Chapter 3: Evangelicals and social involvement Greg Smith
Evangelical Christians, since the movement bearing the name emerged in the eighteenth century, have been noted for their activism in preaching and spreading the gospel to the ends of the earth, and also in their work for social reform and charitable care. In the nineteenth century, great public figures such as William Wilberforce and Lord Shaftesbury led the struggle to abolish slavery and child labour and, along with others such as Barnardo, Muller and William and Catherine Booth, were involved in founding charitable organisations covering every conceivable form of human need. In the twentieth century, commitment to social involvement was more patchy as some feared that the social gospel could divert people away from the foundational truths about eternal salvation. Yet by the end of the century, a more holistic approach was re-emerging with the establishment of organisations such as Tearfund and the wide acceptance across the evangelical world of the Lausanne Covenant of 1974. This was drafted by a group which included the highly influential John Stott, who died in 2013 and who was the most frequently named speaker and author (by 15% of respondents) in our Time for discipleship? survey. Our research suggests that this tradition of active, socially engaged evangelicalism is alive and well, and continuing to make a significant impact on the life and welfare of British society in the twenty-first century. Under the New Labour government (1997–2010), the theoretical concept of social capital, as developed by Robert Putnam, was influential on policy in welfare and community development. Putnam argued in his book, Bowling Alone (2000), that in the USA there had been a serious decline in community participation over the previous half century and that there was serious and increasing shortfall in stocks of social capital. This resonates with what many commentators and some studies by social scientists have observed in respect of British society. Putnam understands social capital as a good thing, and he defines and attempts to measure it largely as a property of communities and whole societies. More recently he has refined the