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Religious Clubs: The Strategic Role of Religious Identity

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Advances in the Economics of Religion

Part of the book series: International Economic Association Series ((IEA))

Abstract

Religious identity not only defines group boundaries but also imposes costs on members. We examine the strategic role of costly religious sacrifice and stigma. Strict religious clubs are defined by costly entry requirements and participation rules, including stigmatizing forms of dress, speech, and diet. In the canonical model (Iannaccone, Journal of Political Economy 100(2): 271–291, 1992), these prohibitions and proscriptions are designed to solve incentive problems associated with collective production by (1) screening out non-cooperators and (2) inducing substitution from outside activity to group activity. Recent research identifies four new strategic functions of religious costs: (3) social sorting, (4) esteem maintenance, (5) religious commitment, and (6) cultural resistance. This produces new explanations for exotic religious beliefs, oppositional identity, political mobilization by religious groups, and religious radicalization. All strategic functions of religious identity are examples of the theory of the second best.

I am grateful for comments by Larry Iannaccone, Mark Koyama, Mike McBride, Pete Richerson, Stergios Skaperdas, and participants at the IMBS conference on Identity, Cooperation and Conflict (2018) and the UCI Program in Religious Studies lecture series.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Economics and Institute for Mathematical Behavioral Sciences, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, USA

    Jean-Paul Carvalho

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  1. Jean-Paul Carvalho
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Correspondence to Jean-Paul Carvalho .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of California, Irvine, Irvine, CA, USA

    Jean-Paul Carvalho

  2. Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK

    Sriya Iyer

  3. Chapman University, Orange, CA, USA

    Jared Rubin

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Carvalho, JP. (2019). Religious Clubs: The Strategic Role of Religious Identity. In: Carvalho, JP., Iyer, S., Rubin, J. (eds) Advances in the Economics of Religion. International Economic Association Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98848-1_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98848-1_2

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-99336-2

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-98848-1

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