Religion

Durkheim 

• key feature of religion was not belief in gods but fundamental distinction between sacred and profane in all religions
• sacred symbols represent society's collective conscience (shared norms, values)
• source of solidarity
• Religion unites and segregates

Malinowski

• performs psychological functions for individuals; helps them cope with stress that would undermine social solidarity

Parsons

• creates and legitimates society's central values
• primary source of meanin 

Bellah

• civil religion integrates society in a way that individual religions cannot

Merton

• argues that religious surrogates give people same sense of congregation and emotional release as religion

Stark and Bainbridge

• religious surrogates cannot replace religion as they involve no teachings
• religions act as if in a market place, competing for customers (religious market theory)

Marx 

• used by capitalist class to control prol. by inducing state of false consciousness - ideological weapon
• religion is a conservative force, religious teachings emphasise that poverty and suffering are a virtue
• 'it is the opium of the people

Lenin

• 'spiritual gin'

Bruce

• US Christian Evangelical movement teaches wealth and successes of earth are signs of being chosen by god, manifest destiny

Norris and Inglehart

• Existential Secuirty Theory - societies where people are secure there is low religion

Bloch

• religion can limit and prevent change in way marxists outline but can inspire people to rebel
• religion is utopian- involves expression of hope for a better world

McGuire

• Religion does different things to different groups at different times

Woodhead

• exclusion of women from catholic priesthood is evidence of churches deep unease about women 
• accepts that traditional religions are patriarchal but argues that it is not true of all religions - women and veil

Armstrong

• early religions often places women at the centre

Davie

• 'believing without belonging'
• privatisation
• 'vicarious religion' - small number of professional clergy practise religion on behalf of much larger number of people who experience in second hand

Hervieu-Leger

• spiritual shopping
• people feel they have choice as consumers of religion

Lyon

• sees the last 3/4 decades as period of renchantment

Wilson

• UK religion was stronger in past as churches had more power - majority attended
• 6.3% adult population attended church on sundays in 2005 (halved since 1960's)
• people receive spirtitual guidance from elsewhere

Bruce

• reliigon has lost power and influence in europe
• people used to give large sums of money to church
• belief has become personal choice 
• it has disengaged
• industrialisation undermines the consensus of religious belief
• cultural defence, cultural transition 

Weber

• rationalisation
• disenchanment

Parsons

• structural differentiation - separate institutions carry out functions previously performed by a single institution = disengagement

Berger 

• there are many interpretations of faith = religious diversity, this undermines religious structure

Bruce

• 'secularisation from within'
• stable rate of about 40% attendance has declined

Wilson

• churchgoing in america was more of an expression of the american way of living

Heelas

• consumerist culture - individuals not belonging to a group
• sacrilisation is growing

Bruce 

• NAM's provide no solutions to problems have minimal influence of society

Dawkins

• NAM's impact on society is dangerous - homeopathic hospitals and alternative medicines

Weber

• sects tend to arise in groups who are marginal to society

Stark and Bainbridge

• it is the relatively deprived who break away from churches to form sects

Wilson

• periods of rapid change disrupt and undermine established norms and values, people see it as a solution

Bruce

• response to modernity, especially rationalisation of work

Giddens

• fundamentalists are tradionalists who seek to return to basics
• response to postmodernity

Davie

• male backlash against womens greater freedom/reaction to greater sexual freedom

Bruce 

• monotheism - fundamentalism is a feature of societies and cultures that believe in one god and doesn't arise in polytheistic societies

Norris

• Existential secuirty theory

Popper

• science is an 'open belief system' 
• works on principle of falsification and testability

Horton

• religion is closed and science is open

Merton

• science is functional for society and are driven by the goal of enhancing human progress

Polyani

• claims all belief systems are closed and reject challenges to the knowledge that they follow

Kuhn

• science is mostly closed system but at school etc scientists are taught to accept established theories
• Paradigm - agreement about what to study. Being a successful scientist involves not challenging the paradigm

Lyotard

• science is just another meta-narrative
• focus is not on whether things are true but whether they can be applied/used
• science falsely claims to make the world a better place

Gramsci

• ideological domination of society and hegemony - maintaining ruling class world views, values and beliefs

Mannheim 

• sees all belief systems as a partial or onesided world view