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Notes for a general theory of secularisation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

David Martin
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Extract

A General theory of secularisation is closer to realisation in the sociology of religion than might be expected, in spite of the field being poorly developed. However, the sociology of religion has the advantage of being able to draw in a synthesising manner on neighbouring areas which are more developed, and in so doing will be able in return to suggest broad schemata of interpretation for use in those fields, especially political sociology. No doubt the notion of a general theory of secularisation remains premature, but premature statements do elicit more precise or even alternative formulations incorporating and subsuming wider ranges of material. In any case what follows is less a complete statement of a general theory than a specification of some of its components. Yet in another sense it is a theory, since it could be reduced to sets of overarching propositions and their integrally related sub-propositions, with appropriate qualifications and marginal rubrics.

Type
Research Article
Information
European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie , Volume 10 , Issue 2 , November 1969 , pp. 192 - 201
Copyright
Copyright © Archives Européenes de Sociology 1969

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References

(1) It will be clear that the ‘theory’ does not adequately specify for these three distinct areas, which are in any case known to vary independently of each other. However I have indicated below something of the range of this variation.

(2) These adaptations will include the various sects and denominations as well as changes in ‘churchly’ Christianity: and sociologists will make statements about their varied viability according to social milieu.

(3) Of course they are also ‘not equal’ with respect to factors which are much more adventitious than those dealt with in this article. Such an adventitious element would be the migration of Catholics to the urban areas of Protestant cultures thereby upsetting to some extent the correlation between large scale urbanisation and low practice.

(4) An exposition of this notion can be found in Lipset, S. M., Revolution and Counter-revolution (London, Heinemann, 1968)Google Scholar. Cf. the points I have tried to make at the beginning of chap. IV in my A Sociology of English Religion (London, S.C.M., 1967)Google Scholar, and in Moore, Barrington, Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy (Boston, Beacon Press, 1966).Google Scholar

(5) In Switzerland for example one could treat the Geneva-Zurich axis as the ‘active’ segment of the society.

(6) For a lucid contrast of two of these patterns, the British and the American, of the essay on Canada in Lipset, S. M., op. cit.Google Scholar For an equally lucid contrast of the British and French (Latin) patterns of the forthcoming book on education in the two countries by M. Clifford-Vaughan and M. Scotford-Morton.

(7) Notably the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, 1685.

(8) Presumably the Italian pattern is influenced for Catholicism in that the Papacy is Italian, but against it in that the Pope was a temporal ruler and opposed to Italian nationalism.

(9) The point about nationalism is made tentatively, but Lutheran cultures do have a smaller internationalist aspect than Calvinist ones: at least so Stark, W. argues in his Sociology of Religion (London, Routledge, 1966), vol. IGoogle Scholar. A difficult point arises here in that one does not know whether to categorise nationalistic possibilities as belonging to the original ‘essence’ of Lutheranism or not. Cf. Kaser, G., L'éveil du sentiment national. Rôle du piétisme dans la naissance du patriotisme, Archives de sociologie des religions, XXII (1966), 59–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

(10) It is arguable whether Orthodox cultures have been less pluralistic than Catholic cultures; Russia has always had substantial dissent.

(11) ‘Retardation’ is not employed pejoratively: they are ‘holding movements’ expressing some awareness of the weaknesses of liberalism rather than mere reaction. At the intellectual level and in the form of neo-orthodoxy they can mount complex critiques of liberalised Christianity: especially perhaps in alliance with political forces to the left of liberalism e.g. Niebuhr and Barth.

(12) This point has been strongly emphasised by Talcott Parsons. Cf. also his valuable essay on Christianity in Sills, D. (ed.), International Encyclopedia of the Social SciencesGoogle Scholar.

(13) Cf. Marty, M., The Modern Schism (London, S.C.M., 1969).Google Scholar