Description
Book Synopsis* Law presents a novel and exciting approach to the subject of the social order -- central to modern social theory* The book draws on difficult arguments and concepts but presents them in an extremely accessible form* Law, in effect, offers an alternative postmodern sociology which should attract wide attention. .
Trade Review"In this beautifully written book John Law describes a laboratory in political and economic turmoil. His notion of the 'mode of ordering' draws on post-structuralist theory to create a striking and critical vision of modernity. His book is also an impassioned reply to those on left or right who believe that it is possible to design the perfect society. Who said nothing good came of Thatcherism?"
Michel Callon, Centre de Sociologie de l'Innovation, Ecole Nationale Superieure des Mines, Paris "Professor Law's analysis offers challenges at many levels - to what we understand by laboratory management, to the nature of connections between science studies and wider social theory in throwing light on it, and on the relationship of author to subject. His most sustained challenge is to the role of the reader, who is never allowed to relax into passivity in tackling this open and honest book." Peter Healey, The Science Policy Support Group
"This is a book that reanimates the old idea of the 'sociological imagination' and which continually captivates the reader with its restless questioning, its intellectual honesty and its sheer craft." Robert Cooper, University of Lancaster
Table of ContentsAcknowledgements vii
1. Introduction 1
2. Networks and Places 31
3. Histories, Agents and Structures 52
4. Irony, Contingency and Mode of Ordering 73
5. Contingency, Materialism and Discourse 94
6. Rankings 115
7. Dualisms and Gradients: Notes on the Material Forms of Ordering 137
8. Enterprise, Trust and Distrust 163
9. Postscript 185
References 196
Index 206
