Description
Book SynopsisThe second edition of this remarkably lucid text, provides a wide-ranging historical introduction to social theory. The new edition preserves, and further enhances, the book's striking qualities - its clarity, reliability, comprehensiveness and scholarship.
Trade Review"The best of its kind on the market."
Steve Fuller, Times Higher Education
"Alex Callincos has written one of the best historical introductions to sociological theory. His book also does a nice job of connecting sociological theory to broader intellectual trends and movements. This new edition sustains the quality and improves the coverage."
Craig Calhoun, New York University
"The second edition of Alex Callincos' Social Theory reads in the same beautifully clear, reliable and accessible way as the first edition. The new material adds a further dimension to this splendid book, bringing it fully up to date with debates in which Callinicos has himself played a part."
William Outhwaite, University of Sussex
Table of ContentsIntroduction
1. The Enlightenment
1. 1 Prehistory
1. 2 The concept of modernity
1. 3 A moral science
1. 4 The development of social theory
1. 5 Inner strains
2. Hegel
2. 1 Reconciling modernity
2. 2 The labour of the negative
2. 3 The debate over modernity
3. Liberals and Reactionaries
3. 1 Post-revolutionary debates
3. 2 Agonistic liberalism: Tocqueville and Mill
3. 3 Providence and race: Maistre and Gobineau
4. Marx
4. 1 The adventures of the dialectic
4. 2 History and capitalism
4. 3 Class struggle and revolution
5. Life and Power
5. 1 Evolution before and after Darwin
5. 2 Two evolutionists: Spencer and Kautsky
5. 3 Nature as the will to power: Nietzsche
6. Durkheim
6. 1 Social evolution and scientific objectivity
6. 2 Society as a moral reality
6. 3 Meaning and belief
7. Weber
7. 1 Prussian agriculture and the German state
7. 2 Science and the warring gods
7. 3 History and rationalization
7. 4 Liberal imperialism and democratic politics
8. The Illusions of Progress
8. 1 The strange death of liberal Europe
8. 2 Objectivity and estrangement: Simmel
8. 3 The self dissected: Freud
8. 4 Memories of underdevelopment: Russian intellectuals and capitalism
9. Revolution and Counter-Revolution
9. 1 Hegelian Marxism: Lukács and Gramsci
9. 2 Heidegger and the conservative revolution
10. The Golden Age
10. 1 Theories of capitalism: Keynes and Hayek
10. 2 Functionalist sociology: Talcott Parsons
10. 3 Despairing critique: the Frankfurt school
11. Crack-Up?
11. 1 The 1960s and after
11. 2 Structure and subject: Lévi-Strauss and Althusser
11. 3 Nietzsche’s revenge: Foucault and poststructuralism
11. 4 Carrying on the tradition: Habermas and Bourdieu
12. Debating modernity and postmodernity
12. 1 Postmodernity?
12. 2 Modernity and capitalism
12. 3 Reason and nature
12. 4 Theory and practice
12. 5 Universal and particular
12. 6 Beyond capitalism?
13. Changing the subject: globalization, capitalism, and imperialism
13. 1 Much ado about globalization
13. 2 The social as networks ... or as nothing
13. 3 Back to capitalism - and imperialism?
13. 4 The debate resumed
Further Reading
Index
