Kirsten Endres: “Religious economy” and “rational choice” - an interpretative framework for Vietnamese spirit mediumship?

Since the economic reforms implemented in the mid-1980s, Vietnam has felt considerable impact of global forces which do not only play out in the economic sphere of the society but influence religious life as well. With the growing popularity of lên đồng mediumship, many temples dedicated to the deities of the Four Palaces have turned into veritable ritual "service centres" that dispose of ramified and efficient "business networks" specialized on catering to mediums' demands. In this paper, I shall explore how these recent developments in lên đồng mediumship can be usefully conceptualized in terms of a theoretical rationale that links religion and economics. Drawing from anthropological fieldwork among urban spirit mediums in Vietnam, I will examine the "entrepreneurial strategies" of different master mediums and temple masters in contemporary Hanoi, and discuss the benefits and limits of a religious economy-based conceptual framework such as the rational choice theory of religion.