Joel S. Fetzer

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Joel S. Fetzer
Born (1965-11-13) November 13, 1965 (age 58)
Board member ofAmerican Association for Chinese Studies
AwardsSociety for the Scientific Study of Religion's Distinguished Book Award (2020)
Academic background
Alma materYale University (Ph.D.)
Cornell University (A.B.)
ThesisNational borders/cultural boundaries (1996)
Doctoral advisorMartin Gilens
Academic work
DisciplinePolitical science
Sub-disciplineComparative politics
Institutions
Notable worksReligion and Nationalism in Global Perspective (2018)

Joel Steven Fetzer (born November 13, 1965)[1] is an American political scientist best known for his pioneering work on comparative politics, nationalism, and democratization. He is a distinguished professor of political science at Pepperdine University.

Life and work[edit]

Early life[edit]

Fetzer was born on November 13, 1965, in Jacksonville, Florida, to Christian parents.[1][2] His father, a U.S. Naval intelligence officer, received orders to report to the Pentagon in Washington, D.C. and relocated the family to northern Virginia.[1]

He attended Cornell University as an undergraduate where he wrote Selective Prosecution of Religiously Motivated Offenders in America: Scrutinizing the Myth of Neutrality. Fetzer matriculated at Yale University and completed his Doctor of Philosophy degree in 1996. He was awarded the Ebert Dissertation Fellowship from the Friedrich Ebert Foundation and the Peace Scholar Fellowship from the United States Institute of Peace.[3]

His dissertation was published as Public Attitudes toward Immigration in the United States, France, and Germany in 2000. Fetzer taught at Central Michigan University from 1998 to 2000 then at Pepperdine University starting in 2001.[4] He was coordinator of the political science department at Pepperdine from 2019 to 2022 and spent time as a visiting professor at the Centre for Interdisciplinary Research on Citizenship and Minorities (CIRCM) at University of Ottawa, the University of British Columbia, and the University of Luxembourg.[3]

Research[edit]

Fetzer's book Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective (2018), co-authored with Christopher Soper, explores the "resurgence of nationalism, usually populist, often religious, and all too often authoritarian" in the United States, Israel, India, Greece, Uruguay, and Malaysia and popularized the idea that the relationship between religion and nationalism for each and every nation in the world fits into one of three models: secular nationalism, religious nationalism, or civil-religious nationalism.[5][6]

Fetzer and Soper, in the words of then President of the American Political Science Association (APSA) Rogers Smith, "produced a seminal theory of how and why religion and nationalism are related in distinct ways in different societies."[7] Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective was the first large-scale cross-national analysis undertaken to understand the emergence, development, and stability of different church-state arrangements over time. The research received the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion's Distinguished Book Award, which is given to the year's best book on the sociology of religion, in 2020.[8]

Archives[edit]

The Fetzer's archives are maintained by Pepperdine University and the Online Archive of California (OAC).[1]

Publications[edit]

Books[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c d "Fetzer (Joel S.) Papers". Online Archive of California (OAC). Retrieved 2022-12-12.
  2. ^ Tyrkus, Michael J. (2015). Joel S. Fetzer. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  3. ^ a b "Cornell divestment movement collection, 1983-1987". Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library. Retrieved 2022-12-13.
  4. ^ Leonard, Andrew (March 18, 2020). "Taiwan Is Beating the Coronavirus. Can the US Do the Same?". Wired. Retrieved December 12, 2022.
  5. ^ a b Reviews of Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective:
  6. ^ Andrew L Whitehead (Autumn 2019). "Reviewed: Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective, by J. CHRISTOPHER SOPER and JOEL S. FETZER". Sociology of Religion.
  7. ^ "Religion and Nationalism in Global Perspective". Cambridge University Press. Retrieved December 12, 2022.
  8. ^ "Distinguished Book Award". Society for the Scientific Study of Religion. Retrieved 2022-12-12.
  9. ^ Reviews of Public Attitudes toward Immigration in the United States, France, and Germany:
  10. ^ Reviews of Muslims and the State in Britain, France, and Germany:
  11. ^ Reviews of Confucianism, Democratization, and Human Rights in Taiwan:

External links[edit]