| There is an inherent tension in the relationship between religion and democracy. While religion generally adheres to a single ultimate set of values, democracy requires political tolerance and the recognition of the coexistence of several truths.;The study concludes that there is a need to re-evaluate the relationship between the state and religion over time, and reconsider deterministic conclusions about the ability of some religions---Islam in particular---to peacefully co-exist with democratically governed states.;This is why, both intuitively and according to influential theories of modernization, the separation of religion and the state has been seen as a pre-condition for successful democratization. Yet a comparison of Israel and Turkey challenge the validity of such alleged "truths." This is because existing theories cannot adequately account for the dynamic nature of the state-religion relations. Israel, which assigned a formal role to religion in the state, was able to maintain stable democratic rule despite some major internal and external political challenges. Nevertheless, after three decades of constructive collaboration between the state and religious actors, the latter have increased their demands on the state in a manner that challenged the foundations of the regime, although so far the state has been successful in effectively containing them. In contrast, the Turkish state attempted to enforce strict secularization on society by marginalizing religion from public affairs through constitutional measures and military repression. Yet after eight decades trying, Turkish society remained far from being truly secular and the attempts to enforce secularism seriously undermined Turkish democracy. To understand why this has been the case, the dissertation develops a model for the state-religion relationship, the Bounded Integration Model (BIM), that overcomes the over simplistic, static and deterministic nature of existing theories. The model demonstrates that religious actors should be understood as potential members in civil society, the dynamic interaction of which with the state determines the boundaries of civil society and the prospects for stable democratic governance. |
