Short version:
There absolutely are books and studies on this, but they don’t give a clean “winner.” Most serious work ends up with something like:
The healthiest modern societies tend to have liberal, largely secular state institutions (rule of law, rights, equality before the law) + a plural, free religious sphere (including Christian, Muslim, and secular worldviews), rather than a state officially built on one religious doctrine.
Below is a map of the main literatures and what they actually conclude.
Pinker’s Chapter 10 synthesis — religion is neither one peace force nor one poison
Pinker rejects religion as a consistent master cause of declining violence. Sacred certainty, scriptural authorization, clerical power, and purity or tribal commitments have at times licensed persecution, blocked compromise, and opposed humanitarian reform. But particular religious institutions have also supplied the trust, organization, rhetoric, and leadership used by Quaker abolitionists, liberal Protestants, Black churches in the civil-rights and crime-reduction movements, and Christian reconciliation leaders after civil conflict.
His conclusion is therefore about heterogeneity and endogeneity: “religion” is not one variable with a fixed effect, and traditions change with wider intellectual, political, and moral currents. This supports the mixed-order conclusion of this note better than a league table of Christian, Muslim, and secular societies. It is still Pinker’s forcefully secular historical interpretation—not an independent audit of every example or proof that religious belief is causally irrelevant. Chapter 10 synthesis · Attachment (file not included in this release) · Attachment (file not included in this release)
Haidt’s Chapter 11 synthesis — cooperative function supports plural civil society, not establishment
Haidt argues that religion’s relevant unit is not a lone believer but a system of belief, practice, and belonging. Costly commitment, ritual, monitoring, reputation, and dense relationships can suppress free riding; his strongest U.S. evidence, through Putnam and Campbell, links civic generosity more closely to religious friendship networks than to doctrine or denomination. That strengthens the case that liberal states depend on social infrastructure they do not automatically manufacture.
The constitutional conclusion still does not follow from the function. Haidt’s definition would count cults, mafias, and authoritarian orders as successful cooperative systems if it stood alone. Voluntary religious participation is not evidence that establishment, clerical veto, religious tests, or unequal citizenship cause the same benefits. The mixed model remains strongest: neutral and rights-protecting public institutions plus a plural ecology of religious and secular communities, constrained by voice, review, safe exit, and equal standing. → mechanisms and audit · Chapter 11 source audit · Attachment (file not included in this release)
1. Cross-country empirical work: what do data say?
These are political science / econ studies that look at religion, democracy, and development across many countries.
a) Religion & economic growth
Robert Barro & Rachel McCleary – “Religion and Economic Growth” (2003)
Using data on many countries, they find:
- Stronger religious beliefs (especially belief in heaven/hell) are positively associated with economic growth.
- Higher religious attendance is negatively associated with growth (it uses time/resources).
- They do not say “Christian vs Muslim vs secular” in simple ranking terms; they argue beliefs can support traits like trust and work ethic, but institutional quality and human capital matter more than the specific tradition.
Barro & McCleary, “Religion and Economic Growth” (NBER)
Takeaway: Religious belief can coexist with good economic performance; devoting lots of resources to religious institutions can be a drag. No faith tradition is empirically “best” once you control for institutions and development.
b) Religion, democracy, and secularization
Pippa Norris & Ronald Inglehart – Sacred and Secular: Religion and Politics Worldwide
Using World Values Survey data, they argue:
- As societies become more secure and affluent, people tend to become more secular in practice and values.
- Democracy and liberal values (gender equality, tolerance) correlate strongly with economic development and “existential security,” not with any single religion.
- Muslim-majority publics are not inherently anti-democratic; they show strong support for democracy in principle, but more conservative views on gender/sexuality. (Cambridge University Press & Assessment)
“Sacred and Secular” (Cambridge)
Takeaway: They lean toward: secure, affluent, liberal-democratic and relatively secular societies produce the best mix of freedom and well-being. Religion is not “the” foundation; secure institutions are.
c) Why many Muslim-majority countries are authoritarian
There is a big literature asking whether Islam itself explains lower democracy scores, or whether other factors do.
- Ahmet Kuru – “Authoritarianism and Democracy in Muslim Countries: Rentier States and Regional Diffusion”
Shows that oil wealth (rentierism) and regional authoritarian diffusion explain much of the democratic deficit in Muslim-majority countries, more than theology per se. (politicalscience.sdsu.edu) - Work on the “resource curse” more broadly (e.g., Michael Ross) also finds that oil income makes authoritarianism more likely, regardless of religion. (Munich Personal RePEc Archive)
Takeaway: Mainstream political science says:Muslim-majority countries are often less democratic primarily because of structural factors (oil, colonial legacies, Cold War alignments, regional authoritarian norms), not simply because “Islam is a worse foundation.”
d) Religion, civic life and pluralism (mostly Christian/secular context)
Robert Putnam & David Campbell – American Grace: How Religion Divides and Unites Us
Based on large US surveys, they find:
- Religious Americans (mostly Christian) are more civically engaged, give more to charity, and have higher social trust.
- Religious diversity + a strong norm of tolerance makes the US relatively good at mixing religion, pluralism, and democracy.
- But religion also polarizes politics on moral issues. (Harvard Kennedy School)
American Grace – overview
Takeaway: A mix of strong (mostly Christian) religiosity + robust secular constitutional rules + religious diversity has worked reasonably well in the US.
e) Missionaries and democracy (Christian influence)
Robert Woodberry – “The Missionary Roots of Liberal Democracy” (2012)
Uses historical data to show that areas with Protestant missionary activity (independent missionaries, not state churches) are more likely, later on, to develop:
- Mass education and printing
- Civil society organizations
- Rule-of-law norms and democratic institutions (Cambridge University Press & Assessment)
“The Missionary Roots of Liberal Democracy”
Takeaway: Historically, certain forms of Christianity (especially Protestant missions) seem to have fostered conditions favorable to liberal democracy. That’s not the same as saying a formally Christian state is best today, but it is part of why Christian societies led early democratization.
2. Books arguing for a Christian foundation of liberal society
These are more historical / philosophical than statistical, and they generally say: the modern West’s best features are deeply Christian, even when they look secular.
Tom Holland – Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World
Thesis:
- Core Western values—human equality, universal moral worth, concern for the weak, even secular humanism itself—are historically rooted in Christianity.
- Even self-consciously secular or anti-Christian movements (e.g., liberalism, socialism) rely on moral intuitions originally shaped by Christian ideas (imago Dei, the cross, etc.). (Wikipedia)
Dominion
Implied verdict: A “secular” West is still living off a Christian moral capital; if you like egalitarian liberal norms, you are, functionally, living in a Christian-shaped society.
Larry Siedentop – Inventing the Individual: The Origins of Western Liberalism
Thesis:
- The idea of the morally equal individual with inherent rights arose from Christian theological developments (e.g., the equal worth of souls, canon law, etc.).
- Modern liberalism is, in its assumptions, “the offspring of the Church,” even if later secularized. (jstor.org)
Inventing the Individual
Implied verdict: A liberal secular order works because it rests on a Christian view of the person; remove that entirely and you might erode the foundations.
3. Islamic thought on the state: Islamic vs secular foundations
Here we’re in Islamic political theology and reform debates.
Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im – Islam and the Secular State: Negotiating the Future of Shari‘a
Thesis:
- Historically, Islam and political authority have often been separate; the modern “Islamic state” idea is relatively new.
- He argues Muslim-majority societies are best served by a secular state (no official enforcement of shari‘a) that protects religious freedom, while Muslims freely live according to Islam in civil society.
- For him, this arrangement is more authentically Islamic than coercive “Islamic states.” (jstor.org)
Islam and the Secular State
Implied verdict: For Muslim-majority countries, the best foundation is secular constitutionalism + free Islamic public ethics, not a fusion of mosque and state.
Syed Naquib al-Attas – Islam and Secularism
Thesis (almost the mirror image):
- Claims that when a society is built on secular, materialistic values, the “meaning and value and quality of life” become distorted; secularism leads to spiritual and moral loss.
- He argues that Islamic metaphysical principles should provide the foundation of social, educational, and political life. (Traditional Hikma)
Islam and Secularism (PDF)
Implied verdict: A truly good society for humans is one explicitly grounded in Islam, not secularism.
Jocelyne Cesari – The Awakening of Muslim Democracy: Religion, Modernity, and the State
Thesis:
- Traces why modernization in many Muslim-majority countries produced nationalisms with Islamic coloringrather than Western-style secular democracies.
- Shows that Islam is often nationalized and politicized by the state (Turkey, Egypt, Pakistan, etc.), creating hybrid regimes that are not fully secular and not fully theocratic. (Cambridge University Press & Assessment)
The Awakening of Muslim Democracy
Implied verdict: The problem is not “too Islamic” vs “too secular” in the abstract, but how states have instrumentalized Islam. Reform is about depoliticizing Islam and strengthening democratic institutions.
4. Secular / post-secular theorists: mixed foundations
These thinkers focus on how religion and secular institutions can coexist.
José Casanova – Public Religions in the Modern World
- Argues that secularization does not simply mean religion disappears; instead, religions re-enter the public sphere and shape debates and civil society.
- Shows that religion can support democracy when it accepts pluralism and does not demand monopoly power. (University of Chicago Press)
Public Religions in the Modern World
Charles Taylor – A Secular Age
- Argues that we now live in a “secular age” where belief in God is just one option among many, not the default.
- Secular modernity itself emerged out of internal developments in Western Christianity, not from a simple subtraction of religion.
- He does not say a purely secular or purely religious society is best; he emphasizes plural, contested space where religious and non-religious people share institutions. (Wikipedia)
A Secular Age
Jürgen Habermas – “Religion in the Public Sphere” and post-secular society
- Argues that modern democracies are becoming “post-secular”: religion has not vanished and must be taken seriously in public debate.
- Religious citizens can bring their convictions into public discourse, but laws must ultimately be justified in terms accessible to all citizens, religious or not.
- He favors a secular state that nonetheless acknowledges the “translation” of religious moral insights into general public reason. (Wiley Online Library)
“Religion in the Public Sphere”
Alfred Stepan – “Religion, Democracy, and the Twin Tolerations”
- Proposes the idea of “twin tolerations”:
- The state must tolerate religious groups and allow them to participate.
- Religious authorities must tolerate the autonomy of democratic institutions and not demand total control.
- Shows empirically that democracy can coexist with a wide range of religious arrangements (Christian, Muslim, Hindu), as long as twin tolerations are respected. (Journal of Democracy)
“Religion, Democracy, and the ‘Twin Tolerations‘“
Implied verdict across these thinkers:The best foundation is not either a hard secularism that expels religion or a confessional state that monopolizes religion, but a mixed order: secular, rights-based institutions plus vibrant, plural religious and secular moral cultures.
5. So, what do these literatures say about your core question?
“What is a better foundation for a society? A Christian, Muslim or secular society or a combination?”
If you aggregate the mainstream scholarly work:
- Almost nobody serious ranks “Christian vs Muslim vs secular” in a simple league table. Outcomes differ hugely within each camp (compare Norway vs Guatemala vs the US; or Indonesia vs Saudi Arabia vs Senegal; or France vs China vs Sweden).
- Empirical political science tends to say:
- Quality of institutions (rule of law, constraints on power, inclusive economic and political institutions) and economic development are the strongest predictors of good outcomes.
- Religious heritage has some influence (Protestant missions, for example, correlate with democracy), but it’s not destiny.
- Historical/philosophical works (Holland, Siedentop, Taylor) argue that:
- Modern “secular” Western liberal orders are deeply shaped by Christian ideas about human dignity, conscience, and equality.
- So a successful secular order may in practice be a Christian-seeded secularism, even if it no longer confesses Christianity as state doctrine.
- Islamic reformers (An-Na’im, some others) argue that:
- For Muslim-majority societies, the best foundation is a secular state that protects freedom of religion, combined with Islamic moral commitments lived voluntarily in society.
- Structural issues (oil, authoritarian elites) matter far more than whether the constitution says “Islam is the religion of the state.”
- The “combination” view is closest to the academic center of gravity:
If you operationalize “better foundation” in terms of:- Stable democracy
- Human rights and civil liberties
- Economic growth and innovation
- Peaceful pluralism
Then the dominant answer is:A liberal-democratic, largely secular state framework (no official monopoly religion, strong rights, and rule of law) + a robust, plural religious and secular civil society—where Christian, Muslim, and other traditions are free to shape culture and public debate, but none has coercive control over the state.
That’s compatible with:
- Christian accounts that see liberalism as a Christian outgrowth.
- Muslim reformist accounts that want Islam in society but not enforced by the state.
- Secular/post-secular accounts that want equal citizenship and institutional neutrality.
If you’d like, next step I can: - Build you a small table summarizing pros/cons each side claims for:
- Christian-confessional state
- Islamic-confessional state
- Strong secular state
- Hybrid “twin tolerations” model
so you can drop it straight into Obsidian.