Product Description: This work examines the extent of religious influence on governmental and public policies, covering up-to-date issues and many countries. (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

This book is a major comparative analysis of fundamentalist movements in historical and cultural context, spanning revolutionary France, America and Japan, with an emphasis on the contemporary scene. Leading sociologist S. N. Eisenstadt examines the protofundamentalist movements that arose in the great "axial civilizations" in premodern times in order to illuminate the meaning of the global rise of fundamentalism that is shown to be an important current in modernity. The central theme of the book is the distinctively Jacobin features of fundamentalist movements and their ambivalent attitude to tradition. (view table of contents)