desecularization

"The Pussy Riot Case" and the Peculiarities of Russian Postsecularism

Some Aspects of Desecularization in Post-Soviet Russia

The article deals with desecularization in post-Soviet Russia as a backlash of massive secularization in the Soviet Union. Author presents analysis of different aspects of secularization typical to communist countries such as «hyper-privatization of religion» and what he calls «distillation of the religious consciousness.» He then explores special features of religion’s revival in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet system.

The Conceptual Foundations of the Desecularization Theory

The paper attempts at achieving the conceptual understanding of the desecularization, the idea first proposed by Peter L. Berger in late 1990s. The idea still lacks theoretical elaboration as the sociology of religion is usually late in such theoretical enterprise; this paper tries to fill the gap. In doing so, the author starts with using categorical language of the secularization theory, which was developed in the course of the twentieth century. Yet he adds other theoretical frames and takes a new approach concentrating upon actors, patterns, regimes, and levels of desecularization.

Understanding the Secular

The article explores the notion of «secular» and other terms that include this Latin root – secularization, secularism, de-secularization, and post-secular. All these terms are used in various ways by different researchers and in normatively biased ways both within and beyond academia, yielding much confusion. The author attempts to unpack the meanings behind these terms and organize a certain logical matrix for their use.