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This is an FFAF report.
"A remarkable new study by Robert D. Woodberry has demonstrated conclusively that Protestant missionaries can take most of the credit for the rise and spread of stable democracies in the non-Western world. That is, the greater the number of Protestant missionaries per ten thousand local population in 1923, the higher the probability that by now a nation has achieved a stable democracy. The missionary effect is far greater than that of fifty other pertinent control variables, including gross domestic product (GDP) and whether or not a nation was a British colony.
Woodberry not only identified this missionary effect but also gained important insights into why it occurred. Missionaries, he showed, contributed to the rise of stable democracies because they sponsored mass education, local printing and newspapers, and local voluntary organizations, including those having a nationalist and anticolonial orientation.
These results so surprised social scientists that perhaps no study ever has been subjected to such intensive prepublication vetting. Woodberry was required to turn over his entire database to editors of the American Political Science Review, who subjected it to extensive, independent reanalysis. But after this vetting, the editors were satisfied that the robust statistical results were correct; in fact, they gave Woodberry considerably more space than the usual maximum to present his findings in detail.
Protestant missionaries did more than advance democracy in non-Western societies. The local schools and colleges they established had a profound impact on these societies. The schools they started even sent some students off to study in Britain and America. It is amazing how many leaders of successful anticolonial movements in British colonies received university degrees in England—among them Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru of India and Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, who led the Mau Mau Rebellion and ended up as the first president of independent Kenya.
Less recognized are the lasting benefits of the missionary commitment to medicine and health.
American and British Protestant missionaries made incredible investments in medical facilities in non-Western nations. As of 1910 they had established 111 medical schools, more than 1,000 dispensaries, and 576 hospitals. To sustain these massive efforts, the missionaries recruited and trained local doctors and nurses, who soon greatly outnumbered the Western missionaries. These efforts made a great difference in places that otherwise would have lacked access to modern medicine. And the benefits have lived on.
Once again, it is research by Robert Woodberry that reveals the long-term influence. His study showed that the higher the number of Protestant missionaries per one thousand population in a nation in 1923, the lower that nation’s infant-mortality rate in 2000—an effect more than nine times as large as the effect of current GDP per capita. Similarly, the 1923 missionary rate was strongly positively correlated with a nation’s life expectancy in 2000." - Rodney Stark (sociologist of religion), "How the West Won: The Neglected Story of the Triumph of Modernity"
Read the study here:
http://www.academia.edu/2128659/The_...eral_Democracy
"A remarkable new study by Robert D. Woodberry has demonstrated conclusively that Protestant missionaries can take most of the credit for the rise and spread of stable democracies in the non-Western world. That is, the greater the number of Protestant missionaries per ten thousand local population in 1923, the higher the probability that by now a nation has achieved a stable democracy. The missionary effect is far greater than that of fifty other pertinent control variables, including gross domestic product (GDP) and whether or not a nation was a British colony.
Woodberry not only identified this missionary effect but also gained important insights into why it occurred. Missionaries, he showed, contributed to the rise of stable democracies because they sponsored mass education, local printing and newspapers, and local voluntary organizations, including those having a nationalist and anticolonial orientation.
These results so surprised social scientists that perhaps no study ever has been subjected to such intensive prepublication vetting. Woodberry was required to turn over his entire database to editors of the American Political Science Review, who subjected it to extensive, independent reanalysis. But after this vetting, the editors were satisfied that the robust statistical results were correct; in fact, they gave Woodberry considerably more space than the usual maximum to present his findings in detail.
Protestant missionaries did more than advance democracy in non-Western societies. The local schools and colleges they established had a profound impact on these societies. The schools they started even sent some students off to study in Britain and America. It is amazing how many leaders of successful anticolonial movements in British colonies received university degrees in England—among them Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru of India and Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, who led the Mau Mau Rebellion and ended up as the first president of independent Kenya.
Less recognized are the lasting benefits of the missionary commitment to medicine and health.
American and British Protestant missionaries made incredible investments in medical facilities in non-Western nations. As of 1910 they had established 111 medical schools, more than 1,000 dispensaries, and 576 hospitals. To sustain these massive efforts, the missionaries recruited and trained local doctors and nurses, who soon greatly outnumbered the Western missionaries. These efforts made a great difference in places that otherwise would have lacked access to modern medicine. And the benefits have lived on.
Once again, it is research by Robert Woodberry that reveals the long-term influence. His study showed that the higher the number of Protestant missionaries per one thousand population in a nation in 1923, the lower that nation’s infant-mortality rate in 2000—an effect more than nine times as large as the effect of current GDP per capita. Similarly, the 1923 missionary rate was strongly positively correlated with a nation’s life expectancy in 2000." - Rodney Stark (sociologist of religion), "How the West Won: The Neglected Story of the Triumph of Modernity"
Read the study here:
http://www.academia.edu/2128659/The_...eral_Democracy
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