As someone who has long been leery of the persistent overuse of the “crisis” frame in any context—whether personal, cultural, economic, or scientific and theoretical—I was pleased to see an upbeat evaluation of the current state of, and prospects for, the sociology of religion. Smilde and May’s data and preliminary analysis indicate a certain empirical and theoretical vibrancy in the field (a modest increase in the number of religion articles in top-tier sociology journals and a notable increase in articles in which religion is the independent variable in explanations of social processes). Their analysis also helps to quantify the frequently made claim (echoed by Levitt et al.) that the field is dominated by studies centered on the US and Protestantism. I don’t think any sociologist would disagree with Levitt et al.’s exhortation to sociologists to be far more attentive to rethinking what religion “is,” as well as to global religions and the meaning and relevance of religion in globalizing political, social, and cultural processes. It’s good that a new generation of sociologists is beginning to tackle such questions.
As this discussion moves forward, I would like to raise a couple of points. Although the sociology of religion is in a relatively good state, it still seems that there is continuing intellectual insecurity and uncertainty among sociologists who study religion. I find it interesting, for example, that in discussing the historical dominance of positive socio-evaluative findings in sociological studies of religion, Smilde and May note that we are now likely in a new social context, where “the publication of negative socio-evaluative findings is a reasonable and acceptable professional undertaking.” Bender et al. similarly welcome the tendency of new studies to balance “positive portraits of religion as agency with more nuanced analyses of religion as a source of social power that simultaneously enables and dis-empowers.” I don’t want to over-interpret these statements. I think, however, that they raise larger and more complex questions about the nature of sociological inquiry in general as a scientific enterprise and reflect a lingering ambivalence among sociologists (including, maybe even especially, sociologists who study religion) toward the scientific validity of the study of religion.
American sociologists embrace, to varying degrees, the scientific status of sociology, and our professional training, associations (e.g., ASA, SSSR), and allegiances (with NSF, NIMH, NIJ, etc.) reinforce commitment to a scientific methodology. Yet, within this framework, the prevalence of positive socio-evaluative findings in sociological studies of religion is seen as suggestive of a pro-religion bias in the research program, rather than a “true” finding. Does any other sociological sub-field produce meta-narratives about their area’s findings, or engage in the crisis-assessment conversations that sociologists of religion seem compelled to have? I wonder whether, for instance, stratification sociologists worry that too many (all?) of their studies of inequality demonstrate a positive relationship between a family’s socioeconomic status and its children’s educational attainment and socioeconomic status; or whether some exhort their peers to embark on studies showing more nuanced consequences of socioeconomic disadvantage? By the same token, I wonder whether sociologists of culture, for example, might ever think that their sub-field is too provincial (i.e., US-centric), or overly focused on cultural agency at the expense of unearthing disempowerment?
It was also interesting to read Smilde and May’s discussion of the impact of increased funding on religion research, and particularly to see that the strongest relation between funding and positive socio-evaluative findings is with the public sector rather than private sources. Smilde and May suggest that the receptivity of public institutions and administrators to research documenting religion’s positive role “complicates the view that government institutions and bureaucrats are the main motors of secularization.” I understand their point, but it could also be argued that by (rightly) funding meritorious studies investigating religion’s impact on social processes, the state and other institutions (public and private) are treating religion like any other social phenomenon—i.e., a normal social fact, worthy of rigorous scientific investigation, rather than some epiphenomenal entity that defies understanding—and in so doing are perhaps contributing to the demystification of both religion and society. In any case, would we be surprised to discover that federal and other public agencies are receptive to studies showing a positive role for school achievement or healthful behavior? Probably not. Again it seems that sociological studies of religion—their findings and funding and institutional contexts—evoke different expectations and responses among sociologists than do studies in other sub-fields. This is the continuing thorn in the side of any effort to develop a strong intellectual and research program in the sociology of religion.
On balance, it may be a good thing that the sociology of religion is (and is forced to be) more reflexive than other sub-fields about its problems and its promise. Any insights that emerge from our deliberations may help transform sociology more generally, compelling sociologists to confront their discipline’s relative provincialism and the content and sources of its generally unexamined normative assumptions. I hope that as we continue these conversations we do not lose sight, however, of historical consciousness. There are good reasons today to study religion’s relevance in geopolitical processes, but there are also good reasons why congregations, for example, have been and continue to be so extensively studied; for many Americans, congregations are still the primary spaces in which they engage in religious practices, and independent of religion, they are also significant sites of local community and civic action.
I also hope that we can keep in mind Alvin Gouldner’s admonition that a reflexive sociology should not lull us into “an illusion of self-confrontation that serves to disguise a new form of self-celebration.” He wrote during a very different intellectual and political era, a time when Functionalism was the primary framework anchoring American sociology and geopolitical issues were simplified by Cold War alliances. Our era is very different; we entertain several competing and fragmentary theories of society, and multi-directional transnational processes impose on even the most local of consciousnesses. Following Gouldner’s advice, we can welcome new developments in the sociology of religion, but as we go forward we must also remain open to scrutinizing the emerging strong program and its assumptions and research topics with the same cold eye we readily cast on its predecessors. Given that knowledge rarely proceeds in a linear manner, we would do well to pay attention to transnational issues and other edgy questions, but also to keep at hand the insights already gleaned from “old” debates about secularization and religious economies, without necessarily adopting any of these frameworks wholesale.
Professor Dillon has a useful orientation to confront the hackneyed crisis mentality which often afflicts sociology—in contrast to other social sciences such as economics, psychology, and political science. However, the issue of cheerleading for positive effects of religion (often stimulated by extramural funding from varied public and private agencies), is not analogous to stratification experts eliding the positive functions of poverty. The elephant in the room for the last decade has been the growing influence of conservative Christian scholars and foundations on the questions asked about the influence of religion. And, in the era of faith-based social services championed under the Bush regime, the sway of those who want to believe that Christianity makes you healthy, wealthy, and wise extended to public and secular foundations as well. This despite the fact that scientific findings demonstrate mixed influences of religious factors on health, uniformly negative effects of conservative Christianity on post-secondary educational attainment, women’s employment, verbal ability, and scientific literacy.
Further, the influence of scholars of faith on the scientific process extends to scholarly review. Those of us who examine both positive and negative influence of religion have noticed a marked increase in reviewer hostility towards findings which put conservative Christian religion in a negative light. I sincerely hope that Levitt, Bender, Cadge, and Smilde are correct that the tides will both ebb and flow—however there are strong structural advantages given to scholars seeking to elaborate the positive effects of religion, and negative sanctions are applied towards those with a more critical orientation.
I greatly appreciate Michele Dillon’s willingness to respond to both the “Emerging Strong Program” article I co-authored with Matt May as well as the “Towards a New Sociology of Religion” post. Such commentary helps us think and articulate as we continue to work on them. I would like to make a couple of comments and clarifications.
For us, examining the rate of positive socio-evaluative findings regarding religion is a sign neither of insecurity nor ambivalence regarding the scientific validity of the sociology of religion. From the Weberian concept of social science that we work with, the fact that a researcher’s values are frequently important in the selection of research problems does not undermine the validity of her findings. We assume that both positive and negative findings can be valid and that what we are measuring here are trends in problem-selection among sociologists of religion.
There is indeed a presupposition here: we do not consider religion to be an “achievement” or “healthy” by nature. We think religion is simply a human phenomenon like any other. Few sociologists would consider “the nation-state” to be clearly good or bad. The nation-state has facilitated human flourishing at an unprecedented scale. At the same time it has facilitated some of the greatest horrors of human history. We see religion in the same way. While Evangelical churches have been key elements of the drive for racial equality, they have also been key conduits for organized racism. Or, if you will, the same mosques that radicalized the 9/11 bombers almost certainly contributed to the personal and social well-being of those who attended and perhaps the surrounding community.
Given our perspective, we are indeed surprised when sociologists are five times more likely to report positive findings than negative, and when articles with public finding are significantly more likely to support positive portrayals of religion than articles without. Even if you start with the presupposition that religious practices are by nature five times more likely to have positive social consequences than negative, there is significant variation over the thirty-year period we track that needs to be explained. We do not think that religion itself has gotten better over time (and then suddenly worse after 2002). Nor do we want to indulge ourselves in narratives of scientific progress that would suggest we are simply smarter now (and then suddenly less so after 2002).
We do not think reflection on trends in the sub-discipline of the sociology of religion is a thorn in its side anymore than Jeff Alexander’s critique of the “weak program” in favor of a “strong program” was a thorn in the side of the sociology of culture, or the critiques of collective behavior approaches…and then resource mobilization…and then the political process model…and then frame theory…have been a thorn in the side of research on contentious politics. To the contrary we think such narratives of reflection and critique have been keys to the vitality of these sub-fields
One final note, we undertook an empirical study and try to stick close to the data (which in many cases did not tell us what we expected) precisely to avoid Gouldner’s “illusion of self-confrontation.” And not only are we open to scrutinizing the strong program, it is the central task of our paper. As we state, we are not heralding the good news but trying to critically engage the dominant trends in the sub-field.
Thank you to Professors Sherkat and Smilde for their responses.
I was not suggesting that Smilde and May or Levitt et al. are personally ambivalent or insecure about their status as religion scholars. But I think the attention of both papers to the social-evaluative nature of religion findings is a reflection of, and response to, the collective zeitgeist of unease regarding the scientific study of religion, which I sense at academic conferences and other venues that give us hints about what is cool. I very much welcome seeing the empirical findings of Smilde and May laid out so clearly. (I wish we had similar analyses of several other sub-fields, so we could actually see how religion compares.) Precisely from a Weberian perspective, however, we are prompted to ask what values in the discipline of sociology, and in the institutional contexts in which sociologists move, might account for a certain intellectual ambivalence toward religion, rather than toward stratification, crime, etc., notwithstanding the sub-field’s vitality (indicated by publication trends, and memberships rates for the ASA section and other religion scholarship associations).
I agree with Professor Smilde that sociologists do not say outright whether the nation-state is good or bad, but I would conjecture that there are more studies claiming to show the state’s negative effects than there are the opposite. In general, I think sociology tends towards a concentration of studies that extend a particular value-laden, “liberal” presumption. We don’t see too many studies documenting, for example, the positive impact of welfare reform on poor people’s attitudes, or disentangling whether the increase in women wage-earners is contributing to a decline in family cohesion, or whether working class socialization nurtures authoritarianism. The reason these questions are not explored is surely related, in part, to the normative assumptions informing sociology—even as we uphold it and take it seriously as a scientific endeavor.
My caution regarding self-congratulation is directed to the collectivity of sociologists, and is prompted mostly by the Levitt et al. paper. I agree that we should study the edges, margins, and intersections—but we should be careful not to be misled into thinking that, just because we are studying the edges, this research is somehow “better.” Levitt et al. do not make that claim. But given the attachment in some academic circles to privileging the “standpoint of the proletariat,” I believe we should be alert to querying all knowledge standpoints—those on the margins, as well as those at the core and those in between.
In essence, I would like to see the revitalization of the sociology of knowledge. This self-reflexive field would, among other tasks, interrogate the “causal” factors accounting for the very interesting trends Smilde and May document, explore the impact of conservative Christian foundations and scholars on the study of religion (highlighted by Darren Sherkat), and of other foundations in other sub-fields (e.g., the Sloan Foundation, Russell Sage, etc.), as well as of federal agencies and the political context in which they operate. It would also need, of course, to examine the impact of the SSRC in shaping conversations about religion.
A sociology of knowledge would also examine the resistance among sociologists to overturning paradigms that are challenged by good empirical findings. Professor Sherkat perceives a conservative Christian hostility to negative findings about religion. I perceive a resistance to the view that individualized, non-church based spirituality may be “good” for individuals and communities, despite the accumulation of rigorous empirical research supporting this interpretation. This reluctance, I believe, has less to do with the religious or political affiliations of reviewers than with a bias in sociology toward the overarching social necessity of institutions. This, however, is a topic for another time.