1
Olivier Tschannen
Université de Fribourg
Switzerland
A HISTORY OF THE SECULARIZATION ISSUE
Original unpublished English version
of the book published in French under the title
Les théories de la sécularisation, Genève: Droz, 1992
Written at the University of Wisconsin at Madison
1989-1990
INTRODUCTION
The main purpose of this study is to provide a sociologically informed history of the secularization issue as is has been discussed among sociologists. The implications of this formulation are threefold. First, this is a studyin the history of ideas. It is not a discussion of the problem of religion in the modern world. Nor is it a defense, a refutation, or even an evaluation of the validity of "secularization theory". Although the analysis sometimes uncovers the weaknesses or strengths of certain theories, and does occasionally reflect on their relation to empirical data, this is done only incidentally. Furthermore, even though I do dismiss claims put forward by certain theories, this is done only from the point of view of the history of ideas. Certain theories in effect present themselves as almost revolutionary, whereas in reality, they contain nearly nothing new. Claims of this sort have to be dismissed.
Second, the history presented here is sociologically informed. An interpretation can be properly understood only if the social background in which it plunges its roots is taken into account. Accordingly, as far as this was possible, I have written a history not only of ideas, but of the persons who put forward these ideas, and of the social contexts, in particular the scholarly communities, in which these persons were embedded. But perhaps more significantly, the whole account given here is organized according to a sociological conception of sociological theory. This conception is not normative, but descriptive: it does not tell us what sociological theory ought to be, but rests content with an empirical description of a particular type of theory construction. Specifically, I will be arguing that the recurrent emphasis on theory-construction in sociology is exaggerated; that the sociological enterprise - at least as exemplified by the secularization issue - rests not so much on formal theories and definitions, but on simple analogies and examples. In other words, this book is not only a contribution to the history of sociology, but also to the sociology of intellectual knowledge.
Third, the focus of this study is on sociologicaltheories. The numerous theological and philosophical implications of secularization are only briefly touched upon. Unlike the great majority of sociologists who concern themselves with religion, I have no personal religious commitment. However, I am not an atheist, nor even a very systematic agnostic. As a matter of fact, until I started this work, I had never been interested in religion - not even from an academic viewpoint. The original incentive for this work was an interest in what Berger and Luckmann have called the social construction of reality - a topic that can, but need not, be discussed with reference to religion. In carrying out the research, I have remained faithful to this initial commitment to sociology as a frame of reference. Accordingly, if this book can claim to contribute to anything besides a better knowledge of the history of secularization theory, it is not to our knowledge of religion in the modern world, but to our understanding of the sociological enterprise.
Of course, these considerations do not suffice as yet to delineate my field of investigation. For it is not immediately clear what is to be understood under the "secularization issue". The notion of secularization can be defined in a number of ways and, no matter which definition one adopts, one finds that some authors speak of "secularization" without ever using the word, while others use the word while actually speaking of something else. Accordingly, any investigation in the history of this issue must rest on two preliminary decisions. The first is the definition of secularization. For reasons that will become evident in the course of this study, I will consider that a secularization theory is a body of propositions that gives an account of the situation of religion in the modern world, and that describes the evolution which led to this situation. The second decision concerns the fate of all uses of the term "secularization" that are not consistent with the chosen definition. Strictly speaking, they could be ignored. But this would greatly restrict the significance of the findings. Typically, debates among sociologists are defined by the addition of a problematic and of a term. Experience shows that, even though some uses of a term are irrelevant to a given problematic, they still impose themselves upon the discussion. Accordingly, this study is focused on the sociological theories that concern the situation of religion in the modern world (although some of these are not designated as "secularization theories"), but will not neglect uses of the term "secularization" which should in principle not concern this problematic.
Throughout this historical investigation, I will be arguing that the meaning of a text cannot be properly understood if one ignores the intentions of its author. As the same principle applies to the present text, it is only fair that I should outline what were my own intentions in writing it. This is especially important since these intentions might easily be misinterpreted, which might in turn give rise to a biased reading of the present book. As I do not spare my criticisms against certain facile and superficial reproaches addressed to "secularization theory", some readers might be tempted to conclude that my main intention has been to defend and rehabilitate the "secularization thesis". Nothing could be further from the truth. Not only because I am not very deeply involved personally in the secularization issue. But, more significantly, because my intention when I started this work was exactly the opposite. As the original dissertation proposal out of which this book grew testifies, one of my intentions was to demonstrate that secularization theory was nothing but a modern myth, or ideology of modernity - not that I had any personal reasons to dislike "secularization theory" (I did not really know it); but this approach appeared to me a convenient way to address the problematic which I was interested in: the social construction of reality. At the beginning of my research, I had been very taken in by certain criticisms of "secularization theory", and eagerly set out to uncover the mythical aspects contained in it. I hoped to be able to show that, in modern societies, sociology had taken over the role once played by religion in the construction of a coherent cosmos. However, very much to my dismay, the more I read the works of modern proponents of the "secularization thesis", the less I found reason to consider them ideological. During a few months, I felt that I would be unable to live up to the intention encapsulated in my dissertation proposal, and that I would have to abandon the whole enterprise. But I pressed on, and in doing so, my intention drastically altered. My aim was no longer to show that secularization theorists were wrong, but only to find a way to reorient my dissertation! Eventually, I found a solution to my dilemma: The people who considered secularization theory mythical were wrong, and I had been tricked by them, but at least, I felt that I was able to explain why. Not only why they were wrong (factually), but what, in the history of the field, helped explain why they had come to hold these opinions. And the only way to succeed in explaining this was in giving as complete as possible an account of the genesis of "modern secularization theory". Such, I feel, is the intention that lies behind my enterprise.
The main sources used for this history are the usual written ones: books, scattered articles, main journals in the sociology of religion, textbooks, acts of conferences, bulletins of professional associations, and the Social Science Citation Index. But an additional and very valuable source was provided by a series of formal and informal discussions with specialists in the field as well as with some other sociologists and theologians. The formal part of the investigation included twenty tape-recorded interviews with sociologists of religion, carried out in the framework of international conferences. I have made no systematic content analysis of these interviews, but have used them freely to bolster my understanding of the problem at hand. Some of the information obtained in this way is very personal - and sometimes polemical - and could not be printed, but used only as background. Some blunt remarks made during the interviews had to be revised afterwards to allow for publication (but this is always indicated). In most cases, however, quotations from the interviews have been directly integrated in the text or in the footnotes.
The most difficult and painful (as well as exhilarating) phase in any research is the entry into a completely new and unknown field. In this research, I have repeatedly had to immerse myself into unfamiliar areas of knowledge and foreign intellectual communities. These adventures would have been impossible without the help and the support of people familiar with these topics and at home in these social circles. The first incentive to study the subject of secularization came from my dissertation supervisor, Giovanni Busino, in long and repeated discussions over lunch. Without his help, I would never have been able to transform the vague problematic that interested me into a concrete research. And, I might add, without his advice and his tolerant attitude all along my endeavor, I might have abandoned the enterprise altogether.
As a result of the choice of secularization as a topic, the next step was the familiarization with religion as a subject of research. I was helped in this by my colleague Maya Burger, with whom I attended a very enlightening seminar on the history of religion given by Carl Keller. At a later stage, I received support and advice from a number of theologians and sociologists who had more intimate contact than I with religion, most notably Shaffique Keshavjee, Bernard Raymond, Richard Schoenherr, Jacques Waardenburg, and a number of participants in the Séminaire romand de troisième cycle de théologie. While in the United States, I took advantage of the religious pluralism prevalent in this country to attend a number of religious services in different congregations. I hope that, through these contacts, I have been able to develop a certain measure of empathy for the religious experience.
The next step was to penetrate into the international community of researchers in religion. I was greatly helped in this by Roland Campiche, then Secretary General of the Conférence Internationale de Sociologie des Religions. He proposed that I conduct a series of interviews to gain greater insight into the social processes behind the scene, an idea that had a great impact on my research. Further familiarization was made possible through participation in major international conferences on the sociology of religion: the CISR meetings in Tübingen and Helsinki, the meeting of the Comité de recherche sociologie de la religion of the AISLF in Geneva, the SSSR meeting in Salt Lake City, and the ASR meeting in WashingtonD.C.
When I was ready to start writing the dissertation out of which this monograph grew, I moved to the University of Wisconsin at Madison, where I benefited from support and friendly criticism. Charles Camic introduced me to the world of Quentin Skinner, and helped me tremendously all along by sharing with me his experience in writing intellectual history and his knowledge of American sociology. Warren Hagstrom guided my steps in my investigations into the sociology of science, and drew my attention to many a point I had overlooked in my utilization of the works of Thomas Kuhn and others. Joyce Sexton, from the Writing Lab, assisted me very efficiently in dealing with my difficulties with the English language and in my search for a more concise and precise style. I have also benefited much from exchanges in a seminar on the history of social science directed by Victor Hilts (department of history of science), and from discussions in an informal seminar with other dissertators: Su-Jen Huang, Steven Lybrand, and Richard Randell. Other friends and advisors have read my papers and helped me with their comments. I am grateful especially to Pierre Ammann, Godehard Baeck, Alexander Bergmann, Meerten ter Borg, Claudia Dubuis, Robert Alun Jones, Franco Panese, Jean-Pierre Sironneau, Laurent Thévoz, and Stephen Warner.
In addition to providing support and advice, several of the persons mentioned above have read and thoroughly criticized hundreds of pages of the working papers and drafts out of which this manuscript grew. That their name should be mentioned twice is by no means excessive. The final form of this study owes much to the constructive criticism of the members of the dissertation committee and of my advisors in Madison: Giovanni Busino, Karel Dobbelaere, Pierre Gisel, René Lévy, Charles Camic, Warren Hagstrom, Richard Lachmann, and Richard Schoenherr. To all of them, I wish to express my warmest thanks for their prolonged and patient effort, and my regrets for not always having been able to improve this study along the lines they had suggested.
Finally, I am very grateful to the twenty persons who took one or two hours from their time in Lausanne, Geneva, Konstanz, Helsinki, and Salt Lake City for interviews: Yoshiya Abe, Eileen Barker, Jim Beckford, Roland Campiche, Karel Dobbelaere, Richard Fenn, Antonio Grumelli, Danièle Hervieu-Léger, Christian Lalive d'Epinay, Leo Laeyendecker, Thomas Luckmann, Emile Poulat, José Prades, Jean Rémy, Roland Robertson, Wade Clark Roof, Jean Séguy, Liliane Voyé, Jean-Paul Willaime, and Bryan Wilson.
This research would not have been possible without the support of a number of institutions. The Department of Sociology of the University of Wisconsin at Madison invited me to be an Honorary Fellow for two years (fall 1989-fall 1991), during which I enjoyed the most nearly perfect conditions I could hope for to write this study. Adequate financial support was provided by the Swiss National Science Foundation (Commission de la recherche de Lausanne), the Fondation du 450e anniversaire de l'Université de Lausanne, the Fondation Van Walsem, the Société Académique Vaudoise, and the Faculté des Sciences Sociales et Politiquesde l'Université de Lausanne.
CHAPTER 1
SECULARIZATION THEORY IN A KUHNIAN PERSPECTIVE
Since Max Weber at least, sociologists have been aware that the objects of scientific enquiry are not simply given, but must be constructed, and that this can be done only at the cost of what French sociologists call an epistemological break (Bourdieu et al. 1968, pp.27-34; pp. 51-54), that is, a break with the common, socially given, perception. But when they turn to studying their own discipline, sociologists often fall back to a more comfortable position. They accept, as would-be "external" observers, the understanding of the field which they have as insiders. In other words, they take their familiarity with sociology as practitioners as sufficient to allow them to dispense with the usual epistemological standards. In historical investigations, this attitude often results in "presentism", that is, a reduction of past theoretical preoccupations to those current in the discipline at the time of the analysis (Jones 1977).
Nothing is more revealing of this situation than the usual approaches to "secularization theory". Sociologists who investigate this field never construct "secularization theory" as an object: they consider it as given[1]. But, as disagreements and divergences among them show, in reality there is no such pre-defined object as "modern secularization theory". Indeed, the very definition of "secularization theory" is itself part of the secularization debate.
Secularization as a Theory
The debate about secularization is twofold. Not only do sociologists debate about whether secularization has happened or not; they also debate over the question whether "secularization theory" exists or not, and what this theory exactly is. This second aspect of the debate is just as important as the first one. As Pierre Bourdieu has shown in La distinction (1979), scientific definitions of reality must always be situated in a social field. This is true not only for concepts like "class", which seek to account for "social reality" through theories, but also for meta-discursive concepts, which seek to describe these theories themselves. The different definitions of the field of "secularization theory" given by different actors in the social field of sociology cannot be reduced to purely methodological or theoretical divergences: in Bourdieu's terminology, they must also be understood as efforts in the struggle for the monopoly of symbolic violence inside of the field (1976, pp.113-20).
To illustrate: Criticisms against "the secularization thesis" are sometimes based on the contention that the concept of secularization is unclear, that the theory is contradictory, incomplete, indeed inexistent. Thus for instance Jeffrey Hadden (a critic of "secularization theory") contends that secularization is "a hodgepodge of loosely employed ideas rather than a systematic theory", and that "the theory has not been systematically stated" (1987, pp. 598-99). To this charge, Frank Lechner (a defender of "secularization theory") answers that "by strongly positivist criteria, it is hard to see what current sociological 'theories' in any domain would pass muster. [...] It is no longer clear, if it ever was, what qualifies as theory in sociology". However, he goes on to comment, "even by Hadden's standards there is a body of work that deserves to be called secularization theory" (1990, p. ?).
I am not very interested, at this particular point, in taking position in this debate (for a discussion, see chap. 13). It will suffice, for our purposes, to note that in the dispute over secularization, "secularization theory" is at stake just as much as "secularization" as such, and that there is no agreement as to what that theory is.
But - if we provisionally accept Hadden's point of view - does the absence of a unified theory really mean that there is no "secularization thesis"? The ambiguities displayed in the position of Hadden - who contends that there is no theory, but at the same time proceeds to show that the theory is wrong[2] (1987, pp. 598-99) - are a clear sign that the two things are quite distinct. For the absence of a unified theory does not prevent sociologists from doing research, writing books and articles, and even from obtaining certain results. Consideration of our discipline as a whole suggests that unified theories are by no means always necessary - nor even very helpful, as some famous examples should remind us.