COPING WITH WAR THROUGH GOD REASSESSING THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN RELIGIOSITY AND POLITICAL VIOLENCE

Abstract

The political science scholarship on Islamist militancy has focused on whether religiosity,particularly among Muslims, causes the onset or escalation of armed conflicts. I argue that contrary to the common presumption there is a reverse causal relationship between religiosity and armed conflicts. By causing excessive morality and undermining civilians’ sense of control, armed conflicts lead to religious intensity as a psychological coping response. Intensified religiosity, thus, reflects a general psychological coping response, which is limited neither to Muslims nor to armed conflicts. This dissertation tests the proposed theory by investigating the impact of political violence and the COVID-19 pandemic on religiosity. Using a quasi-experimental design and a panel survey in Kabul, Afghanistan, Chapter 2 documents that exposure to political violence is associated with a seventeen-percent increase in religiosity index. Chapter 3 tests the theory in the context of the war in Ukraine and shows that each war-related fatality per 100,000 people is associated with increased searches for psalms and prayers. Chapter 4 tests the effect that COVID-related deaths have on religiosity in eighteen Arab-speaking Muslim countries. Each COVID-related death per 100,000 people causes 1.5 units increase in the search for key religious terms. Intensified religiosity in response to the pandemic, however, is not limited to Muslims. There was an unprecedented worldwide increase in the search for prayers and for psalms (biblical prayers in Jewish and Christian traditions) after the start of the COVID pandemic. This dissertation offers novel insights into the role of religious rituals and beliefs in the context of armed conflicts and other phenomena that cause excessive mortality.