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71 Soc. F. 225 (1992-1993)
Secularization Revisited

handle is hein.journals/josf71 and id is 241 raw text is: Secularization Revisited* FRANK J. LECHNER, Emory University Debates among sociologists do not enjoy a high reputation for being constructive. For various reasons, these debates seldom observe the minimal civilities of courtroom arguments. Even those staking out claims to scientific rigor - always a useful rhetorical strategy in a discipline still insecure about its status in the academy - rarely stick to the merits of the case under discussion. Nothing could be more crippling to the cause of sociology-as-science. Professor Crippen's response to my article on secularization (Lechner 1991) illustrates the point. He attributes annoyance to me, finds much of what I have to say excessively narrow, declares one of my claims absurd, and charges me and Bryan Wilson (good company, from my point of view) with naivet. Seeing no special virtue in adversary proceedings in science, Crippen nevertheless frames the debate with me in wholly adversative terms. Disclaiming any taste for merely term- inological disputes, he offers an argument devoid of evidence, one that turns entirely on definitional matters - a familiar phenomenon in discussions of secularization. Substantively, he manages the awe-inspiring feat of producing both self-contradiction and tautology in a short article, offered in the guise of a rigorous refutation. But since Crippen's appeal in fact nicely supports my original rebuttal of the conventional case against secularization, I do not have to respond in kind. To the merits, then. Unlike some of our colleagues, Crippen and I agree on the historical evidence secularization theory claims to interpret. In fact, he appears more certain on this score than I. Our disagreement centers on how secularization theory interprets that body of evidence. My main claims were and are as follows: Secularization theory is no less scientifically respectable than any other theory in comparative-historical sociology and has been fully articulated by major figures including Wilson, Martin, and Dobbelaere. It is an empirically grounded general theory of societal change - i.e., a theory of change in societal structure that is applicable in principle across time and space, a theory as general as Goldstone's theory of revolutions, Wallerstein's theory of world-system development, or Elias's theory of civilizing processes. It is a theory that has long since proven its merits, thus placing the burden of refutation on its contemporary challengers. As I argued, it meets the quasi-positivist standards commonly used in theory evaluation, not least the requirement that it be refutable - a feature amply demonstrated by Crippen's own strenuous attempts at criticism. (However, I shall not take literally Crippen's statement that he does not know of other grounds * Direct correspondence to Frank . Lechner, Department of Sociology, Emory University, Atlanta, GA 30322. Social Forces, September 1992, 71(1):225-228 © The University of North Carolina Press

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