Pluralism Project, The

The Pluralism Project is a research initiative at Harvard University that studies, documents, and disseminates information about religious diversity [Page 1667]in the United States and provides platforms for public discussions on issues related to it. Its mission includes documentation about the changing religious landscape of the United States, the study of its new religious communities, an examination of the implications of its growing diversity, and discernment of the emerging meanings of “pluralism” for its people and institutions. In recent years it has expanded its research to other multireligious societies.

The Pluralism Project grew out of a research-intensive course about religious diversity in Greater Boston taught by Professor Diana Eck at Harvard in 1990. The course led to a keen interest among its participants in pluralism, or meaningful engagement with diversity rather than mere awareness of it. This development combined with the fact of growing religious diversity on Harvard's campus led Professor Eck and her students to pursue a broader inquiry into the changing U.S. religious landscape and its implications for public life. In 1991, the Pluralism Project was established to pursue this broader inquiry and has been running under the directorship of Professor Eck.

During its early years, the project focused on documentation. Harvard students conducted research on religious diversity in large U.S. cities and its specific outcomes, such as the establishment of new religious institutions as well as the struggles of communities to establish them. In 1997, the project experienced a turning point with a multimedia CD-ROM titled On Common Ground, produced by its staff and published by Columbia University Press. This CD-ROM contains an introduction to 15 religious traditions practiced in the United States, profiles of 300 religious centers in different parts of the United States, and a valuable historical account, written by Diana Eck, of how the United States has dealt with religious diversity. Because of its use of cutting-edge technology for higher education and its accessibility to a wider readership, the CD-ROM won four national awards. Director Eck also received the National Educom Medal Award.

The project's effective use of technology continued with the development of an extensive website in the following years. The website not only made the documentation about religious centers and communities readily available to the public, it also allowed the project to provide summaries and links for related news in its new “Religious Diversity News” portal. With the news portal, the project moved from documentation about diversity to education about its implications. Its aim was to track developments in multireligious America and provide an educational resource for people to engage with diversity. An important activity of the project has remained counseling people from many sectors, including the media, regarding the latest developments in this religious diversity in the United States. In 2006, the project added another analytical and educational level to its activities with the case study initiative led by its research director, Elinor Pierce. In this initiative, recent cases in U.S. public life that involve challenges to religious pluralism are discussed in forums with participants from multiple religious and professional backgrounds. The first case study focused on a dilemma faced by the mayor of a small Illinois city when local citizens and city council members opposed the establishment of a mosque.

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