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Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions · Model answer

What is cult? Explain the growth of cults in the contemporary world.

  • UPSC 2021
  • Religion and Society

In everyday speech "cult" is a label of suspicion. In sociology it is a technical term. Howard P. Becker (1932) split Ernst Troeltsch's church–sect scheme and used "cult" for Troeltsch's mystical type: a small, loosely organised, individualistic religious grouping. Its growth tests the claim that modernity means religious decline.

You are reading the opening of the model answer. The full answer is part of Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions.

What the full answer covers

  • What a cult is
  • Growth of cults in the contemporary world
  • The darker side and the state
  • A sociological caution
  • Conclusion

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