Engaging with the idea that the world reveals not one, but many routes to modernity, this volume explores the role of religion in the emergence of multiple forms of modernity, which evolve according to specific cultural conditions and interpretations of the 'modern project'. It draws upon case study material from Africa, The Middle East, Russia and South America to examine the question of whether modernity, democracy and secularism are universalistic concepts or are, on the contrary, unique to Western civilization, whilst considering the relationship of postsecularism to the varied paths of...

Drawing on the thought of Durkheim, this volume focuses on societal changes at the symbolic level to develop a new conceptualisation of the emergence of postsecular societies. Neo-Durkheimian categories are applied to the case of Turkey, which in recent years has shifted from a strong Republican and Kemalist view of secularism to a more Anglo-Saxon perspective. Turkish society thus constitutes an interesting case that blurs modernist distinctions between the secular and the religious and which could be described as postsecular . Presenting three symbolic case studies - the enduring image of...