Religious Economy Theory Revisited : Towards a New Perspective of Religious Dynamics in the East Asian Settings

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Originating from the American contexts, the religious economy model has provided new insights to the study of religion in the United States using the market perspectives to explain, interpret, and predict the dynamics of religious suppliers and consumers. And because of its rather successful application in the American settings(i.e.a free market of religion with relative dominance of Christianity), scholars of religions began to adopt this model to study the sociology of religion of various areas from a market perspective. However, this presents both opportunities and challenges to these scholars dedicated to use this approach to study non-American societies where religious cultures and social contexts are very different. On the one hand,it provides a very interesting perspective to understand religious movements as market economies, especially when the secularization theory has failed to respond to the revival of religion in most parts of the world (i.e.Asia, North and South America,and Africa). On the other hand,given the nature of the model,it is very difficult,if not impossible,to apply it to societies where the religious landscape and social and cultural backgrounds are not identical to the American context,though advocates of this model claim that it has the potential to develop into a “dominant theoretical frame of reference with the social scientific study of religion”( Lawrence 1997: xii). As a piece of work dedicated to this ongoing project and debate, this paper first sets out the main tenets of the economic approach to the sociology of religion and the key arguments of its leading critics. Then, by reviewing how scholars of religion have attempted to improve and modify this theory and applied it on different cultural contexts,it also suggests how this model may be analytically useful in studying religion in the East Asian settings, especially China and Japan, and discusses the modifications that may add value to the model by taking political, economical, social, and cultural factors into consideration.

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  • 研究論集

    研究論集 13 511-530, 2013-12-20

    北海道大学大学院文学研究科

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