Influence of Religion on Economic Growth and the State of the Environment in Relation to Contemporary Theories of Secularisation

Abstract

The article concerns contemporary research on the influence of religion on economic growth and the state of the environment, its limitations and the need to consider the category of secularisation and its various concepts. The authors concretise this objective by analysing the existing literature on the subject. In the first part, they discuss the methodological aspects of the problem signalled. In the next two, they review theories on the relationship between religion and economic growth as well as the state of the environment. In the fourth part, they analyse the concept of secularisation and its importance in objectifying the relationships and discrepancies occurring between religion, economics, and the environment. They conclude by arguing that the data collected does not support the strong secularisation thesis, according to which religion in its essential manifestations is consistently and irreversibly displaced from social life, and thus its influence on the economy and the natural environment disappears.