Religious Preferences and Social Science: A Second Look

Although finding considerable value in Joshua Mitchell's recent JOP article about political science commentary on religion, we take issue with his contentions about empirical work on religious influence in politics. We argue that Mitchell has propounded an individualized conceptualization of religion that overlooks the communal nature of religious interaction, a dimension central to translating religious perspectives into political action. Moreover, we argue that conceptualizing religion in terms of preference, values, identity, and choice—which Mitchell regards as antithetical to the true nature of the religious experience—is in fact consistent with the lived religion of most people. Approaches to religious influence in politics rooted in such concepts have yielded considerable predictive power, the appropriate standard by which measurement decisions should be assessed.