A social role for churches and cultural demarcation: how German MEPs represent religion in the European Parliament

Abstract

This study deals with the question of how German members of the European Parliament (MEPs) represent the German model of religion–state relations at the European level. Based on a survey and interviews with German MEPs as well as a content-analysis of German MEPs’ speeches, motions and parliamentary questions during the seventh term of the European Parliament (EP), our study demonstrates that this model is represented in three dimensions. First, German MEPs reflect the close cooperation between the churches and the state in Germany, primarily on social issues, through largely church- and religion-friendly attitudes and relatively frequent contacts with religious interest-groups. Second, by referring to religious freedoms and minorities primarily outside the EU and by placing Islam in considerably more critical contexts than Christianity, German MEPs create a cultural demarcation line between Islam and Christianity through their parliamentary activities, which is similar to, though less politicised than, cultural boundaries often produced in public debates in Germany. Third, our study illustrates similar patterns of religious affiliation and subjective religiosity among German parliamentarians in both the EP and the national Parliament, which to some degree also reflect societal trends in Germany. Yet our data also suggest that European political elites are more religious than the average German population. If the presence of religion in terms of religious interest-groups and arguments is included, the EP appears to be more secularist than the German Parliament.

Keywords:

• Religion
• church-state relations
• church
• Islam
• Germany
• European Parliament

Notes

^1. ‘Aware of its responsibility to God and the people, inspirited by the willingness to serve peace in the world as an equal member of a united Europe, the German nation, by virtue of its constitutional power, has given itself this constitution’ (our translation).

^2. The Protestant Church consists of different units, called Landeskirchen, which together form the Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland (EKD).

^3. The condition for receiving this status is the guarantee of continuity proven by a statute and a certain number of community members. Religious communities not operating under public law receive a civil law status as a private registered association (German Constitution, art. 137.5).

^4. The classification of the churches as organised interests, however, is contested (Willems 2007, 318–321).

^5. As the research presented here uses the MEP as level of analysis and since most motions and questions are issued by a group of MEPs, these numbers do not represent the number of motions and questions but exceed it.

^6. We thank Johanna Voß for her assistance in this research.

^7. The phrase ‘religious affairs’ was dropped in 2012. However, the group still works primarily on issues of religion (http://www.eppgroup.eu/intercultural-dialogue).

^8. We name here only countries that were referred to at least 10 times. A complete list can be obtained from the authors.

^9. Given the limited scope of this study, we can focus here only on major trends and do not report about alternative views on issues reflected in our content analysis.

^10. This assumption corresponds to the impression of some of the interviewed MEPs. Another piece of anecdotal evidence from our interviews for this assumption is the failed attempt of an Italian MEP to establish an intergroup on Christian family values.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Anne Jenichen

Anne Jenichen has a doctorate in political science from the University of Bremen. As a senior researcher and lecturer, she is based at the Jean Monnet Centre for European Studies at the University of Bremen. Her research interests include issues of European integration, European foreign policy, the impact of international institutions, multilevel governance, religion and politics, gender and politics, and postwar reconstruction. She is author of the book Politische Innovation in internationalisierten Nachkriegskontexten – Bosnische Frauenrechtspolitik in vergleichender Perspektive (Wiesbaden: Springer, 2012) and co-editor (with Shahra Razavi) of a special issue of Third World Quarterly (31(6), 2010) on ‘The unhappy marriage of religion and politics: problems and pitfalls for gender equality’.

Henrike Müller

Henrike Müller has a doctorate in social science and is a senior researcher in the Department of Political Science at the University of Bremen. Her research interests are European integration theory, gender studies, European migration policy, and religion and politics. At present she is working on the research project ‘What direction for Europe? Elections to the European Parliament 2014: new issues and strategies?’