Voting Behavior of Christians in the Arab World

• In Event: Race, Ethnicity, and Minoritized Groups in MENA

Abstract

How do the regime preferences of religious minorities in the Arab world impact their political behavior? While facing high levels of repression in the MENA region, religious minorities have been found to favor authoritarian regimes when compared to other minority groups (Belge and Karakoc 2015). Such political preferences are identified by scholars of the MENA region as a result of institutions developed from the historical legacies of legal systems which granted legal autonomy to religious minorities living under Islamic polities, such as the Millet system. In this paper, I use data from the Wave 7 of the Arab Barometer to look at the extent to which these historical legacies and regime preferences influence the political behavior of Christians living in majority Muslim countries. Doing so, I find that despite having negative democratic regime preferences, Christians in the Arab world have a significant positive association with elections and engagement in democratic behavior (such as being members of civil society groups) when compared to other groups and the general population. From these findings, I argue that while historical legacies of religious autonomy negatively impact support for liberal democracy at the ideational level, religious autonomy as a political institution bolsters engagement of religious minorities with democratic institutions in illiberal states as a means to express their community interests.

Author

• Samuel Eisenkraft, University at Albany