Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Africa

by Terence O. Ranger

Overview

In recent decades, Christianity has acquired millions of new adherents in Africa, the region with the world's fastest-expanding population. What role has this development of evangelical Christianity played in Africa's democratic history? To what extent do its churches affect its politics? By taking a historical view and focusing specifically on the events of the past few years, Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Africa seeks to explore these questions, offering individual case studies of six countries: Nigeria, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Kenya, Zambia, and Mozambique. Unlike most analyses of democracy which come from a secular Western tradition, these contributors, mainly younger scholars based in Africa, bring first-hand knowledge to their chapters and employ both field and archival research to develop their data and analyses. The result is a groundbreaking work that will be indispensable to everyone concerned with the future of this volatile region.

Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Africa is one of four volumes in the series Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in the Global South, which seeks to answer the question: What happens when a revivalist religion based on scriptural orthodoxy participates in the volatile politics of the Third World? At a time when the global-political impact of another revivalist and scriptural religion — Islam — fuels vexed debate among analysts the world over, these volumes offer an unusual comparative perspective on a critical issue: the often combustible interaction of resurgent religion and the developing world's unstable politics.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780195174779
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	04/22/2008
Series:	Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in the Global South Ser.
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	9.30(w) x 6.20(h) x 0.90(d)

Table of Contents

Preface   Timothy Samuel Shah     vii
Contributors     xxiii
Abbreviations     xxvii
Introduction: Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Africa   Terence O. Ranger     3
Evangelicals, Muslims, and Democracy: With Particular Reference to the Declaration of Sharia in Northern Nigeria   Cyril Imo     37
Evangelical Attitudes toward Democracy in Kenya   John Karanja     67
President Frederick Chiluba and Zambia: Evangelicals and Democracy in a "Christian Nation"   Isabel Apawo Phiri     95
Foundations for Democracy in Zimbabwean Evangelical Christianity   Isabel Mukonyora     131
Evangelicals and Democracy in Mozambique   Teresa Cruz e Silva     161
From Apartheid to the New Dispensation: Evangelicals and the Democratization of South Africa   Anthony Balcomb     191
Evangelical Christianity and Democracy in Africa: A Response   Paul Gifford     225
Afterword   Terence O. Ranger     231
References     243
Index     261

Editorial Reviews

"This impressive collection of essays represents a major contribution to the study of Africa's fast-growing Christianity, and to the larger question of the interface of religion and democracy. It deserves a wide audience." —Philip Jenkins, author of The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South

From the Publisher