God, politics and protest: Religious beliefs and the legitimization of contentious tactics

Moststudents of social protest nowagree thatprotest participation andparticipation in institutionalized politics are both potentially effective means ofaddressing individual and collective grievances. A primary conceptual distinction between the two forms of political participation centers on thecontentious nature ofprotest. We focus attention on thedisruptive potential of religious beliefs and values and argue that approval of contentious tactics isa critical link between religious beliefs andprotest participation. We analyze data from a representative sample ofchurchgoing Protestants in the United States. Results show thatfourfactors increase thelikelihood thatProtestants approve of contentious tactics: volunteering for church organizations, a perception that religious values are being threatened, a beliefthat individuals should nothave a right todeviate from Christian moral standards, and a beliefthat humans are inherently sinful. Approval ofcontentious tactics andfrequent volunteeringforchurch organizations are theonlyvariables in ouranalysis thatdifferentiate conservative Christian voters from those who combine conservative Christian voting withprotest participation. Social protest has become increasingly common in the u.S. and other western democracies, and it has also become more widely accepted by the general public as a legitimate form of political activity (Dalton 1988; McCarthy et al. 1996; Tilly 1984). Corresponding with these trends, in the last several decades a growing number of scholarswho study socialprotest have adopted the viewthat participation in protest movements and participation within traditional political institutions are motivated by similar factors and are basically serving similar ends. Each is>I- We are grateful to Christian Smith and to anonymous reviewers for their valuable comment