Religion in China: How Can We Measure Change?

The broad challenges of measuring religion in China have been well documented, but the related difficulty of quantifying how China’s religious landscape is changing has received less scholarly attention. This study is a comprehensive review of available sources that allow researchers to understand religious trends in China. We pay special attention to the strengths and limitations of the standard measure of religious (zongjiao 宗教 ) identity. This measure is the only religion-related question that has been consistently asked in surveys. However, it tends not to capture all Chinese people who are religious in a broad sense. Our analysis of 21 nationally representative surveys conducted since the early 2000s finds that despite its limitations, the zongjiao identity measure provides an important signal about religious changes in China in the twenty-first century.