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A Matter of Faith: Religion in the 2004 Presidential Election.

Article Excerpt
A Matter of Faith: Religion in the 2004 Presidential Election. Edited by David E. Campbell. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2007. 308 pp.

The essays in this volume cohere around two questions: For whom, and in what ways, was the presidential election of 2004 a matter of faith? Summing up the answers the contributors offer, editor David Campbell concludes that "any attempt to understand the direction of American presidential politics without accounting for the religious factor will be incomplete at best--and futile at worst" (p. 12). The volume supports this broad conclusion, demonstrating the utility of viewing U.S. elections through the lens of religious considerations, especially by highlighting the challenges candidates face in building winning electoral coalitions. A Matter of Faith contains some of the latest research by many of the best thinkers on religion and politics. As such, it illustrates both the advances made in the study of religion and politics and some of the challenges the field faces as it continues to move toward offering theoretically rich accounts of American politics.

Although it is difficult to describe 12 empirical studies without riding roughshod over their nuances and...

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