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SECULARIZATION
Sociology Index, Theocracy, Sociology
Books 2012, Secularism
Secularization is the process of organizing society or
aspects of social life around non-religious values or principles.
Secularization is linked closely to Max Weber's
concept of a growing ‘disenchantment of the world’ as the sphere of the magical,
sacred and religious retreats in cultural significance before the driving force of
rationalization of culture and social institutions powered by emergent capitalism.
Sociologists and Secularization
Controversy about the process of secularization has consituted the centrepiece of the
sociology of religion. This controversy is a particularly important and illuminating site
upon which the redirection of the sociological enterprise is being wrought. The major
sections of the paper are concern the explication of the terms in which the secularization
controversy has developed among sociologists and sociologically-inclined theologians.
Various relationships between sociological and religious perspectives are explored, the
discussion of these being linked in the concluding section with the development of
critical sociology and the sociology of the possible. - University of York,
University of Pittsburgh Sociology, Vol. 5, No. 3, 297-312 1971
Enforced Secularization - Spontaneous Revival?
Religious Belief, Unbelief, Uncertainty and Indifference in East and West European
Countries 1991–1998. Secularization.
Heiner Meulemann
Universität zu Köln, Institut für Angewandte Sozialforschung, Greinstr. 2, D-50939
Köln, Germany. E-mail: meulemann@wiso.uni-koeln.de
European Sociological Review 20:47-61 (2004) © 2004 Oxford University Press
The religious question of men's origin and destination can be answered by belief,
unbelief, uncertainty and indifference. The degree of secularization should increase
belief against the three remaining options, unbelief against uncertainty and indifference,
and uncertainty against indifference. The paper asks if the enforced form of
secularization of East European countries has the same effects even if the degree of
secularization is controlled, and if these developments are reversed after the demise of
communism. Furthermore, it examines if the developments of countries and their reversal
remain significant if the education, the age and the religious practice of individuals are
controlled. Dependent variables are the belief in God and the Bible as surveyed in the
ISSP 1991 and 1998. In 1991, the degree and the form of secularization affect the answers
to the religious question as expected. Up to 1998, the effects of the degree and the form
of secularization persist. Furthermore, the effects of the degree and the form of
secularization do not shrink if education and age of individuals are controlled, and do
shrink but remain significant if additionally religious practice is controlled. -
esr.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/20/1/47
Education and Secularization: Taking Philosophy of Education
Seriously
E.P. Brandon
Caribbean Journal of Education, 19, 227-238 (1997). Secularization.
Abstract: We all like to think we make a difference. In an anniversary year, if we cannot
point to an impact in the past then it is reassuring and inspiring to offer the promise of
important results in the future for our particular speciality. Philosophers, however, have
a couple of thousand years of history to suggest that such hopes are futile: a
well-argued, comprehensively researched position is not likely to persuade anyone, not
even its author for very long. But hope springs eternal, so I offer the following quixotic
argument for one important consequence of our taking seriously some fairly widely accepted
positions in philosophy and philosophy of education.
The bare bones of the argument are these: (a) educational activity, as against perversions
or distortions of education, must leave space for the possibility of there being good
reasons for what it presents for acceptance by a learner; (b) necessarily religious views
cannot be acquired without a "leap of faith" - i.e. accepting something for
which there is no good reason; so (c) if we restricted ourselves to educational activity
in bringing up the young we would soon find ourselves in a purely secular world.
Clearly various points need to be made with respect to each of these claims.
With respect to (a), besides spelling it out some more we must make it clear that it is
NOT saying that all educational activity involves the giving of good reasons. That would
probably lead to a vicious infinite regress, and is anyway quite unfeasible. Much teaching
omits the reasons for what it offers. It is still possible to think that we ought to learn
multiplication tables by rote. The point is that good reasons are available, whether or
not they are mentioned in the teaching.
With respect to (b) we will need to say something more about the structure of accepting
that there has been a revelation. The claim concerns religions of a kind we meet with; it
is logically possible to describe (as Hanson did in the article that inspired this paper)
a sequence of events that falsifies (b) - it's just that these things don't happen. We
will need to say something also about the contrast between "natural" religion
and revelation, and possibly something on the accounts that can be given, as by John Hick,
that try to square a multiplicity of supposed revelations with theistic belief.
With respect to (c), bringing up children is not just a matter of education in the sense
used in (a). But the rest can be presented without falsifying frills (though morality and
aesthetics are often not so presented) - we can teach them while respecting the kinds of
reasons or lack of them that exist to support various practices. But religion is not like
that. While, sociologically speaking, it may be mainly a matter of practices, it requires
those practices to be seen as supported by the nature of things; and that is where the
ungrounded leap of faith is required. This approach clearly rejects interpretations of
religion that equate it with atheism, the Robinson, Cupitt line.
Having clarified the main points in the argument we can note that our sad acknowledgement
that the conclusion is not likely to be found true (in the short to medium term at least)
shows either that the argument is no good, or that education lacks the link with
reasonableness we have supposed, or that good reasons can be offered for theistic belief,
or that we do not in fact prefer education to its distortions (or any combination of these
factors). My own preferred explanation for the falsity of the conclusion is our general
failure to educate, to prefer socialisation to the rigours of discovering a disenchanted
world. - Secularization. - cavehill.uwi.edu/bnccde/epb/e&sabs.html
Secularization of Public Administration
Thomas D. Lynch, Richard Omdal and Peter L. Cruise
Louisiana State University, Golden Gate University
At issue is the method used to define values in the discipline. For example, when we
discuss ethics, we base our inquiry on "regime values" and ignore the broader
established literature concerning the "common spiritual values of mankind." Like
much of western culture, secularization as a value strongly influences public
administration. This article examines the history of values in public administration
research and questions secularization with its removal of linkage between spiritual wisdom
and public values.
Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Vol. 7, No. 3: 473-488 (1997) ©
1997 Public Management Research Association
Research in public administration evolved from a valueneutral basis immortalized in
Woodrow Wilson's political/administrative dichotomy, to a logical positivism basis
advanced by Herbert Simon, to a call for the return to value-based traditions. Recent
research in the field, including research on ethics for public administrators, has
acknowledged that values do play an integral role and that the value-free neutrality
approach was invalid. This article makes the case that public administration should not
narrow its choice of values to only secularization but should use the full range of human
inquiry available to us, including the various Holy Scriptures from not only the Jewish
and Christian traditions but other traditions as well, such as the Hindu, Buddhist, and
Islamic. - jpart.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/7/3/473
The Catholic Bishops Conferences of the United States and France
Engaging Immigration as a Public Issue
Margarita Mooney, Princeton University
American Behavioral Scientist, Vol. 49, No. 11, 1455-1470 (2006) DOI:
10.1177/0002764206288461 © 2006 SAGE Publications
The secularization paradigm in the social sciences led many scholars to presume that
religious organizations no longer had a public role in society. The author argues that one
pressing public issue today, immigration, has become a strategic site on which the
Catholic church has reasserted its prophetic voice in society, in particular calling for
more humane treatment of undocumented immigrants and greater intercultural dialogue. The
author compares evidence from the Catholic Bishops Conferences in the United States and
France to show how the Catholic church is defining its role as a public religion in modern
democratic states. - Secularization -
abs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/49/11/1455
Secularization and the Role of Religion in State Institutions
Inger Furseth
Social Compass, Vol. 50, No. 2, 191-202 (2003) DOI: 10.1177/0037768603050002005 © 2003
Social Compass
The author examines the decline of religion thesis and the privatization thesis by
studying the role of religion in two state institutions in Norway, namely prisons and the
military. Focus is directed towards the field of relations between the Church of Norway's
military and prison service chaplaincies and representatives of other faiths, especially
Islam. Data consist of interviews with prison chaplains and representatives from the
Chaplaincy Norwegian Army, imams, as well as public policy documents. This study shows
that there are no signs of a decrease in the Church's formal functions within the military
or the prisons. In addition, military and prison chaplains act as intermediaries between
the state, official representatives of the Muslim faith communities, and Muslim prison
inmates, conscripts, and military personnel, and they negotiate between these parties.
This study concludes that the role of the Church of Norway in military and prison
chaplaincies is a clear illustration of the continuing intertwining of religion and state
in Norway. - scp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/50/2/191
Church attendance in Spain (1930-1992): Gender differences and secularization
Pablo Branas - Garza University of Jaen IESA-CSIC, Spain
Abstract: This paper uses retrospective data from the ISSP98 database to reconstruct
church-attendance trends in Spain from 1930 to 1992. Time series analysis is performed to
examine religious changes in two parallel ways: first, to determine both male and female
church-attendance trends and second, to study the gender effect, that is, differences
between males and females regarding church attendance. Our results indicate that: i) both
male and female church attendance is declining at a rate of 2% annually; ii) gender
differences remain unaltered for the period analyzed. -
economicsbulletin.vanderbilt.edu/2004/ volume26/EB-03Z00001A.pdf
The Process of Secularization. A Neglected Issue in Finnish Sociology
Susan Sundback
Social Compass, Vol. 35, No. 1, 91-106 (1988) DOI: 10.1177/003776868803500107 © 1988
Social Compass
Cet article a un triple objet: expliquer le manque ŕ peu prčs total d'intéręt pour le
problčme de la sécularisation de la part des sociologues finlandais; plaider en faveur
d'une telle recherche sociologique; suggérer quelques observations importantes ŕ faire
au début d'une telle recherche en Finlande. -
scp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/35/1/91
Is Northern Ireland Abnormal?
An Extension of the Sociological Debate on Religion in Modern Britain
Claire Mitchell, Queen’s University Belfast
Sociology, Vol. 38, No. 2, 237-254 (2004) DOI: 10.1177/0038038504040861 © 2004 BSA
Publications Ltd.
This article places Northern Ireland within the unfolding sociological debate on religion
in modern Britain. It measures secularization along Casanova’s three dimensions
(1994): religious differentiation, decline and privatization. It finds that Northern
Ireland has, in common with Britain, high levels of religious differentiation, grey areas
of religious belief and little convinced secularism. However, Northern Ireland differs in
that it has higher levels of religious affiliation and practice, and religion plays more
roles in civil society than it does in other parts of Britain. The article explores the
role of conflict in forming these religious trends, asking if they represent a persistence
of the sacred, or simply mask deeper ethnic divisions. It concludes that the social
dimensions of religion are just as important as the supernatural, and that they often
inform each other. Finally, it suggests that the dynamics of religious change are
comparable across regions and, as such, Northern Ireland might be a useful case study for
British policy makers, particularly as it becomes increasingly multicultural and
religiously plural. - soc.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/38/2/237
Secularization, Deviance and Delinquency among Israeli Arab Villagers
S. Giora Shoham, Esther Segal, Giora Rahav
Human Relations, Vol. 28, No. 7, 661-674 (1975) DOI: 10.1177/001872677502800705 © 1975
The Tavistock Institute
Many Israeli Arabs are facing severe culture-conflicts as a consequence of two social
processes. First, there is the increasing frequency of contact with Jews, and second,
there is the process of rapid modernization which involves secularization, disorganization
of traditional social structures and changing norms. In this study the criminality of
rural Arabs in Israel is analyzed in terms of culture-conflict. Interviews with prisoners
and non-prisoners supply the data and the statistical analyses confirm the main
hypotheses. - hum.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/7/661
‘Losing my religion’: a dynamic analysis of leaving the church in the
Netherlands
Ariana Need and Nan Dirk De Graaf
Department of Sociology PO Box 9104, 6500 HE Nijmegen, The Netherlands. Tel: (31) 24
3612042; fax: (31) 24 3612399 E-mail: u211614@vm.uci.kun.nl.
European Sociological Review 12:87-99 1996 © 1996 Oxford University Press
In this article, we examine the influence of individual attributes (education, parental
education, religious homogamy of parents, religious homogamy of respondent and spouse,
frequency of attending religious services, and denomination) and contextual
characteristics (cohort and period effects of secularization) on the risk of leaving a
faith, using life-event data from the Dutch Family Survey 1992–1993. This approach
allows a stronger test of the direction of causality, and enables us to disentangle
life-cycle, period, and cohort effects.
The results show that education, parental education, and marrying a non-religious spouse
significantly increase the risk of becoming unchurched. With regard to the influence of
both one's own and oneis parents' education, it appears that up to the level of higher
secondary education (HAVO) each higher level of education linearly increases the risk of
becoming unchurched. Also, the results show a non-linear life-cycle effect: people are
more likely to leave their faith when they are in their late teens.Furthermore, our
results suggest a period effect: the current level of secularization increases the risk of
becoming unchurched. - esr.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/12/1/87
DYNAMICS OF THE RELIGIOUS ECONOMY
EXIT, VOICE AND DENOMINATIONAL SECULARIZATION
James D. Montgomery
Rationality and Society, Vol. 8, No. 1, 81-110 (1996) DOI: 10.1177/104346396008001004 ©
1996 SAGE Publications
This paper develops a dynamic model of the religious economy. In the model, individuals
with higher incomes prefer less strict denominations. If individuals remain within their
parents' denominations, intergenerational social mobility may alter denominational class
composition, inducing change in denominational strictness. New denominations then form in
the market niches abandoned by older denominations. I characterize the dynamics of the
model through a series of examples. In one case, the model generates the pattern of
denominational secularization and sect formation observed in the American religious
economy; the rise and fall of particular denominations is consistent with stability of the
religious economy as a whole. However, the model may generate other dynamic patterns in
which denominational strictness levels are stationary or denominations become
desecularized through time. Two `religious capital' parameters, characterizing the
strength of denominational loyalty and its relationship to denominational strictness, play
key roles in determining which pattern emerges. -
rss.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/8/1/81
State Welfare Spending and Religiosity
A Cross-National Analysis
Anthony Gill, Political Science, Box 353530, University of Washington, Seattle, WA
98195–3530 tgill@u.washington.edu
Erik Lundsgaarde
Rationality and Society, Vol. 16, No. 4, 399-436 (2004) DOI: 10.1177/1043463104046694 ©
2004 SAGE Publications
What accounts for cross-national variation in religiosity as measured by church attendance
and non-religious rates? Examining answers from both secularization theory and the
religious economy perspective, we assert that cross-national variation in religious
participation is a function of government welfare spending and provide a theory that links
macro-sociological outcomes with individual rationality. Churches historically have
provided social welfare. As governments gradually assume many of these welfare functions,
individuals with elastic preferences for spiritual goods will reduce their level of
participation since the desired welfare goods can be obtained from secular sources.
Cross-national data on welfare spending and religious participation show a strong negative
relationship between these two variables after controlling for other aspects of
modernization. - rss.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/16/4/399
Paracelsus Confronts the Saints: Miracles, Healing and the Secularization of
Magic
CHARLES WEBSTER, All Souls College Oxford OX1 4AL
Social History of Medicine 1995 8(3):403-421; doi:10.1093/shm/8.3.403 © 1995 by Society
for the Social History of Medicine
SUMMARY The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries witnessed an erosion of the role played by
the church in healing. Magical practices mediated by the church were replaced by the
resources of medicine. This represented an important cultural development and it is often
regarded as a manifestation of increasing secularization, the decline of magic and rise of
science. This paper examines this issue with special reference to miraculous healing
associated with saints, which constituted one of the most important facets of magic
controlled by the church. It will be suggested that Paracelsus (Theophrast von Hohenheim,
1493–1541) played an important part in the argument concerning the miraculous powers
of saints.
Many works by Paracelsus produced at various points in his career were relevant to this
issue, but De causis morborum invisibilium, the sequel to his important Opus Paramirum
(1531), was especially significant. The question of miraculous healing was therefore
important in the first, full presentation of the new system of medicine developed by
Paracelsus. Modern commentators have understandably found De causis morborum invisibilium
less intelligible and congenial than the more accessible Opus Paramirum. But the former
was important to Paracelsus, and it addressed problems that were fundamental to his
audience. This case-study shows how conclusions reached by Paracelsus about medical
questions were integrally tied up with his theological standpoint and with his wider
reaction to the acute crisis of confidence which affected the church and the established
social order at the beginning of the sixteenth century. By eliminating the miraculous
intervention of saints and promoting the secularization of magic, Paracelsus was
contributing to one of the important cultural changes associated with the Reformation. -
shm.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/8/3/403
Medicalization and Secularization: the Jewish Ritual Bath as a Problem of Hygiene
(Germany 1820s–1840s)
THOMAS SCHLICH, Institut für Geschichte der Medizin der Robert Bosch Stiftung Straussweg
17, 70184 Stuttgart, Germany
Social History of Medicine 1995 8(3):423-442; doi:10.1093/shm/8.3.423 © 1995 by Society
for the Social History of Medicine
SUMMARY In the 1820s and 1840s the Jewish Ritual bath in Germany was criticized on the
basis of medical arguments. Associated with this critique were demands for a change in the
traditional Jewish way of life in general, especially as concerning the Jewish religion.
The new role assigned to religion can be seen as part of a process of
‘secularization’. The criticism of the ritual bath was justified by medical
arguments and entailed a demand for an extension of the medical sphere of competence, and
thus formed part of a development described as ‘medicalization’. An historical
investigation of the debate on the Jewish ritual bath illuminates the way in which
medicalization and secularization were different aspects of the same process of the
attribution of complementary circumscribed spheres of medicine and religion. -
shm.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/8/3/423
The Roman Catholic Church and the Immigration Issue
The Relative Secularization of Political Life in Spain
Xabier Itçaina, CERVL-CNRS, Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Bordeaux, France
American Behavioral Scientist, Vol. 49, No. 11, 1471-1488 (2006) DOI:
10.1177/0002764206288459 © 2006 SAGE Publications
Immigration has come to the fore in Spain, Italy, and Portugal, turning into a political
issue both with regard to public policy and political jousting in Spain and Italy. In this
context, secular and Catholic third sectors are actively engaged in building a
"register of hospitality" quite distinct from other interpretations of
immigration, such as security-oriented, utilitarian, or citizenship-based approaches. This
article analyzes the role played by the Catholic church in Spain and highlights the way a
religious institution builds a threefold register of interpretation. The article provides
significant insights into the relative secularization of immigration-related politics in
Spain and Southern Europe. Catholic activism indicates that effective withdrawal of the
church as a dominant social institution has not signified the demise of its influence on
the political scene. In fact, the church’s activism highlights a political void
occasioned by the inability of political and administrative actors to cope with this
issue. - abs.sagepub.com/cgi/content/ abstract/49/11/1471
Islam and Secularization
Author: Zubaida, Sami
Source: Asian Journal of Social Science, Volume 33, Number 3, 2005, pp. 438-448(11)
Abstract: This article looks at the relationship of the religious and the secular from a
historical perspective. Contrasting historical facts, including a traditional religious
consciousness, and the political religious language of recent times, it is shown that
there is no natural given boundary separating the two dimensions. Instead, the whole
discussion derives from an advanced state of a secular mind. In nineteenth and the
twentieth century thought in institutions in the Middle East, for example, in the fields
of law, education, administration and mass culture, there was experienced an irreversible
process of change towards secularity. This process was facilitated by the co-existence and
intersection of the religious and the secular. The dichotomy of the religious and the
secular emerged within popularized fundamentalism, which itself has to be seen as a fruit
of the secularization process encouraging religion to turn into a matter of politics and
"social engineering". - ingentaconnect.com
BEYOND UNBELIEF
Author: Meulemann H., University of Cologne
Source: European Societies, Volume 2, Number 2, June 2000, pp. 167-194(28)
Abstract: Uncertainty and indifference are explored as responses to secularization beyond
unbelief in Western and Eastern European countries with low and high degrees of
secularization. The analysis is guided by three hypotheses. First, secularization should
increase unbelief and indifference strongly, but uncertainty less strongly. This range of
secularization hypothesis refers to the aggregate and individual level, to the degree of
secularization of nations and to the religiosity of persons. Second, the self-induced
secularization in Western European countries should produce more uncertainty, the enforced
secularization in the Eastern European countries more unbelief and indifference. This form
of secularization hypothesis refers to the aggregate level only. Third, the relation
between religiosity and uncertainty should be negative in less secularized and positive in
more secularized countries. This modified secularization hypothesis refers to the
modification of individual relations by aggregate membership. Data source is the
International Social Survey (1991), from which fourteen less and more secularized Western
and Eastern nations are selected. Religiosity is measured as church attendance and
self-ascribed religiosity. Dependent variables are belief in God and the Bible. The range
of secularization hypothesis is confirmed for both beliefs on the aggregate as well as the
individual level of analysis. However, the form of and the modified secularization
hypothesis are conformed for the belief in God only. - ingentaconnect.com
Secularization and Aging in Britain: Does Family Formation Cause Greater Religiosity?
James R. Tilley, Nuffield College, Oxford james.tilley@nuffield.ox.ac.uk
Abstract: Using data from the British Election Studies and the British Household Panel
Study, this research note examines how family formation factors, such as marriage and
childrearing, affect church attendance in Britain. Debates in the United States have
centered on how, first, apparent aging effects could be due to family formation or be
evidence for cohort differences, and, second, how family formation effects are sex
specific. This research note shows that sex-specific effects are also present in Britain,
but more importantly that family formation alone cannot begin to account for differences
between age groups in church attendance. Evidence presented here suggests that
generational differences are actually responsible for both age disparities and the large
declines over time in church attendance in Britain. - blackwell-synergy.com
Secularization and Tolerance
Giorgio Spini1University of Florence, Faculty of Political Science, Via Laura, 48,
50121 Florence, Italy
Abstract: In this paper, starting from Condorcet's discussion on progress, the author
analyzes the relationship between the decline of religions, the end of State paternalism
and tolerance. The author underlines how history shows a different course with respect to
illuminist previsions. - blackwell-synergy.com
SOCIAL CHANGE AND RELIGION: THINKING BEYOND SECULARIZATION
Charles L. Harper is Professor in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at
Creighton University.
Bryan LeBeau currently serves as Chair of the Department of History, Coordinator of the
American Studies Program, and holder of the John C. Kenefick Faculty Chair in the
Humanities at Creighton University.
Abstract Extract: are.as.wvu.edu/sochange.htm
In different ways classical social thinkers of the late 19th and early 20th century all
thought that religion would either disappear or become progressively attenuated with the
expansion of modern institutions, resulting in a "secularization thesis" aptly
captured in the title of Freud's famous The Future of an Illusion (see Durkheim,
1912/1965; Freud, 1957; Marx and Engels, 1848/1858; Tylor, 1871; Weber, 1904/1958:182; and
Giddens, 1990:207). The evidence is pervasive and clear, however, that religion has
disappeared nowhere but changed everywhere. For those expecting its attenuation to
accompany modernization, religion remains surprisingly vibrant and socially salient. This
is particularly true in America, but in much of the rest of the world as well, where
religion continues to be a potent factor in the emerging global order and its conflicts.
It is in parts of Western Europe where individual religiosity has been radically
transformed that the secularization thesis seems to work the best.
In the United States pollsters and scholars have found evidence that the vast majority of
Americans continue to believe in supernatural forces, identify themselves in religious
terms, and hunger for a spiritually enhanced life. Regarding the later, there is clear
evidence that many Americans participate regularly in religious and spiritual small groups
and form a large market for religious/spiritual books, tapes, music, and paraphernalia.
Religion is a significant factor in voting patterns, ideology about public policy, and
political careers. But pervasive evidence also exists for changes that many observers see
as religious decline: declining membership, particularly among liberal/mainline Protestant
denominations, and declining participation in religious services and traditional forms of
piety like prayer and Bible reading. Tolerance of "other religions" grows along
with declines in specific confessional and denominational loyalties (i.e., commitment to
"brand name religion") (Barna, 1996; Princeton Religious Research Center, 1996,
1997a, 1997b; Hoge, Johnson, and Luidens, 1994; Roof and McKinney, 1987; Bellah and
others, 1985.; Roof, 1993; Wuthnow, 1988, 1997; Marquand, 1996; The Economist, 1998:65).
Responding to religious persistence as well as perceived declines, social scientists have
created neosecularization perspectives, ostensibly faithful to contemporary facts as well
as classical theory. They understand modernization not to involve the actual disappearance
of religion, but perhaps as attenuation and certainly as changing religious forms in
relation to other institutions. From the (assumed) benchmark of unitary religion in
medieval Europe, scholars have argued variously that secularization involved the
differentiation of religion from other institutional realms, the privatization of
religious belief and experience, desacralization and the declining scope of religious
authority, and the "liberalization" of religious doctrine (See Dobbleare, 1981;
Chaves, 1994; Hadden, 1987; Hammond, 1985, Wald, 1997; and Wilson, 1966). Secularization
theory, including its amended forms, has yielded many fruitful observations, and the
secularization debate continues with great vigor about both the reality and the usefulness
of its perspectives (see, for instance, Lechner, 1996; Stark and Iaconne, 1996, Yamane,
1997). While we do not disparage its usefulness, we think that contested issues have
narrowed so that, increasingly, facts are less in question as much as are definitional,
methodological, and epistemological issues (or perhaps attachment to received social
science traditions).
In this paper we consider the relationship between social change and religion using
perspectives other than secularization. Specifically, we utilize perspectives from (1)
broad currents of world-historical change, (2) communication and media studies, and (3)
postmodernism. We assume that like other institutional realms, religion is embedded in a
broad process of sociocultural change, and that in this process religion is not passive,
as so often depicted in secularization or modernization theory. Like other spheres, it is
a partly autonomous force, reflexively shaping and being shaped by that large-scale
transformation. This paper does not offer either new empirical observations or different
causal explanations of large-scale change patterns. Rather it uses contemporary analytic
frameworks to develop a broad overview of religious change, while suggesting parallel
changes in other social spheres that are all embedded in the large-scale sociocultural
transformation now occurring.
Secularization, Religiosity, and the United States Constitution
Christopher L. Eisgruber
Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies, Summer 2006, Vol. 13, No. 2, Pages 445-472
This article draws upon leading works in the sociology of religion to assess what I shall
call "the secularization claim" regarding the United States. It endeavors, in
particular, to clarify the possible meanings of "secularization," and then to
use these conceptual refinements to examine what sort of evidence exists that the United
States has been secularized. Though it is not possible to falsify every version of the
secularization claim, there is little evidence to support it, especially in its most
prominent and politically relevant variations. The article then goes on to offer a
preliminary analysis of to what extent, if any, are constitutional factors responsible for
sustaining a public culture in the United States that is, by comparison to most other
nations, durably religious. The article identifies four constitutional or
quasi-constitutional factors that sociologists and political scientists have suggested
might be partly responsible for the vigor of American religion: disestablishment, the
fragmentation of political authority, ethnic diversity and immigration, and provocative
judicial decisions. The article concludes by recommending that scholars who are interested
in the conditions that sustain religious activity and other forms of civic association in
the United States should pay more attention to the constitutional fragmentation of
political authority. - inscribe.iupress.org
The Secularization of South Africa's Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Mike
Nicol's The Ibis Tapestry
Michael Titlestad, Mike Kissack
Indiana Journal of Global Legal Studies, Winter 2006, Vol. 37, No. 4, Pages 48-67
In this article we read Mike Nicol's The Ibis Tapestry (1998) as an intertextual novel
that brings a postmodern inflection to its interrogation of the principles and practices
of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Using the distant mirror of the
life, work, and death of Christopher Marlowe, the novel unravels aspects of the ethical
ideology and epistemological framing of the Commission in a way that, we argue, amounts to
its secularization. This does not mean that Nicol presents a conservative subversion of
attempts to accomplish postapartheid nation building. Rather, his novel is one of those
literary works that deepens, extends, complicates, and intensifies the work of the TRC by
casting doubt on its ecclesiastical framing and its foundational teleology. Further, this
article is an attempt to redress the degree to which The Ibis Tapestry has been ignored in
the study of South African literature. We argue that its unsettling dynamic needs to be
considered if we are to do justice to the literary imprint of the Commission. -
inscribe.iupress.org
Is there a Place for the Sacred in Organizations and their Development
Rajen K. Gupta, Indian Institute of Management, Lucknow
Journal of Human Values, Vol. 2, No. 2, 149-158 (1996) DOI: 10.1177/097168589600200207 ©
1996 SAGE Publications
Secularization of life in general is widely seen as a direct consequence of European
enlightenment and the process of modernization. The paper contests this thesis of societal
secularization through a historical analysis of ideas in the Anglo-Saxon Christian parts
of Europe and North America. It contends that the sense of the sacred has either been
pushed to the private lives of individuals or marginalized into myriad forms of
counter-movements. This paper then contests secularization of organizations and sees it as
a thin veil of misperception. Success of Japanese organizations and studies thereof, have
brought back the inevitable relevance of societal cultures for organizational management.
A sense of the sacred is an essential aspect of culture—societal or
organizational—which must be taken into account to build truly humane and optimally
effective organizations. The theory and practice of organization development must advance
itself accordingly to remain true to its spirit. -
jhv.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/2/2/149
Secularization in a strong religious society: the case of Turkey
Tahirli, Taleh, Department: Linköping University, Department of Management and
Economics
Abstract [en] : There is a widespread belief among many researchers that Islam and
secularization is incompatible. Obviously, in the Eastern world and in Muslim countries in
particular, the problematic relationship between religion and democracy is still shows
itself intensively. The current lack of democracy in most Muslim countries derives in part
from this mindset contending that Islam is incompatible with secularization. So the
application of concept “secularization” to studies of the Muslim countries
Middle East has often been more problematic than enlightening.
The present study continues the discussion of the compatibility of secularization and
Islamic religion bringing to the fore the case of modern Turkish politics. By considering
the possible ways of how secularization can emerge and survive in a predominantly Muslim
society, the study demonstrates the state-religion interaction in Turkey.
The thesis examines how the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of Turkish
nationalism decreased religious authority which led to the emergence of secularization. It
shows that western institutions played a crucial role in survival of secularization. Later
it discusses the reasons of revival of religion and survival of secularization in Turkish
politics.
The main purpose is to present Turkey as a case in support of the argument concerning the
coexistence of Islam and secularization. -
diva-portal.org/liu/undergraduate/abstract.xsql?dbid=5318
Is Secularization a Discontinuous Process?
Daniel Rigney, Richard Machalek, Jerry D. Goodman
Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 17, No. 4 (Dec., 1978), pp. 381-387
doi:10.2307/1385401
Abstract: Wuthnow (1976) contends that secularization in the United States has been a
"discontinuous" process marked by dramatic fluctuations in religious commitment.
This brief paper undertakes an empirical assessment of the discontinuity thesis. When
Wuthnow's indicators of religious commitment are expanded, refined, and reanalyzed, it is
not clear that secularization has been discontinuous during this century. Of the seven
indicators examined, four exhibit linear trends. The paper concludes with suggestions for
further investigation of this emerging issue in secularization theory. - jstor.org
The Case Secularization: A Rebuttal
FRANK J. LECHNER, Emory University
questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=95251252
Abstract: This article examines the main charges against secularization theory and finds
them wanting. Contrary to the recent arguments of various critics, there is a reasonably
solid body of secularization theory with valid historical content; secularization cannot
be explained away as either institutionalization or transformation; it is neither a
self-limiting process nor reversed by fundamentalist movements; and while secularization
theory may be of limited use in current macrosociological research on global change, it is
as yet far from irrelevant. Until it is more solidly refuted, secularization theory
remains a valuable part of the theoretical arsenal of the sociology of religion.
Secularization used to be part of the conventional sociological wisdom. In fact, for most
Western intellectuals the Great Transformation since at least the eighteenth century was
above all a process of secularization. According to the collective understanding of these
intellectuals, modern societies no longer operated under a sacred canopy, the canopy had
dissolved into a set of leaky umbrellas. In gesellschaft, individuals were left to their
own spiritual devices, which were to become increasingly disconnected from traditional
religion.
Once exposed to rational criticism, the tenets of a faith could no longer be accepted on
faith or serve to unify a culture. Religious institutions weakened and were reduced to a
minor role. Above all, social life in modernity no longer derived its meaning from being
embedded in a transcendently guaranteed order. Secularization, in short, was always more
than a particular set of hypotheses about particular institutions: it was central to the
self-interpretation of modern societies. The sociology of religion only elaborated in more
systematic terms what was a common perspective shared by the majority of
intellectuals.
Recently, however, the conventional wisdom has come under attack, and secularization
theory in particular has become suspect in the eyes of sociologists.
Secularization as Declining Religious Authority
MARK CHAVES, The University of Notre Dame
Abstract: Secularization is most productively understood not as declining religion, but as
the declining scope of religious authority. A focus on religious authority (1) is more
consistent with recent developments in social theory than is a preoccupation with
religion; (2) draws on and develops what is best in the secularization literature; and (3)
reclaims a neglected Weberian insight concerning the sociological analysis of
religion.
Several descriptive and theoretical "pay-offs" of this conceptual innovation are
discussed: new hypotheses concerning the relationship between religion and social
movements; the enhanced capacity to conceptually apprehend and empirically investigate
secularization among societies, organizations, and individuals; and clearer theoretical
connections between secularization and other sociological literatures. Ironically, these
connections may indeed spell the end of secularization theory as a distinct body of
theory, but in a different way than previously appreciated.
The central analytical question has been: "What is religion?" and the difficulty
of providing a satisfactory answer to that question has consequently dominated the debate
about secularisation in industrial societies. . . . The question is, without doubt,
significant in both the philosophy and sociology of religion, but it has had the effect of
inducing a certain theoretical sterility and repetitiveness within the discipline. The
endless pursuit of that issue has produced an analytical cul-de-sac. ( Turner 1991
:3)
Hitherto, too many studies in the sociology of religion have been interested in meaning
systems. It is my contention that the study of structural changes is more important and is
in closer alignment with the great sociological traditions. ( Dobbelaere 1989 :42)
A longstanding consensus around classical versions of secularization theory has broken
down in recent decades. Religion's stubborn refusal to disappear has prompted major
reevaluation of inherited models of secularization.
Individualization, identity formation and the secularization of ethical
orientation
Abstract Individualization causes new processes of identity development (the endless
search for sources of the self), both on a micro-level (individual) and on a meso-level
(organisations, institutions). These processes differ from earlier processes of identity
formulations: focusing less on philosophically and theologically elaborated credo s and
related types of statements, and focusing more on acting, codes of conduct and other
concrete issues. Even in churches there is a remarkable shift of focus, from pure
theological debates about the final thruth to practical questions: how is the church to be
structured, what is the role of hierarchy, is homosexuality allowed, are female priests
acceptable, should the Eucharist rituals be open for members of other churches, a.s.o.. By
contrast one sees secular organizations busily engaged working on their often rather
abstract mission statements, their corporate culture and their organizational identity.
The new societal processes of identity formulation reflect shifts in both theology and
society. In theology it is the emerging recognition - be it rather slowly, at times - of
the fact that the usual words and terms (including christian , tradition , belief ) in the
end all evoke many different interpretations and hermeneutics, so that the communally
phrased credo may not always be the ultimate remedy for dissension. Moreover, theology
becomes more open for pluralism and diversity in belief. For society, meanwhile, the
development is in the opposite direction: pluralism apparently is more and more
experienced as a problem, if not a threat. Society is in search of a formulation of shared
ideals and values that may ground a new common morality. On the meso-level of institutions
and organisations this results in a strange paradox: churches start talking less about
their theological truths, and secular organisation start secular discussions about values,
in search of a basis for their codes of conduct. This gives rise to a cluster of research
questions, of which the three main questions in this research project are: what is the
contribution of religious discourse (and the religious institutions) in processes of
present day identity formation?, and in connection with that: what is the role of
religious institutions in processes of societal (re)formulation of morality and the
systematic reflection on morality (= ethics)? through what type of processes do secular
institutions (schools, non-governmental organisations, professional associations,
companies, political and state institutions) arrive at their formulation of values,
philosophies and ethical deliberations? - onderzoekinformatie.nl/en/oi/nod/
onderzoek/OND1309147/
Religious Advocacy in Secular Society: A Neo-Secularization Perspective
David Yamane, University of Wisconsin-Madison
This research contributes to the ongoing debate over the proper role of religion in
American public life and institutions by theorizing and empirically examining the role of
religious groups in Wisconsin state politics. The project seeks to answer the following
question: What is the role of religious advocacy in the legislative process in Wisconsin,
and how does the secularity of modern social structure constrain and enable the
involvement of religious advocates in that process? An answer to this question is pursued
in light of current debates over the concept of “secularization” in sociology.
The work mounts a defense of a neo-secularization paradigm in which secularization is
conceived of not as involving a unidirectional movement toward a decline in religion, but
as entailing a double-movement: institutional differentiation causes a decline in the
scope of religious authority over the political sphere, but also creates new conditions
which facilitate the re-emergence of religious organizations in the political sphere.
Against this theoretical background. original data on the relationships between and among
religious interest groups, secular interest groups, and legislators iii Wisconsin is being
collected and analyzed. The empirical project is composed of three parts, each of which
highlights the fact that religious advocacy is enabled by a secular political system whose
autonomy from religious authority at the same time constrains religious involvement in
politics to predominantly non—threatening strategies and goals. This is
characteristic of the double-movement suggested by the neo-secularization perspective
advocated here. - louisville-institute.org/secondary/abstract.asp?id=255
Secularization Troubles: The Sociology of Liberal Protestantism
Christopher Hinkle, Harvard Divinity School
In seeking a clearer understanding of the situation of contemporary American liberal
Protestantism, this dissertation pursues a comparative analysis of the work of Peter
Berger, Rodney Stark, Robert Bellah, and Robert Wuthnow. Giving particular attention in
this analysis to implicit and explicit theological commitments at work in these writings,
I address disagreements among the sociologists and contend that a more interdisciplinary
approach to these questions is justified. Contemporary resistance among both sociologists
and theologians to greater engagement between the disciplines reflects an intellectual
differentiation associated with secularization. Building on sociological interpretations
of liberal Protestantism, I argue here that similar social pressures towards
differentiation significantly undermine both contemporary liberal Protestant practice and
theology. A renewal of liberal Protestantism will thus require active resistance to such
compartmentalization of religious practice and religious belief. Though such resistance is
difficult, requiring a reappraisal of liberal Protestantism’s de-centering of
doctrine and transcendence, it suggests a distinctive and much needed role for liberal
theology and the liberal Protestant churches. -
louisville-institute.org/secondary/abstract.asp?id=3800
The Great Secularization Experiment: An Analysis of Communism's Attempt to Eliminate
Religion
Froese, P.
Description: In this manuscript, I provide a comparison of many different cases
(countries) to create a complex explanation of how different religious groups and
historical traditions responded to the religious laws of communism. Crucial to this
endeavor is my theoretical framework which seeks to predict when religious and secular
ideologies come into conflict and which will prevail. I apply the basic logic of a
"religious-economies" approach to produce propositions specific to the unique
circumstances of communism and provide expectations of how extreme religious repression
impacts religiosity. Through a detailed analysis of the communist experiment to secularize
multiple countries I show how significant changes in state religious policy effect
religious competition within diverse cultural settings. Of special interest is how
different churches confront and endure religious regulations. My work identifies specific
characteristics that make some religions more resilient than others and specifies the
mechanisms which cause religious decline. - baylor.edu/Sociology/index.php?id=22238
Trends in de katholieke godsdienstigheid eind 20ste eeuw: België vergeleken met West -
en Centraal-Europese landen, Tijdschrift voor Sociologie, 24 (1), 9-36.
Karel Dobbelaere (2003)
Beginning with a description of Belgian trends in weekly mass attendance, participation in
rites of passage and acceptance of Catholic beliefs, this essay compares these trends with
data from other West-European countries in order to establish whether Belgian trends are
particular to that country or are rather similar to trends in other countries. To enable
us to explain the trends, two prominent current theories in the sociology of religion --
Rational Choice Theory and Secularization Theory -- are used to analyse data on Catholics
and former Catholics from eleven West European and Central European countries collected in
the frame of the Religious and Moral Pluralism study. The outcome of this analysis allows
us to elaborate a theoretical explanation of past trends based on Secularization Theory.
Finally, we consider whether the secularization of European societies resulted on the
individual level in a secularization of mind or compartmentalization. Starting from that
point, we try to assess possible future trends for the laicization of the country and the
consequences for the position of the Catholic Church in Belgium. -
sociologie.be/tijdschrift/jrg/abs/abs2003-1-1.htm
The Religious and the Secular: Studies in Secularization
by David Martin
Suzanne Gwiazda, Church History, Vol. 39, No. 2 (Jun., 1970), p. 268 doi:10.2307/3163424 -
jstor.org
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