Communism as the Unhappy Coming
This paper shows that Eastern Orthodox believers are less happy compared with Catholics and Protestants using data covering more than 100 countries around the world. Consistent with the happiness results, the paper also finds that relative to Catho...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Language: | English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2018
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/303241522775925061/Communism-as-the-unhappy-coming http://hdl.handle.net/10986/29669 |
| Summary: | This paper shows that Eastern Orthodox
believers are less happy compared with Catholics and
Protestants using data covering more than 100 countries
around the world. Consistent with the happiness results, the
paper also finds that relative to Catholics, Protestants,
and non-believers, those of Eastern Orthodox religion have
less social capital and prefer old ideas and safe jobs. In
addition, Orthodoxy is associated with left-leaning
political preferences and stronger support for government
involvement in the economy. Compared with non-believers and
Orthodox adherents, Catholics and Protestants are less
likely to agree that government ownership is a good thing,
and Protestants are less likely to agree that getting rich
can only happen at the expense of others. These differences
in life satisfaction and other attitudes and values
persisted despite the fact that communist elites sought to
eradicate church-going in Eastern Europe, since communists
maintained many aspects of Orthodox theology which were
useful for the advancement of the communist doctrine. The
findings are consistent with Berdyaev's hypothesis that
communism is a successor of Orthodoxy. |
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