Special Issue in the journal “Frontiers in Political Science”, October 2023.
CALL FOR PAPERS:
Digital religion meets politics: pushing boundaries and opening-up new perspectives
New digital technologies are transforming the landscape of religion and religious practices.
“Christianity influencer”, faith tweets, digital chaplaincy, or online Islamic hate speech are
popular examples in place. The rapidly growing scholarship, known as digital religion studies,
explores the extent to which traditional religious practices are being adapted to digital
environments and how aspects of digital culture are informing offline religious groups and
institutions. While the young field profits from interdisciplinary collaborations and
perspectives, the political dimension of this transformation is still underdeveloped. For
instance, we know very little about how digital religion influences formal state-church
relationships. Will states respond to newly created religious online communities, and if so, with
which governance tools? How do political actors adjust religious practices in digital times?
How do digitalization processes in public administrations affect religious minorities? And in
what ways do religious welfare organizations adapt to cope with the new conditions of a digital
welfare market?
This Research Topic will bring together scholars from various social science disciplines (e.g.
communication studies, religious studies, sociology or theology) as well as political science
sub-disciplines (e.g. public policy, public administration, political theory and comparative
politics). We welcome qualitative and quantitative approaches, country-specific research, comparative studies, and micro, meso, or macro analyses that provide empirical, theoretical, or
methodological knowledge about the intersection between religion, digitalization, and politics.
Possible topics include, but are not limited to, the following:
Digitalization of religious practices of political actors (e.g. use of spiritual apps, religious blogs, chats etc.)
Digital communication strategies of religious political parties (e.g. Tweets, videos)
Digital hate speech by or about religious groups in the political sphere (e.g. Islamic hate speech)
Algorithmic governance & (religious) discrimination
Digitalization of religious welfare state organizations and their service provision (e.g. digital spiritual care / digital chaplaincy)
New forms of religious engagement via social networks by majority churches and their members (e.g. offline-online formats of religious services)
Social media & religion (e.g. religious influencer)
Public policy and regulation of digital religion
Reflection on the need to reconceptualize typologies of state-church relationship
Digital protest of (far-right) religious actors (e.g. anti-gender-campaigning)
Reflections on transhumanism and artificial intelligence from the perspective of human right and religious values
Reflections on new types of “religious authority” promoted by algorithms and bots
Why publish in our Special Issue? Alongside a top group of authors, your work will be
published in Frontiers in Political Science, a leading journal in the field with a confirmed
Journal Impact Factor and a CiteScore of 1.6. As an open access journal, publishing fees are
applied to accepted articles. There is the opportunity to discuss fees, institutional waivers (see
at the homepage, if your home institution has an agreement), and discounts with the journal
manager.
We will organize a workshop to discuss the papers beforehand, which will take place from the
10-11th of May 2024, most likely at the “Evangelische Akademie Landau” (close to
Heidelberg/Mannheim in Germany). Online participation is also possible.
The paper workshop is jointly organized by the “AK Religion & Politik” and the “Sektion
Policy-Analyse und Verwaltungswissenschaft” of the German Political Science Association.
If you are interested, please send us an abstract of about 500 words until the 1st of December 2023 via the journal homepage: https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/59538/digital-
religion-meets-politics-pushing-boundaries-and-opening-up-new-perspectives
Provisional Timeline
1st of December 2023: Deadline Abstracts
Mid-December 2023: Information Authors about the selection process
2nd of May 2024: Circulation of paper drafts among the participants
10-11th of May 2024: Workshop
15th of September 2024: Deadline for manuscript submission to the journal
Team of Topic Editors :
* Prof. Dr. Eva-Maria Euchner, Fliedner University of Applied Sciences, e.euchner@studium.fliedner-fh.de
* Prof. Dr. Simon Fink, University Göttingen, simon.fink@sowi.uni-goettingen.de
* Prof. Dr. Oliver Hidalgo, University Passau, oliver.hidalgo@uni-passau.de