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Author | : Frank Hearn |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 346 |
Release | : 2020-08-26 |
Genre | : Political Science |
ISBN | : 1000155838 |
Download Reason and Freedom in Sociological Thought (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
How has reason, believed since the Enlightenment to be the ally of freedom in the search for a better, more humanly satisfying world, been reduced to a technical rationality that has actually impoverished the bases of human freedom? What might be the options and obligations for sociologists who wish to restore reason to its proper status? Working within the tradition of C. Wright Mills and Jurgen Habermas, Frank Hearn sets out to answer these questions. He surveys the treatment of the relation between reason and freedom in both the classical tradition (especially the writings of Saint-Simon, Comte, Durkheim, Marx, Weber, and Freud) and an increasingly significant segment of social thought and criticism (and, for example, in the contrasting visions of Daniel Bell and Christopher Lasch.) He then analyses both the concrete social and historical forms of expression taken by what Mills calls 'rationality without reason' and their impact on individual autonomy and the freedoms associated with democratic politics. Finally, he develops Mills's and Habermas's claims that the cultivation of democratic publics and a critical social theory committed to a vibrant public life are indispensable to the protection and revitalization of the values of reason and freedom and of the practices they entail. This book updates and enriches Mills's influential argument by demonstrating its affinity with critical theory, by showing its contributions to a critical understanding of the classical tradition, and by showing its implications for contemporary social, political, and economic developments.
Author | : Frank Hearn |
Publisher | : Unwin Hyman |
Total Pages | : 220 |
Release | : 1985-01-01 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 9780043011959 |
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Author | : Barry Hindess |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 142 |
Release | : 2014-08-21 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 1317652142 |
Download Choice, Rationality and Social Theory (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Choice, Rationality and Social Theory is a powerful rebuttal of the remarkably influential theories underlying 'rational choice analysis'. Rational choice analysis maintains that social life is principally to be explained as the outcome of rational choices on the part of individual actors. Adherents of this view include not only philosophers, political scientists and sociologists, but also prominent politicians in Western governments – notably of the United Kingdom and the United States. Rational choice analysis is said to be rigorous, capable of great technical sophistication, and able to generate powerful explanations on the basis of a few, relatively simple theoretical assumptions. Barry Hindess argues that the theory is seriously deficient, first, because there are important actors in the modern world other than human individuals, and second, because it says nothing about those processes of deliberation that play an important part in actors' decisions. The use of highly questionable assumptions about actors and their rationality has the effect of closing off important areas of intellectual inquiry and ignoring the reality of certain forms of thought and the social conditions on which they depend. These points are established through detailed examination of the concepts of the actor and of rationality – providing an overall argument that constitutes a serious challenge to any adherent of rational choice analysis.
Author | : Werner Stark |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 262 |
Release | : 2014-08-07 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 131765109X |
Download Social Theory and Christian Thought (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
Almost all the great religious thinkers of the past have developed a social as well as theological doctrine, but their sociology was as a rule merely implicit in their work or at best half formulated so that careful study and analysis is needed to bring it out. This is the task which Dr. Stark has set himself in the present essays. He has searched the writings of St. Augustine, Paschal, Newman and Kierkegaard for the sociological ideas they contain and shows that their social philosophies were varied, profound, fascinating and surprisingly definite. Dr. Stark seeks the theological conceptions present in, and basic to, the teachings of some outstanding secular sociologists, economists and philosophers, such as Adam Smith, Kant, Hegel, Marx, the Darwinians, Bergson Scheler and Meinecke and proves that their systems were built around a religious centre even though they themselves were at times unaware of it.
Author | : Frederick NEUHOUSER |
Publisher | : Harvard University Press |
Total Pages | : 351 |
Release | : 2009-06-30 |
Genre | : Philosophy |
ISBN | : 0674041453 |
Download Foundations of Hegel's Social Theory Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
This study examines the philosophical foundations of Hegel's social theory by articulating the normative standards at work in his claim that the central social institutions of the modern era are rational or good.
Author | : Axel Honneth |
Publisher | : John Wiley & Sons |
Total Pages | : 450 |
Release | : 2014-03-11 |
Genre | : Philosophy |
ISBN | : 0745680062 |
Download Freedom's Right Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
The theory of justice is one of the most intensely debated areas of contemporary philosophy. Most theories of justice, however, have only attained their high level of justification at great cost. By focusing on purely normative, abstract principles, they become detached from the sphere that constitutes their “field of application” - namely, social reality. Axel Honneth proposes a different approach. He seeks to derive the currently definitive criteria of social justice directly from the normative claims that have developed within Western liberal democratic societies. These criteria and these claims together make up what he terms “democratic ethical life”: a system of morally legitimate norms that are not only legally anchored, but also institutionally established. Honneth justifies this far-reaching endeavour by demonstrating that all essential spheres of action in Western societies share a single feature, as they all claim to realize a specific aspect of individual freedom. In the spirit of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right and guided by the theory of recognition, Honneth shows how principles of individual freedom are generated which constitute the standard of justice in various concrete social spheres: personal relationships, economic activity in the market, and the political public sphere. Honneth seeks thereby to realize a very ambitious aim: to renew the theory of justice as an analysis of society.
Author | : Richard Badham |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 235 |
Release | : 2014-08-21 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 1317650514 |
Download Theories of Industrial Society (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
The concept of industrial society plays a dominant role in the social sciences. The ‘Great Divide’ between pre-industrial and industrial societies is commonly assumed to be the main bridge separating modern societies from the past, and distinguishing ‘developed’ from ‘undeveloped’ states in the present era. In history, economics, politics and sociology the concept of industrial society underlies a wide variety of discussions, particularly those relating to economic development and social progress. Outside academic writing, too, the concept exerts a great deal of influence. In the developing world, there is a widespread concern to ‘industrialise’, whilst in the developed world there is growing uneasiness as to whether ‘industrialisation’ is beneficial or not, but still the concept is central. This book examines critically the concept of industrial society, its pervasiveness and influence. It reviews all the major theories of industrial society and the research into the changing character of post-industrial societies. It argues that the decision to use the concept severely restricts the social imagination, and that the concept becomes increasingly less useful as criticism of the equating of industrialisation with social progress grows.
Author | : Gunter Werner Remmling |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 472 |
Release | : 2022-03-23 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 100015579X |
Download Towards the Sociology of Knowledge (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
The sociology of knowledge is an area of social scientific investigation with major emphasis on the relations between social life and intellectual activity. It is now an area central to most graduate and undergraduate courses in sociology. The present collection of readings explains the origins, systematic development, present state and possible future direction of the discipline. The major statements in the field were developed early in the twentieth century by Durkheim, Scheler and Mannheim, but the sociology of knowledge continues to engage the theoretical and empirical interests of contemporary sociologists who desire to penetrate the surface level of social existence. This book, with its carefully selected contributions and an introduction which relates the selections to the developmental pattern of the discipline, provides guidance and insight for the reader concerned with the topical issues raised by sociologists of knowledge.
Author | : S.I. Benn |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 427 |
Release | : 2014-08-21 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 1317651278 |
Download Rationality and the Social Sciences (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
The concepts of rationality that are used by social scientists in the formation of hypotheses, models and explanations are explored in this collection of original papers by a number of distinguished philosophers and social scientists. The aim of the book is to display the variety of the concepts used, to show the different roles they play in theories of very different kinds over a wide range of disciplines, including economics, sociology, psychology, political science and anthropology, and to assess the explanatory and predictive power that a theory can draw from such concepts.
Author | : Hermann Strasser |
Publisher | : Routledge |
Total Pages | : 288 |
Release | : 2014-08-13 |
Genre | : Social Science |
ISBN | : 1317652320 |
Download The Normative Structure of Sociology (RLE Social Theory) Book in PDF, ePub and Kindle
In this provocative analysis of the central issues and developments in modern social theory, Dr Strasser contends that enquiry into the function, tasks and mission of sociology as a discipline can be understood only in relation to the subject's historical development. He believes that a discussion of the origin and intention of sociology, particularly in relation to the established social order, enables us to grasp fully the nature of sociological theory, both past and present. He maintains that a sociologist's own position in society, and consequently his views on its development and his way of expressing those views, will affect the theoretical position he takes up.