Sacred and Secular: Religion and Politics Worldwide

Pippa Norris, Ronald Inglehart

Cambridge University Press, Sep 20, 2004 - Political Science

Seminal thinkers of the nineteenth century - Auguste Comte, Herbert Spencer, Emile Durkheim, Max Weber, Karl Marx, and Sigmund Freud - all predicted that religion would gradually fade in importance and cease to be significant with the emergence of industrial society. The belief that religion was dying became the conventional wisdom in the social sciences during most of the twentieth century. During the last decade, however, the secularization thesis has experienced the most sustained challenge in its long history. The traditional secularization thesis needs updating. Religion has not disappeared and is unlikely to do so. Nevertheless, the concept of secularization captures an important part of what is going on. This book develops a theory of secularization and existential security. Sacred and Secular is essential reading for anyone interested in comparative religion, sociology, public opinion, political behavior, political development, social psychology, international relations, and cultural change.

Contents

• The Secularization Debate: 3
• Measuring Secularization: 33
• Comparing Secularization Worldwide: 53
• The Puzzle of Secularization in the United States and Western Europe: 83
• A Religious Revival in PostCommunist Europe?: 111
• Religion and Politics in the Muslim World: 133
• Religion the Protestant Ethic and Moral Values: 159
• Religious Organizations and Social Capital: 180
• Religious Parties and Electoral Behavior: 196
• Secularization and Its Consequences: 215
• Classifications of Types of Society: 243
• Concepts and Measures: 247
• Technical Note on the Freedom of Religion Scale: 253
• Notes: 255
• Bibliography: 287
• Index: 315

Popular passages

Page 325 - Schuster. P. 19. Putnam also offers a related definition: “By ‘social capital' I mean features of social life — networks, norms and trust — that enable participants to act together more effectively to pursue shared objectives.” Robert D. Putnam. 1996. “The Strange Disappearance of Civic America.

Page 322 - If a woman wants to have a child as a single parent but she doesn't want to have a stable relationship with a man, do you approve or disapprove?” (disapprove coded low). Three items used statements with

About the author

Pippa Norris is the McGuire Lecturer in Comparative Politics at the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. Her work analyzes comparative elections and public opinion, gender politics, and political communications. Companion volumes by this author, also published by Cambridge University Press, include A Virtuous Circle (2000), Digital Divide (2001), Democratic Phoenix (2002), Rising Tide (2003, with Ronald Inglehart) and Electoral Engineering (2004).

Ronald Inglehart is professor of political science and program director at the Institute for Social Research at the University of Michigan. His research deals with changing belief systems and their impact on social and political change. He helped found the Euro-Barometer surveys and directs the World Values Surveys. Related books include Modernization and Postmodernization: Cultural, Economic and Political Change in 43 Societies (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997), Rising Tide (2003, with Pippa Norris) and Development, Cultural Change and Democracy (2004, with Christian Welzel).

Bibliographic information

• Title: Sacred and Secular: Religion and Politics Worldwide; Cambridge Studies in Social Theory, Religion and Politics
• Authors: Pippa Norris, Ronald Inglehart
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press, 2004
• ISBN: 1139456385, 9781139456388
• Subjects: Political Science / General; Political Science / History & Theory; Political Science / International Relations / General; Psychology / Social Psychology; Religion / Comparative Religion; Social Science / Anthropology / Cultural & Social; Social Science / Sociology / General