Religion and the New Populism

Religion is playing an important role in the various expressions of new populism across the Western world today. In some cases, it seems that the diverse religious heritage of the Western world has been swallowed up by the fish of populism. While some religious communities are backing some of the new populism, others are exercising their prophetic office, and still other religious communities are trying to maintain an objective neutrality in these moving times. As Nadia Marzouki, Duncan McDonnell, and Olivier Roy remark, there is an important distinction to be drawn between the churches and the populist movements: “populists speak of identity and churches speak of faith.” Democracies will always bring forth populist movements when a broad cross-section of the democratic order feels, correctly or incorrectly, that their concerns are not being recognized by the establishment. For good or ill, these movements provide a corrective to the ruling order and call for reforms.