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A Critical Interpretation of Olivier Roy: on Globalization, the Cosmopolitan and Emerging Post-Secular Religiosities

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A Critical Interpretation of Olivier Roy: on Globalization, the Cosmopolitan and Emerging Post-Secular Religiosities University of Denver Digital Commons @ DU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Graduate Studies 1-1-2018 A Critical Interpretation of Olivier Roy: On Globalization, the Cosmopolitan and Emerging Post-Secular Religiosities Joshua Rey Ramos University of Denver Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd Part of the Other Religion Commons, and the Sociology of Religion Commons Recommended Citation Ramos, Joshua Rey, "A Critical Interpretation of Olivier Roy: On Globalization, the Cosmopolitan and Emerging Post-Secular Religiosities" (2018). Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 1425. https://digitalcommons.du.edu/etd/1425 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Graduate Studies at Digital Commons @ DU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ DU. For more information, please contact [email protected],[email protected]. A Critical Interpretation of Olivier Roy: On Globalization, the Cosmopolitan, and Emerging Post-Secular Religiosities __________ A Dissertation Presented to the Faculty of the University of Denver and the Iliff School of Theology Joint PhD Program University of Denver __________ In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy __________ by Joshua Rey Ramos June 2018 Advisor: Dr. Carl Raschke ©Copyright by Joshua Rey Ramos 2018. All Rights Reserved Author: Joshua Rey Ramos Title: A Critical Interpretation of Olivier Roy: On Globalization, the Cosmopolitan and Emerging Post-Secular Religiosities Advisor: Dr. Carl Raschke Degree Date: June 2018 Abstract My thesis is that secularization transforms religion into religiosity. In other words, the secular breaks apart religion, or rather, ‘deculturates’ religion from a cohesive, collective body embedded within a particular society and within a traditional culture towards an individuated, and existential experience of faith within the autonomous religious subject. There are various reasons for this shift, as there are various consequences. Globalization, which is modernization writ large, is the dominant paradigm through which I conceptualize these changes. The theorist whose work I use as a lens to interpret secularization, religion and societal transformation is Olivier Roy. Roy’s theories are of significance within the contemporary debates of globalization, the post-secular, and what is known as the ‘return of religion’, in that his theories provide a strong explanatory effect of the conditions of contemporary religion and societal change. Roy stands in the tradition of secularization theory that supports transition towards religious decline. He does not advocate the model of a revival of religion within the West. For Roy, secularization stands triumphant. My work supports his argument, thus I too advocate the secularization model, albeit with certain modifications. ii Acknowledgements I would like to thank first and foremost Carl Raschke for all of his academic counsel and professional guidance over these past several years. I also thank Nader Hashemi from the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, as well as Albert Hernandez of the Iliff School of Theology, for their critical input within my dissertation and support of my academic projects. I would also like to acknowledge Erich Striessnig and Marcin Stonawski of the World Population Program at the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis in Laxenburg, Austria, as well as Vegard Skirbekk of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, for all of their gracious assistance. I also extend my gratitude to Olivier Roy and Nadia Marzouki of the European University Institute in Florence, Italy, for their generosity. Lastly, I would to thank my good friends Jason W. Alvis, Julia Alvis-Seidel, Tyler Akers, Adam R. Moore, David C. Anderson, Michael P. Ruch, Erica Ruch, Jason Valdez, Sylvia Valdez, Sunny Raschke, Emily C. Guetz and Francesco De Luca, as well as all of my family back home in Texas, for all of their camaraderie, encouragement and support. iii Table of Contents Introduction…………………………………………………………………………p.1 Chapter 1……………………………………………………………………………p.8 Chapter 2……………………………………………………………………………p.47 Chapter 3……………………………………………………………………………p.73 Chapter 4……………………………………………………………………………p.109 Chapter 5……………………………………………………………………………p.132 Chapter 6……………………………………………………………………………p.151 Bibliography……………………………………………………………………..….p.156 iv List of Figures Figure 1.…………………………………………………………………………..….p.91 Figure 2………………………………………………………………………………p.92 Figure 3………………………………………………………………………….....…p.93 Figure 4…………………………………………………………………………….....p.94 Figure 5……………………………………………………………………….……....p.95 Figure 6…………………………………………………………………………….…p.96 Figure 7………………………………………………………………………………p.98 Figure 8…..……………………………………………………………………….….p.98 v Introduction My thesis is that secularization transforms religion into religiosity. In other words, the secular breaks apart religion, or rather, ‘deculturates’ religion from a cohesive, collective body embedded within a particular society and within a traditional culture towards an individuated, and existential experience of faith within the autonomous religious subject. There are various reasons for this shift, as there are various consequences. Globalization, which is modernization writ large, is the dominant paradigm through which I conceptualize these changes. The theorist whose work I use as a lens to interpret secularization, religion and societal transformation is Olivier Roy. Roy’s theories are of significance within the contemporary debates of globalization, the post-secular, and what is known as the “return of religion”, in that his theories provide a strong explanatory effect of the conditions of contemporary religion and societal change. Roy stands in the tradition of secularization theory that supports transition towards religious decline. He does not advocate the model of a revival of religion within the West. For Roy, secularization stands triumphant. My work supports his argument, thus I too advocate the secularization model, albeit with certain modifications. In particular, I use Roy’s work of Holy Ignorance , which is a comparative sociology of religion in conjunction with political science. The seminal and core theory of Olivier Roy’s Holy Ignorance is that religion and culture have parted ways because of 1 globalization and secularization. There is now no longer an organic, embedded, and traditional link between a specific religion located within its specific culture. This split between culture and religion is what Roy calls “deculturation”. Religion is disembedded, and is thereby made abstract and virtual. The abstraction and virtualization of religion is subject to variation through the dissemination of information within the technology of the Internet and social media, and is thereby universalized. Why the term Holy Ignorance ? What does Roy mean by Holy Ignorance? Holy Ignorance indicates religious fundamentalism’s ignorance of its own cultural and theological traditions, and it also indicates the secular west ignorance of its own cultural religious heritage. Roy’ use of the term ‘ignorance’ does not intend polemical insult, but rather Roy means ignorance in its most literal sense, that of the lack of knowledge. Knowledge of theological tradition is no longer required for the salvation for the religious believer, and knowledge of the religious heritage of Europe by the secular societies has largely been forgotten, in what French sociologist Danielle Hervieu-Leger calls “amnesiac societies”, which is the loss of the cultural memory of Europe through the process of secularization. Holy Ignorance is therefore the ignorance on both sides of the divide, that is, the ignorance that proceeds from the religious, and the ignorance that proceeds from the secular. In Chapter One, I lay out the connections between religion and globalization, and between secularization and Roy’s theory of deculturation. My observation is that globalization created the condition of the so-called return of religion, but at the same time it secularized religion into religiosity, thereby transforming and re-configuring the nature and role of religion within the public square into an embattled minority that takes on a 2 modernized, fundamentalist interpretation of the sacred. In this sense, globalization is both secularization and sacralization. However, secular culture impacts religion more so than the other way around. The unintended consequence of secularization is that by creating an autonomous sphere for religion, a road was paved for the 21 st century resurgence and revitalization of religion. But this revitalization is only apparent, for it is the shifting tectonic plates of secularization that is driving the apparent phenomena of the religious resurgence. In Chapter Two, I support the theory that globalization secularizes and thereby deculturates religion into religiosity with the discussion of religious demography. Demographically, it is projected that the religious are set to out-birth the non-religious at such a prodigious rate that there may occur a reversal of secularization within the United States and Europe around 2050. This is because religiosity and fertility are directly correlated. Higher religiosity equals higher fertility, while lower religiosity equals lower fertility. And it is values that stand above socioeconomics when it comes to determining the rate of fertility. This is what Second Demographic Transition Theory maintains, that
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