Introduction

In many parts of the world religion has re-entered the public sphere to such an extent that it has undermined the ‘hard line’ secularisation thesis – that is, the assumption that religion would disappear in Western, modernised societies. Since this ‘hard line’ view should not be happening, views on secularisation have had to be revised. Some academics (for example, Bruce 2002, 2006; Norris and Inglehart, 2004) explain that secularisation is still happening but in a much less extreme process than first predicted, while others (for example, Richardson, 1985; Hadden, 1987; Brown, 1992; Warner, 1993; Kepel, 1994) propose that there is a reverse process and that secularisation is losing momentum. In accordance with this latter view, recent theories in the sociology of religion (see, for example, Martin, 2005; Casanova, 2006; Davie, 2006) have pushed the debate further by applying Eisenstadt's (2000) multiple modernities paradigm.

To illustrate this paradigm, I am using Martin's (2005) recent work on the matter in which he employs Casanova's definition of secularisation on social differentiation, ‘meaning by that the increasing autonomy of the various spheres of human activity’ (Martin, 2005, p 123). Religion is no longer an overarching system and is now seen as a sub-system of society alongside other sub-systems (for example, education, health, commercial, scientific institutions) such that all-encompassing claims of religion have much less relevance. Religion no longer has the place it had in societal structure and is no longer the dominant voice when it comes, for example, to politics, welfare and education. If religion is still strong in our culture, it is not the yesteryear pillar of Western social structure. Moving beyond this fait accompli, Martin's work pushes further our understanding of this process by underlining the different dynamics of secularisation, rather than simply assuming a single one as in many previous sociological studies. The fundamental argument of his latest work is that secularisation is not a clear-cut process that happens in all Western societies homogeneously or that will happen to all industrialising countries.