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Social theory is the theoretical core of the social sciences, clearly distinguishable from political theory and cultural analysis. This book offers a unique overview of the development of social theory from the end of the Second World War in 1945 to the present day. Spanning the literature in English, French and German, it provides an excellent background to the most important social theorists and theories in contemporary sociological thought, with crisp summaries of the main books, arguments and controversies. It also deals with newly emerging schools from rational choice to symbolic interactionism, with new ambitious approaches (Habermas, Luhmann, Giddens, Bourdieu), structuralism and antistructuralism, critical revisions of modernization theory, feminism and neopragmatism. Written by two of the world's leading sociologists and based on their extensive academic teaching, this unrivalled work is ideal both for students in the social sciences and humanities and for anyone interested in contemporary theoretical debates.
Social theory is the theoretical core of the social sciences, clearly distinguishable from political theory and cultural analysis. This book offers a unique overview of the development of social theory from the end of the Second World War in 1945 to the present day. Spanning the literature in English, French and German, it provides an excellent background to the most important social theorists and theories in contemporary sociological thought, with crisp summaries of the main books, arguments and controversies. It also deals with newly emerging schools from rational choice to symbolic interactionism, with new ambitious approaches (Habermas, Luhmann, Giddens, Bourdieu), structuralism and antistructuralism, critical revisions of modernization theory, feminism and neopragmatism. Written by two of the world's leading sociologists and based on their extensive academic teaching, this unrivalled work is ideal both for students in the social sciences and humanities and for anyone interested in contemporary theoretical debates.
Introduction; 1. What is theory?; 2. The classical attempt at synthesis: Talcott Parsons; 3. Parsons on the road to normativist functionalism; 4. Parsons and the elaboration of normativist functionalism; 5. Neo-utilitarianism; 6. Interpretive approaches (1): symbolic interactionism; 7. Interpretive approaches (2): ethnomethodology; 8. Conflict sociology and conflict theory; 9. Habermas and critical theory; 10. Habermas' 'theory of communicative action'; 11. Niklas Luhmann's radicalization of functionalism; 12. Anthony Giddens' theory of structuration and the new British sociology of power; 13. The renewal of Parsonianism and modernization theory; 14. Structuralism and poststructuralism; 15. Between structuralism and theory of practice: the cultural sociology of Pierre Bourdieu; 16. French anti-structuralists (Cornelius Castoriadis, Alain Touraine and Paul Ricoeur); 17. Feminist social theories; 18. A crisis of modernity? New diagnoses (Ulrich Beck, Zygmunt Bauman, Robert Bellah, and the debate between liberals and communitarians); 19. Neopragmatism; 20. How things stand; Bibliography.
An unrivalled overview of social theory and its development from 1945 to the present day.
Hans Joas is the Max Weber Professor and Director of the Max Weber Center for Advanced Cultural and Social Studies at the University of Erfurt. He is also Professor of Sociology and a member of the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chicago. Wolfgang Knöbl is Professor of Sociology at the University of Göttingen.
'Social Theory does a remarkable job of making a complex and
sometimes difficult subject matter into a clear and continuously
interesting book. Without claiming a false neutrality Joas and
Knöbl combine exposition and criticism in a way that is
consistently fair even to positions that are farthest from their
own. This should be an indispensable book for at least a
generation.' Robert N. Bellah, University of California, Berkeley,
and co-author of Habits of the Heart
'Possibly the most comprehensive and critical analysis of the
development of Social Theory in the second half of the twentieth
century - bringing together European and American developments
showing their common roots in the classical problematique and the
continual development thereof.' S. N. Eisenstadt, Hebrew University
of Jerusalem and Van Leer Jerusalem Institute
'… this fascinating book will provide a wealth of conceptual
resources for a long time.' Sociologica
'Hans Joas and Wolfgang Knöbl's Social Theory: Twenty Introductory
Lectures is a remarkable book. There is nothing that I know that
comes anywhere near to it in the contemporary landscape of social
theory. [It] is, in addition to other things, an intellectually
heavyweight textbook for graduate students and professors,
providing a summation of, and critical commentary on, virtually all
the major and minor currents in social theory since the middle of
the twentieth century.' Rob Stones, Journal of Classical Sociology
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