Resurrecting Democracy: Faith, Citizenship and the Politics of Common Life

"Resurrecting Democracy: Faith, Citizenship, and the Politics of a Common Life," is an examination by British theologian Luke Bretherton of broad-based community organizing as a distinctive form of democratic politics. He argues that IAF organizing draws on religious traditions and diverse faith communities to renew civic life, strengthen democratic participation, and check the outsized power of markets and states over ordinary people. Extrapolating from the experiences of London Citizens, a UK affiliate of the IAF, he argues that this style of organizing offers a "consociational" model of democracy: a mutual fellowship between distinct institutions and traditions federated for a common purpose, rather than a single ideology or religious identity claiming to represent everyone.

Central to Bretherton's argument is that faith isn't treated as a private matter walled off from public life — instead, religious commitment and civic participation are seen as mutually reinforcing, with people of different faiths and secular convictions working together across their differences to build power and hold financial and political institutions accountable to ordinary citizens.