Continuum Studies in Religion and Political Culture – serie

The Politics to Come brings together an international collection of thinkers to consider the meaning of liberal democratic modernity at a moment when its future has never been less certain. It examines the explosive threats the liberal order confronts today: financial meltdown, religious extremism, environmental catastrophe. Yet, it also seeks to place these - singularly modern - crises within a much longer history. For the contributors to this collection, it is the ancient religious tradition called 'the messianic' that provides the critical lens through which modernity may be interrogated. In its ongoing struggles with the messianic, liberal modernity confronts the promise and threat of a radically new Politics to Come. So what are the Politics to Come? How do they manifest themselves throughout history? Why does the possibility of a messianic judgement continue to haunt the western political imaginary? This collection offers a series of political, philosophical and theological perspectives from which the future of liberal modernity - if it has one - can be imagined.

Politics of Fear, Practices of Hope is about the relationship between two hugely influential ideas in political life: fear and hope. How are cultures of resistance nurtured within an environment of paranoia and social paralysis? Stefan Skrimshire argues that grass-roots responses to a politics of fear coincide with an explosion of interest in the quasi-religious themes of apocalypse, eschatology and utopia in cultural life. Where visions of a better future are replaced by the acceptance of a fearful present - a state of 'war with no end' - this is an important examination of the beliefs that underpin our capacity to hope.

Patrick Riordan's timely study analyzes the concept of the common good in light of recent heightened interest in globalization.Globalization: the catch-all term used to refer to a complex reality whereby humanity faces global challenges to do with a shared environment - global warming, a global economic order in the absence of significant global governance, international institutions which lack independence from the member states which comprise them, and the possibility of violence, whether using a car- or plane-bomb or nuclear weapons, in the name of whatever cause. Such realities raise major questions about the intellectual and moral resources available to humanity to deal with the challenges posed, and the topic of the common good has enjoyed an explosion of interest recently in various disciplines and in different areas of life.Patrick Riordan's timely study analyzes the concept of the common good as it is used in debates within political philosophy, economics, theology and most recently globalization, clarifying distinctions in definition and offering clarity and precision for a common language appropriate to debates on globalization.In recent years the study of the nature and function of religion with respect to politics has seen enormous changes.This important series provides a range of books devoted to furthering this study, and aimed at those studying and researching in this area across both disciplines.Titles in this series look specifically at the relationship between religion and political culture. Drawing upon a broad range of religious perspectives the series is open for studies of historical as well as current phenomena in political culture. It seeks not only to inform but to provoke debate at a time when religion is gaining increasing prominence in the public realm.

Fear and hope are two hugely influential ideas in political life; here Stefan Skrimshire examines their relationship at a time where interest has exploded in the quasi-religious themes of apocalyptic protest and utopian politics.This book is about the relationship between two hugely influential ideas in political life: fear and hope. In distinction to a growing literature already grappling with these ideas, this book argues that responses to a politics of fear have coincided with an explosion of interest in the quasi-religious themes of apocalyptic protest and utopian politics in both scholarly interest and cultural and political life. As such, it makes a timely contribution to the rapidly growing study into the re-surfacing of religious reasons in our 'post secular' political culture.Whilst recent scholarly studies have drawn attention to the re-emergence of theological questions of, for example, political sovereignty; attitudes towards the body; universality; and transcendence, this book argues in addition that the subject of political orientations of the future should also be taken seriously, where political thought is engaged with theological themes such as eschatology, apocalypse and utopia, in order to generate resources for hope.In recent years the study of the nature and function of religion with respect to politics has seen enormous changes. This important series provides a range of books devoted to furthering this study, and aimed at those studying and researching in this area across both disciplines.Titles in this series look specifically at the relationship between religion and political culture. Drawing upon a broad range of religious perspectives, the series is open for studies of historical as well as current phenomena in political culture. It seeks not only to inform but to provoke debate at a time when religion is gaining increasing prominence in the public realm.