Synopses & Reviews
This volume proposes that across many cultures, the revival of religious fundamentalism is a response to the globalization of economies and markets, the weakening of the autonomy of national political sovereignties, and the corruption of cultural autonomy because global information systems are intruding upon regional and ethnic symbolic orders and modes of discourse. Editors Bronislaw Misztal and Anson Shupe bring together theoretical and empirical studies that focus on fundamentalist social movements in North and Central America and Eastern Europe and that examine the role religion plays in determining the direction of social evolution. Each chapter emphasizes a common set of processes at work: how religious identities arise or reemerge to confront the globalization trend, how various social movements cope with pressures to conform their identities, and how the globalization trend sets in motion the antithetical reaction of the nationalistic/religious dialectic that it was thought to have eliminated.
Part I considers the concept of global fundamentalist resurgence and discusses how energetic, even radical, religious movements gradually mellow to accommodate various social institutions they set out to reform or purify. An analysis of American Christian fundamentalism in its relation to modernity and the production of symbolic capital serves as an example. The chapters in Part II examine fundamentalist religious revivals in previously Eastern bloc countries, with special attention to Poland, which gained visibility as one of the first nations to challenge the Communist Party's hegemony. Part III explores religious revival in North and Central America, from the new Christian right and its auxiliary anti-evolution creation science controversy to Protestant fundamentalism and pacifistic resistance in Latin America. Finally, in Part IV the authors attempt predictions about the role of religion in social movements to come. Recommended for sociologists, political scientists, historians, and religious studies scholars.
Review
This book holds essential reading for scholars with an interest in the global fundamentalist movement, religion's influence on the fall of communism, or the fundamentalist revival in the United States.Sociology of Religion
Review
...this is an interesting book, written by a group of distinguished scholars. Serious students of religion will find the book provocative and can learn much from it.Perspectives on Political Science
Synopsis
Misztal and Shupe bring together theoretical and empirical studies that focus on fundamentalist social movements in North and Central America and Eastern Europe and that examine the role religion plays in determining the direction of social evolution.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. [193]-212) and index.
About the Author
BRONISLAW MISZTAL is Professor of Sociology at Indiana University-Purdue University at Fort Wayne.ANSON SHUPE is also Professor of Sociology at Indiana University-Purdue University.
Table of Contents
Introduction
The Global Fundamentalism Phenomenon
Making Sense of the Global Revival of Fundamentalism by Bronislaw Misztal and Anson Shupe
Fundamentalism in America Revisited: The Fading of Modernity as a Source of Symbolic Capital by John H. Simpson
The Accommodation and Deradicalization of Innovative Religious Movements by Anson Shupe
Religious Revival in the Eastern Bloc
The Vanishing Point: The Religious Components of Peasant Politics of Protest, Poland, 1970-1980 by Krzysztof Gorlach
Religious Revival or Political Substitution: Polish Roman Catholic Movements After World War II by Janusz L. Mucha and Maciej K. Zaba
Religious Nationalism: Six Propositions from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union by Hank Johnston
Religious Revival in the Western Hemisphere
Reasons for the Growing Popularity of Christian Reconstruction: The Determination to Attain Dominion by Bruce Barron and Anson Shupe
Scientific Creationism and the Politics of Lifestyle Concern in the United States by Raymond A. Eve and Francis B. Harrold
Explaining Protestant Fundamentalism in Central America by Michael Dodson
Advocating Nonviolent Direct Action in Latin America: The Antecedents and Emergence of SERPAJ by Ronald Pagnucco and John D. McCarthy
The Future of Religious Fundamentalism East and West
Radical Religious Movements: A Global Perspective by Anthony B. van Fossen
The Conflict between "Denominational State" and "State of Law" by Bronislaw Misztal
Movementization of Social Change by Slawomir Jan Magala
References
Index