Holding the Sacred Accountable: The Dynamics of the State–Religion Relationship and Media Freedom

Abstract

Abstract How does government involvement in religion affect media freedom? One of the primary roles of independent news media is to hold government accountable, but will governments with official policies for or against religion accept this check on power? This study investigates the effect of government involvement in religion on media freedom. Previous empirical studies have shown that authoritarian regimes may tolerate free media in order to remain informed about lower level bureaucratic performance and potential rebellion, but we hypothesize that states with greater involvement in religion are more likely to control news media because freedom of the press may be seen as a political threat to their ideological authority. Using a multimethod approach, we test our hypothesis with a statistical analysis across countries from 1991 to 2014. We find that government involvement in religion does have a negative effect on media freedom. We then put these findings in context with a case illustration of the changes in media freedom in Greece, a democracy with a high level of government support for religion.