Anna Grzymala-Busse, Professor of Political Science, WCEE/WCED director, U-M. Professor Grzymala-Busse will examine how churches influence politics, and why some have been so successful in framing policy debates and shaping policy outcomes. Familiar examples include abortion in Poland, stem cell research in Italy, and the teaching of evolution in the United States. In other countries, such as Croatia or Canada, churches have had much less impact on even the most sensitive areas of public policy. These differences persist even if we take into account levels of popular religious belief and practice, so that equally religious societies can produce very different public policy outcomes. In explaining these patterns, this talk will argue that the churches' historical role in establishing the nation led both to claims of moral authority and to the diffidence of contemporary political elites to the churches.