Rights statement: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Religion, State and Society on 15/08/2018, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/09637494.2018.1483861
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Final published version
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Religion and Brexit
T2 - populism and the Church of England
AU - Smith, Greg
AU - Woodhead, Linda
N1 - This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Religion, State and Society on 15/08/2018, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/09637494.2018.1483861
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - Drawing on our own recent surveys on beliefs and values in Great Britain (Woodhead) and evangelical Christians in the UK (Smith) this article explores the links between religion, views and votes on leaving or remaining in the EU in the UK’s 2016 referendum. Poll data gathered shortly after the 2016 referendum (n = 3,243) allows us to test associations between religious identity and behaviour and attitudes to voting Leave, while controlling for other demographic variables. The main finding is that identifying as Church of England (Anglican) is an important independent predictor of voting Leave even when other relevant factors like age and region are corrected for. By contrast, self-defined English evangelicals (from an opportunity sample of 1,198, collected and analysed by Smith) appear to be more pro-EU and generally internationalist in outlook. Previous surveys by Woodhead on religion and values in the UK provide some explanation for these findings, and for the striking difference of UK and US evangelicals, 81% of whom supported Donald Trump in the 2016 US presidential election. The article ends with reflections on whether the term ‘populist’ can be usefully applied to the evangelical pro-Trump vote in the US or the Church of England pro-Brexit vote in the UK. © 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
AB - Drawing on our own recent surveys on beliefs and values in Great Britain (Woodhead) and evangelical Christians in the UK (Smith) this article explores the links between religion, views and votes on leaving or remaining in the EU in the UK’s 2016 referendum. Poll data gathered shortly after the 2016 referendum (n = 3,243) allows us to test associations between religious identity and behaviour and attitudes to voting Leave, while controlling for other demographic variables. The main finding is that identifying as Church of England (Anglican) is an important independent predictor of voting Leave even when other relevant factors like age and region are corrected for. By contrast, self-defined English evangelicals (from an opportunity sample of 1,198, collected and analysed by Smith) appear to be more pro-EU and generally internationalist in outlook. Previous surveys by Woodhead on religion and values in the UK provide some explanation for these findings, and for the striking difference of UK and US evangelicals, 81% of whom supported Donald Trump in the 2016 US presidential election. The article ends with reflections on whether the term ‘populist’ can be usefully applied to the evangelical pro-Trump vote in the US or the Church of England pro-Brexit vote in the UK. © 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
KW - Anglican
KW - Brexit
KW - Church of England
KW - EU referendum
KW - Europe
KW - evangelicals
KW - identity
KW - no religion
KW - nones
KW - populism
KW - Religion
KW - voting
U2 - 10.1080/09637494.2018.1483861
DO - 10.1080/09637494.2018.1483861
M3 - Journal article
VL - 46
SP - 206
EP - 223
JO - Religion, State and Society
JF - Religion, State and Society
SN - 0963-7494
IS - 3
ER -