The secularization debate

Staf Hellemans

Chapter 2 in Understanding the Sociology of Religion, 2026, pp 18-52 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Abstract: Secularization has been the subject of a decades-long research program on a crucial issue: the decline – or not – of religion. It has always been attended by fierce controversies. This chapter surveys the evolution of the secularization debate: its spectacular rise in the 1960s and 1970s, the fundamental criticisms it encountered, the modifications of its historical narrative, the recent shift from a perspective stressing ‘European exceptionalism’ to another arguing that there is worldwide secularization. There are associated themes, like discussions of internal secularization and of the relationship between secularization and differentiation. Finally, in the last decades, more attention has begun to be given to the flip side of secularization: the (post)secular, secularities, and ‘nones’. Like David Martin, I argue that a limited definition of secularization makes most sense. Its core is the decline – and, possibly, resurgence – of the major world religions in modernity. Secularization is only one facet of the great transformation of religion.

Keywords: Secularization; Internal Secularization; Desecularization; Secularization And Differentiation; Worldwide Secularization; Secularities; Nones (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
ISBN: 9781035312009
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