A theocracy is any political system run by clerics, or by and along the tenets of any organized religion. There are few modern examples, though the state of Iran since the overthrow of the Shah could be an example, and Taliban Afghanistan another. Sometimes the term is used extravagantly to indicate a state where religious ideas, or religious institutions, have what is seen as an undue influence. Thus a political system such as modern Italy, where Roman Catholicism carries considerable political influence, having a privileged position in the constitution, and with the dominant political party being church-oriented and led, could be seen by some as verging on theocracy.
Theocratic values were in the past more important, and more common, than in the present world. Medieval political society, for example, was suffused by political doctrines supporting the rule of established religious order, because the political authorities relied on Christianity as a justifying ideology.
Even earlier societies, classical Athens for example, could have made little sense of theocracy because it assumes a distinction between political and religious rule and obligation. Yet these societies were so structured that the functions of the priesthood were connected to those of political leadership. In much later primitive societies this pattern can still be seen. In European terms it was the Reformation which forced a division between politics and religion by establishing the principle of religious toleration. Thus the constitution of the USA actually carries a prohibition on the ‘establishment’ of any religion as a guard against any theocratic tendencies (see secular state). There are still countries in the developed world, including the United Kingdom and the Scandinavian countries, where an established church exists.
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