This paper examines the social base of Christian Right activism, using data on approximately 3,000 members and financial supporters of a single state-level Christian Right organization: the Oregon Citizens' Alliance (OCA). The findings of the study are consistent with theories that identify “status anxiety” among marginal or threatened segments of the middle class as a motivation for right-wing activism. The class of small business owners was the most overrepresented group among OCA activists. Members of the salaried middle class were also overrepresented, although to a lesser degree. Contrary to expectations, OCA activism was not disproportionately high among elderly persons or in the most rural areas of the state. The paper also illustrates the prevalence of status concerns in the rhetoric of the OCA's anti-abortion and anti-gay campaigns.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
Adam, Barry D.1987. The Rise of a Gay and Lesbian Movement. Boston: Twayne Publishers.
2.
Bell, Daniel, ed. 1963. The Radical Right. Garden City, NY: Doubleday .
3.
Bracher, Karl Dietrich.1970. The German Dictatorship. New York: Praeger.
4.
Bruce, Steve.1988. The Rise and Fall of the New Christian Right. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
5.
Burris, Val.1986. “The Discovery of the New Middle Class.” Theory and Society15:317—349.
6.
Childers, Thomas.1976. “The Social Bases of the National Socialist Vote .” Journal of Contemporary History11:17—42.
7.
Collins, Randall.1979. The Credential Society. New York: Academic Press.
8.
Crawford, Alan.1980. Thunder on the Right. New York : Pantheon.
9.
Crespi, Irving.1971. “Structural Sources of the George Wallace Constituency .” Social Science Quarterly52:115—132.
10.
Davis, James A.1965. Undergraduate Career Decisions. Chicago : Aldine Publishing.
11.
Diamond, Sara.1989. Spiritual Warfare: The Politics of the Christian Right . Boston: South End Press .
12.
———. 1995. Roads to Dominion: Right-Wing Movements and Political Power in the United States. New York: Guilford Press.
13.
Eichhorn, Robert L.1969. “The Student Engineer.” Pp. 141—159 in Robert Perrucci and Joel E. Gerstl, eds., The Engineers and the Social System. New York: Wiley.
14.
Eitzen, D. Stanley.1970. “Status Inconsistency and Wallace Supporters in a Midwestern City.” Social Forces48:493—498.
15.
Fromm, Erich.1941. Escape From Freedom. New York : Avon Books.
16.
Gardner, Steve.1992. Rolling Back Civil Rights: The Oregon Citizens' Alliance at Religious War. Portland, OR: Coalition for Human Dignity.
17.
Geiger, Theodore.1930. “Panik im Mittelstand.” Die Arbeit7:637—653,
18.
Georgianna, Sharon.1989. The Moral Majority and Fundamentalism. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellon Press.
19.
Gerth, Hans.1940. “The Nazi Party: Its Leadership and Composition .” American Journal of Sociology45:517—541.
20.
Green, John, and James Gurth.1988. “The Christian Right in the Republican Party: The Case of Pat Robertson's Supporters.” Journal of Politics50:150—165.
21.
Grupp, Fred.1969. “The Political Perspectives of the John Birch Society Members.” Pp. 83—118 in Robert A. Schoenberger, ed., The American Right Wing. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
22.
Guerin, Daniel.1939. Fascism and Big Business. New York : Monad Press.
23.
Guth, James, and John Green.1987. “God and the GOP.” Presented at the annual meeting of the American Political Association , Chicago.
24.
Hamilton, Richard.1975. Restraining Myths. Beverly Hills, CA : Sage Publications.
25.
——— 1982. Who Voted for Hitler?Princeton : Princeton University Press.
26.
Harper, Charles L. and Kevin Leicht.1984. “Religious Awakenings and Status Politics: Sources of Support for the New Religious Right.” Sociological Analysis45:339—353.
27.
Herman, Didi.1997. The Antigay Agenda: Orthodox Vision and the Christian Right. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
28.
Hofstadter, Richard.1967. The Paranoid Style in American Politics. New York: Random House.
29.
Hunt, Larry L., and Robert G. Cushing .1970. “Status Discrepancy, Interpersonal Attachment and Right-Wing Extremism.” Social Science Quarterly51:587—601.
30.
Johnson, Stephen, and Joseph Tamney.1984. “Support for the Moral Majority: A Test of a Model.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion23:183—196.
31.
Johnson, Stephen, Joseph Tamney, and Ronald Burton.1989. “Pat Robertson: Who Supported His Candidacy for President?” Journal for the Scienfic Study of Religion28:387—399.
32.
Kazin, Michael.1995. The Populist Persuasion. Ithaca, NY : Cornell University Press.
33.
Laswell, Harold.1933. “The Psychology of Hitlerism.” Political Quarterly4:373—384.
34.
Lenski, Gerald.1954. “Status Crystallization: A Non-Vertical Dimension of Social Status.” American Sociological Review19:405—413.
35.
Lerner, Daniel.1951. The Nazi Elite. Stanford: Stanford University Press.
36.
Lipset, Seymour M.1960. Political Man. New York: Anchor Books.
37.
———. 1963. “The Sources of the Radical Right.” Pp. 307—372 in Daniel Bell, ed., The Radical Right. Garden City, NY: Doubleday .
38.
Lipset, Seymour M., and Earl Raab.1978. The Politics of Unreason. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
39.
Lo, Clarence Y.H.1982. “Countermovements and Conservative Movements in the Contemporary U.S.” Annual Review of Sociology8:107—134.
40.
Loomis, Charles P., and J. Allan Beegle .1946. “The Spread of German Nazism in Rural Areas.” American Sociological Review11:724—734.
41.
Luker, Kristin.1984. Abortion and the Politics of Motherhood. Berkeley: University of California Press .
42.
Lunch, William M.1995. “Oregon: Identity Politics in the Northwest .” Pp. 227—251 in Mark J. Rozell and Clyde Wilcox, eds., God at the Grass Roots: The Christian Right in the 1994 Elections. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.
43.
Markson, Stephen L.1985. “The Roots of Contemporary Anti-Abortion Activism.” Pp. 33—43 in Paul Sachdev , ed., Perspectives on Abortion. Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow Press.
44.
McCarthy, John D., and Mayer N. Zald .1977. “Resource Mobilization and Social Movements: A Partial Theory.” American Journal of Sociology82:1212—1241.
45.
McEvoy, James.1971. Radicals or Conservatives? The Contemporary American Right . Chicago: Rand McNally.
46.
Mills, C. Wright.1951. White Collar. New York: Oxford University Press.
———. 1992b. “Anonymous Letter” [Duplicated and circulated by No Special Rights Committee]. Wilsonville, OR: Oregon Citizens' Alliance.
56.
Petchesky, Rosalind Pollack.1984. Abortion and Woman's Choice. New York : Longman.
57.
Perrucci, Carolyn Cummings.1969. “Engineering and the Class Structure.” Pp. 279—310 in Robert Perrucci and Joel E. Gerstl, eds., The Engineers and the Social System . New York: Wiley.
58.
Pratt, Samuel.1948. “The Social Basis of Nazism and Communism in Urban Germany.” M.A. thesis, Michigan State University .
59.
Rohter, Ira.1969. “Social Psychological Determinants of Radical Rightism.” Pp. 193—237 in Robert A. Schoenberger , ed., The American Right Wing. New York : Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
60.
Rubenstein, Sura.1991. “Mabon, OCA Wield Political Power.” [Portland] Oregonian (July 28):A1, A20.
61.
Rush, Gary.1967. “Status Consistency and Right-Wing Extremism .” American Sociological Review32:86—92.
62.
Schneider, William and I.A. Lewis.1984. “The Straight Story on Homosexuality and Gay Rights.” Public Opinion7:16—20, 59—60.
63.
Sigelman, Lee, Clyde Wilcox, and Emmett Buell.1987. “An Unchanged Minority: Popular Support for the Moral Majority in 1980 and 1984.” Social Science Quarterly68:876—884.
64.
Simpson, John H.1985. “Status Inconsistency and Moral Issues.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion24:155—162.
65.
Struening, Elmer L., and Stanley Lehmann .1969. “Authoritarian and Prejudiced Attitudes of University Faculty Members.” Pp. 161—199 in Robert Perrucci and Joel E. Gerstl, eds., The Engineers and the Social System. New York: Wiley.
66.
Stryker, Sheldon, and Anne Statham Macke .1978. “Status Inconsistency and Role Conflict.” Annual Review of Sociology4:57—90.
67.
Tamney, Joseph, and Stephen Johnson .1983. “The Moral Majority in Middletown.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion22:145—157.
68.
———. 1988. “Exlaining Support for the Moral Majority .” Sociological Forum3:234—255.
69.
Trow, Martin.1957. “Right-Wing Radicalism and Political Intolerance.” Ph.D. thesis, ColumbiaUniversity.
70.
Wald, Kenneth D., Dennis E. Owen, and Samuel S. Hill, Jr.1989. “Evangelical Politics and Status Issues.” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion28:1—16.
71.
Wallerstein, Immanuel.1954. “McCarthyism and the Conservative.” M.A. thesis, ColumbiaUniversity.
72.
Wallis, Roy.1977. “A Critique of the Theory of Moral Crusades as Status Defence.” Scottish Journal of Sociology1:195—203.
73.
Wilcox, Clyde.1992. God's Warriors: The Christian Right in Twentieth-Century America. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
74.
Wilson, Kenneth, and Louis Zurcher.1976. “Status Inconsistency and Participation in Social Movements.” Sociological Quarterly17:520—533.
75.
Wolfinger, Raymond, Barbara Wolfinger, Kenneth Prewitt , and Sheilah Rosenhack .1969. “America's Radical Right: Politics and Ideology.” Pp. 9—47 in Robert A. Schoenberger, ed., The American Right Wing. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
76.
Wood, Michael, and Michael Hughes.1984. “The Moral Basis of Moral Reform.” American Sociological Review49:86—99.
77.
Zurcher, Louis, David Snow, and Sheldon Ekland-Olson .1980. “Social Networks and Social Movements.” American Sociological Review45:787—801.
78.
Zurcher, Louis, and David Snow.1981. “Collective Behavior: Social Movements.” Pp. 447—482 in Morris Rosenberg and Ralph Turner, eds., Social Psychology: Sociological Perspectives. New York: Basic Books.
