Mais um passo para compreender a secularização: Análise comparativa das teorias da secularização e da economia religiosa

Much has been written about secularization, but there have been few profound researches on its internal layers and on the most solid and systematic alternatives that followed. In our view, this has had two consequences: constraints of interpretative understanding and of analytical-theoretical deepening that must and can be overcome. To achieve this goal, we have chosen a research design that encompasses the strategy of thick description as well as the comparative method and we divided the paper in two basic parts. First, we analyse the main substrates of secularization, namely functional differentiation, rationalization, societalization, existential security and diversity, egalitarianism and individualism. Secondly, we introduce the main and most challenging alternative to secularization theories, according to the state of the art ? the religious economy ?, examining it in the light of secularization?s central assumptions. The analysis of two diametrically opposed theories, concerning the understanding of religion?s place in contemporary world, will allow us to explore patterns of difference and similarity between them. Additionally, we will be able to explain how is it possible that this theoretical models, with similar objects of study, have led us to the inference of such different results in respect to the (in)variance or to the religious vitality (or the lack of it) in modern societies. At the end of the paper, for a more systematic exam of this point, we provide a table analysis comparing the main axioms of both theories.