Call for Articles – Religion and the Social Order Book Series

Religion has often been understood as a response to personal, social or cultural crisis. Classical scholars, such as Peter L. Berger and Max Weber, pointed out that it provides a theodicy of good and evil – an account that gives ultimate meaning in a meaningless world. Religions, as Stark and Bainbridge (1985) contend, are other-worldly compensators for individuals in crisis – for those who are deprived from this-worldly rewards. Even advocates of the secularization thesis acknowledge that crisis and rapid social change temporarily motivate the popularity of religion (Bruce 1997).

But religion, once considered to be in crisis under the secularizing powers of modernity, is alive and well in Europe. More than that: religion seems to thrive on what can now be called the crisis of modernity. Modern science, the nation state, capitalism, unrestricted consumption and the globalizing economy, have lost much of their credibility and plausibility in many European countries. In this cultural climate, the voices of traditional religious groups grow louder whereas, some say, we are witnessing a massive turn to holistic forms of spirituality (e.g. Campbell 2007). The atheist-secular worldview is more than ever contested by a fraction of Muslims, Christian creationists, Buddhists and other religious groups, while a mirror-like process of anti-identification gives rise to alarmist discourses about the return of religions and particularly on the “islamization of Europe”. Religion has once again become salient in the re-formation of identity and the construction of imagined communities: uprooted from tradition, modern individuals in identity crisis search for new (religious) values and meanings whereas some European nation states align themselves with their Christian heritage, long-standing traditions and religious pasts. Religion, then, can not easily be understood as the ‘irrational’ other of modernity – it is instead a common and valid response to the growing crisis of modernity. Jürgen Habermas (2005), once a furious critic of religion, argued from this perspective that intellectuals should include religious partners in the ‘rational’ conversation about modernity, since both share a growing critique on the maladies of modernity.

Against this background, the ASR and the ESA Research Network Sociology of Religion call for articles on Religion in Times of Crisis analogous to the Call for the 11^th ESA conference in Torino.

Particularly papers are welcomed that discuss the following topics:

● Studies dealing with religion in crisis, i.e. the way religious traditions such as Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Buddhism and the like – re-structure their organizations, beliefs, and practices and adopt, negotiate or resist processes of modernization, secularization and disenchantment.

● Studies dealing with the ways religion provides answers to existential crisis and, particularly, the crisis of modernity – i.e. how and why Islam, Christianity and other religious-spiritual groups formulate a critique of and alternative to modern science, capitalism, mass-consumption and individualism.

● Studies dealing with the way crisis increases the salience of religious identities and cultural polarization, i.e., in what particular ways religion gives meaning in everyday life and if, how and why religious identity-formations induce processes of inclusion and exclusion; social cohesion and religious conflict.

● Studies focusing on the way religion changes the modern world in Europe and beyond, i.e., how rapid social changes motivate the appeal and popularity of religion and if, how and why such religions transform private and public domains in Europe.

Instructions to authors and deadlines:

Please submit an outline abstract of 750-800 words (plus bibliographical indications; in .doc, .rtf or .pdf format) by 25^th May 2013 to each editor (gganiel@tcd.ie; christophe.monnot@unil.ch; hwinkel@uni-potsdam.de) outlining the following:

• Title of proposed paper

• Contributing author/s and contact details

• Significance and importance of the research question

• Key concepts, research framework, aim and methodology

If provisionally accepted, full articles are to be submitted by 1^st October 2013 for review in line with ASR policy. All contributors to the volume must be members of ASR and ESA’s Sociology of Religion Research Network. Submission of an abstract does not guarantee publication and no payment shall be received upon publication. Each contributor shall receive one copy of the publication.