By: Douglas Johnston
March 21, 2025
Religion, The Missing Dimension of Statecraft at 30—Lessons and Legacies
Editor’s note: Douglas Johnston co-edited Religion, The Missing Dimension of Statecraft with Cynthia Sampson.
In October 2014, Georgetown University sponsored a major event to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the publication of Religion, the Missing Dimension of Statecraft. I recall being somewhat puzzled at the time because I had never before heard of celebrating a book’s publication date. Five years later, the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) did the same thing on the book’s twenty-fifth anniversary. And, most recently, the U.S. Institute of Peace followed suit on the book’s thirtieth anniversary.
None of the above celebrations were initiated by anyone who had been involved in producing the book. So, the question arises: what accounts for these impromptu celebrations over time? I strongly suspect it is a well-deserved tribute to the collective wisdom of the 46 world-class scholars (from nine different disciplines), selected religious leaders, and foreign policy practitioners who, over a seven-year period, contributed in varying degrees to making it happen. As former Assistant Secretary of State Harold Saunders, who crafted the Camp David Accords and later served on the book’s steering committee, commented along the way: “In my experience, the collaborative nature of this book is unprecedented.”
In the immediate wake of its publication, the book struck a responsive chord around the world, with laudatory reviews during the first year in no fewer than 60 prestigious journals and newspapers, including Foreign Affairs, the Washington Post, the New York Times, the International Herald Tribune, a full page in the Washington Times, and a half-page in the London Financial Times.
In short order, the book became a course text in numerous colleges, universities, and seminaries. It also became required reading at the United States Foreign Service Institute (where we train our diplomats), and in 1999 it was highlighted in Sapio (Japan’s equivalent of Time Magazine) as one of the 12 most important books to read in preparing for the twenty-first century.
In addition to constituting a tribute to the collective wisdom and insights of the contributing scholars and practitioners, the book’s impact was also attributable, at least in part, to the underlying marketing strategy, which consisted of three elements. First, having the book come out under the auspices of CSIS (where I worked at the time) would give it resonance with policymakers. In those waning days of the Cold War, CSIS enjoyed an unrivaled, bipartisan impact on public policy and was perceived as having a tough-minded, steely-eyed approach to foreign policy in which conflict was resolved by soundly defeating the other side. Second, having the book published by Oxford University Press—the best of the best—would resonate with academia.
Finally, a concerted effort was made to purposely understate the significance of the findings, so no one could fault those findings for having been exaggerated in any way. Francis Fukuyama (of “end of history” fame), who crafted the book’s review for Foreign Affairs, saw through it: “The editors’ concluding comments try not to overstate the positive role of religion, but the book brings badly needed balance into the discussion of religion and international affairs.”
Yet another ingredient in the mix was a foundation grant of $10,000 a year for several years to support the marketing of the book, including a trip to a major conference in Switzerland where the book’s authors were able to vet their preliminary findings before an audience of 600 international participants and to conduct an in-depth discussion of the case studies with a smaller audience of 30 seasoned foreign policy practitioners, ranging the length of the alphabet from Britain to Sudan. This exposure led to some important last-minute refinements that proved very helpful in producing a stellar product. This marketing support also facilitated a number of speaking engagements both domestically and overseas relating to the book’s findings.
The resulting global acclaim effectively paved the way for walking the talk, which soon followed with the formation of a Preventive Diplomacy Program at CSIS. For the first five years of this new program, it focused on the ongoing conflict in the Balkans, teaching conflict resolution skills to religious and civil society leaders from the Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian communities. At one point, the CSIS team was caught in a siege of Sarajevo with no apparent way out as Serbian gunners bombarded the city from the surrounding hills. The team eventually escaped by paying a young man to lead them through a little-known passage through those hills. In the wake of this episode, the president of CSIS shared a concern of the center’s board about the financial liabilities if something were to happen to a staff member and suggested that we henceforth refrain from going into war zones. In light of their understandable concern, I made a decision to leave the think tank and form a “do tank” in which board members would understand from day one that going in harm’s way would sometimes be required to carry out this new center’s mission.
The International Center for Religion & Diplomacy (ICRD) began operations on August 1, 1999, and over the next two decades it achieved a number of successes in various trouble spots around the world. In almost all instances, these were situations of strategic consequence to the United States and were deliberately chosen to demonstrate to policymakers and diplomats the benefits of addressing the religious dimensions of such conflicts (that would otherwise go unaddressed). Among other accomplishments, the center:
After 16 years of such efforts, the U.S. State Department established a new Office for Religion and Global Affairs during the Obama administration, which promoted religious engagement across a range of activities. Although advancing religious freedom received significant emphasis under the succeeding Trump administration, religious engagement was effectively marginalized and remains so to this day. Meanwhile, ICRD has continued to press ahead with State Department support on a number of fronts, the most recent of which is taking place in Syria, where the center is delivering sophisticated youth entertainment programming to promote peace in northwest Syria and the border regions of Iraq, Turkey, and Lebanon. Its principal goal, which is to inspire children and their families to resist extremist narratives, appears to be having the desired effect.
Although the long-term impact of the book on U.S. diplomacy appears mixed at best, it played an instrumental role in planting major religion and foreign policy educational programs in a number of universities across the country—primarily through the sponsorship of the Henry Luce Foundation which, because of the book, turned to ICRD to help make its decision to do so.
The book itself has also inspired any number of young scholars to pursue careers in this field out of a selfless desire to make a meaningful difference in life. Closer to home, after reading the book, a couple friends of mine—one a former congressman and the other a former vice president of a major oil company—are now devoting their lives to the practice of faith-based diplomacy. It is this ability to inspire that may be the single greatest contributor to the book’s continuing appeal.
Douglas M. Johnston is president emeritus and founder of the International Center for Religion and Diplomacy, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that works to address identity-based conflicts by including religion as part of the solution. He holds a master’s degree in public administration and Ph.D. in political science from Harvard University.
