Conservative society in the non-Catholic west?

I imagine this has probably been discussed before, but what under what kind of conditions could north America and the historically Protestant regions of Europe remain socially and morally conservative into the 21st century-- i.e. with high religiosity, divorce and separation rare and stigmatised, women strongly expected to be primary caregivers, etc.? Based on my own cursory study of the issue it seems like the decisive factor is the capture of states on the one hand, and churches on the other (this latter having happened in Europe far more so than the US, hence the near extinction of social conservatism as a political force in most of northern Europe) by progressive minded elites. Economic and technological change doubtless also played a part in some ways, but as far as I am aware at least some Catholic countries, the most prominent example for me being Ireland, also experienced very similar changes in these respects but largely without the breakdown of 'traditional values', thus far.

In which case, how could this have happened otherwise? Or, I suppose, what is the latest plausible POD that could have changed it? Maybe in the US you could do it with fairly straightforward PODs involving greater electoral success for conservatives at the right times (I could be wrong on this though, my knowledge of US history is shaky at best).

But the curious thing about the triumph of permissive/progressive values in Europe and most conspicuously perhaps in Britain seems to be the lack of coherent and organised opposition to the political process, ie conservative/right wing political parties seemed to be profoundly uninterested in opposing the legal reforms that I think were, directly, largely responsible: so would the POD have to involve some sort of religious revival among the middle/upper middle classes in the early to mid c20th, maybe involving disestablishment of the state churches? I'm pretty shaky on where modern progressive values in European national elites really came from though, hence my asking this question.

Looking forward to some interesting responses.
 
Hi, welcome to Alt Hist! :)

Alright, as far as progressives getting some competition on social policy how about conservatism among middle-class persons? (who I think often take social norms quite a bit more seriously than rich people)

With low-income families in the United States, it long been the case with the wife trying to take in laundry and other income-producing activities as well as making things by hand to save on expenses. In the 1970s(?) both the rise of feminism and more economic necessity among middle-class persons for both spouses to work. And maybe from the '80s, 90s, till today, kind of an economic necessity to buy a maximal house in order to be in a "good" school district.
 
If not conservative "societies," conservative sub-societies exist, for example in the Amish and in a slightly weaker sense, the Mormons. They're definitely more than subcultures but haven't really captured state power yet.

The Amish, however, might be worth paying attention to. They pretty much represent the entirety of the population growth in Holmes and Lancaster counties and their population is set to double within twenty years. As the Amish repopulate abandoned rural areas we could start to see patches of land where secular American culture more or less does not apply.
 
Top