Religion and Politics in the European Union: The Secular Canopy

Religion and Politics in the European Union: The Secular Canopy
François Foret
Cambridge University Press 2015 

This book analyzes the place and influence of religion in European politics. François Foret presents the first data ever collected on the religious beliefs of European decision makers and what they do with these beliefs. Discussing popular assumptions such as the return of religion, aggressive European secularism, and religious lobbying, Foret offers objective data and non-normative conceptual frameworks to clarify some major issues in the contemporary political debate.

• Utilizes a new data set, which includes results from the first ever survey on the religious beliefs of European political elites
• Provides an empirically grounded view on a topic dominated by the clash of normative views
• Offers a multilevel (from the national to the supranational) and multidimensional (political, legal, cultural, and social) analysis to tackle the complexity of the interactions between religion and politics

“Foret’s closely argued and impressively researched book builds on the MEPs’ survey with fieldwork in Brussels, Strasbourg, and Washington, and overall provides a fascinating overview of the role of religion in one of the EU’s few democratically-accountable institutions.”  — Jeffrey Haynes, Democratization