Beliefs in Society

Specification at a glance:
1. ideology, science and religion, including both Christian and non-Christian religious
traditions
2. the relationship between social change and social stability, and religious beliefs,
practices and organisations
3. religious organisations, including cults, sects, denominations, churches and New Age
movements, and their relationship to religious and spiritual belief and practice
4. the relationship between different social groups and religious/spiritual organisations and
movements, beliefs and practices
5. the significance of religion and religiosity in the contemporary world, including the nature
and extent of secularisation in a global context, and globalisation and the spread of
religions.

TOPIC 1 → THEORIES OF RELIGION

Substantive Definitions

● Max Weber (1905): Defines religion as belief in a superior or supernatural power that is
above nature and cannot be explained scientifically.
● They are exclusive - they draw a clear line between religious and non-religious beliefs. To be a
religion → set of beliefs must include belief in God or the supernatural.
● Substantive definitions are also accused of Western bias because they exclude religions
such as Buddhism which do not have the Western idea of a god.

Functional Definitions

● Rather than defining religion in terms of specific kinds of belief, functional definitions
define it in terms of the social or psychological functions it performs for individuals or
society.
● Durkheim (1915) → defines religion in terms of the contribution it makes to social integration,
rather than any specific belief in God or the supernatural.
● Milton Yinger (1970) → identifies functions that religion performs for individuals, such as
answering ‘ultimate questions’ about the meaning of life and what happens when we die.
● Advantage → functional definitions is that they are inclusive- allowing us to include a wide range
of beliefs and practices that perform functions such as integration.
● There is no bias against non-Western religions such as Buddhism, however just
because an institution helps integrate individuals into groups this does not make it a
religion.

Constructionist Definitions

● Social constructions take an interpretivist approach that focuses on how members of

society themselves define religion.
● They argue that it is not possible to produce a single universal definition of religion to
cover all cases, since in reality different individuals and groups mean very different
things by ‘religion’.
● Social constructionists are interested in how definitions of religion are constructed,
challenged and fought over. For example, Alan Aldridge (2013) → shows how, for its
followers, Scientology is a religion, whereas several governments have denied it legal status as a
religion and sought to ban it. This shows that definitions of religion can be contested and are
influenced by who has power to define the situation.
● Social constructionists do not assume that religion always involves a belief in God or the
supernatural, or that it performs similar functions for everyone in all societies. Their
approach allows them to get close to the meanings people themselves give to religion.
● However, this makes it impossible to generalise about the nature of religion, since
people may have widely differing views about what counts as a religion.

Functionalist Theories
 ● Each institution performs certain functions- that is, each contributes to maintaining the
social system by meeting a need.
● Society's most basic need is the need for social order and solidarity so that its members
can cooperate. For functionalists, what makes order possible is the existence of value
consensus- a set of shared norms and values by which society’s members live. Without
this, individuals would pursue their own selfish desires and society would disintegrate.
● Durkheim on Religion: For functionalists, religious institutions play a central part in
creating and maintaining value consensus, order and solidarity- who was the first
functionalist to develop this idea.
● The sacred and the profane → For Durkheim, the key feature of religion was not a belief
in gods, spirits or the supernatural, but a fundamental distinction between the sacred
and the profane found in all religions. The sacred are things set apart and forbidden, that
inspire feelings of awe, fear and wonder, and are surrounded by taboos and prohibitions. By
contrast, the profane are things that have no special significance- things that are ordinary and
mundane. Religion is not just a belief- it involves rituals (which is a collective) or practices in
relation to the sacred → performed by social groups.
● The fact that sacred things evoke such powerful feelings in believers indicates to
Durkheim that this is because they are symbols representing something of great power.
● In his view, these things can only be society itself, since society is the only thing
powerful enough to command such feelings. When they worship the sacred symbols,
therefore people are worshipping society itself.
● For Durkheim, although sacred symbols vary from religion to religion, they all perform
the essential function of uniting believers into a single moral community.

Totemism

● Durkheim → The essence of all religion could be found by studying its simplest form, in the
simplest type of society- clan society. For this reason, he used studies of the Arunta, an
Aboriginal Australian tribe with a clan system.
● Arunta clans consist of bands of kin who come together periodically to perform rituals
involving worship of a sacred totem. The totem is the clan's emblem, such as an animal
or plant that symbolises the clan’s origins and identity. The shared totemic rituals
venerating it serve to reinforce the group’s social solidarity and sense of belonging.
● For Durkheim, when clan members worship their totemic animal, they are in reality
worshipping society- even though they are unaware of this. The totem inspires feelings
of awe in the clan’s members precisely because it represents the power of the group on
which the individual is ‘utterly dependent’.

The Collective Conscience

● In Durkheim’s view, the sacred symbols represent society’s collective conscience or

consciousness (the French word) ‘conscience’ means both conscience and
consciousness.
 ● This means the shared norms, values, beliefs and knowledge that make social life and
cooperation between individuals possible- without these societies would disintegrate.
● For Durkheim, regular shared religious rituals reinforce the collective conscience and
maintain social integration. Participating in shared rituals binds individuals together,
reminding them that they are part of a single moral community to which they owe their
loyalty. Such rituals also remind the individual of the power of society- without which they
themselves are nothing, and to which they owe everything.
● In this sense, religion also performs an important function for the individual as it makes
us feel part of something greater than ourselves, religion reinvigorates and strengthens
us to face life’s trials and motivates us to overcome obstacles that would otherwise
defeat us.

Cognitive functions of religion

● Durkheim sees religion not only as the source of social solidarity but → intellectual or cognitive
capacities- our ability to reason and think conceptually. In order to think we need categories such
as time, space and cause.
● In order to share our thoughts, we need to use the same categories as others.
● In Durkheim’s view, religion is the origin of the concepts and categories we need
reasoning, understanding the world and communicating. Durkheim and Mauss (1903;
2009) argue that religion provides basic categories such as time, space and causation.
E.g. ideas about a creator bringing the world into being at the beginning of time. The
divisions of tribes into clans give humans their first notion of classification. Thus for
Durkheim, religion is the origin of human thought, reason and science.

Criticisms →
● There is no evidence behind totemism. Worsley (1956) notes that there is no sharp
division between the sacred and the profane, and that different clans share the same
totems. And even if Durkheim is right about totemism, this does not prove that he has
discovered the essence of all other religions.
● Durkheim’s theory may apply better to small-scale societies with a single religion. It is
harder to apply it to large-scale societies, where two or more religious communities may
be in conflict. His theory may explain social integration within communities but there may
be conflict between them.
● Post-modernist- Stjepan Mestrovic (2011) → argues that Durkheim’s ideas cannot be applied
to contemporary society, because increasing diversity has fragmented the collective conscience,
so there is no longer a single shared value system for religion to reinforce.

Psychological Functions

● Anthropologist, Bronisław Malinowski (1954) → agrees with Durkheim that religion promotes
solidarity. However, in his view it does so by performing psychological functions for individuals,
helping them cope with emotional stress that would undermine social solidarity.
● Malinowski identifies two types of situations that perform this role:
 1) Where the outcome is important but is uncontrollable and thus uncertain (In
his study of the Trobriand Islanders of the Western Pacific, Malinowski contrasts fishing
in the lagoon and fishing in the sea: Lagoon Fishing → is safe and uses the predictable
and successful method of poisoning + no ritual by islander. Ocean Fishing → dangerous
and uncertain, and is always accompanied by ‘canoe magic’ rituals (‘god of the gaps’- fills in the
gaps humans control over the world such as inability to control outcome of trip) to ensure a safe
and successful expedition- sense of control, which eases tension, gives them confidence to
undertake hazardous tasks → reinforces group solidarity)
2) At times of life crisis → Birth, Puberty, Marriage and Death are all disruptive changes in
social groups. Religion helps to minimise disruption. For example, the funeral ritual
reinforces solidarity while immortality provides comfort. Malinowski argues that death is
the main reason for the existence of religious belief.

Parsons: values and meaning

● Talcott Parson (1967): sees religion helping individuals to cope with unforeseen events
and circumstances and uncontrollable outcomes.
● He identifies two main functions in modern society:
1) It creates and legitimates society’s central values → to create basic norms and values by
sacralising them (making them sacred) e.g. In the USA, Protestantism has sacralised
american core values: individualism, meritocracy and self-discipline which serves to
promote value consensus and thus social stability.
2) It is the primary source of meaning → it answers the ‘ultimate’ questions about the human
condition, such as why the good suffer and why some die young → these events defy our sense of
justice and make life appear meaningless which may undermine our commitment to society’s
values. Religion provides answers to such questions as it is a test of faith and thus religion
enables people to adjust to adverse events or circumstances and helps maintain
stability.

Civil Religion

● Like Parsons, Robert Bellah (1991; 2013) is interested in how religion unites society
especially which is multi-faith like in the USA. What unifies an American society is an
overarching civil religion- a belief system that attaches sacred qualities to society itself.
● Bellah argues that civil religion integrates society in a way that America’s may different
churches and denominations cannot. While none of these can claim the loyalty of all
Americans, civil religion can.
● American civil religion involves loyalty to the nation-state and belief in God = true
American. It is expressed in various rituals, symbols and beliefs e.g. pledge of allegiance
to the flag, singing the national anthem and phrases like ‘one nation under God’. This
isn’t a specific religion, but rather an ‘American’ God as it sacralised the American way
of life and binds together Americans from many different ethnic/religious backgrounds.
Functional Alternatives

● Functional alternatives or functional equivalents to religion are non-religious beliefs and

practices that perform functions similar to those of organised religion such as reinforcing
shared values or maintaining social cohesion.
● E.g. Although in America civil religion involves a belief in God, Bella argues that this
doesn’t have to be the case. Some other belief systems could perform the same
functions. For example, Nazi Germany + Soviet Union had secular (non-religious)
political beliefs and rituals around which they sought to unite society. However, the
problem with the idea of functional alternatives is the same as with functional definitions
of religion which is that it ignores what makes religions distinctive and different which is
the belief of a supernatural.

Evaluation of Functionalism

● Functionalism emphasises the social nature of religion and the positive functions it
performs, but it neglects negative aspects such as religion as a source of oppression of
the poor or women.
● It ignores religion as a source of division and conflict, especially in complex modern
societies where there is more than one religion e.g. Northern Ireland which has religious
pluralism (many religions) it is hard to see how it can unite people and promote
integration.
● The idea of civil religion overcomes this problem to some extent, but arguing that
societies may still have an overarching belief system shared by all but is this a religion if
it is not based on the belief of the supernatural?

Marxist Theories of Religion

● Marxism see all societies as divided into two classes: one of which exploits the labour of
the other. In modern capitalist society, the capitalist class who own the means of
production exploit the working class.
● In such a society, there is always the potential for class conflict, and Marx predicted that the
working-class would ultimately become conscious of their exploitation and unite to overthrow
capitalism → classless society where there is no exploitation.
● Marx’s theory of religion differs from the Functionalist belief that sees religion as a unifying
force that strengthens the value consensus and is a feature of all societies → there will be no need
for religion in a classless society and will disappear.

Religion as ideology

● For Marx, Ideology → A belief system that distorts people’s perception of reality in ways that
serve the interests of the ruling class. He argues that the class that controls economic production
 and distribution of ideas in society, through institutions such as the church, the education system
and the media.
● In Marx’s view, religion operates as an ideological weapon used by the ruling class to
legitimate and justify the suffering of the poor as something inevitable and god-given.
Religion misleads the poor into believing that their suffering is virtuous and that they will
be favoured in the after-life. E.g. Bible- “easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a
needle than it is for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven” and such ideas create
false consciousness- a distorted view of reality that prevents the poor from acting to
change their situation.
● Similarly, Lenin (1870-1924) describes religion as ‘spiritual gin’- an intoxicant doled out
to the masses by the ruling class to confuse them and keep them in their place. In
Lenin’s view, the ruling class uses religion cynically to manipulate the masses and keep
them from attempting to overthrow the ruling class by creating a ‘mystical fog’ that
obscures reality.
● Religion also legitimates the power and privilege of the dominant class by making their
position appear to be divinely ordained. For example, the 16th century idea of the Divine
Right of Kings was the belief that the king is God's representative on earth and is owed
total obedience. Disobedience is not illegal but a sinful challenge to God’s authority.

Religion and alienation

● Marx (1844): also sees religion as the product of alienation. Alienation involves
becoming separated from losing control over something that one has produced or
created. Alienation exists in all class societies, but it is more extreme under capitalism.
● Under capitalism, workers are alienated because they do not own what they produce
and have no control over the production process and have no control over the
production process, and thus no freedom to express their true nature as creative beings.
● Alienation reaches a peak with detailed division of labour in the capitalist factory, where
the worker endlessly repeats the same minute track devoid of all meaning or skill.
● In these dehumanising conditions, the exploited turn to religion as a form of consolation.
As Marx puts it, religion is the “opium of the people. It is the sigh of the oppressed
creature, the heart of a heartless world, the soul of soulless conditions, the spirit of a
spiritless situation”.
● Religion acts as an opiate to dull the pain of exploitation. But just as opium masks pain
rather than treating its cause, religion masks the underlying problem of exploitation that
creates the need for it.
● Religion is a distorted view of the world, it can offer no solution to earthly misery. Instead,
promises of the afterlife create an illusory happiness that distracts attention from the true source
of the suffering → capitalism.
● Marx sees religion as the product of alienation → arises out of suffering and acts as a consolation
for it, but fails to deal with its cause- class exploitation. Religion also acts as an ideology that
legitimates both the suffering of the poor and the privileges of the ruling class.

Evaluation →
 ● Marx shows how religion may be a tool of oppression that masks exploitation and
creates false consciousness. However, he ignores positive functions of religion such as
psychological adjustment to misfortune.
● Neo-Marxists see certain forms of religion as assisting not hindering the development of
class consciousness.
● Some Marxists, such as Althusser (1971), reject the concept of alienation as unscientific
and based on a romantic idea that human beings have a ‘true self’. This would make the
concept an inadequate basis for a theory of religion.
● Religion does not necessarily function effectively as an ideology to control the
population. E.g. Abercrombie, Hill and Turner (2015) → argue that in pre-capitalist society,
while Christianity was a major element of ruling-class ideology, it had only limited impact on the
peasantry.

Feminist Theories of Religion

● Feminst see society as patriarchal- based on male domination. Many feminists regard
religion as a patriarchal institution that reflects and perpetuates this inequality.
● Religious beliefs function as a patriarchal ideology that legitimates female subordination.

Evidence of Patriarchy

● Although the formal teachings of religions often stress equality between the sexes, there
is considerable evidence of patriarchy within many of them.
● For example:
1) Religious organisations → mainly male-dominated despite the fact women often participate
more than men in these organisations. E.g. Orthodox Judaism and Catholicism forbid women to
be priests. Karen Armstrong (1993) → sees exclusion from the priesthood as evidence of
women’s marginalisation.
2) Places of worship → often segregate the sexes and marginalise women, for example seating
them behind screens while the men occupy the central and more sacred spaces,
women’s participation may be restricted for example not being allowed to preach or to
read from sacred texts and taboo with menstruation, pregnancy. In Islam, menstruating
women are not allowed to touch the Qur’an. Jean Holm (2001) → describes this as the
devaluation of women in religion.
3) Sacred texts → largely feature the doings of male gods/prophets and usually interpreted by
men. Stories often reflect anti-female stereotypes such as that of Eve, who in the Judeo- Christian
story of Genesis, caused humanity’s fall from grace and expulsion from the Garden of Eden.
4) Religious law and customs → may give women fewer rights than men, for example in access
to divorce. Religious influences on cultural norms may lead to unequal treatment, such as genital
mutilation or punishment for sexual transgressions. Reinforcing stereotyped role of women in the
family. For example, the Catholic Church bans abortion and artificial contraception Woodhead
 (2002) → argues that the exclusion of women from the Catholic priesthood is evidence of the
Church’s deep unease about the emancipation of women.

● However, feminists argue that women have not always been subordinate to men within
religion. Karen Armstrong (1993) → argues that early religions often placed women at the
centre. For example, earth mother goddesses, fertility cults and female priesthoods were found
throughout the Middle East until about 6,000 years ago. However, the rise of monotheistic
religions saw the establishment of a single, all-powerful male God, such as the Hebrew’s
Jehovah, and male prophets such as Abraham/Ibrahim and this first prophet of Judaism,
Christianity and Islam.
● While religion may be used to oppress women, Nawal El Saadawi (1980) → argues that it
is not the direct cause of their subordination. Rather this is the result of patriarchal forms of
society coming into existence in the last few thousand years.
● Once, patriarchy began to influence and re-shape religion. E.g. men reinterpreted
religious beliefs in ways that favoured patriarchy. Thus religion now contributes to
women’s oppression. Like Armstrong, El Saadawi sees the rise of monotheism as
legitimating the power of men over women.

Religious forms of feminism

● Linda Woohead (2009) → criticises feminist explanations that simply equate religion with
patriarchy and the oppression of women. While accepting that much traditional religion is
patriarchal, she emphasises that this is not true of all religions. She argues that there are religious
‘forms of feminism’- ways in which women use religion to gain greater freedom and respect.
● Woodhead uses the example of the hijab worn by Muslim women. While Western
feminists tend to see it as a symbol of oppression, to the wearer it may be a means of
liberation.
● According to Sophie Gilliat-Ray (2010), some young British Muslim women wear the
hijab to gain parental approval to enter further education and especially employment,
where it has been traditionally problamatic.
● Women also use religion to gain status and respect for their roles within the private sphere of
home and family. E.g. Elisabeth Brusco (1995; 2012) found in Colombia, belonging to a
Pentecostal group can be empowering for some women → grow power and influence.
● For example, a strongly held belief among Pentecostals is that men should respect
women. This gives women power to influence men’s behaviour and refrain from ‘macho’
behaviour.
● Piety movements → Rachel Rinaldo (2010) → sees this pattern as typical of ‘piety
movements’, that are conservatice movements that support traditional teachings about women’s
role. Includes Pentecostal and evangelical groups.
● She also argues that even within conservative religions, women may sometimes find
ways to further their own interests. However, she notes that it is middle-class urban
women who are most likely to join piety movements. These women may already have
other resources such as education and income with which to pursue their goals.
 ● Liberal Protestant organisations → such as the Quakers and Unitarians which are committed
to gender equality and women play leading roles. E.g. ⅓ of Unitarian ministers are female. The
Church of England, has had female priests since 1992 and female bishops since 2015- over ⅕ of
its priests are female.

Topic 1-Summary:

1. Sociologists define religion as substantive, functional and social constructionist.

2. Functionalism → religions performs positive functions for society and individuals,
including solidarity and integration; provision of values and meanings, and psychological
functions. Functionalists also identify functional alternatives such as civil religion.
3. Marxists → see religion as dulling the pain of class exploitation and as fostering false
consciousness. They see religion as a form of ideology and a response to alienation.
4. Feminists → see religion as instrument to patriarchy- a set of beliefs and practices
responsible for women’s subordination. Some feminists argue that religion is not always
patriarchal.
TOPIC 2 → RELIGION AND SOCIAL CHANGE

Religion as a conservative force

● It is often seen as conservative in the sense of being ‘traditional’, defending traditional

customs, institutions, moral views, roles etc. It upholds traditional beliefs about how
society should be organised.
● It is conservative because it functions to conserve or preserve things as they are. It
stabilises society and maintains the status quo.

Religion’s beliefs

● Many of them oppose changes that would allow individuals more freedom in personal
and sexual matters. For example: the Catholic Church forbids divorce, abortion and
artificial contraception. It opposes gay marriage and condemns homosexual behaviour.
● Most religions uphold ‘family values’ and often favour a traditional patriarchal domestic
division of labour. E.g. The man should be the head of the family and traditional
marriage (CofE since 1602).
● Traditional conservative values also predominate in non-Christian religions. For
example, Hinduism endorses male domestic authority and arranged marriages.

Religion’s Functions

● Religion is also a consevative force in that it functions to conserve or preserve things as

they are and maintain the status quo.
● The view of religion is held by functionalists, Marxists and feminists. Although each of
these perspectives sees the role of religion differently, all of them argue that it
contributes to social stability.

Religion and consensus →

● Functionalists see religion as a conservative force because it functions to maintain social
stability and prevent society from disintegrating. For example, it promotes social
solidarity by creating the value consensus, thus reducing the likelihood of society
collapsing through individuals pursuing their own selfish interests at the expense of
others. It also helps individuals to deal with stresses that would otherwise disrupt the life
of society.
● Marxists and Feminists see religion as an ideology that supports the existing social
structure and acts as a means of social control, creating stability in the interests of the
powerful. This helps to maintain the status quo by preventing the less powerful from
changing things.

Religion and capitalism →

 ● Marx sees religion as a conservative ideology that prevents social change. By legitimating or
disguising exploitation and inequality, it creates false consciousness in the working class and
prevents revolution → maintaining the stability of capitalist society.

Religion and Patriarchy →

● Feminists see religion as a conservative force because it acts as an ideology that
legitimates patriarchal power and maintains women’s subordination in the family and
wider society.

Weber: Religion as a force for change

● Max Weber (1905) → The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism. Weber argues that the
religious belief in Calvinism (a form of Protestantism founded by John Calvin during the
reformation) helped to bring about major social change- in particular, the emergence of modern
capitalism in Northern Europe in the 16th/17th centuries.
● Weber notes that many past societies had capitalism in the sense of greed for wealth,
which they often spent on luxury consumption.
● However, modern capitalism is unique, he argues, because it is based on the
systematic, efficient, rational pursuit of profit for its own sake, rather than consumption.
Weber calls this the spirit of Capitalism. According to Weber, this spirit had what he calls
an elective affinity or unconscious similarity to the Calvinists’ beliefs and attitudes.

Calvinist Beliefs

● Predestination → God has predetermined which souls would be saved- ‘the elect’- and which
would not, even before birth. Individuals could do nothing whatsoever to change this, whether
through their deeds, as the Catholics believed (e.g. through pilgrimages, prayer or giving to the
Church), or through faith, as the Lutheran Protestants believed. God’s decision is already and
cannot be altered.
● Divine transcendence → God was so far above and beyond this world and so incomparably
greater than the mortal that no human being could claim to know his will- The Bible. This
included the Church and its priests- leaving the Calvinsists to feel ‘an unprecedented inner
loneliness’. When combined with the doctrine of predestination, this created what Weber calls a
salvation panic in the Calvinists. They could not know whether they had been chosen to
be saved and they could not do anything to earn their salvation.
● Asceticism → This refers to abstinence, self-discipline and self-denial. For example, monks lead
an ascetic existence, refraining from luxury (e.g. clothes) and devote their life to God and prayer.
● The idea of a vocation or calling → Before Calvinism, the idea of religious vocation (a calling
to serve God) meant renouncing everyday life to join a convent or monastery. Weber calls this
other-worldly asceticism. Calvinism introduces for the first time the idea of this-worldly
asceticism. This only thing Calvinist knew of God’s plan for humanity came from the
 Bible, which revealed to them that we were put on earth to glorify God’s name by our
work. Thus for Calvinists the idea of a calling or vocation means constant, methodical
work in an occupation, not in a monastery. However, work could not earn salvation- it
was simply a religious duty.
● The Calvinists led an ascetic lifestyle. Idleness is a sin and the Calvinists’ hard work and
asceticism had two consequences.
1. Their wealth and success performed a psychological function for the Calvinists that
allowed them to cope with their salvation panic. As they grew wealthier, they took this
as a sign of God’s favour and their salvation- for else they would have prospered.
2. Driven by their work ethic, they systematically and methodically accumulated wealth by
the most efficient and rational means possible. But not permitting themselves to
squander it on luxuries, they reinvested it in their businesses, which grew and
prospered, producing further profit to reinvest and so on.
In Weber’s view this is the spirit of modern capitalism - where the object is simply the
acquisition of more money as an end in itself. Calvinism thus brought capitalism as we
now know it into the world which is one of its causes.

Hinduism and Confucianism

● Weber notes that there have been other societies that have had a higher level of
economic development than Northern Europe had in the 16th and 17th centuries, but
that still failed to develop modern capitalism.
● He argues that ancient China and India were materially more advanced than Europe, but
capitalism did not take off there. He argues that the failure of capitalism to take off was
that there was a lack of a religious belief system like that of Calvinism that would have
spurred its development.
● In ancient India, Hinduism was an ascetic religion, like Calvinism, favouring renunciation
of the material world. However, its orientation was other-worldly - it directed its followers’
concerns away from the material world and towards the spiritual world.
● In ancient China, Confucianism also discouraged the growth of rational capitalism. Like
Calvinism it was this-worldly that directed its followers towards the material world, but it
was not ascetic like Calvinism.
● Both Hinduism and Confucianism lacked the drive to systematically accumulate wealth
that is necessary in modern capitalism. Calvinism was unique in combining asceticism
with a this-worldly orientation to enable the spirit of modern capitalism to emerge.

Evaluation →

● Weber’s work is often described as a ‘debate with Marx’s ghost’. Marx saw economic or
material factors as the driving force of change, whereas Weber argues that material
factors alone are not enough to bring about capitalism like cultural factors.
● Marxist, Karl Kautsky (1927) argues that Weber overestimates the role of ideas and
underestimates economic factors in bringing capitalism into being. He argues that in fact
capitalism preceded rather than followed Calvinism.
 ● R.H. Tawney (1926) argues that technological change, not religious ideas, caused the
birth of capitalism. It was only after capitalism was established that the bourgeoisie
adopted Calvinist beliefs to legitimate their pursuit of economic gain.
● Weber has also been criticised because capitalism didn’t develop in every country where
there were Calvinists.
● E.g. Large Calvinist population but was slow to develop capitalism. But Weberians such
as Gordon Marshall (1982) argue that this was because of a lack of investment capital
and skilled labour- supporting Weber’s point that both material and cultural factors need
to be present for capitalism to emerge.
● Others argue that although Calvinists were among the first capitalists, this was not
because of their beliefs but simply because they have been excluded by law from
political office and many of the professions, like the Jews in Eastern Europe who turned
to business. However, Weberians reply that other religious minorities were also excluded
in this way but did not become successful capitalists.

Religion and social protest

● Steve Bruce (2003): Interested in the relationship between religion and social change.
He compares two examples of the role of religiously inspired movements in America that
have tried to change society: Civil Rights Movement and the New Christian Right.

The American Civil Rights Movement

● Bruce describes the struggle of black civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s to
end racial segregation as an example of religiously motivated social change.
● Although slavery had been abolished in 1865, blacks were denied legal and political
rights in many Southern states where segregaration was enforced, preventing them form
using the same entities (such as buses, shops and toilets) as whites. Schools were
segregated and inter-racial marriages forbidden. Blacks were often excluded from voting
by various legal restrictions and intimidation.
● The civil rights movement began in 1955 when Rosa Parks, a black civil rights activist in
Montgomery, Alabama. Campaigning involved direct action by black people themselves,
including protest marches, boycotts and demonstrations. Almost a decade later, in 1964,
segregation was outlawed.
● Bruce described the black clergy as the backbone of the movement. Led by Dr Martin
Luther King, they played a decisive role, giving support and moral legitimacy to civil
rights activists. Their churches provided meeting places and sanctuary from the threat of
white violence, and rituals such as prayer meetings and hymn singing were a source of
unity in the face of oppression. Bruce argues that the black clergy were able to shame
whites into changing the law by appealing to their shared Christian values of equality.
Although the impact on the white clergy in the South was limited, their message reached
a wide audience outside the Southern states and gained national support.
● Bruce sees religion in this context as an ideological resource- it provided beliefs and
practices that protesters could draw on for motivation and support. Using the civil rights
 movement as an example, he identifies several ways in which religious organisations are
well equipped to support protests and contribute to social change:
1. Taking the moral high ground → Black clergy pointed out hypocrisy of white clergy
who preached ‘love thy neighbour' but supported racial segregation.
2. Channeling dissent → Religion provides channels to express political dissent. For
example, the funeral of Martin Luther King was a rallying point for the civil rights cause.
3. Acting as honest brokers → Churches can provide a context for negotiating change
because they are often respected by both sides in conflict and seen as standing above
‘mere politics’.
4. Mobilising public opinion → Black churches in the South successfully campaigned for
support across the whole of America.
● Bruce sees the civil rights movement as an example of religion becoming involved in
secular struggle and helping to bring about this change. In his view, the movement
achieved its aims because it shared the same values as wider society and those in
power.
● It brought about change by shaming those in power to put into practice the principle of
equality embodied in the American Constitution that all women are born equal.

The New Christian Right

● This is a politically and morally conservative, Protestant fundamentalist movement. It has

gained prominence since the 1960s because of its opposition to the liberalising of
American society.
● The aims of the New Christian Right seek to take America ‘back to God’ and make
abortion, homosexuality, gay marriage etc., turning the clock back to a time before the
liberalisation of American culture and society.
● The New Christian Right believes strongly in the traditional family and traditional gender
roles. It campaigns for the teaching of ‘creationism’ (the view that the Bible’s account of
creation is literally true) and to ban sex education in schools.
● The New Christian Right has made effective use of the media and networking, notably
televangelism, where church-owned television stations raise funds and broadcast
programmes aimed at making converts and recruiting new members.
● Right-wing Christian pressure groups have also become the focus for political
campaigning and for strengthening links with the Republican Party.

● However, the New Christian Right has been largely unsuccessful in achieving its aims.
Bruce suggests these reasons:
1. Its campaigners find it very difficult to cooperate with people from other religious
groups, even when campaigning on the same issue, such as abortion.
2. It lacks widespread support and has met with strong opposition from groups who
stand for freedom of choice.
● Bruce describes the New Christian Right as a failed movement for change. Despite
enormous publicity and a high profile in the media, it has not achieved its aims of taking
 America ‘back to God’. In his view, its attempt to impose the Protestant fundamentalist
morality on others has failed because of the basically liberal and democratic values of
most of American society.
● These values include: a belief in the separation of church and state- very few Americans
support the idea of theocracy (rule by religious leaders)
● Numerous surveys shows that most Americans are comfortable with legalising activites that they
personally believe are immoral such as abortion, homosexuality and pornography → unwilling to
accept other people’s definition of how they should live their lives.
● This poses an enormous problem for the New Christian Right as it believes that
everyone follows the literal truth of the Bible and everyone should conform, which is
impossible to demand in a mature democracy.
● Comparisons with the civil rights movement → They suggest that to achieve success, the beliefs
and demands of religiously motivated protest movements and pressure groups need to be
consistent with those of wider society. Thus in the American case, they need to connect with
mainstream beliefs about democracy, equality and religious freedom which the civil rights
movement did, but New Christian Right failed to do.

Marxism, religion and change

● Marxists are often thought of as seeing religion as an entirely conservative ideology- a

set of ruling- class ideas that are shaped by and legitimate the class inequalities in
society’s economic base.
● BUT → Marxists recognise that ideas, including religious ideas, can have relative autonomy.
That is, that can be partly independent of the economic base of society. As a result,
religion can have a dual character and sometimes be a force for change as well as
stability.
● Marx sees religion as capable of humanising a world made inhuman by exploitation,
even if the comfort it offers is illusory.
● The idea that religion has a dual character is taken up by Friedrich Engels (1985) he
argued that although religion inhibits change by disguising inequality, it can also
challenge the status quo and encourage social change.

Ernst Bloch: the principle of hope

● He sees religion as having a dual character. He argues for a view of religion that
recognises both its positive and negative influence on social change.
● As a Marxist, he accepts that religion often inhibits change, but he emphasises that it
can also inspire protest and rebellion.
● For Bloch, religion is an expression of ‘the principle of hope’- our dreams of a better life
that contain images of utopia.
● They may also help people see what needs to be changed in this world. Religious beliefs
may therefore create a vision of a better world, which, if combined with effective political
organisation and leadership, can bring about social change.
Liberation Theology

● A movement emerged within the Catholic Church in Latin America at the end of the
1960s, with a strong commitment to the poor and opposition to military dictatorships.
● Liberation theology was a major change of direction for the Catholic Church in Latin
America. It has been a conservative institution, encouraging a fatalistic acceptance of
poverty and supporting wealthy elites and military dictatorships.
● The factors that led to liberation theology were:
1. Deepening rural poverty and the growth of urban slums throughout Latin
America.
2. Human rights abuses following military take-overs, such as torture and death
sqauds murdering political openents in Argetina, Brazil and Chile
3. The growing commitment among Catholic priests to an ideology that supported
the poor and opposed violations of human rights.
● Unlike traditional Catholicism, which supported the status quo, liberation theology set out
to change society. For example, priests helped the poor to establish support groups
called ‘base communities’ and helped workers and peasants to fight oppression under
the protection of the Church.
● Priests took the lead in developing literacy programmes, educating poor and raising
awareness and mobilising support.
● During the 1970s, priests were often the only authority figures who took the side of the
oppressed when dictatorships used murder squads and torture to hold onto power.
● During the 1980s, the Church’s official attitude changed. Pope John Paul II condemned
liberation theology on the grounds that it resembled Marxism, and instructed priests to
concentrate on pastoral activities, not political struggle.
● Since then, the movement has lost influence. However, as Casanova (1994)
emphasises, it played an important part in resisting state terror and bringing about
democracy.
● Although Catholicism in Latin America has become more conservative, it continues to
defend the democracy and human nights that were achieved in part by liberation
theology.
● The success of liberation theology has led some neo-Marxists to question the view that religion is
always a conservative force. For example, Otto Maduro (1982) → believes that religion can be a
revolutionary force that brings about change.
● In the case of liberation theology, religious ideas radicalised the Catholic clergy in the
defence of peasants and workers, making them see that serving the poor was part of
their Christian duty. Similarly, Lowy (2005) questions Marx’s view that religion always
legitimates social inequality.
● Both Maduro and Lowy see liberation theology as an example of religiously inspired
social change but other Marxists disagree. Much depends on how social change is
defined.
 ● Liberation theology may have helped to bring about democracy but it did not threaten the
stability of capitalism.
The Pentecostal Challenge

● Liberation theology has faced competition from Pentecostal churches, which have made
big inroads in Latin America among the poor. David Lehmann (1996) contrasts the two:
1. Liberation Theology → offers an ‘option for the poor’ of community consciousness-
raising and campaigning for social change, led by ‘revolutionary priests and nuns
in their jeans and sandals’.
2. Pentecostalism → offers an ‘option for the poor’ for individuals to pull themselves out
of poverty through their own efforts, supported by the congregation and led by church
pastors, ‘uniformly respectable in their suits, white shirt and black ties’.
3. Thus, liberation theology offers a radical solution to poverty: collective
improvement through political action in the public sphere, while Pentecostalism’s
solution is conservative: individual self-improvement through the private sphere
of family and church.

Millenarian movements

● Religion raises the hope of a better world in the afterlife, it may also create a desire to change
things here and now; e.g. bring about the kingdom of God on Earth → millenarian movements
are an important example of this desire.
● Millenarian movements → in Christian theology this refers to the idea that Christ would come
into the world for a second time and rule for a thousand years before the day of judgement- end of
the world.
● According to Peter Worsley (1968) → such movements expect the total and imminent
transformation of this world by supernatural means → creating a heaven on Earth which is a life
from pain, death, sin etc. The transformation will be collective- the group will be saved, not
just individuals.
● The appeal of millenarian movements is largely to the poor because they promise
immediate improvement, and they often arise in colonial situations.
● European colonialism led to economic exploitation and cultural and religious domination,
for example through the Christian missionaries and their schools.
● At the same time, it shattered the traditional tribal social structures and cultures of the
colonised people. Local leaders and local gods lose power and credibility when their
people are forced to work for colonists who live in luxury.
● Worsley studied the millenarian movements in Melanesia (Western Pacific) known as
Cargo Cults → The islanders felt wrongfully deprived when ‘cargo’ (material goods) arrived in
the islands for the colonists. A series of cargo cults sprang up during the 19th and 20th centuries
asserting that the cargo had been meant for the natives but had been diverted by the whites for
themselves, and that this unjust social order was about to be overturned. These movements often
led to widespread unrest that threatened colonial rule.
 ● Worsley notes that the movements combined elements of traditional beliefs with
elements of Christiantity- such as ideas about a heaven where the suffering of the
righteous will be rewarded- the Day of Judgement and punishment of the wicked.
● He describes the movements as pre-political- they used religious ideas and images, but
they united native populations in mass movements that spanned tribal divisions. Many of
the secular nationalist leaders and parties that were to overthrow colonial rule in the
1950s and 1960s developed out of millenarian movements.
● From a Marxist perspective, Engels argues that they represent the first awakening of
‘proletarian self-consciousness’.

Gramsci: Religion and Hegemony

● Antonio Gramsci (1971) → is interested in how the ruling class maintain their control over
society through the use of ideas. He uses the term hegemony (The authority, dominance, and
influence of one group, nation, or society over another group, nation, or society; typically
through cultural, economic, or political means) to refer to the way the ruling class
useiseads such as religion to maintain control.
● By hegemony, Gramsci means ideological domination or leadership of society. When
hegemony is established, the ruling class can rely on popular consent to their rule, so
there is less need for coercion.
● E.g. Italy (1920s and 1930s), Gramsci notes the immense conservative ideological
power of the Catholic Church in helping to win support for Mussolini’s fascit regime.
● However, hegemony is never guaranteed → always possible for working-class to develop an
alternative version of how society should be organised → counter- hegemony. Like Engels,
Gramsci sees religion as having a dual character and he notes in circumstances it can
challenge as well as the ruling class.
● He argues that popular forms of religion can help workers see through the ruling-class
hegemony by offering a vision of a better fairer world.
● Similarly, some clergy may act as organic intellectuals - that is, as educators, organisers
and leaders. They can help workers see the situation they are in and support working-
class organisations such as trade unions.

Religion and class conflict

● Dwight Billings (1990) → applies to Gramsci’s ideas in a case study comparing class struggle in
two communities- one of coal miners, the other of textile workers in Kentucky (1920s and
1930s). Both were working-class and evangelical Protestant, but the miners were much more
militant, struggling for recognition of their union and better conditions, while the textile workers
accepted the status quo.
● Following Gramsci, Billings argues that the differences in levels of militancy can be
understood in terms of hegemony and the role of religion. He identified three ways in
which religion either supported or challenged the employer’s hegemony:
1. Leadership → miners benefited from the leadership of organic intellectuals (an
intellectual member of a social class, as opposed to a member of the
 traditional intelligentsia that regards itself as a class apart from the rest of
society) many of them lay preachers who were miners and trade union
activists. These clergy helped to convert miners to the union cause.
Textile workers lacked leadership.
2. Organisation → the miners were able to use independent churches to hold
meetings and organise, whereas the textile workers lacked such spaces.
3. Support → the churches kept miners’ morale high with supportive sermons,
prayer meetings and group singing. By contrast, textile workers who engages in
union activity met with opposition from local church leaders.
● Billings concludes that religion can play ‘a prominent opposition role’ - his study
shows that that same religion can be called upon either to defend the status quo
or justify the struggle to change it.

TOPIC SUMMARY →

● Sociologists argue that religion does not always maintain the status quo. Weber
argues the protestant ethic contributed to the birth of capitalism. Marxists such as
Maduro, who gives liberation theology that uses religion to bring about change.
Religious organisations have actively supported campaigns for change e.g. US
civil rights movements and the others which have failed to gain popular support,
the New Chrisitan Right. Millenarian movements had been forerunners of anti-
colonial political parties.

TOPIC 3 → Secularisation

Secularisation in Britain

● Stat: 1851- Census of Religious worship, Crockett (1998) → estimates that in a year 40%
or more of the adult population of Britain attended church on Sundays.This is a much higher
figure today, but there have been changes in the UK since then, for example:
1) A decline in the proportion of the population going to church or belonging to one.
2) An increase in the average of churchgoers
3) Few baptisms and church weddings
 4) A decline in the numbers holding traditional Christian beliefs
5) Greater diversity, including more non-Christian beliefs

● Sociologists have put forward different explanations of these trends, different

explanations and different conclusions about whether religion is declining.
● Bryan Wilson (1966): Argued that Western societies had been undergoing a long-term
process of secularisation. He defined secularisation as ‘the process whereby religious
beliefs, practices and institutions lose social significance’.
● Stat: Church Attendance in England and Wales has fallen from 40% of the population in the mid-
19th century to 10-15% by the 1960s → Church weddings, baptisms and Sunday school
attendance has also declined leading Wilson to conclude that Britain had become a secular
society.

Church attendance today

● Wilson → Stat: By 2015 about 5% of the adult population attended church on Sundays.
Churchgoing in britain has therefore more than halved since WIlson’s research in the
1960s.
● Stat: 1960 & 2013 → Sunday attendance in the Church of England from 1.6 million, to under 0.8
million. In addition, Sunday school attendance has declined further by a small proportion.
● Stat: English Church Census (2006): shows that attendances at large organisations such as the
Church of England and the Catholic Church have declined more than small organisations whilst
some of which are remaining stable or have grown → overall = trend shows decline
● Stat: 1971 → 60% of weddings were in church but by 2012 it declined to 30% and the number of
Catholic churches holding wedding fell by 3/4s between 1965-2011.
● Bogus Baptisms→ Have increased whilst infants baptisms have declined and research has
shown that this may be due to faith schools rather than christian commitment.

Religious Affiliation today

● A person’s religious affiliation refers to their membership or identification with a religion.

Evidence indicates a continuing decline in the number of those affiliated with a religion.
British Social Attitudes Survey (1983-2014): the percentage of adults with no religion
rose from around a ⅓ to ½.
In the same period, those identifying as Christian fell by a 1/3rd - in particular the
Anglicans whose numbers more than halved.
● The number of Catholics have increased slightly due to East European immigration and
higher birth rates.
● Other Christians include denominations and this category has remained static since
1983 at 17% of the population are identified to a specific group.

Religious institutions today

 ● Influence of religion as a social institution has declined. However, Church of England
Bishops sit in the House of Lords so they do have some influence on lawmaking but this
has declined significantly in the 19th C as the state has taken over many functions that
Church possessed.
● In the mid 19th Century the churches provided education, although faith schools still
exist.
● There is a legal requirement for schools to provide a daily act of collective worship → BBC
Survey (2005): Over half the secondary schools in Wales failed to comply with this.
● The Clergy → A measure of institutional weakness of the churches is the number of clergy.
During the 20th C, this fell from 45,000 to 34,000. The number of Catholic priests fell by 1/3rd
between 1965-2011.
● Woodhead → A lack of clery in local communities means that the day-to-day influence of the
churches is reduced.
● Bruce → decline in church's influence in society. He predicts that if current trends continue, the
Methodist Church will fold around 2030 and CofE will be a small voluntary organisation with
a large amount of heritage property.

Explanations of Secularisation

Max Weber: Rationalisation → Rationalisation: A process by which rational ways of thinking and
actions come to replace religious ones. Many sociologists argue Western society has
undergone a process of rationalisation.

● Weber (1905): He argued that the Protestant Reformation begun by Martin Luther in the
16th C started a process of rationalisation of life in the West. This process undermined
the religious worldview of the Middle Ages and replaced it with the rational scientific
outlook found in modern society.
● The Medieval Catholic worldview in Europe: ‘Enchanted (or magical) garden’, God and
other spiritual beings and forces such as angels, devils were believed to be present.
Humans could try to influence these beings and forces by magical means such as
prayers, spells and wearing charms.
● Disenchantment: Instead of interventionist God of medieval Catholicism, Protestantism
saw God as transcendent- as existing above and beyond, or outside, this world. Although
God had created the world, he did not intervene in it, but instead left it to run according to its own
laws of nature. This means that events were no longer explained as the work of unpredictable
supernatural beings, but as the predictable workings of natural forces → rationality- the power of
reason- allowed them to understand.
● Through reason and science, humans could discover the laws of nature, understand and
predict how the world works and control it through technology. There was no longer a
need for religious explanations of the world, since the world was no longer an enchanted
garden.
● Weber’s View of Protestant Reformation → ‘disenchantment’ of the world means that
magical and religious ways of thinking start off the rationalisation process that leads to the
dominance of the rational mode of thought. This enables science to thrive and provide the basis
for technological advances that give humans more and more power to control nature →
undermines the religious worldview.
A technological worldview

● Bruce (2011): argues that the growth of a technological worldview has replaced religious
or supernatural explanations of why things happen, by using explanations like science
and technology.
● A technological worldview leaves little room for religious explanations in everyday life
which only survive in areas where technology is least effective- for example we may pray
for a cure of a disease where scientific medicine has no cure.
● Bruce concludes that although scientific explanations do not challenge religions directly,
they have greatly reduced the scope for religious explanations. Scientific knowledge
does not in itself make people into atheists, but the worldview it encourages results in
people taking religion less seriously.

Structural differentiation

● Talcott Parsons (1951): Structural Differentiation → A process of specialisation that

occurs with the development of industrial society. Separate, specialised institutions develop to
carry out functions that were previously performed by a single institution => Parson sees this as
this happening to religion- it dominated pre-industrial society, but with industrialisation it has
become a smaller and more specialised institution.
● Disengagement: According to Parsons, structural differentiation leads to
disengagement of religion. Its functions are transferred to other institutions such as the
state and it becomes disconnected from wider society. Eg) The Church loses the
influence it had on education, social welfare and law.
● Privatisation: Bruce → agrees that religion has become separated from wider society and lost
many of its former functions → privatised (confined to the private sphere of the home and
family).
● Religious beliefs are now largely a matter of personal choice and religious institutions have lost
much of their influence on wider society → traditional rituals and symbols have lost meaning.
● Where religion still has control, such as education, it most conforms to the requirements
of the secular state. Modern states increasingly accept that religion is a personal choice
and therefore that the state should not be identified with one particular faith.

Social and Cultural diversity

● Decline of community → The move from pre-industrial to industrial society brings about the
decline of community and this contributed to the decline of religion.
● Wilson argues that in pre-industrial communities, shared values were expressed
through collective religious rituals that integrated individuals and regulated their
behaviour. However, when religion lost its basis in stable local communities, it lost its
vitality and its hold over individuals.
● Industrialisation → Bruce sees industrialisation as undermining the consensus of
religious beliefs that hold small rural communities together. Small close-knit rural
communities give way to large loose-knit urban communities with diverse beliefs and
values.
 ● Social and geographical mobility not only breaks up communities but brings people
together from many different backgrounds, creating even more diversity.
● Diversity of occupations, cultures and lifestyles undermines religion → Where
people continue to hold religious beliefs, they cannot avoid knowing that many of those around
them hold very different views.
● Bruce argues that the plausibility (believability) of beliefs is undermined by alternatives.
It is also undermined by individualism because the plausibility of religion depends on the
existence of a practising community of believers. In the absence of practising religious
communities that function on a day-to-day basis, both religious belief and practice tend
to decline.
● Criticisms → The view that decline of community causes the decline of religion has been
criticised. Alderidge points out that a community does not have to be in a particular area:
● 1) Religion can be a source of identity on a worldwide scale (e.g. Jewish communities)
● 2) Some religious communities are imagined communities that interact through the use
of global media
● 3) Pentecostal and other religious group often flourish in ‘impersonal’ urban areas

Religious diversity

● Berger (1969): A cause of secularisation is the trend towards religious diversity where
instead of there being only one religious organisation and only one interpretation of faith.
● The sacred canopy → In the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church held an absolute
monopoly (it had no competition). As a result, everyone lived under a single sacred
canopy or set of beliefs shared by all. This gave these beliefs greater plausibility
because they had no challengers and the Church’s version of the truth was
unquestioned.
● This changed with the Protestant Reformation, when Protestant churches and sects broke
away from the Catholic Church in the 16th C. Since the Reformation, the number and variety of
religious organisations has continued to grow, each with a different version → no church can now
claim an unchallenged monopoly of the truth.
● Society is thus no longer unified under the single scared canopy provided by one church.
Religious diversity creates plurality of life worlds, where people’s perceptions of the
world vary and where there are different interpretations of the truth.
● Plausibility structure → Berger argues that this creates a crisis of credibility in religion.
Diversity undermines religion’s ‘plausibility structure’- the reasons why people find it
believable.
● When there are alternative versions of religion to choose between, people are likely to
question all of them and this erodes the absolute certainties of traditional religion.
● Religious beliefs become relative rather than absolute- what is true or false become
relative rather than absolute- what is true or false becomes simply a personal point of
view, and this creates the possibility of opting out of religion altogether.
● Bruce: Sees religious diversity as the most important cause of secularisation as he
claims “it is difficult to live in a world that treats as equally valid a large number of
incompatible beliefs, without coming to suppose that there is no one truth”

Cultural Defence and transition

 ● Bruce: Identifies two counter-trends that seem to go against secularisation theory, both
are associated with high average levels of religious participation.
● Cultural defence → where religion proves a focal point for the defence of national, ethnic,
local or group identity in a struggle against an external force such as hostile foreign power. Eg)
Popularity of Catholicism in Poland before the fall of communism and the resurgence of Islam
before the revolution in Iran in 1979
● Cultural Transition → where religion provides support and a sense of community for ethnic
groups such as migrants to a different country and culture.
● Herberg: describes this in his study of religions and immigration to the USA. Religion
has performed similar functions for Irish, A/C, Muslim, Hindu etc migrants to the UK.
● Bruce: argues that religion survives in such situations only because it is a focus for group
identity. Thus these examples do not disprove secularisation, but show that religion is most likely
to survive where it performs functions other than relating individuals to the supernatural →
evidence: Churchgoing declined in Poland after the fall of communism and there is evidence that
religion loses importance for migrants once they are integrated into society.
● Criticism: Berger (1999) has changed his views and now argues that diversity and
choice actually stimulate interest and participation in religion. Eg) The growth of
evangelicalism in Latin America and New Christian Right in the USA point to continuing
vitality of religion- not decline.
● Beckford (2003): agrees with the idea that religious diversity will lead some to question
or even abandon their religious beliefs, but this is not inevitable. Opposing views can
have the effect of strengthening a religious group’s commitment to its existing beliefs
rather than undermining them.

Secularisation in America

● Stat- Wilson (1962) → found that 45% of Americans attended church on Sundays. However, he
argues that churchgoing in America was more an expression of the ‘American way of life’. He
claimed that America was a secular society, not because people had abandoned churches,
but because religion there had become superficial.
● Bruce (2002; 2011) → shares Wilson’s view, he uses 3 sources of evidence to support his claim
that America is becoming increasingly secular: declining church attendance; ‘secularisation
from within’ and a trend towards religious diversity and relativism.

Declining church attendance

● Stat- Opinion poll research asking people about church attendance suggests 40% of the
population since 1940.
● Kirk Hadaway (1993) → working with a team of researchers employed by major churches,
found that this figure did not match the churches’ own attendance statistics. 40% of Americans
were going to church, the churches would be full but they were not.
● To investigate this statistic- to see if this was exaggerated, Hadaway et al (1993) →
studied church attendance in Ohio. They carried out head counts at services and then in
interviews asked how many people attended church. They found that the level of attendance
claimed by the interviewees was 83% higher than that researches’ estimates of church
attendance in the county.
 ● The attendance gap has widened. As a study in in a Catholic Mass in San Francisco
found that in 1972, opinion polls exaggerated attendance by 47% but by 1996 the
exaggeration doubled to 101%.
● Bruce concludes that a stable rate of self-reported attendance of about 40% has masked
a decline in actual attendance in the US.
● The widening gap may be due to the fact that it is still seen as socially desirable or
normative to go to church, so people who have stopped going will still say they attend if
asked in a survey.

Secularisation from within

● Bruce argues that the way American religion has adjusted to the modern world amounts
to secularisation from within.
● This emphasis on traditional Christian beliefs glorifying God has declined and religion in
America has become ‘psychologised’ or turned into a form of therapy. This change has
enabled it to fit with a secular society → American religion has remained popular by becoming
less religious.
● The purpose of religion has changed from seeking salvation in heaven to seeking
personal improvement in this world. This decline in commitment to traditional beliefs can
be seen in people’s attitudes and lifestyles. Churchgoers are now much less strict than
previously in their adherence to traditional religious morality.

Religious diversity

● The growth of religious diversity has also contributed to secularisation from within, as
churchgoers are becoming less dogmatic (follow rules no matter what) in their views.
● Bruce identifies a trend towards practical relativism among American Christians,
involving acceptance of the view that others are entitled to hold beliefs that are different
to one’s own.
● This is shown in Lynd and Lynd’s (1929) → Stat- study which found in 1924 that 94% of
churchgoing young people agreed with the statement that ‘Christianity is the one true
religion and all people should be converted to it’, however in 1977 only 41% agreed.
● The counterpart of practical relativism is the erosion of absolutism- that is, we now live in
a society where many people hold views that are completely different to ours, which
undermines our assumption that our own views are absolutely true.

Criticisms of secularisation theory →

● Secularisation theorists provide evidence to support their claims that religious beliefs,
practices and institutions have declined both in Britain and America.
1. Religion is not declining but changing its form
2. Secularisation theory is one-sided. It focuses on decline and ignores religious revivals
and the growth of new religions
3. Evidence of falling church attendance ignores people who believe but don’t go to church.
4. Religion may have declined in Europe but not globally, so secularisation is not universal.
 5. The past was not a ‘golden age’ of faith from which we have declined, and the future will
not be an age of atheism
6. Far from causing decline, religious diversity increases participation because it offers
choice. Religious trends point in different directions and people make use of religion in
all sorts of different ways.

TOPIC SUMMARY →

● Secularisation refers to the decline in the social significance of religion. Statistics shows
church attendance in the UK falling. THe number of baptisms and church weddings has
declined. And opinion polls show that religious belief is declining.
● Reasons include: rationalisation, social and structural differentiation, social and religious
diversity.
● Counter trends are: cultural transition and defence; for example where religion may be a
focal point for preserving an ethnic minority’s culture.
● In America → church attendance is also declining in America and experiencing
secularisation from within - becoming less strict and having to accept religious diversity.

TOPIC 4 → RELIGION, RENEWAL AND CHOICE

Critics have challenged the secularisation theory’s claim that religions’ is declining:

1) They question whether religion is in fact declining rather than simply changing
2) They reject the view that increased diversity and choice undermines religion’s plausibility
and claim that it encourages greater involvement in religion.
3) They argue that religion is not declining on a global scale, but only in Europe.
4) Two main alternative to secularisation theory: Theories of late modernity and
postmodernity and Religious market theory

New forms of religion

● Some reject the secularisation thesis that religion is undergoing an inevitable decline in
modern Western society. They argue that, while some aspects of traditional religion are
in decline, new forms are emerging, often as a result of changes in wider society such as
greater individualism, choice and consumerism.

From obligation to consumption

● Grace Davie (2013) → argues that in today’s late modern society we are seeing a major change
in religion, away from obligation and towards consumption or choice.
● In the past, churches such as the Church of England and the Catholic Church could
‘oblige people to go to church’. This is no longer the case; religion is no longer inherited
or imposed, but a matter of personal choice.
 ● Eg) In England and France, infant baptism was once seen as an obligatory rite of
passage but now only as a minority of babies are baptised. By contrast, there has been
an increase in the number of adults making an individual choice to be baptised.

Believing without belonging

● Davie argues that religion is not declining but simply taking a different, more privatised
form. People are increasingly reluctant to belong to organisations, whether these are
churches, political parties or trade unions. But despite this, people still hold religious
beliefs- a situation that Davie calls believing without belonging.

Vicarious religion: the Spiritual Health Service

● Davie also notes a trend towards ‘vicarious religion’ → she means religion practiced by an active
minority (the professional clergy + regular churchgoers) on behalf of the great majority.
● This pattern is typical of Britain and Northern Europe where, despite low levels of
attendance, many people still identify with the churches
● Davie arguess that in Europe, the major national churches are seen as public utilities, or
a sort of ‘Spiritual Health Service’. This includes using the churches for rites of passage
such as baptisms, weddings and funerals as well as for major national occasions like
public mourning of Princess Diana in 1997.
● Davie compares vicarious religion to the tip of an iceberg and sees it as evidence of
believing without belonging. Beneath the surface of what appears to be only a small
commitment lies a much wider commitment.
● Most people may not normally go to church or pray, but they remain attached to the
church as an institution that provides rituals and support when needed and they continue
to share at some level its beliefs.
● Davie questions that the secularisation theory assumes that modernisation affects every
society in the same way, causing the decline of religion.
● She argues there are multiple modernities, e.g. Britain and America are both modern
societies, but with very different patterns of religion, especially in relation to church
attendance- high in America and low in Britain, but accompanied by believing without
belonging.

Neither believing nor belonging

● Voas and Crockett (2005) → do not accept Davie’s claim that there is more believing than
belonging. Evidence from 5,750 respondents shows that both church attendance beliefs in God
are declining together, according to Davie there would be higher levels of belief.
● Bruce (2011) → adds that if people are not willing to invest time in going to church, this just
reflects the declining strength of their beliefs. When people no longer believe, they no longer
wish to belong, and so their involvement in religion diminishes.
● Census → show that 72% of people identified themselves as Christian, which supports the
‘believing without belonging’ view.
 ● However, Abby Day (2007) → found that very few of the ‘Christians’ she interviewed
mentioned God or Christianity. Their reason for describing themselves as Christian was not
religious, but simply a way of saying they belonged to a ‘White English’ ethnic group. By
describing themselves as ‘Christian’ was actually a non- religious marker of their ethnic or
national identity.

Spiritual shopping

● Daniele Hervieu-Leger (2000; 2006) → continues the theme of personal choice and the decline
of obligation. She agrees that there has been a dramatic decline in institutional religion in Europe,
with fewer and fewer people attending church in most countries.
● This is due to cultural amnesia or a less of collective memory. For centuries, children
used to be taught religion in the extended family and parish church. However, we have
largely lost the religion that used to be handed down from generation to generation,
because few parents teach their children about religion. Parents today let children
decide for themselves what to believe.
● The trend towards greater social equality has undermined the traditional power of the
Church to impose religion on people from above. As a result, young people no longer
have a fixed religious identity imposed on them through socialisation and they are
ignorant of traditional religion.
● While traditional institutional religion has declined, religion itself has not disappeared.
Instead, individual consumerism has replaced collective tradition. People now feel they
have a choice as consumers of religion - they have become spiritual shoppers.
● Religion is now individualised- we now develop our own beliefs that give meaning to our lives
and fit in with our interests and aspirations. Religion has become a personal spiritual journey in
which we choose the elements we want to explore and the groups we wish to join → therefore,
Hervieu- Leger argues two new religious types are emerging:
● 1) Pilgrims → in the holistic milieu in the Kendal Projects. They follow an individual path in a
search for self-discovery, e.g. New Age spirituality by joining groups, or through individual
‘therapy’. The demand is created by today’s emphasis on personal development.
● 2) Converts → join religious groups that offer a strong sense of belonging, usually based on a
shared ethnic background or religious doctrine. Such groups re-create a sense of community in a
society that has lost many of its religious traditions. As in the Kendal Project, these evangelical
movements and also the churches of ethnic minorities.
● As a result of these trends, religion no longer acts as the source of collective identity.
However, Hervieu-Leger notes that religion does continue to have some influence on
society’s values. E.g. the values of equality and human rights have their roots in religion
and such values can be a source of shared cultural identity and social solidarity, even for
those who are not actively involved in religion.
● Hervieu-Leger’s views can be related to the idea of late modernity, this is the notion that trends
within modern society have begun to accelerate such as the decline of tradition and increasing
individualism such as the church → growing importance of individual choice in matters of
religion.

Postmodern religion
 ● David Lyon (2000) → agrees with Davie that believing without belonging is increasingly
popular. He argues that traditional religion is giving way to a variety of new religious forms that
demonstrate its continuing vigour.
● As a postmodernist, he explains this in terms of a shift in recent decades from modern to
postmodern society. In Lyon’s view, postmodern society has a number of features that
are changing the nature of religion. These include globalisation, the increased
importance of the media and communications, and the growth of consumerism.

Globalisation, the media and religion

● Globalisation refers to the growing interconnectedness of societies, which has led to

greatly increased movements of ideas and beliefs across national boundaries.
● This is due to the central role played in postmodern society by the media and information
technology, which saturate us with images and messages from around the globe,
compressing time and space to give us instantaneous access to the ideas and beliefs of
previously remote places and religions.
● Religious ideas have become ‘disembedded’- the media lift them out of physical
churches and move them to a different place and time. E.g. The ‘electronic church’ and
televangelism disembed religion from real, local churches and relocate it on the internet,
allowing believers to express their faith without physically attending church- an example
of how the boundaries between different areas of social life become blurred in
postmodern society.
● As a result, religion becomes de-institutionalised - detached from its place in religious
institutions, floating in cyberspace. Removed from their original location in the church,
religious ideas become a cultural resource that individuals can adapt for their own
purposes.

Online religion and religion online

● The internet thus creates a range of opportunities for religious organisations and
individuals to exploit.
● Helland (2000) → distinguishes between two kinds of internet activity, which he calls religion
online and online religion.
● Religion online → is a form of top-down communication where a religious organisation uses the
internet to address members and potential converts. There is no feedback or dialogue between the
parties. There is no feedback or dialogue between the parties. Hierarchical.
● Online religion → is a form of ‘cyber-religion’ that may have no existence outside the internet. It
is a communication platform for many individuals to create a non-hierarchical relationship and a
sense of community where they can visit worship or meditation spaces, explore shared spiritual
interests and provide mutual support. Cowan (2005) → studied the Pagans and gained a
sense of self-worth from feeling that they belonged to a global network. While Postmodernists
might see online religion as a radical new alternative that may be replacing religion, evidence
from Hoover et al (2004) → shows that for most users, it is just a supplement to their church-
based activities rather than a substitute for them.
Religious consumerism

● Postmodern society involves the growth of consumerism and the idea that we now
construct our identities through what we choose to consume.
● As Hervieu- Leger emphasises this is also true of religion, where we act as ‘spiritual
shoppers’, choosing religious beliefs and practices to meet our individual needs, from
the vast range available in the religious marketplace.
● We no longer have to sign up to any specific religious tradition; instead, we can pick and
mix elements of different faiths to suit our tastes and make them part of our identity- until
something becomes more fashionable or attractive.
● Lyon’s view, religion has relocated to the sphere of consumption. While people may
have ceased to belong to religious organisations- not abandoned religion. They have
become ‘religious consumers’ making conscious choices about which elements of
religions they find useful.
● E.g. the American Christian fundamentalists in Nancy Ammerman’s (1987) study made use
of a number of churches without giving strong loyalty to any of them. One of the effects of
having a great variety of religious products to choose from is a loss of faith in ‘meta-narratives’
→ theories or worldviews that claim to have the absolute, authoritative truth which include
traditional religions.
● People now have access to contradictory religious beliefs. Berger notes this weakens
traditional religious beliefs that claim a monopoly of the truth (they claim that their
position is true and that the views of religious groups are false) and that try to
oblige people to believe them. This is because exposure to many competing versions of
the truth makes people sceptical that any of them is really or wholly true.
● However, postmodernists such as Lyon argue that the decline of traditional churches
does not spell the end of religion. In their place, he argues that many new religious
movements are now springing up that the religious consumer can ‘sample’ and from
which they can construct their own personal belief system.
● In this view, religion and spirituality are not disappearing; they are simply evolving and
fitting into a consumerist nature of postmodern society.

Self-religions and the New Age

● Many of the new forms of religion or spirituality that Lyon refers to are New Age beliefs
and practices. New Age spirituality rejects the idea of obligation and obedience to
external authority found in traditional religions.
● It emphasises the idea of life as a journey of discovery, personal development,
autonomy and connecting with one’s ‘inner self’.
● The key idea linking all these features is individualism: the notion that every individual is
free to decide what is true for him or her e.g. spiritual shopping.

Re-enchantment of the world

● Lyon criticises the secularisation theory for assuming that religion is declining and being
replaced by a rational, scientific worldview. Contrary to Weber’s prediction of increasing
rationalisation and enchantment of the world.
 ● Lyon argues that we are now in a period of re-enchantment with the growth of
unconventional beliefs, practices and spirituality.
● Although traditional forms of religion have declined, especially in Europe, Lyon points to
the growing vitality of non-traditional religions in the West and its resurgence elsewhere
in the world.

A spiritual revolution

● Some sociologists argue that a ‘spiritual revolution’ is taking place today, in which
traditional Christianity is giving to ‘holistic spirituality’ or New Age spiritual beliefs and
practices that emphasise personal development and subjective experience.
● Increased interest in spirituality can be seen in the growth of a ‘spiritual market’, with an
explosion in the number of books about self-help and spirituality, and the many
practitioners who offer consultations, courses and ‘therapies’, ranging from meditation to
crystal healing.

RELIGION SPIRITUALITY

Life as duty Life as discovery

Self-sacrifice Personal development

Deference Autonomy

Conforming with external authority Connecting with your inner self

Family life: traditional values and Family life: emotional bonds and self-
discipline expression

Employment: service to an organisation Employment: professional growth

Future of religion: out of step and losing Future of spirituality: growing and gaining
ground ground

● Paul Heelas and Linda Woodhead (2005) → In their study of Kendal in Cumbria
investigated whether traditional religion has declined and if so, how far the growth of
spirituality is compensating for this. They distinguish between the 2 groups: The
congregational domain → of traditional and evangelical christianity. The holistic
milieu → of spirituality and the New Age.
● Stat: (2000) → 7.9% of the population attended church and 1.6% took part in the
activities of the holistic milieu.
● Within the congregational domain, the traditional churches were losing support,
while evangelical churches were holding their own and faring relatively well.
Although fewer involved in the holistic milieu, it was growing Heelas and
Woodhead offer an explanation for these trends.
● 1. New Age spirituality has grown because of a massive subjective turn in today’s
culture. This involves a shift away from the idea of doing your duty and obeying
external authority, to exploring your inner self by following a spiritual path. 2. As a
 result traditional religions, which demand duty and obedience are declining. As
Heelas and Woodhead put it → ‘religion tells what to believe and how to behave is out
of tune with a culture which believes it is up to us to seek out answers for ourselves’. 3.
Evangelical churches are more successful than the traditional churches. They both
demand discipline and duty, but the evangelicals also emphasise the importance of
spiritual healing and personal growth through the experience of being ‘born again’.
● In the spiritual marketplace, therefore, the winners are those who appeal to
personal experience as the only genuine source of meaning and fulfillment,
rather than the received teachings and commandments of traditional religion.

The weakness of the New Age

● Many sociologists that religion is not declining but rather changing its form. Critics challenge this
claim, as Bruce claims →
● The problem of scale: If New Age forms of individualised religion are springing up, this
would have to be on a much larger scale if it to fill the gap left by the decline of traditional
institutionalised religions. E.g. Stat- in Kendal (1851) about 38% of the population
attended church every Sunday. There would need to be 14,500 churchgoers, instead of
the 3,000 who actually attend church. The 270 people involved in the holistic milieu in
the town come nowhere near making up the shortfall.
● Socialisation of the next generation → For a belief system to survive, it must be passed down
to the next generation. Stat- In Kendal, only 32% of parents who were involved in the New
Age said their children shared their spiritual interests. Yet to maintain the same number
of believers in the next generation, a typical couple with two children would have to
socialise both of them into New Age views.
● Furthermore, women in the holistic milieu are more likely to be childless. And in at least
3/4rs of marriages with a woman in the holistic milieu, the husband does not share his
wife’s beliefs- further reducing the likelihood of transmitting them to their children.
● Weak commitment → Glendinning and Bruce (2006) → found that although many people
dabbled in meditation, alternative medicine, astrology, horoscopes and so on, serious
commitment to New Age beliefs and practices was very rare. Those who describe themselves as
‘spiritual’, very few said that such practices were important in their lives.
● Bruce (2011) → notes that ‘most people in every demographic category show no interest in
alternative spirituality’.
● Structural weakness → New Age spirituality is itself a cause of secularisation because of its
subjective, individualistic nature- it is based on the idea that there is no higher authority than the
self. This means that, unlike traditional religion, the New Age:
1. Lacks an external power (such as the church hierarchy) to extract commitment
from New Age participants against their wishes.
2. Cannot achieve consensus about its beliefs because everyone is free to believe
whatever they wish, so it lacks cohesion as a movement.
3. Cannot evanglalise (persuade others of the truth) because it believes that
enlightenment comes from within, not from someone else.
● These characteristics make the New Age structurally weak and unlikely to fill the gap left
by the decline of traditional institutional religion.
● Bellah (1996) → gives the example of ‘Sheilaism’, she comments that if everyone saw religion
as Sheila (she is religious but not a ‘religious fanatic’), there would be 220 million religions in
America; each one for every individual. He adds that when individuals have their own
interpretations, they may hold religious beliefs without ever practising their religion.
Religious market theory/ Rational choice theory

● The main advocates are Stark and Bainbridge (1996) → they are very critical of
secularisation theory, which they see as Eurocentric- it focuses on the decline of religion in
Europe and fails to explain its continuing vitality in America and elsewhere.
● They put forward a distorted view of the past and future, Stark and Bainbridge argue that
there was no ‘golden age’ of religion in the past, as they claim secularisation theory
implies, nor is it realistic to predict a future end-point for religion when everyone will be
an atheist.
● Stark and Bainbridge propose religious market theory, the two assumptions made:
1. People are naturally religious and religious performs human needs → overall demand for
religion remains constant, even the demand for types of religion may vary
2. It is human nature to seek rewards and avoid costs → when people make choices, they
weigh up the costs and benefits of the different options

Compensators

● Stark and Bainbridge → religion is attractive because it provides us with compensators,

when rewards are scarce/unattainable, religion compensates by promising supernatural
ones. E.g. immortality is unattainable, but religion compensates by promising life after
death- only religion can provide such compensators.
● Non-religious ideologies such as humanism and communism do not provide credible
compensators because they do not promise supernatural rewards.
1. The cycle of renewal → alternative to secularisation theory, which sees a one-way process of
continuous decline, Stark and Bainbridge put forward the concept of a cycle of religious decline,
revival and renewal. They describe a perpetual cycle throughout history, with some religions
declining and others growing and attracting new members. When established churches decline,
they leave a gap in the market for sects and cults to attract new followers. From this POV, the
secularisation is one-sided: it sees the decline, but ignores the growth of new religions and
religious revivals.
2. Religious competition → Stark and Bainbridge, churches operate like companies selling goods
in a market. Where secularisation theory sees competition between different religious
organisations as undermining religion, religious mark theorists take the opposite view. They
argue that competition leads to improvements in the quality of the religious ‘goods’ on offer. The
churches that make their product attractive will succeed in attracting more ‘customers’.
Meanwhile churches that are not responsive to the needs of their members will decline.

America vs. Europe

● The demand for religion increases when there are different sorts to choose from
because consumers can find one that meets their needs. By contrast, where there is a
religious monopoly - one church with no competition- it leads to decline. This is because
without competition, a church has no incentive to provide people with what they want.
● Stark and Bainbridge believe that religion thrives in the USA because there has never
been a religious monopoly there. The Constitution guarantees freedom of religion and
the separation of church and state, and there has always been a great variety of
 denominations to choose from. This has encouraged the growth of a healthy religious
market when religions grow or decline according to consumer demand.
● The situation in Europe is entirely different. Most European countries had a religious
monopoly, such as the Church of England. Competition has been held back and the lack
of choice has led to decline.
● Supply not demand → Stark and Bainbridge conclude that the main factor influencing the level
of religious participation is not demand for religion, as secularisation theory suggests, but the
supply. Participation increases when there is an ample supply of religious groups to choose from
but declines when supply is restricted. Also based on their comparison of America and Europe,
Stark and Bainbridge argue that the decline of religion is not a universal trend happening in all
societies, as some versions of secularisation theory suggests.

Supply-led religion

● Studies support Stark and Bainbridge view that demand for religion is greatly influenced
by the quality and variety of religion on offer and the extent to which it responds to
people’s needs.
● Hadden and Shupe (1988) → argue that the growth of ‘televangelism’ in America shows that
the level of religious participation is supply-led. When commercial funding of religious
broadcasts began in the 1960s, it opened up competition in which evangelical churches thrived.
● Finke (1997) → argues that the lifting of restrictions on Asian immigration into America in the
1960s allowed Asian religions such as Hare Krishna and Transcendental Meditation to set up
permanently in the USA, and Asian faiths became another option that proved popular with
consumers in the religious marketplace.
● Another example is the growth of evangelical megachurches (churches with a
congregation of 2,000+) . Most are in the United States but they are also found in South
Korea and elsewhere. With such large congregations, they have lavish resources and
are able to offer a vast range of activities to meet the diverse needs of their members.
Miller (1997) → compares them with hypermarkets.
● Stark (1990) → Japan is another society where a free market in religion has stimulated
participation. Until 1945, Shintoism was the state religion and other religions were suppressed.
However, after World War 2, religion was deregulated, creating a market in which new religions
such as Soka `gakkai (a type of Buddhism) have thrived Japan’s experience contrasts with that of
post-war Germany where religion was closely regulated by the state and as a result declined.

Criticisms

● Religious market theory is the approach adopted by most American sociologists of

religion. It highlights the supply side of religion and consumer choice, and can be useful
for understanding the growth of new religions. However:
1. Bruce (2011) → rejects the view that diversity and competition increase the demand for
religion. Statistics show that diversity has been accompanied by religious decline in both
Europe and America.
2. Bruce argues that Stark and Bainbridge misrepresent secularisation theory. The
theory does not claim there was a past ‘golden age’ of religion, or that everyone
will become atheists. It simply claims that religion is in long-become atheists. It
 claims that religion is in long-term decline. Nor does it claim secularisation is
universal - just that it applies to Europe and America.
3. Norris and Inglehart (2011) → show that high levels of religious participation exist in
Catholic countries where the Church has a near monopoly, such as Ireland and
Venezuela. By contrast, countries with religious pluralism, such as Holland and
Australia, often have low levels of participation- this contradicts Stark and Bainbridge’s
theory.
4. Beckford criticises religious market theory as unsociological, because it assumes
people are ‘naturally’ religious and fails to explain why they make the choices
they do.

An alternative view: secularisation and security

● Norris and Inglehart (2011) → reject religious market theory on the grounds that it only applies
to America and fails to explain the variations in religiosity between different societies. E.g.
international studies of religion have found no evidence of the link between religious choice and
religious participation that Stark and Bainbridge claim exists.

Existential security theory

● Norris and Inglehart argue that the reason for variations in religiosity between societies
is not different degrees of religious choice, but different degrees of existential security.
They mean ‘the feeling that survival is secure enough that it can be taken for granted’.
● Religion meets a need for security, and therefore societies where people already feel
secure have low levels of demand for religion.
● Poor societies → where people face life-threatening risks such as famine, disease and
environmental disasters, have high levels of insecurity and thus high levels of religiosity. Poor
people who live in rich societies also face greater insecurity and are therefore more religious than
rich people in those societies.
● Rich societies → where people have a high standard of living and are at less risk, have a greater
sense of security and thus lower levels of religiosity.
● Thus the demand for religion is not constant, as Stark and Bainbridge claim, but varies
both within and between societies. Demand is greatest from low-income groups and
societies, because they are less secure. This explains why poor developing countries
remain religious, while prosperous Western countries have become more secular.
● However, Norris and Inglehart note that global population growth undermines the trend
towards secularisation. Rich, secure, secular Western countries have low levels of
population growth, whereas poor, insecure, religious countries have high rates. As a
result, while rich countries are becoming more secular, the majority of the world is
becoming more religious.

Europe vs. America

● In Western Europe, the trend is towards increasing secularisation. Norris and Inglehart argue that
this is not surprising, because these societies are among the most equal and secure in the world
 with well developed welfare states offering health care, social services and pensions → reduces
poverty and protects those at the bottom from insecurity.
● By comparison with Europe, the United States remains much more religious. Norris and
Inglehart argue that this is because America is also the most unequal of the rich
societies, with an inadequate welfare safety-net and individualist ‘dog eat dog’ values.
This creates high levels of poverty and insecurity, which creates a greater need for
religion.
● Thus, although America is more religious than Europe, this is explained by Norris and
Inglehart’s general theory of religiosity as the result of insecurity. For example, they point
out that although America is religious by the standards of other rich nations, it is less
religious than poor ones.

State welfare and religiosity

● Norris and Inglehart’s argument is supported by Gill and Lundegaarde (2004) → found
that the more a country spends on welfare, the lower the level of religious participation. Thus
European countries, which spend more than the USA, are also more secular than the USA.
● Gill and Lundegaarde note that in the past religion used to provide welfare for the poor
and still does so in poorer countries. However, from the 20th century, the state in the
West began to provide welfare and this contributed to religion’s decline.
● They do not expect religion to disappear completely, because although welfare provision meets
the needs for security, it does not answer ‘ultimate’ questions about the meaning of life, unlike
religion. Thus although the availability of welfare reduces the need for religion, it does not
eliminate that need completely. E.g. The case of Uruguay → religious diversity but low levels of
religious participation which goes against Stark and Bainbridge claim that a free market in
religion stimulates participation.

Evaluation

● Vȃsquez (2007) → accepts that Norris and Inglehart offer a valuable explanation of different
levels of religious participation not only in Europe and the USA, but globally.
● He makes 2 criticisms:
1. They only use quantitative data about income levels; they don’t examine people’s
own definitions of ‘existential security’. Vȃsquez argues that qualitative research
is also needed.
2. Norris and Inglehart only see religion as a negative response to deprivation. They
ignore the positive reasons people have for religious participation and they
appeal that some types of religion have for the wealthy.

TOPIC SUMMARY →

1. New forms of religion and spirituality → believing without belonging, vicarious religion,
spiritual shopping, online religion and the New Age holistic milieu. Critics argue that these
changes are not enough to offset the decline in traditional religion.
 2. Religious market theory → argues that demand for religion is constant because it meets human
needs by providing supernatural compensators. Religion thrives where there is diversity and
choice (USA), but declines where on church has had a monopoly (Europe). Rather than
secularisation, there is a perpetual cycle of decline, renewal and revival.
3. Existential security theory disagrees, arguing that religion declines in richer societies that
are more equal with good welfare provision because people are more secure, but is
growing in poorer countries where there is greater insecurity.

TOPIC 5: RELIGION IN A GLOBAL CONTEXT

RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALISM

● The issue of religious fundamentalism has emerged as a major area of media and
political concern- in a global context

The characteristics of fundamentalism

● Fundamentalists appeal to tradition and often look back to a supposed golden age of the
past. They seek a return to basics or fundamentals of their faith. But religious
fundamentalism is quite different from traditional religion.
● It arises only where traditional beliefs and values are threatened or challenged by
modern society and especially by the impact of an increasingly globalised economy.
● The threat to traditional beliefs can come outside, for example through capitalist
globalisation, the penetration of Western culture, or military invasion. Or it can come
from within, for example when sections of society adopt new secular ideas, such as
liberal attitudes to sexuality and gender.

An authoritative sacred text:

● For Christian fundamentalists every word of the Bible is the literal truth, its truth are valid
for all eternity, and it contains the answers to all of life's important questions, from
politics to family life. The text is inerrant (without error) and not open to questioning.
● For example, Christian fundamentalism requires belief in the Virgin Birth of Christ, his
divinity, his bodily resurrection from the dead and his imminent Second coming, all in the
Bible.
● Only those who accept these as historical facts = true Christians —> fundamentalists are
intolerant of all other views and refuse to engage in rational argument with them.
● Aldridge (2003): no text speaks for itself; it has to be interpreted, so in reality what
fundamentalists hold to be true is not the text itself, but their interpretation of its
meaning. They interpret the Bible solely as a set of historical facts and prophecies about
the future, ignoring other interpretations of it as poetry, symbolism or metaphor.

An ‘us and them’ mentality:

 ● Fundamentalists separate themselves from the rest of the world and refuse to
compromise with it.
● As Davie (2013) puts it, they seek to establish islands of certainty against what they see
as social and cultural chaos.

Aggressive reaction:

● Fundamentalist movements aim to draw attention to the threat to their beliefs and
values, and their reactions are therefore aggressive and intended to shock, intimidate or
cause harm.
● Authoritative leaders such as clergy or elders who interpret the sacred text are important
in giving direction to the reactions.

Use of modern technology:

● Fundamentalists oppose modern culture, which they see as corrupted by secularism,

liberalism, materialism, permissiveness and promiscuity, they are keen to use modern
technology to achieve their aims- from computers and the internet to televangelism and
military weaponry.

Patriarchy:

● Hawley (1994) notes that fundamentalists favour a world in which control over women’s
sexuality, reproductive powers, and their social and economic roles, is fixed for all time
by divine decree.

Prophecy:

● Christian fundamentalist proclaim the relevance of biblical prophecies to contemporary

events. They believe that the ‘last days’ will soon be upon us, when the faithful dead will
be resurrected and transported to heaven with the faithful living, before the seven-rule of
the Antichrist and ultimately the final defeat of Satan in the War of Armageddon.

Conspiracy Theories:

● Fundamentalist are often attracted to conspiracy theories: the idea that powerful, hidden,
evil forces and organisations are in control of human destiny. Many Christian and Islamic
fundamentalists hold anti-Semitic conspiracy theories that believe Jew are conspiring to
secure world domination.

Fundamentalism and modernity

 ● As Davie (2013): fundamentalism occurs where those who hold traditional orthodox
beliefs and values are threatened by modernity and feel the need to defend themselves
against it.
● So, fundamentalists are themselves a product of modernity, in so far as they are born
out of a clash between modernity and traditional culture.
● Giddens (1999): fundamentalism is a product of and reaction to globalisation, which
undermines traditional social norms concerning the nuclear family, gender and sexuality.
In today’s ‘late modern’ society, individuals are constantly faced with choice, uncertainty
and risk. The attraction of fundamentalism and its rigid, dogmatic beliefs is the certainty
that it promises in an uncertain world. It is a retreat into faith-based answers and away
from the risks and uncertainties of a globalising world.
● Giddens identifies fundamentalist versions of several major religions, including Islam,
Christianity and Hinduism.

Cosmopolitanism

● Giddens: contrasts fundamentalism with cosmopolitanism- a way of thinking that

embraces modernity and is keeping with today’s globalising world.
● Cosmopolitanism is tolerant of the views of others and open to new ideas, constantly
reflecting on and modifying beliefs in the light of new information- reflexive thinking.
● It requires people to justify their views by the use of rational arguments and evidence
rather than by appealing to sacred texts. One’s lifestyle is seen as a personal choice
rather than something prescribed by an external religious or other authority.
● Cosmopolitan religion and spirituality emphasises the pursuit of personal meaning and
self-improvement rather than submission to authority. This is very similar to Hervieu-
Legers ‘pilgrims’ who explore New Age spirituality.

Responses to postmodernity

● In a similar argument to that of Giddens, Zygmunt Bauman (1992): sees

fundamentalism as a response to living in postmodernity. Postmodern society
brings freedom of choice, uncertainty and a heightened awareness of risk,
undermining the old certainties about how to live that were grounded in tradition.
In this situation, whilsts some embrace the new freedom, others are attracted to
fundamentalism by its claims of absolute truth and certainty.
● Manuel Castells (2010): distinguishes between two responses to postmodernity:
1. Resistance identity —> a defensive reaction of those who feel threatened
and retreat into fundamentalist communities.
2. Project identity —> the response of those who are forward-looking and
engage with social movements such as feminism and environmentalism.

Criticisms —>

● Beckford (2011): criticises Giddens, Bauman and Castells on:

 1. They distinguish too sharply between cosmopolitanism and fundamentalism,
ignoring ‘hybrid’ movements
2. They are ‘fixated on fundamentalism’, ignoring other developments- including
how globalisation is also affecting non-fundamentalist religions such as
Catholicism.
3. Giddens lumps all types of fundamentalism together, ignoring important
differences between them.
4. Giddens’ description of fundamentalism as a defensive reaction to modernity
ignores the fact that reinventing tradition is also a modern, ‘reflexive’ activity.
● Jeff Haynes (1998): we should not focus narrowly on the idea that Islamic
fundamentalism is a reaction to globalisation. For example in the Middle East, conflicts
caused by the failure of local elites to deliver on their promises to improve the standard
of living are often the fuel that drives fundamentalism.

Monotheism and Fundamentalism

● Steve Bruce (2008): sees the main cause of fundamentalism as the perception of
religious traditionalists that today’s globalising world threatens their beliefs
● BUT: Bruce regards fundamentalism as being confined to monotheistic religions e.g.
Judaism, Christiantity and Islam.
● Polytheistic religions that believe in the existence of many gods, such as Hinduism, are
unlikely to produce fundamentalism.
● Bruce’s view: this is because monotheistic religions are based on the notion of God’s will
are revealed through a single authoritative sacred text such as the Qur’an of the Bible.
● This is believed to contain the actual word of God and it lays down specific rules for
believers to follow.
● By contrast, polytheistic religions lack a single all-powerful deity and single authoritative
text, so there is much more scope for different interpretations and none has an
overriding claim to legitimacy of absolute truth. For example, Hinduism has been
described as being more like a collection of religions than just one.

Two fundamentalisms

● In Bruce’s view: while all fundamentalists share the same characteristics such as belief
in the literal truth of a sacred text and destination of modernity, different fundamentalist
movements may have different origins.
● In particular, some are triggered by changes within their own society, while others are a
response to changes being thrust upon a society from the outside.
● Bruce illustrates this distinction with the examples of Christian and Islamic
fundamentalism.

Two fundamentalisms

● In the West —> fundamentalism is most often a reaction to change taking place within a
society, especially the trends towards diversity and choice typical of secular later modern
 society. E.g. The New Christian Right: has developed in opposition to family diversity,
sexual ‘permissiveness’, gender equality and abortion rights. Its aim is to reassert ‘true’
religion and restore it to a public role where it can shape the laws and morals of wider
society.
● In the Third World —> fundamentalism is usually a reaction to changes being thrust
upon a society from outside, in the case of the Islamic Revolution in Iran. It triggered by
modernisation and globalisation, in which ‘Western’ values are imposed by foreign
capitalism or by local elites supported by the West. Fundamentalism involves resistance
to the state’s attempts to sideline it and confine it to the private sphere.

Secular Fundamentalism

● Davie (2013): argues that recent decades have seen the emergence of secular forms of
fundamentalism. She links to changes in the nature of modern society and she
distinguishes between 2 phases of modernity.
● The first phase gave rise to religious fundamentalism: the phase stretched from the time
of the philosophical movement known as the Enlightenment in the late 18th to the 1960s.
Enlightenment philosophy held on the power of science and human reason to improve
the world. This ‘Enlightenment project’ dominated European thought and helped to
secularise all areas of social life, attacking and undermining religious uncertainties.
Religious fundamentalism is one reaction to this secularisation process.
● The second phase is giving rise to secular fundamentalism: Since the 1970s, the
optimism of the Enlightenment project has itself come under attack. This is the result of a
growing mood of pessimism and uncertainty. This mood is the product of the insecurity
caused by changes such as globalisation, concerns about the environment and the
collapse of communism in 1989. This had led to a loss of faith in the major secular
Enlightenment ideologies such as liberalism and rationalism (in Western Europe) and
Marxism (in Eastern Europe) whose claims to truth and belief in progress have been
undermined
● As a result, these secular ideologies are themselves struggling for survival, just like
traditional religion. Davie - when religion is under attack, some supporters of secular
ideologies such as nationalism are attracted to fundamentalism. E.g. disintegration fo
communist Yugoslavia in the early 1990s led to a secular nationalist fundamentalism
that justified the ethnic cleansing of territory to create a clear- cut separation between
ethnic groups- between ‘us’ and ‘them’.
● In Western Europe, perceived religious challenges to liberal secular values have
provoked a secular fundamentalist reaction. E.g. In 2004: France banned pupil wearing
religious symbols in school, and in 2010 made it illegal for women to wear the veil in
public. In 2015: stopped serving pork alternatives which discriminated Muslims and Jews
● Ansell (2000) sees such trends as a form of cultural racism that uses the apparently
liberal language of universal equality and social integration, while denying racist aims.
● However it is about preserving cultural identity and ‘our’ way of life, and it legitimises the
exclusion of religious and cultural minorities.
● Davie argues that both religious and secular movements can become fundamentalist as
a result of the greater uncertainties of life in the late modern or postmodern world, in
which re-asserting truth and certainty is becoming increasingly attractive. As a result,
competing fundamentalism as a form of ‘recreated memories’ in late modern societies
that have suffered ‘cultura amnesia’ and forgotten their historic religious tradition.
The ‘clash of civilisations’

● Religion has been a centre of a number of global conflicts. These include the 9/11
terrorist attacks by Fundamentalist Islamists in the US. In the view of American neo-
conservative Samuel Huntingdon, such conflicts have intensified since the collapse of
communism in 1989 and are symptoms of a ‘clash of civilisations’. However, for
Huntingdon, the problem is not Islam Fundamentalism but Islam itself.
● Huntingdon identifies seven civilisations: Most civilisations are larger than a single
nation. Each has a common cultural background and history, and is closely identified
with one of the world’s great religions.
1. Wetern
2. Islamic
3. Latin American
4. Confucian (China)
5. Japanese
6. Hindu
7. Slavic- Orthodox (Russian and Eastern Europe)
● In Huntington’s view, religious differences are creating a set of hostile ‘us and them’
relationships, with increased competition between civilisations for economic and military
power e.g Middle East. He sees religious difference as harder to resolve than political
one because they are deeply rooted in culture and history.
● Huntington sees history as a struggle of ‘progress against barbarism’. He believes the
West is under threat, especially from Islam, and urged the West to reassert its identity as
a liberal- democratic Christian civilisation.

Criticisms

● Jackson (2006): sees Huntington’s work as an example of orientalism- a western

ideology that stereotypes Easter nations and people (especially Muslims) as
untrustworthy, inferior or fanatical ‘Others’ and serves to justify exploitation and human
rights and abuses by the West.
● Casanova (2005): argues that Huntington ignores important religious divisions within
‘civilisations’ he identifies e.g. Sunni and Shi’a Islam.
● Horrie and Chippindale (2007): see the ‘clash of civilisations’ as a grossly misleading
neo-conservtive ideology that portrays the whole of Islam as an enemy. In reality, only a
small minority of the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims are remotely interested in a ‘holy war’
against the West.
● Karen Armstrong: argues that hostility towards the West does not stem from
fundamentalist Islam, but is a reaction to Western foreign policy in the Middle East. The
West has propped up oppressive regimes and continues to support Israel despite its
aggressive treatment of Palestinians.

The real clash of civilisations?

● Stat: World Values Survey, Inglehart and Norris (2011): conclude that the issue that
divides the West from the Muslim world is not democracy but gender and sexuality. They
 find that support for demcracy is similarly high in both the West and the Muslim world,
but there are great differences when it comes to attitudes to divorce, abortion, gender
equality and gay rights.
● While Western attitudes have become more liberal, in the Muslim world, but there are
great differences when it comes to attitudes to divorce, abortion and gender equality.
● Inglehart and Norris —> comment that in the last decade, democracy has become the
political ideology to gain global appeal, but there is no global agreement about self-
expression values, such as tolerance of diversity, gender equality and freedom of
speech. In their view, ‘these divergent values constitute the real of clash of civilisations
between Muslim societies and the West’.

Cultural Defence

● Bruce (2002): sees one function of religion in today’s world as cultural defence (where
religion serves to unite a community against external threat). Religion has a special
significance for its followers because it symbolises the group or society’s collective
identity. Defending the community against a threat often gives religion a prominent role
in politics.
● Poland:
● Poland was under communist rule, imposed from outside by the Soviet Union. During
this time, the Catholic Church was suppressed, but for many Poles continued to embody
Polish national identity. The church served as a popular rallying point for opposition to
the Soviet Union and the Polish communist party.
● In particular, it lent its active support to the Solidarity free trade union movement in the
1980s that did much to bring about the fall of communism.
● Thereafter, the Church regained the public role and has had significant influence on
Polish politics since.
● Iran:
● Western capitalist powers and oil companies have long influence in Iran, including
involvement in the illegal overthrow of a democratic government in the 1950s to install a
pro-Western regime headed by the Shah of Iran.
● During the 1960s and 70s, his successor embarked on a policy of modernisation and
Westernisation. This included banning the veil and replacing the Muslim calendar.
Meanwhile, modernisation was widening the gap between the rich and poor, while
protest was ruthlessly suppressed.
● Change was imposed rapidly and from above, causing great suffering. Under these
conditions, Islam became the focus for resistance to the Shah’s regime, led by clerics
such as the Ayatollah Khomeini. The revolution of 1979 brought the creation of the
Islamic Republic, in which clerics held stable power and were able to impose Islamic
Sharia law.
● However, Haynes argues that the Iranian revolution was not typical of the Middle East, in
that it was led by the religious leaders. In countries such as Saudi Arabia, the religious
leadership is closely tied to the local elite, who in turn are tied to Western Imperialism.
As such, local religious leaders are opposed by local fundamentalists, who regard them
as enemies of Islam.

Religion and Development

God and Globalisation in India

● Globalisation has brought rapid economic growth and has seen India become a more
important player on the world political stage. It has also brought rising prosperity to
some- notably India’s new middle class.
● Meera Nanda’s (2008): In God and Globalisation book, she examined the role of
Hinduism. Stat: the religion of 85% of the population, in legitimating both the rise of a
new Hindu ‘ultra-nationalism’ and the prosperity of the Indian middle class.

Hinduism and consumerism

● Globalisation has created a huge and prosperous, scientifically educated, urban middle
class in India, working in IT, pharmaceuticals and biotechnology sectors closely tied into
the global economy. These are precisely the people whom secularisation theory predicts
will be the first to abandon religion in favour of a secular worldview.
● Nanda observes, a vast majority of this class continue to believe in the supernatural.
● Stat: A survey by the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (2007) found that
Indians are becoming more religious. Only 5% said their religiosity had declined in the
last 5 years, while 30% said they had become more religious than their rural and illiterate
counterparts’.
● Increased interest in religion has also been reflected in a dramatic growth of religious
tourism, such as visits to shrines and temples. Nanda notes that it is becoming
fashionable to be religious and to be seen to be so.
● Middle-class religiosity is that they are attracted to what were once low-status village
gods and goddesses worshipped by the poor. This is because these deities are seen as
being more responsive to people’s needs than the traditional Hindu ‘great gods’.
● Nanda examines what motivates the sophisticated, urban middle classes to continue to
believe in miracles and supernatural beings. She rejects poverty and existential
insecurity as an explanation, because they are not poor.
● She also rejects the idea that their religiosity is a defensive reaction to modernisation
and Westernisation. On the contrary, the Indian middle classes are optimistic about the
opportunities that globalisation brings them. Instead, Nanda argues, their increasing
religiosity is the result of their ambivalence about their newfound wealth.
● This ambivalence stems from a tension between the traditional Hindu belief in
renunciation of materialism and worldly desires, and the new prosperity of the middle
classes. This is resolved for them by the modern holy men and tele-gurus to whom they
turn, who preach the message that desire is not bad.
● Similarly, they dispense business-friendly versions of Hinduism and take the edge off
guilt by teaching that middle-class consumerism can be ‘spiritually balanced’ by paying
for the performance of appropriate and often extravagant rituals- which also serve as a
way of displaying one’s wealth.
● Modern versions of Hinduism therefore legitimate the position of the middle class and
allow them to adjust to globalised consumer capitalism.

Hindu ultra-nationalism
 ● Nanda (2003): also examines the role of Hinduism in legitimating a triumphalist version
of Indian nationalism.
● Stat: E.g. The Pew Global Attitude Survey: found that 93% of Indians- more than any
other country- agreed with the statement, ‘Our people are not perfect, but our culture is
superior to others’. Nanda notes that India’s success in the global market is increasingly
attributed to the superiority of ‘Hindu values’, a view constantly promoted by the media
and politicians, along with the idea that Hinduism is the essence of Indian culture and
identity.
● In this Hindu ultra-nationalism, the worship of Hindu gods has become the same as
worshipping the nation of India, and Hinduism has become a civil religion. However, as
Nanda claims, this is creating a widening gulf between Hindus and non-Hindu minorities.
● Hinduism has also penetrated public life, so that the supposedly secular state is
increasingly influenced by religion. E.g. ‘Hindu sciences’ such as astrology are being
taught as an academic subject in universities and being used to predict natural disasters.
● Meanwhile, The Ministry of Defence is sponsoring development of weapons with magical
powers mentioned in the Ancient Hindu texts, and the Health Ministry is investing in
development and sale of cow urine (cows being a sacred animal) as a cure for ailments
from AIDs and TB.

Capitalism in East Asia

● ‘East Asian tiger economies’ such as South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan, have
industrialised and become more significant players in the global economy- e.g. China is
now a major global industrial power.
● The success of capitalism in East Asia has led some sociologists to argue that religion
has played a role similar to the one Calvinism played in the development of capitalism in
the 16th and 17th century Europe.
● Gordon Redding (1990): describes the spirit of capitalism among the Chinese
entrepreneurs in the tiger economies. He sees their ‘post-Confucian’ values encouraging
hard work, self-discipline, frugality and a commitment to education and self-
improvement. (Confucianism is a traditional Chinese belief system). The effect of this
values system is similar to that of the Protestant ethic, in that it leads to economic
productivity and the accumulation of capital.

Pentecostalism in Latin America

● Peter Berger (2003): argues that Pentecostalism in Latin America acts as a ‘functional
equivalent’ to Weber’s Protestant ethic. It encourages the development of capitalism
today in the same way as Calvinism did in the 16th and 17th century Europe.
● Latin American Pentecotalists embrace a work ethic and lifestyle similar to that of the
Calvinist.
● Like Calvinism, Pentecostalism demands an ascetic (self-denying) way of life that
emphasises personal discipline, hard work and abstinence from alcohol. In this way, it
encourages its members to prosper and become upwardly mobile. Berger concludes
that Pentecostalism has a strong affinity with modern capitalism.
● Berger: agrees with Weber that an ethic like Protestantism is necessary to promote
economic development and raise a society out of poverty. This process can be led by
 active Pentecotalists. Thus in Chile and southern Brazil, there is now a growing and
prosperous Pentecostalist middle class leading capitalist development.
● However, Berger underlines Weber’s point that religious ideas alone are not enough to
produce economic development- natural resources are also needed. E.g. while
Pentecostalism has grown in northern Brazil, the region lacks resources and remains
backward. By contrast, the south, which is developing rapidly, has both work ethic and
the necessary resources.

Pentecostalism: global and local

● Christianity has globalised itself by expanding out of Europe, first into South America
and then Africa.
● David Lehmann (2002): distinguishes between 2 phases in this expansion:
1. 1st phase: Christianity accompanied colonisation and was imposed on the
indigenous populations by conquest, often forcibly suppressing local religions.
2. 2nd phase: over the last century or so, it has spread because it gained a popular
following- Stat: by 2015 there were 25 million Pentecostalist in Brazil alone.
● Lehmann attributes the success of Pentecostalism as a global religion in part to its ability
to incorporate local beliefs. It preaches a similar message worldwide, it uses imagery
and symbolism drawn from local cultures and beliefs, especially spirit possession cults.
● Pentecostalist attack such cults as the work of the devil, but their ministers conduct
exorcisms to rid people of evil spirits. Therefore, Pentecostalist validate local traditional
beliefs, while at the same time claiming to give believers access to a greater power, that
of the Christian Holy Spirit.
● Pentecostalism creates new local religious forms, rather than simply replacing existing
local beliefs with an imported one, as the first phase of Christianisation had done. In
Africa, this has led to the ‘Africanisation’ of Christianity rather than the total
disappearance of indigenous religions. As a result of this ability to adapt to local customs
and establish a local identity for itself, Pentecostalism shows considerable local diversity
in different parts of the world.
● Pentecostalism has also been successful in developing countries because it is able to
appeal to the poor who make up the majority of the population, and because it uses
global media to spread its message.

Topic Summary

● Fundamentalism is a quest for certainty in response to modernity. It may be a response

to changes from within or from outside.
● One function of religion today is cultural defence. Huntington argues that globalisation is
leading to a ‘clash of civilisations’. Religion may contribute to development. Hinduism
legitimates middle-class prosperity, while post-Confucian and Pentecostalist ideas
perform a similar role to the Prostestant ethic.
● Pentecostalism has achieved global success by incorporating local beliefs.

TOPIC 6: ORGANISATION, MOVEMENTS AND MEMBERS

Types of religious organisations

Church and Sect

● The first attempt to identify the features of different types of religious organisation was by
Ernst Troeltsch: he distinguished between two main types- the church and sect.
● Churches are large organisations, often with millions of members such as the Catholic
Church, run by a bureaucratic hierarchy of professional priests and they claim a
monopoly of the truth.
● They are universalistic, aiming to include the whole of society, although they tend to be
more attractive to the higher classes because they are ideologically conservative and
often closely linked to the state.
● E.g. the British Sovereign is head of both the state and Church of England. They place
few demands on their members.
● Troelstch: sees Sects as small, exclusive groups. Unlike churches, sects are hostile to
wider society and they expect a high level of commitment. They draw their members
from the poor and oppressed. Many are led by a charismatic leader than a bureaucratic
hierarchy. The only similarity with churches is that sects too believe they have a
monopoly of religious truth.

Denomination and cult

● Richard Neibuhr (1929): describes denominations such as Methodism as lying midway

between churches and sects. Membership is less exclusive than a sect, but they don’t
appeal to the whole of society like a church.
● Like Churches, they broadly accept society’s values, but are not linked to the state. They
impose some minor restrictions on members (e.g. alcohol), but are not as demanding as
sects.
● Unlike both church and sects, they are tolerant of other religious organisations and do
not claim a monopoly of the truth.
● Cults: the least organised, highly individualistic, loose-knit and usually small grouping
around some shared themes and interests, but usually without a sharply defined and
exclusive belief system.
● Cults are usually led by ‘practitioners’ or ‘therapists’ who claim special knowledge, like
denominations, cults are usually tolerant of other organisations and their beliefs. Cults
do not demand strong commitment from followers, who are often more like customers or
trainees than members.
● They may have little further involvement with the cult once they have acquired the beliefs
or techniques it offers. Many cults are world-affirming, claiming to improve in this world.

Similarities and differences

● Roy Wallis (1984): highlights two characteristics:

 1. How they see themselves → Churches and Sects claim that their interpretation of the
faith is the only legitimate or correct one. Denominations and cults accept that there can
be many valid interpretations.
2. How they are seen by wider society → Churches and Denominations are seen as
respectable and legitimate, whereas sects and cults are seen as deviant.

From Cathedrals to cults

● Bruce (1996): argues that Troeltsch’s idea of a church as having a religious monopoly
only applies to the Catholic Church before the 16th century Protestant Reformation,
when it had a religious monopoly over society, symbolised by its massive imposing
cathedrals.
● Since then, sects and cults have flourished and religious diversity has become the norm.
In today’s society, churches are no longer truly churches in Troeltsch’s sense because
they have lost their monopoly and been reduced to the status of denominations
competing with all the rest.

New religious movements

● Since the 1960s, there has been an explosion in the number of new religions and
organisations, such as the Unification Church or ‘Moonies’, the Children of God,
Transcendental Meditation (™), Krishna Consciousness.
● Roy Wallis: categories these new religious movements (NRMs) into 3 groups based on
their relationship to the outside world- whether they reject the world, accomodate to it, or
affirm it.

World-rejecting NRMs

● These are similar to Troeltsch’s sects: e.g. Moonies, Krishna Consciousness, Children of
God, the Manson Family and the People’s Temples.
● They vary in size. They have several characteristics:
1. They are clearly religious organisations with a clear notion of God
2. They are highly critical of the outside world and they expect or seek radical
change
3. To achieve salvation, members must make a sharp break with their normal life.
4. Members live communally, with restricted contact with the outside world. They
movement controls all aspects of their lives and is often accused of
‘brainwashing’ them.
5. They often have conservative moral codes, e.g. sex

World-accommodating NRMs

● There are often breakaways from existing mainstream churches or denominations, such
as neo-Pentecostalists who split from Catholicism, or Subud, an offshoot of Islam.
 ● They neither accept nor reject the world, and they focus on religious rather than worldly
matters, seeking to restore the spirituality and purity of religion.
● E.g. neo-Pentecostalists believe that other Christian religions have lost the Holy spirit.
Members tend to lead conventional lives.

World-affirming NRMs

● These groups differ from all other religious groups and may lack some of the
conventional features of religion, such as collective worship, and some are not highly
organised.
● However, like religions, they offer their followers access to spiritual or supernatural
powers. E.g. Scientology, Soka Gakkai and Human Potential
● They accept the world as it is. They are optimistic and promise followers success in
terms of mainstream goals and values, such as careers and personal relationships.
● They are non-exclusive and tolerant of other religions, but claim to offer additional
special knowledge or techniques that enable followers to unlock their own spiritual
powers and achieve success or overcome problems such as unhappiness or illness.
They have become described as psychologising religions offering this-worldly
gratification.
● Most are cults, whose followers are often customers rather than members, and entry is
through training. The movement places few demands on them and they carry on normal
lives.
● Stat- Wallis’s Study: Scientology had about 165,000 members in the UK in 2005 as
compared with only 1,200 Moonies.

Evaluation

● Wallis offers a useful way of classifying the new religious movements that developed in
recent decades. However, some argue that it is not clear whether he is categorising
them according to the movement’s teachings, or individual members’ beliefs.
● He also ignores the diversity of beliefs that may exist within an NRM.
● Wallis himself recognises that real NRMs will rarely fit neatly into his typology (list of
types) and some, such as 3HO (the Healthy Happy Holy Organisation), may have
features of all 3 types.
● Nevertheless, many sociologists find such typologies useful as a way of analysing and
comparing the significant features of NRMs.
● Stark and Bainbridge: reject the idea of constructing such typologies altogether. Instead,
they argue that we should distinguish between religious organisations using just one
criterion- the degree of conflict or tension between the religious group and wider society.
Sect and Cults

● Stark and Bainbridge identify 2 kinds of organisations that are in conflict with wider
society- sects and cults:
1. Sects: result from schisms- splits in existing organisations. They break away from
churches usually because of disagreements about doctrine.
2. Cults: new religions, such as Scientology and Christian Science, or ones new to
that particular society that have been imported, such as tm.
● In general, Stark and Bainbridge see sects as promising other-worldly benefits (e.g. a
place in heaven) to those suffering economic deprivation or ethical deprivation (where
their values conflict with wider society). By contrast cults tend to offer this-worldly
benefits (e.g. good health) to more prosperous individuals who are suffering psychic
deprivation (normlessness) and organismic deprivation (health problems).
● Stark and Bainbridge subdivide cults to how organised they are:
1. Audience cults → least organised and do not involve formal membership or much
commitment. There is little interaction between members. Participation may be through
the media. E.g. astrology and UFO cults
2. Client cults → based on the relationship between a consultant and a client, and provide
services to their followers. In the past, they were often purveyors of medical miracles,
contact with the dead etc, but the emphasis has shifted to ‘therapies’ promising personal
fulfillment and self-discovery.
● Cult movements: the most organised and demand a higher level of commitment that
other cults. The movement aims to meet all its members’ religious needs and unlike
followers of the audience and client cults, they are rarely allowed to belong to other
religious groups at the same time.
● E.g. cultic movements are the Moonies. Some client cults become cultic movements for
their most enthusiastic followers, such as Scientology, which developed out of the client
cult Dianetics. Some well publicised Doomsday cults that predict the end of the world
and practise mass suicide may be best seen as cultic movements.
● Stark and Bainbridge make some useful distinctions between organisations. E.g. their
idea of using the degree of conflict with wider society to distinguish between them is
similar to Troelstch’s distinction between church (which accepts society) and sect (which
rejects society). However, some of the examples they use do not fit neatly into any one
of their categories.

Explaining the growth of religious movements

● Since the 1960s, there has been a rapid growth in the number of sects and cults. E.g.
estimated to be over 800 NRMs and over half a million individuals belonging to these
and other non-mainstream Christian churches in the UK. Sociologists have offered 3
main explanations for this trend: marginality, relative deprivation and social change.

Marginality

● Troeltsch noted, sects ten to draw their members from the poor and oppressed.
According to Max Weber, sects tend to arise in groups who are marginalised in society.
 Such groups may feel that they are disprivileged- that is, that they are not receiving their
just economic rewards or social status.
● In Weber’s view, sects offer a solution to this problem by offering their members a
theodicy of disprivilege- that is, a religious explanation and justification for their suffering
and disadvantage. This may explain their misfortune as a test of faith, for example, while
holding out the promise of rewards in the future for keeping the faith.
● Historically, many sects, as well as millenarian movements, have recruited from the
marginalised poor. E.g. in the 20th Century the Nation of Islam (the Black Musclims)
recruited successfully among disadvantages blacks in the USA.
● Since the 1960s, the sect-like world-rejecting NRMs such as the Moonies have recruited
mainly from more affluent groups of often well-educated young, middle-class white.
● Wallis argues that this does not contradict Weber’s view, because many of these
individuals had become marginal to society. Despite their middle-class origins, most
were hippies, dropouts and drug users.

Relative deprivation

● Relative deprivation refers to the subjective sense of being deprived. This means that it
is perfectly possible for someone who is in reality quite privileged nevertheless to feel
that they are deprived or disadvantaged in some way compared to others.
● Although middle-class people are materially well off, they may feel they are spiritually
deprived, especially in today’s materialistic, consumerist world, which they may perceive
as impersonal and lacking in moral values, emotional warmth of authenticity. As a result,
Wallis argues, they may turn to sects for a sense of community.
● Similarly, Stark and Bainbridge argue that it is the relatively deprived who break away
from churches to form sects. When the middle-class members of a church seek to
compromise its beliefs in order to fit into society, deprived members are likely to break
away to form sects that safeguard the original message of the organisation.
● E.g. the deprived may stress Christ’s claim that it is harder for a rich man to enter the
Kingdom of Heaven than for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle- a message
that the better of might want to play down.
● By contrast, the deprived may want to emphasise Christ’s message that ‘the meek shall
inherit the earth’. Stark and Bainbridge argue that world-rejecting sects offer to the
deprived the compensators that they need for the rewards they are denied in this world.
● The privileged need no compensators or world-rejecting religion. They are attracted to
world-accepting churches that express their status and bring them further success in
achieving earthly rewards. This distinction is very similar to Wallis’ two main types of
NRMs.

Social change

● Wilson: argues that periods of rapid change disrupt and undermine established norms
and values, producing anomie or normlessness. In response to the uncertainty and
insecurity that this creates, those who are most affected by the disruption may turn to
sects as a solution. E.g. the dislocation created by the industrial revolution in Britain in
the late 18th and early 19th century led to the birth of Methodism which offered a sense
 of community, warmth and fellowship, clear norms and values and the promise of
salvation.
● Bruce sees the growth of sects and cults today as a response to the social changes
involved in modernisation and secularisation. In Bruce’s view, society is now secularised
and therefore people are less attracted to traditional churches and strict sects, because
these demand too much commitment. But, people now prefer cults because they are
less demanding and require fewer sacrifices.

The growth of NRMs

● World-rejecting NRMs- Wallis: He points to social changes form the 1960s impacting on
young people, including the increased time spent in education. This gave them freedom
from adult responsibilities and enabled a counter-culture to develop.
● Also, the growth of radical political movements offered alternative ideas about the future.
● World-rejecting NRMs were attractive in this context because they offered young people
a more idealistic way of life. Bruce: argues that it was the failure of the counter-culture to
change the world that led to disillusioned youth turning to religion instead.
● World-affirming NRMs: Bruce argues that their growth is a response to modernity,
especially to the rationalisation of work. Work no longer provides meaning or a source of
identity- unlike the past, when the Protestant ethic gave work a religious meaning for
some people, expected to achieve even if you don’t have the opportunities to.
● World-affirming NRMs provide both a sense of identity and techniques that promise
success in this world.
● Wallis also notes that some ‘movements of the middle ground’ such as the Jesus Freak
have grown since the mid-1970s. These have attracted disillusioned former members of
world-rejecting NRMs (which have generally been less successful) because they provide
a halfway house back to a more conventional lifestyle.

The dynamics of sects and NRMs

● While churches such as the Catholic Church and the Church of England have a history
stretching over many centuries, sects by contrast are often short-lived organisations,
frequently lasting only a single generation or less.
● Sociologists have therefore been interested to understand the dynamics of sect
development. There is also interest in how the NRMs described by Wallis will fare in the
longer term.

Denomination or death

● Niebuhr: argues that sects are world-rejecting organisations that come into existence
because of schism- splitting from an established church because of a disagreement over
religious doctrine. Niebuhr argues that sects are short-lived and that within a generation,
they either die out, or they compromise with the world, abandon their extreme ideas and
become a denomination. There are several reasons for this:
 1. The second generation: Born into a sect, lack the commitment and fervour of
their parents, who had consciously rejected the world and joined voluntarily.
2. The ‘Protestant ethic’ effect: Sects that practise asceticism (hard work and
saving) tend to become prosperous and upwardly mobile, as was the case with
the Methodists in the 19th century. Such members will be tempted to
compromise with the world, so they will either leave or it will abandon its world-
rejecting beliefs.
3. Death of the leader: Sects with a charismatic leader either collapse on the
leader’s death, or a more formal bureaucratic leadership takes over, transforming
it into a denomination.

The sectarian cycle

● Similarly, Stark and Bainbridge: see religious organisations moving through a cycle. In
the first stage, schism, there is a tension between the needs of deprived and privileged
members of a church.
● Deprived members break away to found a world-rejecting sect. The second stage is one
of initial fervour, with a charismatic leadership and great tension between sect;s beliefs
and those of wider society. In the third stage, denominationalism, the ‘Protestant ethic’
effect and the coolness of the second generation mean the fervour disappears.
● The fourth stage, establishment, sees the sect become more world-accepting and
tension with wider society reduces.
● In the final stage, further schism results when more zealous or less privileged members
break away to found a new sect true to the original message.

Established sects

● However, Wilson argues that not all sects follow the patterns outlined above. Whether or
not they do so, depends on how the sect answers the question, ‘What shall we do to be
saved?’
● Conversionist: sects such as evangelicals, whose aim is to convert large numbers of
people, are likely to grow rapidly into larger, more formal denominations.
● Adventist: sects such as the Seventh Day Adventists or Jehovah’s Witnesses await the
Second Coming of Christ. To be saved, they believe they must hold themselves
separate from the corrupt world around them. This separatism prevents them from
compromising and becoming a denomination.
● Wilson goes on to argue that some sects have survived over many generations such as
the Amish, Pentecostalist and Quakers for example. Instead of becoming
denominations, these groups become established sects. Contrary to Neibuhr’s
predictions, many of them have succeeded in socialising their children into a high level
of commitment, largely by keeping them apart from the wider world.
● He argues that globalisation will make it harder in the future for sects to keep themselves
separate from the outside world. On the other hand, globalisation can make it easier to
recruit in the Third world, where there are large numbers of deprived people for whom
the message of sects is attractive, as the success of Pentecostalists has shown.
The growth of the New Age

● The term ‘New Age’ covers a range of beliefs and activities that have been widespread
since at least the 1980s- Heelas- Stat: estimated that there are about 2,000 such
activities and 146,000 practitioners in the UK.
● Many of them are very loosely organised audiences of client cults. They are extremely
diverse and eclectic (putting unconnected ideas together in a new combination). They
include belief in UFOs and aliens, astrology, tarot, alternative medicine and
psychotherapy.
● Two common themes that characterise the New Age:
1. Self-spirituality: New Agers seeking the spiritual have turned away from
traditional ‘external’ religions such as the churches and instead look inside
themselves to find it.
2. Detraditionalisation: The New Age rejects the spiritual authority of external
traditional sources such as priests or sacred texts. Instead it values personal
experience and believes that we can discover the truth for ourselves and within
ourselves.
● Beyond these common features, New Age beliefs vary. E.g. they include world-affirming
aspects that help people succeed in the everyday outer world, as well as world-rejecting
elements that allow individuals to achieve enlightenment in their inner world. However,
Heelas argues that most New Age beliefs and organisations offer both.

Postmodernity and the New Age

● John Drane argues that its appeal is part of a shift towards postmodern society. One of
the features of postmodern society is a loss of faith in meta-narratives or claims to have
‘the truth’.
● Science promised to bring progress to a better world but instead it has given us war,
genocide, environmental destruction and global warming. As a result, people have lost
faith in experts and professionals such as scientists and doctors, and they are
disillusioned with the churches’ failure to meet their spiritual needs. So, they are turning
to the New Age idea that each of us can find the truth for ourselves by looking within.

The New Age and modernity

● Bruce: argues that the growth of the New Age is a feature of the latest phase of modern
society, and not postmodernity. Modern society values individualism, which is also a key
principle of New Age beliefs (e.g. the idea that each individual has the truth within
themselves). It also of particular value among those in the ‘expressive professions’
concerned with human potential, such as community workers or artists- the group to
whom the New Age appeals most.
● Bruce notes that New Age beliefs are often softer versions of much more demanding
and self-disciplined traditional Eastern religions such as Buddhism that have been
‘watered down’ to make them palatable to self-centred Westerners.
● This explains why New Age activities are often audience or client cults, since these
make few demands on their followers. Bruce sees the New Age eclecticism or ‘pick and
 mix spiritual shopping’ as typical of religion in late modern society, reflecting the
consumerist ethos of capitalist society.
● Heelas: sees the New Age and modernity as linked in 4 ways:
1. Source of identity: In the modern society, the individual has many different roles
(e.g. work and family) but there is little overlap between them, resulting in a
fragmented identity. New Age beliefs offer a source of ‘authentic’ identity.
2. Rapid social change: In modern society disrupts established norms and values,
resulting in anomie. The New Age provides a sense of certainty and truth in the
same way as sects.
3. Decline of organised religion: Modernity leads to secularisation, thereby
removing the traditional alternative to New Age beliefs. For example in the USA
the New Age is strongest where churchgoing is as its lowest, California

Religiosity and social groups

Gender and religiosity

● Davie notes there are gender differences in terms of religious practice, belief, self-
identification, private prayer and many other aspects of religiosity. For example:
1. Brierley: Most churchgoers are female and they are more likely than men attend
church regularly. Female churchgoers outnumber males by almost half a million.
2. Stat- British Social Attitudes Survey (2012): More women than men (55% vs.
44%) say they have a religion
3. Stat- British Social Attitudes Survey (2008): More women than men (38% versus
26%) say religion is important to them and more women (40% vs. 28%) describe
themselves as ‘spiritual’.
4. Voas-Stat (2015): Many fewer women than men (34% as against 54%) are
atheists or agnostics. Even among atheists, men are nearly twice as likely to say
they definitely do not believe in life after death.
5. Miller and Hoffman: In all major faiths in the UK except for Sikhs, women are
more likely than men to practise their religion.

Reasons for gender differences

Risk, socialisation and roles

● According to Miller and Hoffman, there are 3 main reasons for women’s higher levels of
religiosity.
● They suggest that gender differences in risk-taking are a reason for differences in
religiosity. By not being religious, people are risking that religion might be right and they
will be condemned to hell. As men are less risk-averse than women, they are more likely
to take the risk of not being religious
● Women are more religious because they are socialised to be more passive, obedient
and caring. These are qualities valued by most religions, so it follows that women are
 more likely than men to be attracted to religion. Interestingly, men who have these
qualities are also more likely to be religious.
● Miller and Hoffman note that women’s gender roles mean they are more likely than men
to work part/full-time carers, so they have more time to participate in religious activities.
● Women are also more likely to be attracted to the church as a source of gender identity,
and Greenley argues that their role in taking care of other family members increases
women;s religiosity because it involves responsibility for their ‘ultimate’ welfare as well
as their everyday needs.
● Davie argues that women are closer to birth and death and this brings them closer to
‘ultimate’ questions about the meaning of life that religion is concerned with. This also
fits with differences in the way men and women see God: men are more likely to see a
God of power and control, while women tend to see a God of love and forgiveness.

Paid work

● Bruce: argues that women’s religiosity is a result of their lower levels of involvement in
paid work. He links this to secularisation processes such as rationalisation.
● Over the past 2 centuries, this has gradually driven religion out of the male-dominated
public sphere of work, religion out of the male-dominated public sphere of work,
confining it to the private sphere of family and personal life- the sphere that women are
more concerned with. As religion has become privatised, so men’s religiosity has
declined more quickly than women’s.
● By the 1960s, many women had also taken on secular, masculinised roles in the public
sphere of paid work, and this led to what Callum Brown calls ‘the decline of female
piety’- women too were withdrawing from religion.
● Yet, despite the decline, religion remains more attractive to women than to men for at
least 2 reasons:
1. Religion has a strong affinity with values such as caring for others. Women
continue to have a primary role in caring for the young.
2. Men’s withdrawal from religion in the last 2 centuries meant that the churches
gradually became feminised spaces that emphasise women’s concerns such as
caring and relationships. Woodhead: argues that this continues to make religion
more attractive to women. The introduction of women priests in the Church of
England in 1994 and women bishops in 2015 may have reinforced this.

Women and the New Age

● As women are more often associated with ‘nature’ (e.g. childbirth) and a healing
role, they may be more attractive than men to New Age movements and ideas.
● E.g. Stat: Heelas and Woodhead found that 80% of the participants in the holistic
milieu in Kendal were female.
● This is because such movements often celebrate the ‘natural’ and involve cults of
healing, which gives women a higher status and sense of self-worth.
● Bruce: argues that women’s experience of child-rearing make them less
aggressive and goal-oriented, and are more cooperative and caring- where men
wish to achieve, women wish to feel. In Bruce’s view, this fits the expressive
emphasis of the New Age.
 ● Women may also be attracted to the New Age because it emphasises the
importance of being ‘authentic’ rather than merely acting out roles- including
gender roles. Women may be more attracted than men to this because they are
more likely to perceive their roles as restrictive.
● The individual sphere: women in paid work may experience a role conflict,
between their masculinised, instrumental role in the public sphere of work and
their traditional expressive feminine role in the private sphere of the family.
● Woodhead: suggests that for these women, New Age beliefs are attractive
because they appeal to a third sphere, which calls the individual sphere.
● The sphere is concerned with individual autonomy and personal growth rather
than role performance. New Age beliefs bypass the role conflict by creating a
new source of identity for women based on their ‘inner self’ rather than these
contradictory social roles, giving them a sense of wholeness.
● Callum Brown: argues that the New Age ‘self’ religions- those that emphasise
subjective experience rather than external authority-attract women recruits
because they appeal to women’s wish for autonomy. Some women may be
attracted to fundamentalism because of the certainties of a traditional gender role
that it prescribes for them.
● Class differences: Bruce points out that there are class differences in the type
of religion that appeal to women. While New Age beliefs and practices
emphasising personal autonomy, control and self-development appeal to some
middle-class women, working-class women are more attracted to ideas that give
them a passive role, such as belief in an all-powerful God or fatalistic ideas such
as superstition, horoscopes and lucky charms.
● These differences fit with other class differences in areas such as education,
where the middle-class belief in the ability of individuals to control their own
destiny contrasts with fatalistic working-class attitudes.

Women, compensators and sects

● Bruce: estimates that there are twice as many women as men involved in sects. One
explanation for this comes from the religious market theorists
● Stark and Bainbridge: they argue that people may participate in sects because they offer
compensators for organismic, ethical and social deprivation. These forms of deprivation
are more common among women and this explains their high level of sect membership:
1. Organismic deprivation → stems from physical and mental health problems. Women
are more likely to suffer ill health and thus to seek the healing that sects offer.
2. Ethical deprivation → women tend to be more morally conservative. They are more
likely to regard the world as being in moral decline and be attracted to sects, which often
share this view.
3. Social deprivation → sects attract poorer groups and women are more likely to be poor.

The Pentecostal gender paradox

● 1970s → Pentecostalism has grown rapidly in many parts of the world, particularly among the
poor. E.g. In Latin America an estimated 13% of the continent’s population are now members of
Pentecostal churches.
 ● Pentecostalism is generally regarded as a patriarchal form of religion: men are seen
both as head of household and head of the church (all clergy = male)
● Despite this, Pentecostalism has proved attractive to women.
● Bernic Martin: describes this as the ‘Pentecostal gender paradox’: why should
conservative patriarchal religion be attractive to women.
● Elizabeth Brusco’s study of Pentecostals: In Columbia, the answer lies in the fact that
Pentecostals demand that its followers adapt an ascetic (self-denying) lifestyle. This
resembles the personal discipline of the 16th century Calvinists. Pentecostalism also
insists on a traditional gender division of labour that requires men to provide for their
family.
● Pentecostal women can use these ideas to combat a widespread culture of machismo in
Latin America, where men often spend 20-40% of the household’s income on alcohol, as
well as further spending on tobacco, gambling and prostitutes. Pentecostal men are
pressured by their pastor and church community to change their ways, act responsibly
and redirect their income back into the household, thereby raising the standard of living
of women and children.
● Pentecostalism is not offering Wester-style women’s liberation: men retain their
headship role in the family and church. But as Brusco shows, Latin american women can
and do use Pentecostalism as a means of improving their position.
● Although Pentecostalism is patriarchal, its critique of the sexual irresponsibility and
wastefulness of machismo culture make it popular with women.
● Carol Ann Drogus: also notes that although official Pentecostal doctrine is that men
should have authority over women, church magazines and educational materials often
encourage more equal relations within marriage.

Recent trends

● Women remain more likely to be religious than men, there has been a decline in their
participation in religious activities in the UK.
● Traditional religions have tended to be closely bound up with traditional gender roles,
women’s rejection of subordination has led them to reject traditional religion at the same
time there has been a relatively modest participation to New Age beliefs and practices.

Ethnicity and religiosity

● Stat: Christians are about 72% of the population. There are significant numbers of
Muslims, Hindus and Sikhs, almost all of whom belong to ethnic minorities originating in
the Indian subcontinent, while many Christians are of black African or Caribbean origin.
● There are clear ethnic patterns in religious participation with higher than average rater
for most minority ethnic groups.
● Brierley: In London, church as whites. Muslim, Hindus and black Christians to see their
religion as important and to attend a place of worship every week. Among Christians,
blacks are more likely than whites to be found in Pentecostal churches, where they
make up 40% of the membership.
● However while minorities have higher participation rates, Modood et al: found some
decline in the importance of religion for all ethnic groups and that fewer were observant,
especially among the second generation.
Reasons for ethnic differences

● One is the idea that most ethnic minorities originate from poorer countries with traditional
cultures, both of which produce higher levels of religious belief and practice.
● In the UK, they and their children maintain the pattern they brought with them from their
country of origin. However, this disregards the impact of their experiences as immigrants
and as minorities in a new society, and how this may give religion a new role as a
cultural defence and cultural transition.

Cultural defence

● Bruce argues that religion in such situations offers support and a sense of cultural
identity in an uncertain or hostile environment.
● As Bird notes, religion among minorities can be a basis for community solidarity, a
means of preserving one’s culture and language, and a way of coping with oppression in
a racist society.
● In the case of black Africzn and Caribbean Christians, many found that white churches in
the UK did not actively welcome them and some turned to founding or joining black-led
churches, especially Pentecostal churches.
● Brierley: shows a significant growth of new churches in London catering for specific
languages and nationalities as a result of recent immigration

Cultural transition

● Religion can also be a means of easing the transition into a new culture by providing
support and a sense of community for minority groups in their new environment.
● Will Herberg: gives for high levels of religious participation among first-generation immigrants
into the UK, where religion has provided a focal point for Irish, African Caribbean, Muslim etc.
→ wider transition into the wider society, religion may lose its role and decline in importance.
● Pryce’s study of the African Caribbean Community: In Bristol, it shows both cultural
defence and cultural transition have been important.
● He argues that Pentecostalism is a highly adaptive ‘religion of the oppressed’ that
provided migrants with values appropriate to the new world in which they found
themselves.
● Pentecostalism helped African Caribbeans to adapt to British society, playing a kind of
‘Protestant Ethic’ role in helping its members succeed by encouraging self reliance and
thrift.
● It gave people mutual support and hope of improving their situation. On the other hand,
Rastafarianism represented a different response for some African Caribbeans radically
rejecting the wider society as racist and exploitative.

Age and religious participation

 ● The general pattern of religious participation is that the older a person is, the more likely
they are to attend religious services.
● But, the under 15s are more likely to go to church than those in most of the age groups
above them.
● This is because they may have less choice in the matter and are made to go by their
parents.
● For any given age group apart from those aged 65 and over, there is an ongoing fall in
church attendance, and the fall is sharpest among the young.
● Stat: the number of 15-19 year olds is projected to fall by half between 2015 and 2025.
From 126,000 to 63,000- as Brierley notes by 2025, 15-19 yer olds will be a mere 2.5%
of all churchgoers. Half of all English churches have no-one under 20 attending.

Reasons for age differences

● Voas and Crockett: suggest three possible explanations for age differences in religiosity.
● The ageing effect: This is the view that people turn to religion as they get older. For
example, using evidence from the Kendal Project, Heelas (2005): argues that people
become more interested in spirituality as they age. As we approach death, we ‘naturally’
become more concerned about spiritual matters and the afterlife, repentance of past
misdeeds and so on. As a result, we are more likely to go to Church.
● The period or cohort effect: People born during a particular period may be more of less
likely to religious because of the particular events they lived through, such as war or
rapid social changes.
● Secularisation: As religion declines in importance, each generation becomes less
religious than the one before it.
● Voas and Crockett: found little evidence for either of the first 2 explanations. Instead,
they argue that secularisation is their main reason why younger people are less religious
than older people.
● They found that in each succeeding generation, only half as many people are religious
compared with the generation before it.
● Arweck and Beckford: described as the ‘virtual collapse of religious socialisation’ after
the 1960s. For example, traditional Sunday schools, which in the 1950s enrolled as
1/3rd of all 14-year olds, have all but disappeared.
● Voas: even parents who share the same faith, for example, where both are Anglicans
have only a 50/50 chance of raising their child to be a churchgoer as an adult.
● When they are of different faiths which are on the increase, the chances fall to one in
four.
● Therefore likely to see a steadily ageing population of churchgoers. In 2015, one in three
were aged 65 or over. By 2025, this will be over four in ten and without significant
numbers of young people joining the congregations, within two or three generations
practising Christians will have become a very small and very old minority of the UK
population.
Topic Summary

TOPIC 7 → IDEOLOGY AND SCIENCE

SCIENCE AS A BELIEF SYSTEM

THE IMPACT OF SCIENCE

● Science has had an enormous impact on society over the last few centuries.
● Its achievements in medicine have eradicated many once fatal diseases. Many basic
features of daily life today- transport, communications, work and leisure- would be
unrecognisable in the recent past due to scientific and technological development.
● Science and technology have revolutionised economic productivity and raised our
standard of living to previously undreamt of heights.
● This success has led to widespread faith in ‘science’- a belief that it can ‘deliver the
goods’.
● This faith has been somewhat dimmed by a recognition that science may cause
problems as well as resolve them. Pollution, global warming and weapons of mass
destruction are as much a product of science and technology as are space flight,
‘wonder drugs’ and the internet.
 ● While science may have developed to protect us from natural dangers such as disease
and famine, it has created its own ‘manufactured risks’ that increasingly threaten the
planet.
● Both the ‘good’ and ‘bad’ effects of science demonstrate the key feature distinguishing it
from other belief systems or knowledge-claims- that is, its cognitive power. In other
words, science enables us to explain, predict and control the world in a way that non-
scientific belief systems cannot do.

Open belief systems

● Karl Popper: science is an ‘open’ belief system where every scientist’s theories are open
to scrutiny, criticism and testing by others.
● Theories are open to scrutiny, criticism and testing by others. Science is governed by the
principle of falsification. That is, scientists set out to try and falsify existing theories,
deliberately seeking evidence that would disprove them.
● If the evidence from an experiment or observation contradicts a theory and shows it to
be false, the theory can be discarded and the search for a better explanation can begin.
● In science, knowledge- claims live or die by the evidence.
● Poppers: discarding falsified knowledge-claims is what enables scientific understanding
of the world to grow. Scientific knowledge is cumulative- it builds upon the achievements
of previous scientists to develop a greater understanding of the world around us.
● Despite the achievement of great scientists such as Newton, no theory is ever to be
taken as definitely true- there will always be someone to disapprove of it. E.g. the sun
revolved around the earth until Copernicus demonstrated that this knowledge claim was
false.
● In Popper’s view, the key thing about scientific knowledge is that it is not sacred or
absolute truth- it can always be questioned, criticised, tested and be false.

The CUDOS norms

● Functionalist, Robert Merton: argues that science can only thrive as a major social
institution if it receives support from other institutions and values.
● He argues that this first occurred in England as a result of the values and attitudes
created by the Protestant reformation especially Puritanism (a form of Calvinism). The
Puritans’ this-worldly calling and industriousness, and their belief that the study of nature
led to an appreciation for God's works, encouraged them to experiment.
● Puritanism also stressed social welfare and they were attracted by the fact that science
could produce technological inventions to improve the conditions of life.
● The new institution of science also received support from economic and military
institutions as the values of the practical applications of science became obvious in
areas such as mining, navigation and weaponry.
● Merton: science as an institution or organised social activity needs an ‘ethos’ or set of
norms that make scientists act in ways that serve the goal of increasing scientific
knowledge. He identifies four such norms, known as ‘CUDOS’.
1. Communism: scientific knowledge is not private property. Scientists must share it
with the scientific community by publishing findings otherwise knowledge cannot
grow.
 2. Universalism: the truth or falsity of scientific knowledge us judged by universal,
objective critearia such as testing, and not by the particular race, sex etc. of the
scientist that produces it.
3. Disinterestedness: means being committed to discovering knowledge for its own
sake. Having to publish their findings makes it harder for scientists to practise
fraud, since it enables others to check their claims.
4. Organised Scepticism: no knowledge-claim is regarded as ‘sacred’. Every idea is
open to questioning, criticism and objective investigation.

Closed belief systems

● Science appears to differ fundamentally from traditional religious belief systems. While
scientific knowledge is provisional, open to challenge and potentially disprovable,
religion claims to have special, perfect knowledge of the absolute truth.
● Its knowledge is literally sacred and religious organisations claim to hold it on God’s
divine authority. This means that it cannot be challenged- and those who do so may be
punished for their heresy.
● It also means that religious knowledge does not change- how could it, if it already has
the absolute truth? Unlike scientific knowledge, therefore, it is fixed and does not grow.
● Robert Horton → he distinguishes between open and closed belief systems. Like Popper, he sees
science as an open belief system- one where knowledge claims are open to criticism and can be
disproved by testing.
● By contrast, religion, magic and many other belief systems are closed. They make
knowledge- claims that cannot be successfully overturned. Whenever its fundamental
beliefs are threatened, a closed belief system has a number of devices or ‘get-out
clauses’ that reinforce the system and prevent it from being disproved- at least in the
eyes of its believers.
● These devices vary from one belief system to another. One example is witchcraft beliefs.
Edward Evans-Pritchard’s classic anthropological study of the Azande people of the
Sudan illustrates Horton’s idea of a self-reinforcing, closed belief system.

Witchcraft among the Azande

● Like Westerners, the Azande believe that natural events = natural causes.
● However, unlike most Westerners, the Azande do not believe in coincidence of chance.
Thus, when misfortune befalls the Azande, they may explain it in terms of witchcraft.
Someone- probably a jealous neighbour- is practising witchcraft against me.
● In such cases, the injured party may make an accusation against the suspected witch
and the matter may be resolved by consulting the prince’s magic poison oracle.
● The prince’s diviner, at the same time will administer a potion (‘benge’) to a chicken, at
the same time asking the benge whether the accused is the source of the witchcraft and
telling it to kill the chicken if the answer is ‘Yes’. If the chicken dies, the sufferer can go
and publicly demand the witchcraft to stop.
● Because the Azande regard witchcraft as a psychic power coming from a substance
located in the witch’s intestines, and it is believed possible that the witch is doing harm
unintentionally and unconsciously.
 ● This allows the accused to proclaim their surprise and horror, to apologise and promise
that there will be no further bewitching.
● Evans-Pritchard argues that this belief system performs useful social functions. It not only
clears the air and prevents grudges from festering; it encourages neighbours to behave
considerately towards one another to reduce the risk of an accusation. Since, the Azande believe
witchcraft is hereditary, children have a vested interest in keeping their parents in line, since a
successful accusation against the parent also damages the child’s reputation → belief system is an
important social control mechanism ensuring conformity and cooperation.
● This belief system is highly resistant to challenges- that is, it is a closed system that
cannot be overturned by the evidence. E.g. non-believers might argue that if the benge
killed the chicken without the diviner first addressing the potion, this would be a decisive
test showing that the oracle did not work.
● However, for the Azande, such an outcome would just prove that it was not a good
benge. As Evans-Pritchard says ‘The very fact of the fowl dying proves to them it's
badness. Thus, the ‘test’ does not disprove the belief system in the eyes of the believer;
instead, it actually reinforces it. The believers are trapped within their own ‘idiom of
belief’ or way of thinking. Because they accept the system’s basic assumptions (such as
the existence of witchcraft), they cannot challenge it.

Self-sustaining beliefs

● Polyani → argued that all belief systems have 3 devices to sustain themselves in the face of
apparently contradictory evidence:
1. Circularity → Each idea in the system is explained in terms of another idea within the system and
so on, round and round.
2. Subsidiary explanations → E.g. if the oracle fails, it may be explained away as due to the
incorrect use of the benge
3. Denial of legitimacy to rivals → belief systems reject alternative worldviews by refusing to
grant any legitimacy to their basic assumptions. E.g. creationism rejects outright the
evolutionists’ knowledge-claim that the earth is billions of years old, and therefore that species
have gradually evolved rather than having been created.

Science as a closed system

● Polyani argued that all belief systems reject fundamental challenges to their knowledge-
claims- science is no different, as the case of Dr Velikovsky indicates: His theory
challenges some of the fundamental assumptions of geology, astronomy and
evolutionary biology.
● One explanation for scientists’ refusal even to consider such challenges comes from
Thomas Kuhn → he argues that a mature science such as geology, biology or physics is based
on a set of shared assumptions- paradigm. The paradigm tells scientists what reality is like,
what problems to study and what methods and equipment to use, what will count as
evidence, and even what answers they should find when they conduct research. For
most of the time, scientists are engaged in normal science, which Kuhn likens to puzzle
solving- the paradigm lays down the broad outlines and the scientists’ job is to carefully
fill in the details. Those who do so successfully are rewarded with bigger research
grants, professorships, Nobel Prizes etc.
 ● Scientific education and training is a process of being socialised into faith in the truth of
the paradigm, and a successful career depends on working within the paradigm.
● For these reasons, any scientist who challenges the fundamental assumptions of the
paradigm, as Velikovsky did, is likely to be ridiculed and hounded out of the profession.
● Others in the scientific community will no longer regard him or her as a scientist at all.
The only exceptions to this are during one of the rare periods that Kuhn describes as a
scientific revolution, when faith in the truth of the paradigm has already been
undermined by an accumulation of anomalies- results that the paradigm cannot account
for. Only then do scientists become open to radically new ideas.

The sociology of scientific knowledge

● Interpretivist sociologists have developed Kuhn’s ideas further. They argue that all
knowledge- including scientific knowledge is socially constructed.
● That is, rather than being objective truth, it is created by social groups using the
resources available to them.
● In the case of science, scientific ‘facts’- those things that scientists take to be true and
real- are the product of shared theories and paradigms that tell them what they should
expect.
● Karin Knorr-Cetina: argues that the invention of new instruments, such as telescopes or
microscopes, permits scientists to make new observations and construct or ‘fabricate’
new facts.
● Similarly, she points out that what scientists study in the laboratory is highly ‘constructed’
and far removed from the natural world that they are supposedly studying. E.g. water is
specially purified, animals specially bred and so on.

Little green men

● The ethnomethodologist Steve Woolgar (1992) → scientists are engaged in the same process
of ‘making sense’ or interpreting the world as everyone else.
● When confronted by ‘evidence’ from their observations and experiments, they have to
decide what it means. They do so by devising and applying theories or explanations, but
they then have to persuade others to accept their interpretation.
● E.g The discovery of ‘pulsars’ (pulsating neutron stars) by researchers at the Cambridge
astronomy laboratory in 1967, the scientists initially annotated the patterns show on their
printouts from the radio telescope as LGM1, LGM2 and etc- standing for ‘Little Green
Men’.
● Recognising that this was an unacceptable interpretation from the viewpoint of the
scientific community (and one that would have finished their careers had they published
it), they eventually settled on the notion that the patterns represented the signals from a
type of star hitherto unknown to science. There is still disagreement among astronomers
as to what the signals really meant.
● Woolgar notes, a scientific fact is simply a social construction or belief that scientists are
able to persuade their colleagues to share-not necessarily a real thing ‘out there’.

Marxism, feminism and postmodernism

 ● Marxism and feminism see scientific knowledge as far from pure truth. Instead, they
regard it as serving the interests of dominant groups- the ruling class in the case of
Marxists, and men in the case of feminists.
● Many advances in supposedly ‘pure’ science have been driven by the need of capitalism
for certain types of knowledge. E.g. theoretical work on ballistics (the study of the path
followed by objects under the influence of gravity) was driven by the need to develop
new weaponry.

Ideology

● Ideology → worldview or a set of ideas and values- a belief system. These often include
negative aspects such as:
1. Distorted, false or mistaken ideas about the world, or a partial, one-sided or
biased view of reality
2. Ideas that conceal the interests of a particular group, or that legitimate (justify)
their privileges
3. Ideas that prevent change by misleading people about the reality of the situation
they are in or about their own true interests or position
4. A self-sustaining belief system that is irrational and closed to criticism
● The term ideology to describe a belief system, it means they regard it as factually and/or
morally wrong.
● Similarly, biological ideas have been used to justify both male domination and colonial
expansion. In this respect, science can be seen as a form of ideology.

Marxism and ideology

● Marxism sees society as divided into 2 opposed classes: a minority capitalist ruling class who
own the means of production and control the state, and a majority working class who are
propertyless → forced to sell their labour to the capitalists.
● The capitalists class take advantage of this, exploiting the workers’ labour to produce
profit. It is therefore in the workers’ interests to overthrow capitalism by means of a
socialist revolution and replace it with a classless communist society in which the means
of production are collectively, not privately, owned and used to benefit society as a
whole.
● For this revolution to occur, the working class must first become conscious of their true position
as exploited ‘wage slaves’ → they must develop class consciousness. However, the ruling class
control the means of material production (factories, land etc.); they also control the means of
production of ideas, through institutions such as education, mass media and religion. These
produce ruling-class ideology- ideas that legitimate or justify the status quo (the existing
social set up).
● Ruling class ideology includes idea and beliefs such as:
1. That equality will never work because it goes against ‘human nature’
2. Victim blaming ideas about poverty, such as what Bowles and Gintis call ‘the
poor are dumb; theory of meritocracy: everyone has an equal chance in life, so
the poor must be poor because they are stupid are lazy.
3. Racist ideas about the inferiority of ethnic minorities which divide black and white
workers and make them easier to rule.
 ● Thus the dominant ideas are the ideas of the ruling class and they function to prevent
change by creating a false consciousness among the workers. However, despite these
ideological barriers, Marx believes that ultimately the working class will develop a true
class consciousness and unite to overthrow capitalism.

Hegemony and revolution

● The idea is developed further by Antonio Gramsci → refers to the ruling class’ ideological
domination of society as hegemony. He argues that the working class can develop ideas that
challenge ruling-class hegemony.
● This is because in a capitalist society, workers have a dual consciousness - a mixture of
ruling-class ideology and ideas they develop from their own experience of exploitation
and their struggles against it. Therefore possible for the working class to develop class
consciousness and overthrow capitalism.
● In Gramsci’s view, this requires a political party of ‘organic intellectuals’- that is, workers
who through their anti-capitalist struggles have developed a class consciousness.
● But, some critics argue that it is not the existence of a dominant ideology that keeps the
workers in line and prevents attempts to overthrow capitalism. E.g. Abercrombie et al →
argue that it is economic factors such as the fear of unemployment that keep workers from
rebelling.

The ideology of nationalism

● Nationalism is an important political ideology; that claims:

1. Nationals are real, distinctive communities each with its own unique
characteristics and a long, shared history.
2. Every nation should be self-governing
3. National loyalty and identity should come before all others, such as tribe, class or
religion.
● Benedict Anderson → argues that a nation is only an ‘imagined community’, not a real one.
Although we identify with it, we will never know most of its other members. This imagined
community can bind millions of strangers together and create a sense of common purpose.

Marxism: nationalism as false consciousness

● Marx was an internationalist. His Communist Manifesto → end with the words, ‘Workers of
all countries unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains. You have a world to win’.
● In the Marxist view, nationalism is a form of false class consciousness that helps to
prevent the overthrow of capitalism by dividing the international working class.
● This is because nationalism encourages workers to believe they have more in common
with the capitalists of their own country than with workers of other countries. This has
enabled the ruling class of each capitalist country to persuade the working class to fight
wars on their behalf.
Functionalism: nationalism as civil religion

● Functionalists see nationalism as a secular civil religion. Like religion, it integrates

individuals into larger social and political units by making them feel part of something
greater than themselves.
● In modern secular societies, people may be unwilling to believe in supernatural beings
but may be willing to see themselves as part of a nation. Modern societies also often
contain many different faiths, so religion is likely to be a source of division. By contrast,
nationalism functions as a civil religion that unites everyone into a single national
community, regardless of differences such as religion or class.
● For functionalists, education plays an important part in creating social solidarity, and this
may include collective rituals involving nationalist symbols such as the flag and national
anthem, as well as learning the nation’s history (which may be more myth than fact).

Gellner: nationalism and modernity

● Ernest Gellner → also sees nationalism as false consciousness: its claim nations have existed
since time immemorial is untrue. On the contrary, in Gellner’s view, nationalism is a very
modern phenomenon. Pre-industrial societies were held together not by nationalism, but by face-
to-face relationships in small-scale communities with a fixed hierarchy of ascribed statuses.
● Modern society is very different. Industrialisation creates large-scale, impersonal
societies with a complex division of labour, administered by vast bureaucracies, and
where all citizens are of relatively equal status (e.g. all are equal before the law).
● Moder states therefore need some means of enabling communication between to take
place, especially in the economy. This is what nationalism make possible, by using a
mass state education system to impose a single, standard, national culture and
language on every member of society. Similarly, nationalism regards all citizens as equal
and this makes economic and social cooperation between them easier.
● Gellner also notes that elites use nationalism as an ideology to motivate the population
to endure the hardships and suffering that accompany the first phase of industrialisation,
thereby enabling a state to modernise.

Karl Manheim: ideology and utopia

● Karl Manheim’s work on ideology was done between the two World wars- a time of
intense political and social conflict- and this undoubtedly influenced his views.
● Manheim → sees all belief systems as a partial or one-sided worldview. Their one-sidedness
results from being the viewpoint of one particular group or class and its interests. This leads him
to distinguish between 2 broad types of belief system or worldview:
1. Ideological thought: justifies keeping things as they are. It reflects the position
and interests the position and interests of privileged groups such as the capitalist
class. These groups benefit from maintaining the status quo, so their belief
system tends to be conservative and favours hierarchy.
2. Utopian thought: justifies social change. It reflects the position and interests of
the underprivileged and offers a vision of how society could be organised
differently. E.g. the working class are disadvantaged by the status quo and may
 favour radical change to a classless society. Manheim sees Marxism as an
example of utopian thought.
● Manheim sees the worldviews as creations groups of intellectuals who attach
themselves to particular classes. E.g. The role of Gramsci’s organic intellectuals is to
create a working-class or socialist worldview.
● However, because these intellectuals represent the interests of particular groups, and
not society as a whole, they only produce partial views of reality. The belief system of
each class or group only gives us a partial truth about the world.
● For Manheim, this is a source of conflict in society. Different intellectuals, linked to
different groups and classes, produce opposed and antagonistic ideas that justify the
interests and claim of their group as against the others.

The free-floating intelligentsia

● In Manheim’s view, the solution is therefore to ‘detach’ the intellectuals from the social
groups they represent and create a non-aligned or free-floating intelligentsia standing
above the conflict.
● Freed from representing the interests of this or that group, they would be able to
synthesise elements of the different partial ideologies and utopias so as to arrive at a
‘total’ worldview that represented the interests of society as a whole.
● However, many of the elements of different political ideologies are diametrically opposed
to one another and it is hard to imagine how these could be synthesised. For example,
how could Marxist ideas about the need to create a classless society be synthesised
with the conservative idea that hierarchy is essential and beneficial.

Feminism and ideology

● Feminists see gender inequality as the fundamental division in society and patriarchal
ideology as playing a key role in legitimating it.
● Because gender difference is a feature of all societies, there exist many different
ideologies to justify it. E.g. Pauline Marks → describes how ideas from science have been
used to justify excluding women from education.
● She quotes 19th C (male) doctors, scientists and educationalists expressing the view
that educating females would lead to the creation of ‘a new race of puny and unfeminine’
females and ‘disqualify women from their true vocation’, namely the nurturing of the next
generation.
● In addition to patriarchal ideologies in science, those embodied in religious beliefs and
practices have also been used to define women as inferior. There are numerous
examples from a wide range of religions of the idea that women are ritually impure or
unclean, particularly because of childbirth or menstruation.
● This has given rise to given birth. In some Christian churches, a new mother may not
receive communion until after she has been churched.
● But, not all elements of religious belief systems subordinate women. E.g. there is
evidence that, before the emergence of the monotheistic patriarchal religions,
matriarchal religions with female deities were widespread, with female priests and the
celebration of fertility cults. Similarly in Hinduism, goddesses have often been portrayed
as creators of the universe.