The Stark-Bainbridge Theory of Religion: A Critical Analysis and Counter Proposals

Wallis, Roy; Bruce, Steve

doi:10.2307/3711319

Cited by 26 publications

(7 citation statements)

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“…This problem of explanation is often neglected in the literature, as many studies of secularization and religious change are descriptive in orientation and document the rise or decline of particular types of religion (e.g., Voyé 1999;Lambert 1999;Roof 2000;Roof, Carroll, and Roozen 1995). This descriptive orientation is shared by Becker, De Hart, and Mens (1997) and Wallis and Bruce (1984), who have demonstrated that the exodus from the Christian churches outnumbers the growth of new types of religion and conclude that the net trend is one of secularization.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why Do Churches Become Empty, While New Age Grows? Secularization and Religious Change in the Netherlands

Houtman

Mascini

2002

Scientific Study of Religion

134

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Research from the Netherlands has pointed out that the increased popularity of New Age since the 1960s by no means compensates for the dramatic decline of the Christian churches. From a theoretical point of view, however, it is more important to study why those remarkably divergent developments have occurred in the first place. This article does this by analyzing survey data collected among the Dutch population at large in 1998, focusing on a comparison of the young and the elderly. It is concluded, first, that there are no indications that the decline of the Christian tradition has been caused by a process of rationalization. Second, the decline of the Christian tradition and the growth of nonreligiosity as well as New Age are caused by increased levels of moral individualism (individualization). Implications for the sociological analysis of cultural and religious change are discussed.If we have to make one element of modernization central to understanding the nature of modern religion, it would be that which explains the rise of the sect, the tolerance at the heart of the denomination, and the amorphous nature of the cult: individualism. (Bruce 1995:428)

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why Do Churches Become Empty, While New Age Grows? Secularization and Religious Change in the Netherlands

Houtman

Mascini

2002

Scientific Study of Religion

134

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“…They have replicated these results in a parallel study of religion in Canada (Bainbridge and Stark, 1982). For a critique of this theoretical approach, see Wallis and Bruce (1984).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“Numbering Israel”: The U.S. Census and Religious Organizations

Christiano

1984

Social Science History

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“There simply are no reliable historical statistics on church membership,” writes a prominent sociologist of religion, Glock (1959: 39), “and it is extremely doubtful that accurate statistics can be produced through manipulating the unreliable ones.” Problems have so regularly hampered the collection of religious statistics in the United States that historians as well normally hold them in disrepute (Landis, 1957). “Nothing is more elusive in church history,” Littell (1971: 36) has written, “than honest statistics.” Commager (1950: 166) goes further: “Church statistics,” he charges, “attain an unreliability that would be a penal offense in a corporation.”

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“…Only in the case of non-universal otherworldly compensators is an explanation provided: an otherworldly goal is substituted fora this-worldly goal because for many people the latter is unattainable or only partiaUy attainable. This reasoning appears to assume that otherworldly compensators are only desired as substitutes for this-worldly, more tangible and more immediate rewards that would be preferable if they could be achieved (Wallis and Bruce 1984).…”

Section: Demandas Universal Ancl Compensatorymentioning

confidence: 98%

Beyond Christianity: A Critique of the Rational Choice Theory of Religion from a Weberian and Comparative Religions Perspective

Sharot¹

2002

Sociology of Religion

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The rational choice theorists of religion have attempted to build upa body of transcultural, universalistic generalizations, be~nning with basic axioms of human rationality. The problematics of the perspective's analytical focus on one type of rationality are ma& evident by a comparison u,ith Max Weber's types of action. The influence of the American reli~ous experience is evident in the perspective's formulations and explanations, and conceptual and theoretŸ problems arise when the perspective is applied to non.westem reli~on. The relationstª between otherwor/d/:y rewards and supernatural beings proposed by the theory has to be modified with respect to eastem religions. Monopolista and pluralism take on clifferent meanings in eastern reli~ous contexts, and variaaons in state regulations have different consequermes from those in the west.Like rational choice theorists in other areas of study, rational choice theorists of religion have attempted to build up a body of generalizations which are transcultural and transhistorical. They have adopted methodological individualista, and beginning with the axiom that Ÿ choose in accord with what is of optimal utility for them, they have followed a logico-deductive mode of theorizing characterized by a high level of formularization of definitions and propositions. They write that they are perfectly aware that individuals do not always act rationally, but they claim that their simplifying assumptions and ideal-typical models can generate high-level explanations (Stark and Finke 2000:36-41; Iannaccone 1997).There are a number of general critiques of rational choice theory (Hindess 1988;Mouzelis 1991 Mouzelis :146-53, 1995 which may well be relevant to the application of the perspective to the field of religion. It has been argued, for example, that when rational choice theorists refuse to take into account

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The Stark-Bainbridge Theory of Religion: A Critical Analysis and Counter Proposals

Cited by 26 publications

References 10 publications

Why Do Churches Become Empty, While New Age Grows? Secularization and Religious Change in the Netherlands

Why Do Churches Become Empty, While New Age Grows? Secularization and Religious Change in the Netherlands

“Numbering Israel”: The U.S. Census and Religious Organizations

Beyond Christianity: A Critique of the Rational Choice Theory of Religion from a Weberian and Comparative Religions Perspective

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