What is the role of religion in politics and conflicts in Lebanon? : analysing religion and other factors that influenced politics and conflicts

Abstract

This paper starts with a Literature Review followed by a Theory Chapter. The third chapter will introduce the methods used for research. Subsequently, the principal part which is the Empirical Chapter will be divided into five sections. A final conclusion will summarize the findings and salient points of my thesis. The first part of the Literature Review deals with Lebanon, its confessional representation system, demography and the civil war and factors which led to the outbreak of the conflict. The second part contains a more general introduction of the relationship between religion and politics providing definitions and familiarizing the reader with evolving identities, sectarianism, social policy, sharia, political Islam and connections between religion, violence and conflict. The theory chapter focuses on two approaches, first on the instrumentalist theory which holds that religion is being instrumentalized to heat up or to hide social and economic tensions. In the second approach the constructivist theory is presented with the aim of understanding better religion and how its dynamic omnipresence forms identities and interactively influences decisions of stakeholders towards sectarian divides, in easing or increasing tensions and their behaviour before and during conflicts. This approach also helps to see that religion is not the sole cause for conflicts and violence but facilitates the factoring in of other elements and dynamics that lead to conflicts and violence.