Social Movement Theory and the Sociology of Religion: Toward a New Synthesis

Despite a similar genesis in the classic nineteenth century theories of social change, scholarly analyses of religious and social movements have frequently addressed different problems and formulated separate paradigms. This divergence is discussed with reference to historical, ideological, and conceptual factors. Current religions and social movements, it is proposed, increasingly have much in common both structurally and ideologically. Three processes - contestation, globalization, and empowerment - are identified as characteristic of contemporary movements. The article concludes by advocating a fresh perspective on religion and contemporary social movements where the central thrust would be on the construction of new grievances, identities, and modes of association by collective actors. Since the founding of sociology in the nineteenth century, religious and social movements have occupied the same analytic corners of the discipline. Yet, more often than not, sociologists of religion and specialists in the study of social movements have failed to recognize the common grounds in which the two types of movements are rooted, opting instead to address different problems and formulate separate paradigms. While some individual researchers - notably John Lofland, Rodney Stark, and John Wilson - have been contributors to both sociological specialities, for the most part each has tended to be an isolated subcultural universe sealed off from the ideas and approaches of the other (Robbins, 1988a: 17).