In much of the writing on secularization and secularism, it appears that the secularists are right – religion is not only a poison to modern cultures, but it is on its way out soon. This is only pronounced as we can tell by the number of books sold in this genre especially among uber-athiest evangelist authors Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins. However, Mickelthwaite & Wooldridge in their book God is Back: How the Global Rise of Faith Will Change the World, offer us a volume that argues the secularists are in fact wrong. Not only is the place of religion in the world becoming more pronounced, it is expanding not only its numbers, but also its political influence. As Stark & Finke argued in Acts of Faith (2000) secularization is incorrect – especially in American religion.
As secularization has been told, as a culture becomes more modern as an expansion of knowledge in all things scientific and technical, less room will be needed for anything like God and so, religions will move to the deviant periphery of a given society. However, as Stark & Finke argue, if people are given a choice to practice religion and religions are in social environments that foster adaptation and competition among religion, religion will thrive. For Stark & Finke places where religion does not thrive are ares where political and social circumstances create religious monopolies such as state churches in which religion simply cannot compete and adapt on equal footing. The state church, having no incentive to improve as a result of no competition, becomes mired in repetition and institutional self-justification all supported by the state or, in Germany as an example, with public tax revenues.
Mickelthwaite & Wooldridge argue something slightly different while still applying this market theory to their analysis of religion. It is not so much the competitive advantage of a free market that allows religion to thrive as it is the ability for members of a society to self-constitute and self-regulate their religious practices and cultures. With no external negative reinforcement of punishments like oppressive political structures, people have a tendency to explore and form religious practices and niches in a society as structures that are politically and socially regulative of people's behaviors. Indeed, in concert with Stark & Finke among others, as a political structure opens up to allow greater social and individual liberty, religion becomes a more potent and integrated phenomenon that adapts to sub-cultures and local subsets in a society.
Stark & Finke's thesis is precisely what Micklethwaite & Wooldridge argue, but expand the thesis to the political frameworks that are shaping European and Middle Eastern religion specifically, and other Muslim and Hindu nations as well. It is their thesis, in agreement with Grace Davie, that European secularization, to be sure well-entrenched and not likely to give too much ground, is an exception to the rule, not the norm. Secularization is not an outcome of modernization, but pluralism is. As nations adapt to modernization, many are behind the curve set by the post-industrial world, they will foster religious pluralism, religious choice, and religions will adapt to religious choice and behavior. In short, it is the American model of religious pluralism that Micklethwait and Wooldridge argue is more likely to spread as nations continue to modernize.
This is a fantastic read, accurate presentation, and incisive in its political depth as a volume to understand the interaction between religion, politics, and modernization in the global economy.
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