This article is the English version of Peter Mandaville, « Religion, ordre moral et resacralisation de la politique internationale », published in Politique étrangère (Vol. 91, No. 2, 2026) which celebrates the journal’s 90th anniversary.

For much of the late 20th century, it seemed reasonable to assume that religion was gradually receding from the center of international politics. Modernization theory anticipated a process of secularization and the experience of Western Europe in particular appeared to confirm that trajectory. As levels of religious affiliation and participation declined in parts of the North Atlantic world, it became easier to imagine that economic development, urbanization, and liberal democratic governance would progressively relocate religion to the private sphere. After the Cold War, this assumption was reinforced by a broader narrative of convergence: ideological rivalry had ended, and liberal democracy appeared not only institutionally durable but normatively ascendant.

Three decades later, that confidence looks overstated. Religious language is now woven into political discourse across a wide range of contexts. Russian officials frame aspects of their foreign policy in explicitly civilizational terms linked to Orthodoxy. Indian political rhetoric increasingly invokes a civilizational understanding of the state. In the Middle East, religious authority remains intertwined with regional alignments. In multilateral forums, debates over gender, religious freedom, and cultural sovereignty routinely draw on explicitly moral and, at times, theological arguments. These developments are not confined to one region or one religious tradition. They cut across political systems and geographic boundaries. […]

Read the rest of the article

Find the table of contents for the anniversary issue (No. 2/2026) of Politique étrangère here.

>>> More articles of Politique étrangère are available for reading on Cairn International. <<<