Abstract
The religious economy model predicts that when encountered with competition, loosely organized religions will fail or will be transformed into congregational religions. Over time, competition will drive congregational religions to establish an extended relationship with their consumers by generating exclusivist claims and exclusivist socialization. And thus exclusive religion tends to occupy the biggest market share. This model, however, has rarely been tested empirically. By analyzing religious trends in Taiwan after the deregulation of the late 1980s, we find that state suppression contributed to the weakness of organized religion while enhancing the popularity of unchurched congregational religions in Taiwan. We also find that deregulation is associated with the rise of organized and congregational faiths. But whether or not these newly organized religions become exclusive or not needs further studies. Implications of the findings for future research are offered.
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