Religions as Brands

New Perspectives on the Marketization of Religion and Spirituality

Jean-Claude Usunier, Jörg Stolz, Jean-Claude Usunier, Jörg Stolz

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317067085
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religious Essays

During the twentieth century, religion has gone on the market place. Churches and religious groups are forced to 'sell god' in order to be attractive to 'religious consumers'. More and more, religions are seen as 'brands' that have to be recognizable to their members and the general public. What does this do to religion? How do religious groups and believers react? What is the consequence for society as a whole? This book brings together some of the best international specialists from marketing, sociology and economics in order to answer these and similar questions. The interdisciplinary book treats new developments in three fields that have hitherto evolved rather independently: the commoditization of religion, the link between religion and consumer behavior, and the economics of religion. By combining and cross-fertilizing these three fields, the book shows just what happens when religions become brands.

PART I

Introduction

Chapter 1

Religions as Brands: New Perspectives on the Marketization of Religion and Spirituality

Jörg Stolz and Jean-Claude Usunier

The church cannot engage in marketing. The church cannot put itself on a pedestal, create itself, praise itself. One cannot serve God while at the same time covering oneself by serving the devil and the world.¹

Karl Barth

We shouldn’t be surprised then that religion—whether in the form of a film or a church—is being marketed in the current commercialized culture. In order to be heard above the noise of the rest of society, religion, too, must participate in order to survive.

Mara Einstein

There can be no doubt: marketing and branding have started to transform religions.² Despite ferocious critiques, we have seen the emergence of televangelists (e.g. Oral Roberts, Jim Bakker), celebrity pastors (e.g. Rick Warren), stars of compassion (e.g. Mother Teresa), church commercials, religious “product lines,” mega-churches, branded religious sites (e.g. Lourdes), religious best-sellers (e.g. the Left Behind series), and blockbusters (e.g. The Passion of the Christ). Marketing and branding have not spared non-Christian religions. Think of the success of the Kabbalah centers, veiled Barbie dolls, Mecca cola, the Buddha as a decorative item, or the marketing of the Dalai Lama. At the same time, observers have noted that shopping and consuming may take on religious traits. After all, branding makes products into something “out of the ordinary,” “mythical,” and sometimes even “sacred.” Brand communities have formed around such products as Jeep, Star Trek, or Harley Davidson. And Apple fans have not only venerated their Macs, they have also deeply believed in the transformative power of the savior of their brand: Steve Jobs. Are then religions becoming brands while brands are becoming religions?

In this introduction, we lay out the different questions to ask and survey the relevant literature. It is interesting to note that various disciplines—sociology, economics, marketing, theology, history, and anthropology—have contributed to our current knowledge about “religions as brands.” However, these disciplines have not always taken their respective insights into common consideration. One of the aims of this book is therefore to bring these strands of research into closer contact and to suggest promising directions for future research.

The plan of our introduction is as follows. We first describe the historical antecedents of religious consumer society. By this term we mean a society in which religious organizations see themselves as offering “products” and “services” on a “market,” while individuals see themselves as “consumers” choosing these “products” and “services.” We show that modernization processes, the transformation of forms of religious groups, and generalized competition between religious and secular goods have led to a situation that makes both religious consuming and religious marketing increasingly probable. In a second part, we look at the individual effects of the above-mentioned historical antecedents. We analyze changing expectations of individuals towards religious organizations and an increase in choosing and combining different forms of religion and spirituality. We also discuss recent claims that shopping and consuming might be modern forms of religion and spirituality. In a third part, we describe the organizational effects of the historical antecedents. We look at both general and specific forms of religious branding and marketing and also discuss the influence of societal and cultural context. Part four describes the contributions to this volume, giving a sense of how they open up new perspectives concerning the question of “religions as brands.”

Antecedents: Causes of the Religious Consumer Society

A substantial part of the literature describes historical causes that are said to have led to a “religious consumer society.”³ We look at modernization processes, a change in the form of religious groups and the emergence of a generalized religious-secular competition.

While the specific theoretical preferences and terms vary, most authors seem to agree that some sort of “modernization process” is responsible for the emergence of the current religious consumer society (Altermatt, 1981; Beck, 1992; Dawson, 2011; Gauthier et al., 2011; Norris and Inglehart, 2004; Wallis and Bruce, 1995). This process entails (among many others):

• A breakdown of religious norms. Before the 1960s, there was general pressure on individuals to be members of a religion, and to have the same religion as their parents. Depending on various context variables, there could also be pressure to believe and practise.

• An increased individual freedom to choose, emphasizing the freedom and duty of individuals to decide for themselves in all matters important to them—including religious identity, practice, and belief.

• A change in values. Traditional values linked to authority and duty are replaced by self-realization and individualistic values. In the religious field this can be seen as a replacement of the semantic of “religiosity” by “spirituality.”

• Increases in disposable income. This gives individuals a wider range of options, especially concerning secular leisure, which may compete with religious options.

• An increase in individual security. The invention of welfare schemes, various types of insurance, improved biomedical services, etc. give individuals a level of security unprecedented in history. This in turn competes with the reassuring function of religious beliefs and practices.

• An increased exposure to mass media (TV, radio, later the internet). Individuals spend more and more time exposing themselves to and interacting with mass media. This increases the possibility of getting information about all kinds of religions, but equally about all kinds of secular matters.

• Increased individual mobility. Individuals travel increasingly long distances and start to think of their world (and possibly their religious and spiritual involvement) in terms of options that have a price, that may be consumed and that have to be chosen according to individual preferences.

Interestingly, these modernizing processes have led both to extended religious markets and to less religiosity. On the one hand, there has indeed been an increasing number of individuals choosing religious “products” that were specifically marketed by religious entrepreneurs. Alternative spirituality, a form of “consumer religion,” has shown important growth. And it is no accident that the number of megachurches rose dramatically from the 1960s on (Chaves, 2006). On the other hand, there has been a clear tendency towards less religiosity for many individuals. Since religion was not prescribed anymore and since individuals were now “free to choose,” they were also free to choose no religion, no belief, no practice. This led to a rise in “fuzzy religiosity” (Storm, 2009; Voas, 2009) and to a rise in the number of secular individuals. Due to this increased freedom, religion also lost its former importance in the choice of a spouse, leading to a marked rise in the number of religiously mixed couples as well as in couples with only one partner having a religion (Voas, 2003). Summing up, we thus observe a simultaneous process of marketization, individualization, and secularization. Much of the literature sees these processes as mutually exclusive, which is misleading. Rather, they are part of one single social process that has to be explained with a more general theory (Stolz, 2008, 2009a).

The change of religious groups from institutions to non-profit organizations

A second large-scale cause for the emergence of religious consumer society can be seen in the changing form of religious groups. In many countries they seem to evolve from institutions to kinds of non-profit organizations. While, in the nineteenth century and well into the twentieth century, they were institutions to which individuals often belonged by tradition and which were linked multi-functionally to many other societal institutions (the power structure, schools, hospitals, media etc.), religious groups have increasingly been transformed into voluntary associations such as sports clubs or philanthropic societies. Like all other voluntary associations, religious groups now have to compete for memberships and for their members’ time, donations, and energy. And like all other voluntary associations, they are therefore forced to engage in some form of marketing and branding. Thus, religious organizations should not be seen as incorporated “religious companies” with a commercial object and limited liability, but rather as non-profit organizations (NPOs) or voluntary (membership) organizations. In several important respects, non-profit organizations are distinguishable from firms orientated to profit (Mottner, 2007; Schwarz, 1986; Stolz, 2009):

1. They have members and their main goal lies not in the profit making but in the satisfaction of the needs of their members or other specified social groups.

2. They do not produce private goods (like cars), but a number of services for their members or for the general public (or both).

3. They have several important publics that all have to be cared for: members, prospective members, staff, volunteers, and the general public.

4. They do not finance themselves principally by the sale of products, but by members’ contributions or donations.

5. They compete on various levels with various other organizations and institutions. In modern societies, the main competition often stems not so much from other religious institutions as from secular organizations.

This has important practical consequences for the marketing activities in which religious organizations may engage (see below).

Religious-secular competition

A third large-scale process that has made the religious consumer society possible is the emergence of a generalized religious-secular competition. This process is well established in the marketing literature (Einstein, 2011; Mottner, 2007), but has not yet been given the attention it deserves in the sociology of religion and economics of religion literature (see, however, Gruber and Hungerman, 2008; Stolz, 2009b). Since individuals are now free to choose, all organizations and institutions that want to stay “in business” have to compete for the attention, the time and the donations of individuals (Einstein, 2008). This is just as true for religious organizations and groups as for any other secular institutions.

The religious-secular competition is a very serious matter for religious organizations. In fact, the traditional and institutionally based “motivators” that led to religious activity have been destroyed or at least seriously damaged by the modernization process. Christian practice in the nineteenth century was often motivated by the fact that non-practice was socially stigmatized, or that practice was prescribed by employers, or that the church was a place where spouses, friends and business partners could be found, or that the congregation was a place where social status could be displayed (among other things by appearing in one’s “Sunday best”), or that individuals were concerned with their lives hereafter (Brown, 2001; Bruce, 2002). Since these motivators have faded away and an array of secular alternatives is available for finding spouses and showing status, Christian Churches have to engage in marketing in order to renew individual interest in their “products.”⁴

Individual Effects: Religious and Spiritual Shopping and Consuming

The societal changes mentioned have had various effects on individuals that are characteristic of “religious consumer society.” We discuss four such effects: changing expectations towards religious organizations, an increase in choosing and combining religious/secular elements, a tendency to shop and consume religion/spirituality, and the possibility that consumption (of all kinds of products) may itself become a form of religion in modernity.

Changing expectations of individuals towards religious organizations

A first effect resides in significant changes in individual expectations towards religion. In consumer society, individuals learn that products and services should be attuned to their every need. It is therefore no wonder that they also expect such behavior from religious organizations and their products and services. A substantial number of publications show that individuals increasingly expect:

1. “High quality” services (Bruhn, 1999; Santos and Mathews, 2001; Stolz and Ballif, 2010). Several studies show that members of Christian churches increasingly expect high quality religious services, high quality music, good speakers and convenient access to places of worship. One way of reacting to the rising costs this entails has been the trend towards megachurches (Chaves, 2006; Fath, 2008).

2. Entertainment. In religious services, writes Mara Einstein (2008: 8) “consumers have a heightened expectation of being entertained, which is usually met with music and dramatic presentations.” Religious groups will increasingly copy successful entertainment formats from the secular sphere or invent new forms, in order to let individuals “have a good time” during their rituals and religious services (Favre, in this volume).

3. Freedom to choose. Individuals are increasingly concerned that religious groups will not restrict their choices and will respect their absolute freedom to believe and practise according to their individual preferences (Stolz and Ballif, 2010). Just as in the world of shopping and consuming, they want to be able to choose what they like instead of being told what to do.

An increase in individualized religion and religious shopping

In religious consumer society, individuals increasingly choose what to believe, how to practice and what norms to obey (if any). Different disciplinary approaches—individualization theorists, consumer society theorists, economists of religion, marketing theorists and even secularization theorists—agree on this point (Iannaccone, 1992; Roof, 1999). The agreement stops, however, when it comes to the question of what this increasing choice does to individual religiosity.

One position, often found in religious economics or the rational choice approach to religion, is that increasing religious freedom leads to increased religious shopping and a generalized religious market (Finke and Iannaccone, 1993; Iannaccone, 1991, 1992, 1998; Stark, 1999; Stark and Finke, 2000).⁵ These authors normally see any kind of society as a potential religious market that is more or less regulated. Individuals are seen as “naturally religious” and will behave as religious and spiritual shoppers, if only they are allowed to do so. They choose religious beliefs and practices according to their preferences—much as they choose cars or toothpaste. For example, Stark and Iannaccone (1994) argued that it was wrong to believe that Europe in the second half of the twentieth century underwent a process of “secularization” and, on the contrary, that increasing individual freedom would eventually lead to a religious revival.⁶

A second position sees the effect of increasing religious freedom not so much in increases in “shopping” and “consuming,” but rather in the fact that individuals believe and practise in an increasingly syncretistic and individualized way. Various terms have been created and used in order to highlight this phenomenon: bricolage, à la carte religion, do-it-yourself religion, recomposition, Sheilaism, or patchwork-religion (Bailey, 1990; Bellah, 1985; Dobbelaere, 2002: 173; Hervieu-Léger, 2001; Luckmann, 1967). The overall message of this literature is that more religious freedom does not lead to less religiosity, but to a change in the form of religiosity. Since individuals are no longer controlled by institutions, they become religious in ways that often do not look religious to the unsuspecting observer (hence the talk of “invisible” or “implicit” religion) or that are increasingly “spiritual” (Bloch, 1998; Heelas and Woodhead, 2004). Since each individual becomes a “special case,” qualitative research in particular seems to be a good method to investigate these new forms of religiosity and spirituality.

A third position also acknowledges increasing individual religious freedom, but sees various possible individual reactions to such a state of affairs (Gruber and Hungerman, 2006; Need and De Graaf, 1996; Stolz, 2009b). Individuals may, according to this position, become religious shoppers, but they may also choose not to be religious or entertain a kind of “fuzzy fidelity” (Storm, 2009; Voas, 2009). It depends on the context just what kind of reaction should be expected of a given individual or social group. In contexts where there are strong norms that the individual should be religious in some way, where there are few secular alternatives, where there is freedom as to the kind of religious products that may be chosen and where individuals have a certain income, they are very likely to become “religious shoppers.” Good examples are the Halal markets, the markets for Islamic fashion (Sandikzi and Ger, 2010), or the market for Christian music in the evangelical milieu. In contexts, on the other hand, where there are few norms sanctioning religious behavior and where there are many secular alternatives, we should expect more fuzzy fidelity and secularity.⁷

Shopping and consuming as a new religion

Some authors have argued that one of the important life domains where individuals can experience sacredness these days is shopping and consuming (Belk, Wallendorf, and Sherry, 1989). Baggini (2005), writing about the opening of a new branch of Ikea, suggests that “shopping is the new religion and Mammon our new God.” This is because “The kind of ‘must have’ mania that infects some shoppers as they close in on a good deal is more akin to the imperatives of religious devotion than those of personal finance.” Belk et al. (1989) show various ways in which individuals may “sacralize” the experience of consuming. Other authors describe how individuals may engage in various forms of “brand fandom”: they venerate the product, feel an emotional bond to other brand users, fantasize about enemies of the brand and begin to engage in...