SECULAR · The Secularization Theorem in the Long Nineteenth Century

The Secularization Theorem in the Long Nineteenth Century

My project, The Secularization Theorem in the Long Nineteenth Century (SECULAR), centered on the continued relevance of religious ideas in the social and political imaginary of the modern age. What is the role of religion in modern social and political theory? How is it that an age calls itself “modern,” without breaking with the past completely? The main problem addressed was how society understands itself in light of a theorem of secularization, i.e. how theological thought content is thought to still lie at the base of modern politics and society–albeit in various reworked, altered or reduced forms. This problem is relevant since it radically challenges certain standard views held in today’s social sciences which hold that we inhabit a post-religious or even a secular world. The overall objective of SECULAR was to analyze – in the light of secularization theory – the actual complexities and interanimations within multiple strands of modern social and political theory. Focusing on an especially relevant case of the religious/secular divide, I traced 19th Century precursors of the “theorem of secularization” (Hans Blumenberg) – theories that explain the coming into being of modernity with more or less explicit reference to, or in direct continuation of, theology. Generally speaking, this includes instances where the modern age understands itself through the lens of a historically earlier time. This is directly relevant for current society insofar that the project tried to grasp elements foundational to the constitution of modern consciousness. An important part of social life consists in processes by which society is understanding itself. Hence, explanations about the coming into being of modern consciousness directly impact visions of society and politics today. Within modern European intellectual history, the theorem of secularization resulted in explanations about post-religious structures with reference to an allegedly hidden existence of theology. Within modern political science, this figure of thought has received critical acclaim under the label of political theology. This label had mainly been popularized by the intellectual historian, political philosopher and fascist legal theorist Carl Schmitt. I traced the 19th Century origins of the idea of political theology through an analysis of Carl Schmitt’s reception of the work of the Spanish conservative Catholic thinker Juan Donoso Cortés. Through this reading, various hidden assumptions within the modern theory of politics become obvious. Above all, this concerns an amalgamation of method, mode of historical explanation and political normativity. Another major theorist of secularization is the French sociologist Emile Durkheim, who investigated the elementary religious forms of social existence while at the same time questioning the religious nature of societies: For Durkheim, social hierarchy and a socialized process of knowing and understanding form the beginnings of religious phenomena. SECULAR allowed fresh insight into the confluence between different theoretical traditions such as socialism, Catholic political thought and modern sociology. Tracing these schools to their seat in the 19th Century, SECULAR has created contact points and analyses equally valuable to historians of modern Europe, philosophers and social scientists alike.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз