Abstract
Any adequate theory of the interconnections of religion and social change must be an application of a more general theory of change. A skillful application can, in turn, contribute to the reformulation and improvement of the general theory. Unfortunately, serious problems of definition and conceptualization have retarded the investigation of the interconnections.
Adapted from The Scientific Study of Religion, by J. Milton Yinger (New York: The Macmillan Co., 1970), by permission of the publisher.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
I will not try to suggest the vast literature on social change. For a few valuable leads, see E. E. Hagen, On the Theory of Social Change (The Dorsey Press, 1962 );
Daniel Lerner, The Passing of Traditional Society (The Free Press, 1959);
David McClelland, The Achieving Society (Van Nostrand, 1961);
Wilbert Moore, Social Change (Prentice-Hall, 1963);
Amitai Etzioni and Eva Etzioni, eds., Social Change (Basic Books, 1964).
See Joseph Gusfield, “Tradition and Modernity: Misplaced Polarities in the Study of Social Change,” American Journal of Sociology, 72, 1967, pp. 351–362.
For a general theoretical study of the interaction of structural, cultural, and characterological forces, see J. Milton Yinger, Toward a Field Theory of Behavior (McGraw-Hill, 1965 ).
See Philip Rieff, The Triumph of the Therapeutic (Harper and Row, 1966), especially Chapter 8, for a thoughtful discussion of the role of religious change in reworking the “control” and “release” processes of culture. Cultural revolution occurs when the releasing symbolisms are more powerful than the controlling ones. Aggression, destructive attack on the social order grows, as in our time, until new and acceptable symbols of faith arise that are of sufficient power to reintroduce controls.
See Robert Bellah, Tokugawa Religion (The Free Press, 1957).
See Richard Lowenthal, “Government in the Developing Countries: Its Functions and Its Forms,” in Democracy in a Changing World, Henry Ehrmann, ed. (Frederick Praeger, 1964), pp. 177–210.
Edward Shils argues for a rather specifically Weberian interpretation of this transformation: “It is indispensible that men and women in underdeveloped societies come to feel and believe that a ‘spark of the divine,’ or some other manifestation of what is sacred in human life, dwells as much in those who live outside the circle of authority as it does in those who live within it. See The Concentration and Dispersion of Charisma: Their Bearing on Economic Policy in Underdeveloped Countries, World Politics,11, 1958, p. 19.
For a variety of views see, in addition to Weber’s, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (George Allen and Unwin, 1930);
R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism ( Harcourt, Brace, and World, 1926 );
H. M. Robertson, Aspects of the Rise of Economic Individualism (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1933 );
Talcott Parsons, Structure of Social Action (McGraw Hill, 1937);
Werner Sombart, The Jews and Modern Capitalism (George Allen and Unwin, 1913);
Amintore Fanfani, Catholicism, Protestantism, and Capitalism (Sheed and Ward, 1935);
Ernst Troeltsch, The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches (Macmillan, 1931);
H. R. Niebuhr, The Social Sources of Denominationalism (Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1929 );
Albert Hyma, Christianity, Capitalism and Communism (published by the author, 1937);
J. M. Yinger, Religion in the Struggle for Power (Duke Univ. Press, 1946 );
Reinhard Bendix, Max Weber. An Intellectual Portrait (Doubleday, 1960);
Kurt Samuelsson, Religion and Economic Action (Basic Books, 1961);
S. N. Eisenstadt, ed., The Protestant Ethic and Modernization (Basic Books, 1968 );
R. W. Green, Protestantism and Capitalism: The Weber Thesis and Its Critics (D. C. Heath, 1959).
David McClelland, op. cit.,p. 49. There is now a large literature dealing with the sources of achievement motive, taking the subject beyond our interest in its religious dimension. See, e. g., David McClelland, et al, The Achievement Motive (Appleton-Century, 1953);
Bernard Rosen and R. G. D’Andrade, The Psychosocial Origins of Achievement Motivation, Sociometry, 22, 1959, pp. 185–218.
The importance of interaction is also emphasized by Herman Israel, “Some Religious Factors in the Emergence of Industrial Society in England, American Sociological Review,31, 1966, pp. 589–599.
Richard Means, “Protestantism and Economic Institutions: Auxiliary Theories to Webers Protestant Ethic”, Social Forces, 44, 1966, pp. 372–381.
See From Max Weber,Hans Gerth and C. Wright Mills, eds. (Oxford Univ. Press, 1946), pp. 302–322.
S. N. Eisenstadt, “Transformation of Social, Political, and Cultural Orders in Modernization, American Sociological Review, 30, 1965, p. 671.
There are numerous studies in which religion is examined as an inhibitory or contributory factor in development. See, for example, Robert Bellah, Tokugawa Religion; Robert Bellah, ed., Religion and Progress in Modern Asia (The Free Press, 1965 )
Eisenstadt, op. cit.,Part III; Kalman Silvert, ed., Churches and States. The Religious Institution and Modernization (American Universities Field Staff, 1967)
Henri Desroche, Religion et développement. La theme de leurs rapport réciproques et ses variations, Archives de Sociologie des Religions, 12, 1961, pp. 3–34
E. B. Ayal, “Value Systems and Economic Development in Japan and Thailand, Journal of Social Issues, 19, 1963, pp. 35–51.
Melford Spiro, “Buddhism and Economic Action in Burma, American Anthropologist,68, 1966, pp. 1165/1166.
There are functional similarities here to the generosity patterns reported by William Whyte in Street Corner Society (Univ. of Chicago Press, 1943). To save for college or a major economic purpose seemed, on the one hand, futile to the members of highly disprivileged groups. On the other hand, generosity won them group support and prestige. Similar processes, but on the level of magic, are found in the appeal of gambling, by playing “the numbers game”. Impoverished slum-dwellers will “throw away” their last dime or quarter by putting it on a number, in the remote hope of winning a large return from the gambler. Their arithmetic may be poor, but it has to be judged in a context where the hopeless process of saving is set against the exciting possibility of miraculous return.
Ibid.,p. 278. Ediriweera Sarachandra, it should be noted, gives greater emphasis to the hold of traditionalism. See his “Traditional Values and the Modernization of a Buddhist Society: The Case of Ceylon”, in Religion and Progress in Modern Asia,pp. 109–123. In his study of Buddhism in Burma, Manning Nash takes a middle position, which is an interesting comparison with Ceylon: He predicts “… that remote Nibbana will come to be replaced by more proximate religious states of salvation, and that a more austere and puritanical element will come to mark Burmese Buddhism”. But he goes on to say that “… it does take more, and a different sort of, incentive to get a Buddhist into economic activity in Burma, as against say a Muslim, or a Chinese Confucian, or even a Sikh or Hindu…” See The Golden Road to Modernity. Village Life in Contemporary Burma (John Wiley and Sons, 1965), p. 165.
Noel Coulson in Religion and Progress in Modern AsiaRobert Bellah, ed., p. 74.
See Leonard Binder, Religion and Politics in Pakistan (Univ. of California Press, 1963), Chap. 2. On some of the problems as well as the possibilities of modernization in Islam see Clifford Geertz, “Modernization in a Muslim Society”, in Bellah, op. cit.; and Robert Bellah, “Religious Aspects of Modernization in Turkey and Japan”, American Journal of Sociology, 64, 1958, pp. 1–5.
Perspective on the Functions of Religion in a Developing Country: Islam in Pakistan“, Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 3, 1964, p. 237.
See Clifford Geertz, The Religion of Java (The Free Press, 1960).
Frederick Pike in Religion, Revolution, and Reform: New Forces for Change in Latin America,William D’Antonio and Frederick Pike, eds., (Frederick Praeger, 1964), p. 5.
Seymour Lipset, Revolution and Counterrevolution (Basic Books, 1968), p. 70.
See ibid.; John J. Johnson, ed., Continuity and Change in Latin America
Francois Houtart, “Les effets du changement social sur la religion catholique en Amérique latine,” Archives de Sociologie des Religions, 12, 1961, pp. 63–73.
Emilio Willems, Followers of the New Faith: Culture Change and the Rise of Protestantism in Brazil and Chile ( Vanderbilt Univ. Press, 1967 ), p. 256
see also his papers in D’Antonio and Pike, op. cit.,Chap. 5,and “Validation of Authority in Pentecostal Sects of Chile and Brazil,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 6, 1967, pp. 253–258.
For comparative studies of Protestantism among Latin American populations, see Bryan Roberts, “Protestant Groups and Coping with Urban Life in Guatemala City,” American Journal of Sociology, 73, 1968, pp. 753–767
Anne Parsons, “The Pentecostal Immigrants,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, 4, 1965, pp. 183–197.
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1971 Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Yinger, J.M. (1971). Toward a Theory of Religion and Social Change. In: Religion und Sozialer Wandel Und andere Arbeiten / Religion and Social Change And other Essays. Internationales Jahrbuch für Religionssoziologie / International Yearbook for the Sociology of Religion, vol 7. VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-01713-4_1
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-663-01713-4_1
Publisher Name: VS Verlag für Sozialwissenschaften, Wiesbaden
Print ISBN: 978-3-663-01714-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-663-01713-4
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive