(A) Identify and briefly explain three reasons why the new Christian right might have failed to achieve its aims?

* The moral majority was never a majority, but 15% of the population at most; this meant that it was hard for them to fully implement their views, as they didn’t have enough believers in order to actually have an effect and change in society. * It campaigners found it hard to cooperate with people from different to cooperate with people form different religions, even when campaigning on the same issue, as such as abortion. This affected their ability to reach their aims, as they didn’t gain popularity as a religion’s group as they were seen to be very exclusive and didn’t support other religions even when fighting for the same cause. * The new Christian right lacks widespread support and has met with strong opposition from groups who stated freedom of choice, such as Planned Parenthood. As there view can be said to be strong and traditional most people didn’t agree with them, meaning they struggled to get any laws past, due to most people liking the way there was more freedom instead of being restricted by rules of traditional society.

(B) Using material from item A and elsewhere, assess the contribution of religion to social change?

There are many ways in which religion may have contributed to social change, but there is however the argument that religion tries to keep society the same by conservative force. Most religions have some sort of conservative force that it sticks to, for example keeping to traditional beliefs such as monogamy, attending church on a Sunday, opposing to divorce, contraception, cohabitation and abortion and also sticking to the nuclear family way of life where the male is the sole breadwinner.

Weber argues that the religion beliefs of Calvinism helped to bring about major social change specifically the emergence of modern capitalism in north Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries. Weber notes that many past societies had capitalism in the sense of greed for wealth, which they often spent on luxury consumptions. However, modern capitalism is unique.
, He argues, because it is based on the systematic, efficient, rational pursuit of profit for its own sake, rather than consumption. It is very important to note that weber was not arguing that Calvinist beliefs were the cause of modern capitalism but simply they were one if its causes. The protestant ethic of the Calvinists was not sufficient on its won to bring modern capitalism into being. On the contrary a number of material or economic factors were necessary.

Like weber, Bruce was interested in the link between religion and social change. Bruce compared two examples of the role of religiously inspired protest movements in America that have tried to change society: the civil rights movement and the new Christian right. The American civil right was successful in bring about social change, the campaigning involved direct action by black people themselves, including protest marches, boycotts, and demonstrations. Bruce describes the black clergy was the backbone of the movement. Led by Dr Martin Luther King, they played a decisive role, giving support and moral legitimacy to civil rights activist. Their churches provided meeting places and sanctuary from the threat of white violence, and rituals such as prayer meetings and hymn singing were a source of unity in the face of oppression. Although the impact on the white clergy was limited in the south, their message reached a wide audience outside the southern sates and gained national support. It brought about change by shamming those in power to put into practice the principle of quality embodied in the American constitution that’s all men and women are born equal.

However having religious backing doesn’t always mean you can successfully change society an example of how it doesn’t always work is the New Christian Right. Despite having enormous publicity and a high media profile, it didn’t achieve its aim if taking America back to god. In his view, their attempt to impose protestant fundamentalist morality on other has because of the basically liberal and democratic values of most American society. Numerous surveys show that Americans are comfortable with legalizing activists that they personally believe are immoral, such as abortion, and are unwilling to accept other people’s definition of how they should live their lives. This poses an enormous problem for the new Christian right, who insist everyone should be made to conform to its teaching. As Bruce points out, this is an impossible demand to make in a mature democracy.