Netpeace

The Multifaith Movement and Common Security

Authors

  • Anna Halafoff Monash University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1558/arsr.v24i2.127

Keywords:

multifaith, networks, peacebuilding, religion, risk

Abstract

Multifaith initiatives have been increasingly implemented to counter global risks—such as terrorism and climate change—and advance common security in Western societies. This paper examines the rise of multifaith engagement in the twenty-first century, drawing on 42 semi-structured interviews with leading multifaith practitioners in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States of America. Building upon Brodeur’s (2005) typology, I identify four principal aims and six characteristics of the multifaith movement. In addition, I propose a new theoretical framework that I term netpeace, which recognises the interconnectedness of global problems and solutions and the capacity of multi-actor peacebuilding networks—including religious actors—to collaboratively overcome the most pressing risks of our times.

Author Biography

  • Anna Halafoff, Monash University
    Anna Halafoff is a lecturer at the School of Political and Social Inquiry and a researcher for the UNESCO Chair in Interreligious and Intercultural Relations—Asia Pacific, Monash University, Australia. Prior to joining Monash, Anna coordinated the Religion and Peace Program at the International Conflict Resolution Centre, University of Melbourne.

References

Arquilla, John, and David Ronfeldt 2001 The Advent of Netwar (Revisited). In Networks and Netwars: The Future of Terror, Crime, and Militancy, edited by John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt, 1-25. RAND, Santa Monica.

Baldock, John 1997 Responses to Religious Plurality in Australia. In Many Religions, All Australian: Religious Settlement, Identity and Cultural Diversity, edited by Gary D. Bouma, 193-204. The Christian Research Association, Melbourne.

Barrows, John Henry (ed.) 1893 The World’s Parliament of Religions. The Parliament Publishing Co., Chicago.

Bauman, Zygmunt 2006 Liquid Fear. Polity Press, Cambridge.

Beck, Ulrich 1999 World Risk Society. Polity Press, Cambridge.

The Cosmopolitan Vision. Polity Press, Cambridge.

Beckford, James A. 2003 Social Theory and Religion. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511520754.

Beckford, James A., and Sophie Gilliat 1998 Religion in Prison: Equal Rites in a Multi-faith Society. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511520815.

Bharat, Sandy, and Jael Bharat 2007 A Global Guide to Interfaith: Reflections from around the World. O Books, Winchester.

Bouma, Gary D. 2006 Australian Soul: Religion and Spirituality in the Twenty-First Century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

The Challenge of Religious Revitalization and Religious Diversity to Social Cohesion in Secular Societies. In Religious Diversity and Civil Society: A Comparative Analysis, edited by Brian S. Turner, 13-25. The Bardwell Press, Oxford.

Bouma, Gary D., Sharon Pickering, Anna Halafoff and Hass Dellal 2007 Managing the Impact of Global Crisis Events on Community Relations in Multicultural Australia. Multicultural Affairs Queensland, Brisbane.

Braybrooke, Marcus 1992 Pilgrimage of Hope: One Hundred Years of Global Interfaith Dialogue. SCM Press, London.

Interfaith Witness in a Changing World: The World Congress of Faiths, 1996–2006. Braybrooke Press, Abingdon.

Brodeur, Patrice 2005 From the Margins to the Centers of Power: The Increasing Relevance of the Global Interfaith Movement. Cross Currents 55(1): 42-53.

Brodeur, Patrice, and Eboo Patel 2006 Introduction: Building the Interfaith Youth Movement. In Building the Interfaith Youth Movement: Beyond Dialogue to Action, edited by Eboo Patel and Patrice Brodeur, 1-14. Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Oxford.

Cahill, Desmond, Gary D. Bouma, Hass Dellal and Michael Leahy 2004 Religion, Cultural Diversity and Safeguarding Australia. Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs, Canberra.

Croucher, P. 1989 A History of Buddhism in Australia 1848–1988. New South Wales University Press, Kensington.

Eck, Diana L. 2001 A New Religious America: How a ‘Christian Country’ Has Become the World’s Most Religiously Diverse Nation. HarperOne, New York.

Dialogue and the Echo Boom of Terror: Religious Women’s Voices after 9/11. In After Terror: Promoting Dialogue among Civilizations, edited by Akbar Ahmed and Brian Forst, 21-28. Polity Press, Cambridge.

Gopin, Marc 2000 Between Eden and Armageddon: The Future of World Religions, Violence, and Peacemaking. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Halafoff, Anna 2006 UnAustralian Values. In UNAustralia, Cultural Studies Association of Australasia Annual Conference Proceedings, University of Canberra, Canberra 6–8 December 2006. Online: http://www.unaustralia.com/proceedings.php (accessed April 2007, no longer active).

Advancing Australian ‘Shared Security’: Secular–Religious Peacebuilding Networks. In Australian Sociological Association (TASA) and the Sociological Association of Aotearoa New Zealand (SAANZ) Joint Conference, Public Sociologies: Lessons and Trans-Tasman Comparisons, University of Auckland, Auckland, 4–7 December 2007 (CD-Rom).

Hick, John 1985 Problems of Religious Pluralism. Macmillan, Basingstoke and London.

Dialogues in the Philosophy of Religion. Palgrave, Basingstoke and New York.

Kaldor, Mary 1999 New and Old Wars: Organized Violence in a Global Era. Polity Press, Cambridge.

Kearns, Laurel, and Catherine Keller 2007 Preface. In Kearns and Keller (eds.) 2007: xi-xvi.

Kearns, Laurel, and Catherine Keller (eds.) 2007 Ecospirit: Religions and Philosophies for the Earth. Fordham University Press, New York.

Keller, Catherine, and Laurel Kearns 2007 Introduction: Grounding Theory—Earth in Religion and Philosophy. In Kearns and Keller (eds.) 2007: 1-20.

Kirkwood, Peter 2007 The Quiet Revolution: The Emergence of Interfaith Consciousness. ABC Books, Sydney.

Knitter, Paul F. 1995 One Earth, Many Religions: Multifaith Dialogue and Global Responsibility. Orbis Books, Maryknoll, NY.

Lohre, Kathryn 2007 Women’s Interfaith Initiatives in the United States Post 9/11. Interreligious Insight 5(2): 11-23.

Marshall, Katherine, and Lucy Keough (eds.) 2004 Mind, Heart, and Soul in the Fight against Poverty. The World Bank, Washington, DC.

Marty, Martin E., and R. Scott Appleby 1992 The Glory and the Power: The Fundamentalist Challenge to the Modern World. Beacon Press, Boston.

McCarthy, Kate 2007 Interfaith Encounters in America. Rutgers University Press, Piscataway, NJ.

Nash, Roderick 1996 The Greening of Religion. In This Sacred Earth: Religion, Nature and Environment, edited by Roger S. Gottlieb, 194-229. Routledge, New York and London.

Niebuhr, Gustav 2008 Beyond Tolerance: Searching for Interfaith Understanding in America. Viking, New York.

Nordstrom, Justin 2009 Utopians at the Parliament. Journal of Religious History 33(3): 348-65. http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9809.2009.00801.x.

Petrovsky, Vladimir 2003 An Interreligious Council at the UN: UN Charter Possibilities and Constraints. International Journal on World Peace 20(4): 49-57.

Rockefeller, Steven C. 1992 Faith and Community in an Ecological Age. In Rockefeller and Elder (eds.) 1992: 139-72.

The Wisdom of Reverence for Life. In The Greening of Faith: God, the Environment, and the Good Life, edited by John E. Carroll, Paul Brockelman and Mary Westfall, 44-66. University Press of New England, Hanover and London.

Rockefeller, Steven C., and John C. Elder 1992 Introduction. In Rockefeller and Elder (eds.) 1992: 1-14.

Rockefeller, Steven C., and John C. Elder (eds.) 1992 An Interfaith Dialogue, Spirit and Nature: Why the Environment Is a Religious Issue. Beacon Press, Boston.

Sampson, Cynthia 1997 Religion and Peacebuilding. In Peacemaking in International Conflict: Methods and Techniques, edited by I. William Zartman and J. Lewis Rasmussen, 273-318. United States Institute of Peace Press. Washington, DC.

Smock, David R. (ed.) 2002 Interfaith Dialogue and Peacebuilding. United States Institute of Peace Press, Washington, DC.

Tucker, Mary Evelyn 2007 Ethics and Ecology: A Primary Challenge of the Dialogue of Civilizations. In Kearns and Keller (eds.) 2007: 495-503.

Vendley, William, and David Little 1994 Implications for Religious Communities: Buddhism, Islam, Hinduism, and Christianity. In Religion: The Missing Dimension of Statecraft, edited by Douglas Johnston and Cynthia Sampson, 306-15. Oxford University Press, Oxford.

Weller, Paul 2002 What We Might Think and How We Might Act: Diplomacy, Challenge and Exploration in Multi-Faith Britain. In Multi-Faith Britain: An Experiment in Worship, edited by David A. Hart, 127-39. O Books, Alresford.

Religious Diversity in the UK: Contours and Issues. Continuum, London.

Wolfensohn, James D. 2004 Foreword. In Marshall and Keough 2004: xi-xiii.

Wuthnow, Robert 2005 America and the Challenges of Religious Diversity. Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ and Oxford.

Published

2011-10-18

Issue

Section

Penny Magee Memorial Lecture

How to Cite

Halafoff, A. (2011). Netpeace: The Multifaith Movement and Common Security. Journal for the Academic Study of Religion, 24(2), 127-149. https://doi.org/10.1558/arsr.v24i2.127