CHRISTIAN DEMOCRACY

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 474.

Christian democracy is a political and ideological movement which advances a moderate and welfarist brand of *conservatism. The origins of Christian democracy lie in Catholic social theory, which, in contrast to Protestantism's stress upon *individualism, emphasises the importance of social groups, and especially the family, and highlights a harmony of interests amongst these groups. Although Christian democracy is ideologically vague and has adapted itself to different national cultures and political circumstances, two major themes have been recurrent. The first is a concern about the effects of unregulated market capitalism, reflected in a willingness to embrace Keynesian (see *social democracy) and welfarist policies. The second is a fear of state control, reflected in a hostility to *socialism in general and to *communism in particular. The most influential of Christian democrat ideas, particularly associated with the German Christian Democratic Union (CDU), is the notion of the social market. A social market is an economy that is structured by market principles and largely free from government control, operating in the context of a society in which cohesion is maintained through a comprehensive welfare system and effective public services. The market is thus not so much an end in itself as a means of generating wealth in order to achieve broader social goals.

Significance

Christian democracy has been an important political movement in many parts of Europe in the post-Second World War period. Its success has been associated in particular with the influence of Christian democratic parties in France during the Fourth Republic, Italy, Germany, Austria, Belgium and the Netherlands, and, to a lesser extent, in Latin America and post-communist Eastern Europe. The success of these parties stems partly from their centre –right political stance, which parallels that of paternalistic conservatism and consolidates middle-class support, but it is also due to the fact that ‘Christian' has served as a rallying cry against communism, while ‘democracy' indicates a concern with the common good rather than with elite or aristocratic interests (thereby breaking with pre-war conservative parties). It is notable, for instance, that Christian democratic parties generally resisted the *New Right enthusiasms that characterised conservatism in the UK and the USA in the 1980s and 1990s. The chief threats to Christian democracy have come from the declining importance of religion as a source of political motivation, from the receding threat of communism since the Eastern European Revolutions of 1989–91, and from the ideological ambiguities and uncertainties of Christian democracy itself. Since it both praises and warns against government intervention, it sometimes appears to be little more than a vehicle for winning or retaining government power.