The New Geopolitics of Religion:听Sacred Statecraft in a Changing World Order
Peter Mandaville
George Mason University
Date:听Tuesday, March 10, 2026
Time:听12 - 1pm
Location:听Boisi Center, 24 Quincy Road, Conference Room听听
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Around the world today we see a trend whereby great powers鈥攁nd those aspiring to that status鈥攊ntegrate religion and religious outreach activities into their foreign policy and external relations. Manifestations of this trend vary widely, from informal efforts to cultivate solidarity with global co-religionists by states whose history and identity are entangled with religion, to more direct deployment of religious institutions and actors in the service of specific foreign policy and national security objectives. This talk will provide a broad overview of this 鈥渘ew geopolitics of faith,鈥� drawing on recent examples from U.S., Chinese, Russian, Turkish, Saudi, and Emirati foreign policy. Through a global comparison of varying motivations, strategies, and practices associated with the deployment of what might be termed 鈥渞eligious soft power,鈥� the presentation will reveal patterns, trends, and outcomes that will enhance our understanding of religion鈥檚 role in contemporary geopolitics.
Dr. Peter Mandaville is professor of international affairs and director of the AbuSulayman Center for Global Islamic Studies at George Mason University, a senior research fellow at Georgetown University鈥檚 Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, and nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. His government experience includes serving as a member of the State Department鈥檚 Policy Planning Staff (2011-12), Senior Advisor in the Secretary of State鈥檚 Office of Religion and Global Affairs (2015-16), and director of the Center for Faith-Based Partnerships at USAID (2024-25). His other affiliations have included the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Brookings Institution, the RAND Corporation, the Pew Research Center, and the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He is the author or editor of multiple books including The Geopolitics of Religious Soft Power: How States Use Religion in Foreign Policy and Wahhabism and the World: Understanding鈥檚 Saudi Arabia鈥檚 Global Influence on Islam (both Oxford University Press), Islam and Politics (Routledge, 3rd edition 2020), and Reimagining the Umma: Transnational Muslim Politics (2001). He has also contributed to Foreign Policy, Foreign Affairs, and The Atlantic online and testified before the U.S. Congress on political Islam, countering violent extremism, and human rights in Saudi Arabia. He is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations.
Cox, Brian, and Daniel Philpott. 鈥淔aith-Based Diplomacy: An Ancient Idea Newly Emergent.鈥� The Brandywine Review of Faith & International Affairs 1, no. 2 (2003): 31鈥�40.
Mamedov, Intigam, and Leonie B. Jackson. 鈥淚nstrumentalising Islam: The Religious Soft Power Strategies of China, Russia, and the US.鈥� Review of International Studies (August 2025): 1鈥�19. .
Mandaville, Peter G., ed. The Geopolitics of Religious Soft Power: How States Use Religion in Foreign Policy. Oxford Scholarship Online Political Science. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2023.
Toft, Monica Duffy, Daniel Philpott, and Timothy Samuel Shah. God鈥檚 Century: Resurgent Religion and Global Politics. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2011.
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by the New York Times examines how Nigerian Christians and Republican lawmakers successfully pushed the Trump administration to intervene militarily in Nigeria by framing the country鈥檚 complex violence as a targeted 鈥淐hristian genocide.鈥� This diverse coalition argued that Nigerian Christians were facing systematic extermination and worked to persuade President Trump to view the conflict primarily through a Christian religious lens. Interestingly, though, both Christians and Muslims suffer from ongoing violence involving terrorism, land disputes, and criminal activity in Nigeria. The coalition sought to re-designate Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern for religious freedom violations and to pressure U.S. leaders into implementing stronger measures, portraying intervention as a moral duty. Their efforts culminated in President Trump reinstating Nigeria鈥檚 designation and ultimately launching Tomahawk missile strikes on Christmas Day against suspected militants, an action symbolically framed as defending persecuted Christians. The strikes followed intense lobbying and political coordination, demonstrating how religious advocacy can influence foreign policy decisions. Critics, including Nigerian officials and regional experts, contend that the 鈥済enocide鈥� narrative oversimplifies a multifaceted conflict and risks exacerbating instability. Nonetheless, faced with American political and economic leverage, Nigerian leaders shifted toward cooperation with the Trump administration, strengthening military ties and emphasizing protection of Christian communities. The article ultimately illustrates how sustained religious activism, amplified by political allies and media platforms, can reshape U.S. foreign policy. In his lecture, Peter Mandaville will explore many other cases from the U.S. and other countries that demonstrate how religion acts as a 鈥渟oft-power鈥� in diplomatic relations and foreign policy.
On March 10th, 2026, the Boisi Center welcomed Dr. Peter Mandaville, Professor of International Affairs and Director of the AbuSulayman Center for Global Islamic Studies at George Mason University and Senior Research Fellow at Georgetown University's Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs. His lecture, titled "The New Geopolitics of Religion: Sacred Statecraft in a Changing World Order," drew on a multi-year research project to examine how states around the world are increasingly deploying religion as an instrument of foreign policy and power.听He opened by introducing the concept of "religious soft power," combining Joseph Nye's classic notion of soft power with Gregorio Bettiza's idea of "sacred capital" to describe the geopolitical resources that accrue to states by virtue of their historical and symbolic relationship to major religious traditions.
Mandaville illustrated this framework through several case studies. He traced Saudi Arabia's religious transnationalism across decades of shifting geopolitical motivations, and contrasted it with Iran's sophisticated use of anti-imperial messaging and promotion of Persian Sufi heritage around the world. He then broadened the scope to show that religious soft power is global, pointing to Russia's use of the Orthodox Church, China's strategic deployment of Buddhist heritage, India's Hindutva networks, and the United States' own Cold War-era collaboration with religious institutions to counter communist influence.
In the lecture's most theoretically-ambitious section, Mandaville challenged Samuel Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations" thesis, arguing that the prevalence of civilizational language today actually undermines rather than confirms Huntington's framework. Instead of closed civilizational blocs in inevitable conflict, he observed fluid, issue-specific "moral coalitions" cutting across civilizational lines. The deeper shift, Mandaville contended, is the erosion of liberal universalism, which has opened space for competing moral projects (backed by religious narratives and transnational institutions) to reshape global politics into what he called a condition of "normative multipolarity." Overall, Mandaville's lecture offered a compelling framework for understanding religion not as a relic of pre-modern politics but as an active force reshaping alliances, legitimacy, and world order in an era of deepening geopolitical flux.