Religion as politics: moralities, activisms and secularisms

• Grant number: 22/16673-3
• Support Opportunities: Research Projects - Thematic Grants
• Start date: January 01, 2026
• End date: December 31, 2030
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Anthropology
• Principal Investigator: Ronaldo Romulo Machado de Almeida
• Grantee: Ronaldo Romulo Machado de Almeida
• Host Institution: Instituto de Filosofia e Ciências Humanas (IFCH). Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP). Campinas , SP, Brazil
• City of the host institution: Campinas
• Principal investigators: Carlos Alberto Steil ; Luciana Ferreira Tatagiba ; Maria Jose Fontelas Rosado Nunes
• Associated researchers: André Kaysel Velasco e Cruz ; Brenda Maribel Carranza Dávila ; Clayton da Silva Guerreiro ; Cleonardo Gil de Barros Mauricio Junior ; Flávia Millena Biroli ; Joanildo Albuquerque Burity ; Joice Melo Vieira ; Leonardo Vasconcelos de Castro Moreira ; Marcelo Ayres Camurça Lima ; Olívia Bandeira de Melo Carvalho ; Rebecca Neaera Abers ; Vinícius Augusto Guerra Spira

Abstract

This Thematic Project aims to investigate political-religious transformations and conflicts in contemporary Brazil, throught theoretical and empirical comparison and interlocution of research from the American continent, focused on four steps that will guide the researchers in an integrated way: 1) the juncture of the last decade in Brazil that has potentiated the hegemony of the religious right in neoconservative terms and under a populist logic; 2) the transnational and nationalistic nature of this political-religious process as part of a systemic reaction to liberal democracies; 3) the changes in religious activism (conservative and progressive) and its impacts on state-society relations; 4) and, finally, how the antagonistic and multivectoral forces challenge in different ways the balance between pluralism, secularism, and liberal democracy. The core of the Project isn't "religion and politics," but instead "religion as politics". More so than the religious form of politics that separates form from content, and even more so than religion entering politics as if it hadn't ever been there, "making religion" has been the same as "making politics", although that is not all that is being done. We understand religion as a device which is activated by political dynamics, namely: as a arena of conflict; as practices and power relations that sustain political symbols; as a guide of public morality, which generates interpersonal tensions; as a mobilizing and inducing force of political action; as material and corporate interests disputed within the State; and among other dimensions. Our basic hypothesis is that religion is an induced and inducer power of political and cultural dynamics that vary in intensities, scales, and intersections. Like magic, it generates realities by mobilizing affections and projecting future expectations through political imagination, which makes it an unavoidable public issue in the country. (AU)