Date:
Location:
"Progressive Religion and Electoral Politics: Theory and Evidence from the Catholic Church in Brazil"
Speaker:
Guadalupe Tuñón, Academy Scholar, The Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies. PhD Candidate, Department of Political Science, University of California, Berkeley.
Moderator:
Steven Levitsky, Faculty Associate; Chair, Weatherhead Research Cluster on Global Populism/Challenges to Democracy. David Rockefeller Professor of Latin American Studies, Department of Government, Harvard University; Harvard College Professor.
Contact:
Jillian Scales
jscales@fas.harvard.edu
Abstract:
How do progressive religious leaders shape the objectives and electoral fortunes of the left? I argue that church leaders who advance doctrinal interpretations that favor progressive economic policies will mobilize their adherents in support of the left, as long as doing so does not advance policies that contradict the church’s moral agenda. I test this argument using original archival data from the Catholic Church and drawing on a natural experiment in Brazil after Pope John Paul II’s appointment in 1978.
