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Sociology was born in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as a project in, of, and for empire. This essay excavates a tradition of social thought that grew alongside metropolitan sociology but has been marginalized by it: anticolonial thought. Emerging from anticolonial movements, writers and thinkers, anticolonial thought in 19th and 20th centuries emerged from a variety of thinkers (from indigenous activists in the Americas to educated elites in the American, Francophone and British colonies). I argue that this body of thought offers distinct visions of society, social relations, and social structure, along with generative analytic approaches to the social self, social solidarity and global relations-among other themes. Anticolonial thought offers the basis for an alternative canon and corpus of sociological thinking to which we might turn as we seek to revitalize and decolonize sociology., (© 2023 The Authors. The British Journal of Sociology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of London School of Economics and Political Science.)

This paper responds to Julian Go's Lecture "Thinking against Empire. Anti-colonial Thought and Social Theory." It proceeds in two parts: I first follow Go's invitation to read and reread Mabel Dove Danquah and Frantz Fanon and explore what their work contributes to our understanding of state-forms. I then examine the terms of Go's invitation more closely. I contrast Go's juxtaposition of imperial sociology on the one hand and anti-colonial sociology on the other hand, with the broader range of theoretical traditions and methods, which a practice-oriented sociology of sociology and an international history of sociology would highlight. I raise the question what "standpoint" adds to the authors Go discusses and the broader range of scholars who have engaged with post-colonial contexts in their research at this point in time. Calling for consideration of the anti-colonial standpoint is a particular choice, which has a distinctive heritage in Hegelian-Marxian projections of the social whole and is in tension with either deep exploration of particular thinkers or the middle-range theorizing that Go also seems to endorse. Defined at a level of abstraction that is "above" (or underneath) actual conversations in a range of fields and subfields, it can appear as a "test" for scholars who have long engaged with post-colonial contexts, which can have unintended consequences when coupled with the institutional power and asymmetric insularity of Anglo-American academia., (© 2023 The Authors. The British Journal of Sociology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of London School of Economics and Political Science.)

This article develops a novel account of middle-range theories for combining theoretical and empirical analysis in explanatory sociology. I first revisit Robert K. Merton's original ideas on middle-range theories and identify a tension between his developmental approach to middle-range theorizing that recognizes multiple functions of theories in sociological research and his static definition of the concept of middle-range theory that focuses only on empirical testing of theories. Drawing on Merton's ideas on theorizing and recent discussions on mechanism-based explanations, I argue that this tension can be resolved by decomposing a middle-range theory into three interrelated and evolving components that perform different functions in sociological research: (i) a conceptual framework about social phenomena that is a set of interrelated concepts that evolve in close connection with empirical analysis; (ii) a mechanism schema that is an abstract and incomplete description of a social mechanism; and (iii) a cluster of all mechanism-based explanations of social phenomena that are based on the particular mechanism schema. I show how these components develop over time and how they serve different functions in sociological theorizing and research. Finally, I illustrate these ideas by discussing Merton's theory of the Matthew effect in science and its more recent applications in sociology., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2018.)

In Thinking Against Empire: Anticolonial Thought as Social Theory, Julian Go continues his vital work on rethinking and redirecting the discipline of sociology. Go's piece relates to his wider oeuvre of postcolonial sociology – found in works such as his Postcolonial Thought and Social Theory (2016) as well as multiple journal articles on epistemic exclusion (Go 2020), Southern theory (Go 2016), metrocentrism (Go 2014), and the history of sociology (Go 2009). In this response article, my aim is to think alongside some of the central themes outlined in Go's paper rather than offering a rebuttal of any sorts. In particular, I want to think through how the recent work on 'decoloniality' may play more of a central role in Go's vision of sociology and social theory than he acknowledges. In doing so, I hope to engage in Go's prodigious scholarship through centering discussions of the geopolitics of knowledge, double translation, and border thinking. Before proceeding to this discussion, I will offer a brief review of my reading of Go's paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This contribution engages Go's generative invitation to think against empire by thinking through the epistemic and disciplinary implications of such endeavour. I zoom in on the need to explicitly address the purpose and ethos of scholarly inquiry and how that translates into decolonial academic praxis. Thinking with Go's invitation to think against empire, I feel compelled to constructively engage the limitations and impossibilities of decolonising disciplines such as Sociology. I glean from the various attempts at inclusion and diversity in society and argue that adding or including Anticolonial Social Thought/marginalised voices and peoples in the existing corridors of power—such as canons or advisory boards—is at best a minimal rather than a sufficient condition of decolonisation or going against empire. This raises the question of what comes after inclusion. Rather than offer a 'correct' or single alternative anticolonial way, the paper explores the pluriversally inspired method(ological) avenues that appear when we commit to thinking about what happens after inclusion when the goal is decolonisation. I expand on my 'discovery' and engagement with the figure and political thought of Thomas Sankara and how this led me to abolitionist thought. The paper then offers a patchwork of methodological considerations when engaging the what, how, why?—questions of research. I engage with questions of purpose, mastery, and colonial science and turn to the generative potential of approaches such as grounding, Connected Sociologies, epistemic Blackness, and curating as methods. Thinking with abolition and Shilliam's (2015) distinction between colonial and decolonial science, between knowledge production and knowledge cultivation, the paper invites us to not only think of what we need to do more of or better when taking Anticolonial Social Thought seriously, but also what we might need to let go of. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper defends the concept of 'fetishism' as an explanatory parameter in sociological theorizing on Durkheimian grounds, while at the same time paying due attention to important insights regarding the role of objects in social life, originating from Actor-Network Theory (ANT). It critically assesses the current critique of the concept of fetishism propagated by ANT protagonist Bruno Latour. Latour and suggests a compromise between these two 'schools'. First, to place the paper firmly in context, I analyse some examples of modern fetishism and outline the themes of the ensuing discussion. Next, I turn to Durkheim, seeking to develop a distinct interpretation of the concept of the social and of fetishism, and then point to some of Durkheim's shortcomings and attempt to make room for Latourian perspectives. Finally, I critically assess Latour's dismissal of forms of social 'explanation' and of the concept of fetishism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Robert Fine was among the most original social theorists in Britain of the past 30 years, and the aim of this paper is to offer a first systematic assessment of his intellectual contribution. There are sound intellectual reasons to explore Fine's scholarship. He maintained a problematic relation with mainstream sociology and, against the reduction of sociology to questions of method, culture, or class, he argued that sociologists must continue to ask difficult normative questions as part of the social world they ought to explain. And there are also pressing political concerns that justify a reconsideration of his writings. Global politics is currently marked by a populist wave that decries the very ideas and values that were central to Fine's social theory: the need to uphold the rule of law at home and abroad, the politics of cosmopolitan solidarity, and the significance of antisemitism and its relationships with different forms of authoritarian politics. My main argument is that there is a dialectics of universality that drives forward Fine's intellectual project. By this, I mean that a universalistic idea of humanity-an all-inclusive conception of all human beings-is the most important normative intuition of modern times. This idea of humanity moves forward in history through a dual process of emancipation and domination: successful forms of social, legal, and political inclusion help make visible previous dynamics of exclusion but may also create or recreate discriminatory practices. Building on the work of French historian Michael Löwy on heterodox Jewish thinkers, I explain the three main tenets of Fine's work: (a) his reconstruction of critical social theory; (b) the notion of cosmopolitan solidarity; and (c) the significance and main features of modern antisemitism., (© 2020 London School of Economics and Political Science.)

This paper explores the empirical, conceptual and theoretical gains that can be made using cosmopolitan social theory to think through the urban transformations that scholars have in recent years termed planetary urbanization. Recognizing the global spread of urbanization makes the need for a cosmopolitan urban sociology more pressing than ever. Here, it is suggested that critical urban sociology can be invigorated by focusing upon the disconnect that Henri Lefebvre posits between the planetarization of the urban - which he views as economically and technologically driven - and his dis-alienated notion of a global urban society. The first aim of this paper is to highlight the benefits of using 'cosmopolitan' social theory to understand Lefebvre's urban problematic (and to establish why this is also a cosmopolitan problematic) ; the second is to identify the core cosmopolitan contradictions of planetary urbanization, tensions that are both actually existing and reproduced in scholarly accounts. The article begins by examining the challenges presented to urban sociology by planetary urbanization, before considering how cosmopolitan sociological theory helps provide an analytical 'grip' on the deep lying social realities of contemporary urbanization, especially in relation to questions about difference, culture and history. These insights are used to identify three cosmopolitan contradictions that exist within urbanized (and urbanizing) space; tensions that provide a basis for a thoroughgoing cosmopolitan investigation of planetary urbanization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Governmentality studies and social theories agree that in contemporary societies the idea of autonomy is no longer simply an ideal or an individual aspiration but a social obligation. In an attempt to clarify the meaning of autonomy in this day and age, this paper asks how individuals perceive and negotiate the various dimensions of autonomy and how this affects the functioning of late‐modern institutions. The empirical insights derived from a qualitative study provide a differentiated picture of how individuals pursue their claims to autonomy and comply with institutional demands for autonomy in everyday practice. By presenting seven types of late‐modern "autonomy managers," the analysis evinces a usurpation of autonomous agency that renders individuals the institutional editors of the contemporary contradictions, deficits, and tensions that occur in their everyday interactions. This comes at the price of notionally free but exhausted actors running short of all kinds of resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Combining moral philosophy with sociological theory to build on themes introduced in Hall and Lamont's Successful Societies (2009), the paper outlines a distinctive perspective. It holds that a necessary condition of successful societies is that decision‐makers base their decisions on a high level of attentiveness (concern and comprehension) towards subjectively valued and morally legitimate forms of life. Late modern societies consist of a plurality of forms of life, each providing grounds for what Alasdair MacIntyre has called internal goods—valued and morally valuable practices. The status of such goods is examined, and distinctions are drawn between their manifest and latent, and transposable and situationally specific, characteristics. We integrate this refined idea of internal goods into a developed conception of habitus that is both morally informed and situationally embedded. The sociological approach of strong structuration theory (SST) is employed to demonstrate how this conception of habitus can guide the critique of decision‐making that damages internal goods. We identify the most pervasive and invidious forms of damaging decision‐making in contemporary societies as those involving excessive forms of instrumental reasoning. We argue that our developed conception of habitus, anchored in the collectively valued practices of specific worlds, can be a powerful focus for resistance. Accounts of scholarship in higher education and of the white working class in America illustrate the specificities of singular, particular, social worlds and illuminate critical challenges raised by the perspective we advocate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we intend to deconstruct the term 'tribalism' as a colonial category, which figures as a prominent concept in social studies on Kurds as well as the Middle East at large. Blithely used, tribalism has occupied a central place, especially in the existing scholarship on Kurdistan. Some earlier anthropological works have gone so far as to regard tribalism as the 'DNA' of Middle Eastern people. Drawing on recent studies on Latin America, Africa and Central Asia, we argue that the use of tribalism as if it is the natural constitution of Kurdish society has caused a significant misrepresentation and oversimplification of socio‐political life in Kurdistan as well as the broader Middle East. In a way, the existing body of scholarship on this region has reproduced statist‐nationalist discourses at the expense of dominated communities (e.g., Kurds). The historical context of both colonial powers and nation‐states 'combating tribes and tribalism' coincided with the emergence of the discourse of racial biopolitics. Thus, the use of the term tribalism to define certain nations or ethnic groups should not be viewed as merely an application of socio‐anthropological categories. Hence, we argue that the ethical aspects and implications of the use of tribalism by both colonial powers and later by nation‐states to define certain ethnic groups must not be overlooked. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on recent research to explore the changing cultures of racism in English football. Starting from a critical analysis of key themes in the literature on football it seeks to show that existing analytical frameworks need to be reworked if they are going to adequately account for the complex forms through which racism is expressed in contemporary football cultures. In the course of this analysis we question some of the ways in which the issue of racism in football is collapsed into broader accounts of 'hooliganism' and other forms of violence among football fans. From this starting point the paper draws on some elements of our empirical research in order to outline an alternative way of framing the issues of racism and multiculturalism in football. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper offers a defence of sociology through an engagement with Actor Network Theory (ANT) and particularly the critique of 'critical' and politically engaged social science developed by Bruno Latour. It argues that ANT identifies some weaknesses in more conventional sociology and social theory, and suggests that 'critical' and 'public' orientated sociologists can learn from the analytical precision and ethnographic sensibilities that characterize ANT as a framework of analysis and a research programme. It argues, however, that Latour et al. have too hastily dispensed with 'critique' in favour of a value neutral descriptive sociology, and that the symmetrical and horizontalist approach adopted in ANT is particularly ill-suited to the development of scientific knowledge about social structures. It argues that a more straightforwardly realist sociology would share many of the strengths of ANT whilst being better able to interrogate, empirically and normatively, the centres of contemporary social power., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2017.)

This paper takes issue with the way in which the individualization thesis– in which it is assumed that close relationships have become tenuous and fragile– has become so dominant in‘new’ sociological theorizing about family life. Although others have criticized this thesis, in this paper the main criticism derives from empirical research findings carried out with members of transnational families living in Britain whose values and practices do not fit easily with ideas of individualization. It is argued that we need a much more complex and less linear notion of how families change across generations and in time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The temporal gaze in socio-environmental theory can take many forms. Time may be added to existing approaches without disturbing the status quo of theory and methodology. Alternatively, focus may be on the time-space of socio-environmental existence or typologies constructed of the complexity of socio-environmental time. Finally, phenomena, processes and events may be conceptualized as timescapes. Through the focus on genetic modification of foods, the paper demonstrates the pertinence of this timescape perspective for social theory and socio-environmental analyses. A thorough-going temporal gaze is important because a) such reconceptualization forms an integral part of rethinking the social sciences' relationship to nature and environmental matters; b) the implications at the level of theory tend to be glossed over and ignored; and c) it is central to changing practice at the level of public and personal action. The paper thus uses a timescape perspective to set out substantive and conceptual issues that present some of social theory's challenges for the new millennium. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bourdieusian Field Theory (BFT) provided decisive inspiration for the early conceptual formulation of New Institutionalism (NI). This paper attempts to reinvigorate the stalled intellectual dialogue between NI and BFT by comparing NI's concept of isomorphism with BFT's notion of homology. I argue that Bourdieu's understanding of domination-oriented social action, transposable habitus, and a non-linear causality, embodied in his neglected concept of homology, provides an alternative theorization of field-level convergence to New Institutionalism's central idea of institutional isomorphism. To showcase how BFT can be useful for organizational research, I postulate a habitus-informed and field-conditioned theory of transference to enrich NI's spin-off thesis of 'diffusion'. I propose that while NI can benefit from BFT's potential of bringing social structure back into organizational research, BFT can enrich its social analysis by borrowing from NI's elaboration of the symbolic system of organizations., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2016.)

Rancière published two substantial criticisms of the work of Bourdieu in the early 1980s. It is possible that these were provoked by his sense that he needed to oppose what he considered to be the sociological reduction of aesthetic taste offered by Bourdieu in Distinction (Bourdieu 1986 [1979]) at precisely the moment when he (Rancière) was beginning to articulate his commitment to the potential of aesthetic expression as a mode of political resistance. Except in so far as it draws upon some of the retrospective reflections offered by Rancière in his introductions to the re-issues of his early texts, this paper examines the parallel development of the thinking of the two men up to the mid-1980s--but not beyond. The discussion is situated socio-historically and, by definition, does not seek to offer comparatively any transhistorical assessment of the values of the positions adopted by the two men. I argue that Rancière misrepresented the character of Bourdieu's sociological work by failing to recognize the underlying phenomenological orientation of his thinking. Bourdieu suppressed this orientation in the 1960s but, after the May events of 1968, it enabled him to expose the extent to which the practices of both science and art operate within constructed 'fields' in strategic distinction from popular primary experience. The challenge is to introduce an ongoing dialogue between primary and constructed cultures rather than to suppose that either social science or art possesses intrinsic autonomy., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2015.)

There is an emerging 'aesthetic turn' within sociology which currently lacks clear focus. This paper reviews the different issues feeding into this interest and contributes to its development. Previous renderings of this relationship have set the aesthetic up against sociology, as an emphasis which 'troubles' conventional understandings of sociality and offers no ready way of reconciling the aesthetic with the social. Reflecting on the contributions of recent social theorists, from figures including Bourdieu, Born, Rancière, Deleuze, and Martin, we argue instead for the value of a social aesthetic which critiques instrumentalist and reductive understandings of the social itself. In explicating what form this might take, the latter parts of the paper take issue with classical modernist conceptions of the aesthetic which continue to dominate popular and sociological understandings of the aesthetic, and uses the motif of 'walking' to show how the aesthetic can be rendered in terms of 'the mundane search' and how this search spans everyday experience and cultural re-production. We offer a provisional definition of social aesthetics as the embedded and embodied process of meaning making which, by acknowledging the physical/corporeal boundaries and qualities of the inhabited world, also allows imagination to travel across other spaces and times. It is hoped that this approach can be a useful platform for further inquiry., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2015.)

Through a critique of Margaret Archer's theory of reflexivity, this paper explores the theoretical contribution of a Bourdieusian sociology of the subject for understanding social change. Archer's theory of reflexivity holds that conscious 'internal conversations' are the motor of society, central both to human subjectivity and to the 'reflexive imperative' of late modernity. This is established through critiques of Bourdieu, who is held to erase creativity and meaningful personal investments from subjectivity, and late modernity is depicted as a time when a 'situational logic of opportunity' renders embodied dispositions and the reproduction of symbolic advantages obsolete. Maintaining Archer's focus on 'ultimate concerns' in a context of social change, this paper argues that her theory of reflexivity is established through a narrow misreading and rejection of Bourdieu's work, which ultimately creates problems for her own approach. Archer's rejection of any pre-reflexive dimensions to subjectivity and social action leaves her unable to sociologically explain the genesis of 'ultimate concerns', and creates an empirically dubious narrative of the consequences of social change. Through a focus on Archer's concept of 'fractured reflexivity', the paper explores the theoretical necessity of habitus and illusio for understanding the social changes that Archer is grappling with. In late modernity, reflexivity is valorized just as the conditions for its successful operation are increasingly foreclosed, creating 'fractured reflexivity' emblematic of the complex contemporary interaction between habitus, illusio, and accelerating social change., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2015.)

This paper explores how Ulrich Beck's world-risk-society theory (WRST) and Bruno Latour's Actor-Network Theory (ANT) can be combined to advance a theory of cosmopolitics. On the one hand, WRST helps to examine 'cosmopolitan politics', how actors try to inject cosmopolitanism into existing political practices and institutions anchored in the logic of nationalism. On the other hand, ANT sheds light on 'cosmological politics', how scientists participate in the construction of reality as a reference point for political struggles. By combining the WRST and ANT perspectives, it becomes possible to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of cosmopolitics that takes into account both political and ontological dimensions. The proposed synthesis of WRST and ANT also calls for a renewal of critical theory by making social scientists aware of their performative involvement in cosmopolitics. This renewal prompts social scientists to explore how they can pragmatically support certain ideals of cosmopolitics through continuous dialogues with their objects of study, actors who inhabit different nations and different cosmoses., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2015.)

In his highly regarded and influential Modernity and the Holocaust Zygmunt Bauman launched one of the most passionate and sustained critiques of 'bureaucratic rationality' seen within social theory for some time. In so doing he drew heavily upon the work of Max Weber for support. In this brief paper I am interested in exploring the extent to which Weber really is the anti-bureaucratic ally Bauman claims him to be. In the first part of the paper I outline the main elements of Bauman's critique of bureaucratic rationality, drawing particular attention to its reliance upon a self-consciously Weberian theoretical lexicon. In the second part of the paper I seek to indicate that, despite his claims to be following in Weber's tracks, Bauman's conclusions regarding the moral vacuity of bureaucratic conduct are the very antithesis of Weber's own. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper aims to facilitate more adequate critical engagement with current affairs events by journalists, and with current affairs texts by audiences. It draws on social theory to provide the intellectual resources to enable this. The academic ambition is for the framework to be adopted and developed by social thinkers in producing exemplary critical readings of news and current affairs texts. To this end it is offered as a research paradigm. The paper situates its argument in relation to the wider literature in media and cultural studies, acknowledging the subtle skills required to appreciate the relative autonomy of texts. However, it draws attention to the lack of an adequate perspective with which to assess the frames, representations, and judgments within news and current affairs texts. To address this lacuna it proposes the conception of a social-theoretical frame, based on a number of meta-theoretical approaches, designed to provide audiences with a systematic means of addressing the status and adequacy of individual texts. Social theoretical frames can reveal the shortcomings of media framing of the contextual fields within which news and current affairs events take place. Two illustrative case studies are used to indicate the value and potential of the approach: the analysis of a short newspaper report of the return of protesters to Cairo's Tahrir Square in 2011, and a critique of four current affairs reports from various genres on the political turmoil in Thailand leading up to the clashes of May 2010., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2014.)

This paper investigates a puzzling feature of social conventions: the fact that they are both arbitrary and normative. We examine how this tension is addressed in sociological accounts of conventional phenomena. Traditional approaches tend to generate either synchronic accounts that fail to consider the arbitrariness of conventions, or diachronic accounts that miss central aspects of their normativity. As a remedy, we propose a processual conception that considers conventions as both the outcome and material cause of much human activity. This conceptualization, which borrows from the économie des conventions as well as critical realism, provides a novel perspective on how conventions are nested and defined, and on how they are established, maintained and challenged., (© London School of Economics and Political Science 2014.)

This paper provides an assessment of Pierre Bourdieu's sociology based on a reading of his posthumously published lectures on the state in Sur l' État. It argues that the state was a foundational element in Bourdieu's rendition of the symbolic order of everyday life. As such, the state becomes equally pivotal in Bourdieu's sociology, the applicability of which rests on the existence of the state, which stabilizes the social fields and their symbolic action that constitute the object of sociology. The state, which Bourdieu considers a 'meta'-ordering principle in social life, ensures that sociology has a well-ordered object of study, vis-à-vis which it can posit itself as 'meta-meta'. The state thus functions as an epistemic guarantee in Bourdieu's sociology. A critical analysis of Bourdieu's sociology of the state offers the chance of a more fundamental overall assessment of Bourdieu's conception of sociology that has relevance for any critical sociological perspective that rests on the assumption of a meta-social entity, such as the state in Bourdieu's work, as a final ordering instance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Western theoretical traditions can benefit from systematic engagement with non- Western concepts: This is shown through an analysis of the Chinese concept guanxi. After considering the general nature of guanxi, including its possible association with corrupt practices and its particular cultural characteristics, the paper goes on to identify the elements of its general form which have universal representation. The possibility of conceiving guanxi as a variant form of social capital is explored. This shows the way in which both the expressive and instrumentalized forms of guanxi indicate otherwise neglected aspects of social and economic relationships not always recognized and addressed by analogous terms current in social theory but which are none the less important for its advancement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper we argue that the new availability of digital data sets allows one to revisit Gabriel Tarde's (1843-1904) social theory that entirely dispensed with using notions such as individual or society. Our argument is that when it was impossible, cumbersome or simply slow to assemble and to navigate through the masses of information on particular items, it made sense to treat data about social connections by defining two levels: one for the element, the other for the aggregates. But once we have the experience of following individuals through their connections (which is often the case with profiles) it might be more rewarding to begin navigating datasets without making the distinction between the level of individual component and that of aggregated structure. It becomes possible to give some credibility to Tarde's strange notion of 'monads'. We claim that it is just this sort of navigational practice that is now made possible by digitally available databases and that such a practice could modify social theory if we could visualize this new type of exploration in a coherent way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper is a sounding of Ulrich Beck's and Edgar Grande's conceptual map of the varieties of second modernity - Western and Non-Western, European and beyond - that makes up today's world. Their mapping is examined in the light of two, striking analytical perspectives associated with Ulrich Beck: everyday 'cosmopolitization' and his call for a methodological cosmopolitanism. A line of inquiry explores whether contemporary modernities are essentially expressions of a single, underlying modernization drive or whether they are utterly disparate entities. The implications of treating them as 'variants and variations' are unpacked with reference to musical models and how they generate difference. The probe into methodological cosmopolitanism touches on 'de-provincialization' that is somewhat at odds with the postcolonial project of 'provincializing' Europe. It looks at the attempt to go beyond 'nation-bound' sociological dualisms in determining the appropriate 'unit of analysis' for our ever-morphing current reality. Does this imply engaging with 'singularity'- with a mode of conceptualization that sidesteps the universal/particular couple and related either/or thinking? References to the making of the 'first modernity' under unequal centre/periphery relations of colonial power are aired for possible lessons in mappings of the second. Ulrich Beck's 'impure, really-existing cosmopolitanism'- in contrast to its speculative counterpart derived from the realm of pure ideas - springs from humdrum global economic and political links and institutions that span out across, above and beyond the 'container of the national space'. With the inadvertent cosmopolitical impact of the migrations it amounts in practice to a functioning 'cosmopolitan realpolitik'. Is there room for it to develop or will it stall as a mere front for national, tribal-territorial interests - going the way of 'multiculturalism and diversity' that seem increasingly to serve as governmental ideologies for managing global difference? Whether each of the varieties of second modernity throws up a 'cosmopolitan vision' of its own remains to be determined more fully. It seems possible that friction between the modernities might fetch up on a higher plane as clashing cosmopolitanisms. Historical precedents give scant comfort if we look at the fate of the ecumenic empires of the ancient world of the 'first cosmopolitan age' or at landmark cosmopolitan endeavours such as Aby Warburg's and WEB Du Bois' on the eve of counter-cosmopolitan currents of the 1930s. An abiding scepticism prevails about the capacity of 'impure cosmopolitanism' to bootstrap and elaborate itself from an involuntary, reflex condition into a self-reflexive, critical dispensation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sets out an approach to the analysis of political power in terms of problematics of government. It argues against an overvaluation of the ‘problem of the State’ in political debate and social theory. A number of conceptual tools are suggested for the analysis of the many and varied alliances between political and other authorities that seek to govern economic activity, social life and individual conduct. Modern political rationalities and governmental technologies are shown to be intrinsically linked to developments in knowledge and to the powers of expertise. The characteristics of liberal problematics of government are investigated, and it is argued that they are dependent upon technologies for ‘governing at a distance’, seeking to create locales, entities and persons able to operate a regulated autonomy. The analysis is exemplified through an investigation of welfarism as a mode of ‘social’ government. The paper concludes with a brief consideration of neo-liberalism which demonstrates that the analytical language structured by the philosophical opposition of state and civil society is unable to comprehend contemporary transformations in modes of exercise of political power. 1 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Symbolic interactionism is often represented as a perspective which is limited by its restriction to‘micro’ aspects of social organization. As such, it is allegedly unable to adequately conceptualize‘macro’ phenomena such as social structure, patterns of inequality, and power. Such a view is routinely presented in undergraduate textbooks. This paper contests such a view through a consideration of the concept of power. We argue that the interactionist research traditiondoesshow a fundamental concern with power phenomena, and that a reconsideration of the concept is timely in light of theoretical developments in sociology more generally. An increasing concern with the analysis of culture, the continuing influence of Foucault, the development of feminist perspectives, and the emerging consensus around neo-Weberian thought have all contributed to a renewal of interest in themes long ago explored by interactionists. As examples we suggest that interactionist studies in the fields of deviance and education have been concerned above all with the authoritative imposition of consequential identities, i.e., with the social processes through which power is enacted and institutionalized in real situations. Such developments have led some to argue that interactionism has now been incorporated into the mainstream of sociology. We conclude, however, by arguing that such a view runs the risk of granting to orthodox sociological thought a legitimacy which is analytically unwarranted, and which fails to recognize the alternative theoretical and philosophical foundations of symbolic interactionist thought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Treatments of sources of Adam Smith's sociological theory of the self and associated ideas inThe Theory of Moral Sentimentstypically refer to classical antecedents or the work of his teacher Francis Hutcheson or his contemporary David Hume. During the seventeenth century, however, many books on the passions were published in London that arguably constitute an important but neglected source of Smith's treatment of moral sentiments. These works are largely forgotten today but at the time were widely read. They are not philosophical, partly devotional and predominantly psychological. Although Smith does not refer to these works his argument resembles theirs in many places. The importance of the seventeenth-century books on the passions, apart from their role in the history of psychology, is their bearing on contemporary economic practices. In this paper the connections between Smith and one of these books, Thomas Wright'sThe Passions of the Minde in Generall, are indicated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several disciplines have contributed to the understanding of the relationship between science, technology, and economic change. Weber's perspective on this relationship, however, has not been properly explored. In the first part of this paper, we give an account of Weber's perspective. In the second part, we critically assess Weber's ideas, indicating those that are useful and those that deserve to be abandoned. We also confront a revised Weberian perspective with those of the main contemporary competitors, the key ideas of economists and economic historians on one side and social constructivists on the other. We conclude that a Weberian comparative-historical approach compares favourably with these competitors, and suggest where his approach still requires further work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A prominent strand within both sociological and social theory has been concerned to develop a 'systems approach' with which to explore social life. One of the most original contributions to a systems approach has arisen within critical realism. In particular critical realism demonstrates that it is possible to abstract the causal powers of different objects of analysis to examine their interaction within concrete and contingent 'open systems'. The recent dialectical turn of critical realism develops this systems approach in a much more rigorous manner. However, in this paper I argue that the (dialectical) critical realist mode of abstraction ultimately fails to embed concepts and categories internally within the specific ideological and historical forms of social relations. Or rather, critical realists do not seek to develop concepts that reflect the self-movement of a historical and contradictory essence. This self-movement is what I prefer to call a 'system'. Consequently critical realists are led to separate method from system in theory construction and such a separation leads to a problematic dualist mode of theorizing. I make these observations from a Hegelian-Marxist position. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The assertion about the unique 'complexity' or the peculiarly intricate character of social phenomena has, at least within sociology, a long, venerable and virtually uncontested tradition. At the turn of the last century, classical social theorists, for example, Georg Simmel and Emile Durkheim, made prominent and repeated reference to this attribute of the subject matter of sociology and the degree to which it complicates, even inhibits the development and application of social scientific knowledge. Our paper explores the origins, the basis and the consequences of this assertion and asks in particular whether the classic complexity assertion still deserves to be invoked in analyses that ask about the production and the utilization of social scientific knowledge in modern society. We present John Maynard Keynes' economic theory and its practical applications as an illustration. We conclude that the practical value of social scientific knowledge is not dependent on a faithful, in the sense of complete, representation of social reality. Instead, social scientific knowledge that wants to optimize its practicality has to attend and attach itself to elements of social situations that can be altered or are actionable. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The debate between the advocates of sociological individualism and those of holism has been pervasive in the development of social theory. This debate is often situated in the false problems of sociology, since it is seen as a particular form of the perennial and irresolvable dilemma between social nominalism and realism, as well as between freedom and determinism. Nevertheless, the debate is far from over within contemporary sociology and other social science, as indicated by the resurgence of individualism in rational action theory and its repudiation by holistic social theories. The aim of this paper is to identify some modern variations on this theme as well as to discern certain common tendencies of two seemingly opposite theoretical perspectives, viz. the convergence upon a normative solution to the problem of social order. This convergence is therefore denoted normative convergence between sociological individualism and holistic sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Julian Go's 'Thinking Against Empire' identifies the corpus of 'anticolonial thought' as being instructive for a wider rethinking of how sociology might rally its key conceptualisations of social relations. He insightfully identifies the marginalisation of such thinking from Sociology as an institutionalised discipline. In our response we take up some of the warnings Go provides in the closing sections of his essay—which concern the expanse of intellectual engagement being currently bracketed under or connected to the 'anti‐colonial', not least vis‐à‐vis the 'decolonising/decolonial' turn—to further unpack how the 'anti‐colonial' might be adapted for thinking through contemporary socio‐political dynamics. Offering, first, a precis of some particularities of British Sociology vis‐a‐vis the contributions of anticolonial social theory, this article then expands upon the dilemmas arising when anticolonial theory contemporaneous to the pre‐decolonisation era is transposed to contingencies of the present 21st century. Namely, whilst the anticolonial archive has proved invaluable to upending the omissions but also complicities of European social theory canons, allowing for a much more expansive sense of how the modern world and its violences were conjured and how we might accordingly escape its miseries, it is also clear that much of the postcolonial world has undergone sufficient shifts to warrant an adapted sense of how we consider the anti‐colonial for our current politics. We suggest that the important deviations which anti‐colonial theorisations might heed include the dangers of conflating the anticolonial with an affirmation of Global South, non‐white nativist identity; the need to recognise some key conjunctural premises by which the anticolonial is no longer geographically indexed to a straightforward Global North‐Global South distinction; and the need to acknowledge that, at its most radical, anticolonial thought is itself still invested in traversing both the dreams but also corruptions of those dreams as intrinsic to modernity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers the application of Foucauldian perspectives within sociology. While Foucault's epistemology has generated novel historical and philosophical interpretations, when transposed to sociology, problems arise. The first of these concerns the association of knowledge and power, and the concept of 'discourse'. Foucault suggested that there are 'rules' of discursive formation which are extraneous to the 'non-discursive' realm of 'reality'. This formulation is consequently both deterministic and incapable of supplying explanations of why some practices become discursive which others do not. This determinism is reflected in some sociological analyses of embodiment, offering a model of the 'body' which is passive, and incapable of resisting power/knowledge. Secondly, Foucault's notion of the 'self' moves to the other extreme, inadequately addressing the constraints which affect the fabrication of subjectivity. Sociological accounts do not always recognize the ambiguities which consequently result from efforts to use Foucauldian positions. It is argued that post-structuralists other than Foucault may offer more to sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper attempts to breathe a little life into one of the most moribund corners of the methodological literature, namely the 'debate' on interview strategy and the supposed opposition between 'structured' and 'unstructured' approaches. From the very beginning, we tend to learn about interviewing as an issue concerning the pros and cons of each respective strategy. The choke of interviewing style is thus presented as a matter of inclination towards standardization versus sensitivity, enumeration versus emancipation, anonymity versus ardour, and so forth. All such distinctions are essentially method-driven and have resulted in extensive technical literatures on how to achieve the chosen ends. Forgotten, therefore, in most of the literature is the very purpose of the interview - namely to advance data in order to inspire/validate/falsify/modify sociological explanation. This paper proposes a theory-driven approach to the construction of the interview. It takes on board two contemporary approaches to sociological understanding, namely a realist theory of explanation and a structurationist theory of social being, and attempts to incorporate their principles into the basic structure of the interview. The paper is illustrated with examples from the author's research with prisoners, and so hopes to inspire a dons and cons approach to the interview. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sets out an approach to the analysis of political power in terms of problematics of government. It argues against an overvaluation of the 'problem of the State' in political debate and social theory. A number of conceptual tools are suggested for the analysis of the many and varied alliances between political and other authorities that seek to govern economic activity, social life and individual conduct. Modern political rationalities and governmental technologies are shown to be intrinsically linked to developments in knowledge and to the powers of expertise. The characteristics of liberal problematics of government are investigated, and it is argued that they are dependent upon technologies for 'governing at a distance', seeking to create locales, entities and persons able to operate a regulated autonomy. The analysis is exemplified through an investigation of welfarism as a mode of 'social' government. The paper concludes with a brief consideration of neo-liberalism which demonstrates that the analytical language structured by the philosophical opposition of state and civil society is unable to comprehend contemporary transformations in modes of exercise of political power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, it is argued that the feminist critique does not seriously undermine those 'class theories' which seek, in the most general way, to argue that classes are social forces having an impact upon societal development. However, that version of 'class analysis' -- exemplified by researchers such as Wright and Goldthorpe -- which seeks to theoretically identity an empirical ensemble of 'class places' is seriously affected. This approach, which rests upon an analysis of the occupational structure, cannot separate out systematically the impact of 'class' from that of 'gender' (or indeed, of other factors) in this structuring. Although, therefore, such theoretical 'class' schemes retain their sociological utility as descriptive concepts, they do not, as has been claimed, provide uncontaminated measures of 'social class'. An alternative approach to the occupational structure, which stresses its fluid and socially constructed nature, is developed. In the light of this discussion, attempts to establish the theoretical basis of a 'system' of patriarchy are examined. It is argued that although gender relations are universal, they are not necessarily patriarchal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociologists have recently debated the general manner in which respondents' accounts should be treated. Should they be regarded as evidence of underlying intentions, objectives and beliefs or should analytical attention focus on the structure of the accounts themselves? This paper reviews this debate from the point of view of the philosophy of social science. While, as critics have noted, the 'accountist' position is subject to major epistemological problems, the 'actionist' view also faces considerable difficulties. These are elaborated through examples from the history of science and artificial intelligence research. Having established the vulnerabilities of both accountist and actionist positions, a pragmatic and mutually supportive rapprochement is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The way in which many social analyists conceptualize knowledge and order has been changed by postmodernism. Because sociologists have generally ignored this theoretical development, the purpose of this paper is to introduce the central ideas associated with postmodernism. The author proposes the conception of knowledge advanced by postmodern theorists requires that traditional methodologies and social imagery be abandoned. It is argued that society should be viewed as embodied, or to originate from language games, and, within this context, the exercise of praxis and social control are not contradictory ideas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the limitations of holding to a strict fact-value dichotomy, given some of structural difficulties students of social problems encounter. Authors also attempted to extend and clarify the above analysis via a critical discussion of two papers concerned with the value problem in the sociology of deviance-by the well-known American sociologists, Howard S. Becker and Alvin Gouldner. In this article, authors are involved not only with theoretical implications and omissions of this debate but also more generally with its implications for social theory at large. Authors have argued throughout that the social structure will determine that what is truth for one group will not be truth for another. Authors further suggest that there is a clear rationale for close examination of the extent to which deviant values are inextricably linked with social structure, and that, with this as a major concern, one can elucidate one's conception of the way in which men define the world and the way the world actually is.

This article discusses the book "Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences," edited by May Brodbeck. The author gives attention to three topics discussed in this anthology. The first is the controversy over whether the account of explanation given by sociologist Hempel is applicable in the human as well as in the natural sciences. The second theme in the anthology obviously relevant to sociologist is that of methodological individualism versus holism. Many of the papers in this anthology characterize at one level the alternatives confronting a scientist whose theorizing confronts either empirical or conceptual difficulties. Just because actions are informed by intentions and purposes, and intentions and purposes presuppose beliefs, so a social role-which specifies and prescribes or permits certain courses of action for certain types of person presupposes certain beliefs. The matter of the philosophy of science may not only be regulative as regards the form of our theories and the lessons to be learnt here may well be one that the sociologist now feels have been conveyed to him almost too often-but suggestive as to their content.

In this original and stimulating lecture Gurminder K. Bhambra, professor of sociology at Sussex University, consolidates and extends her formidable scholarship about the racialized and colonized origins of the Global North world and the continuing significance of these origins (Bhambra, 2007, 2014, 2020, 2021; Bhambra & Holmwood, 2018, 2021). Bhambra's account challenges the "dominant conceptualizations" of the welfare state and its origins held "within social science", highlighting notably the absence of colonialism in those conceptualizations (Bhambra & Holmwood, 2021). Aside from faulting this literature for its flawed accounts of the fiscal bases of the British welfare state, for Bhambra these scholars' work is simply irrelevant and painfully dated (Bhambra & Holmwood, 2018). Bhambra (2017a, 2017b) of course is fully cognizant of these obstacles and her powerful reconfiguration of global political economy with colonialism at its core anticipates and develops the compelling road to restore the social sciences (2021; Bhambra & Holmwood, 2021). [Extracted from the article]

The work of Ulrich Beck has been important in bringing sociological attention to the ways issues of risk are embedded in contemporary globalization, in developing a theory of 'reflexive modernization', and in calling for social science to transcend 'methodological nationalism'. In recent studies, he and his colleagues help to correct for the Western bias of many accounts of cosmopolitanism and reflexive modernization, and seek to distinguish normative goals from empirical analysis. In this paper I argue that further clarification of this latter distinction is needed but hard to reach within a framework that still embeds the normative account in the idea that empirical change has a clear direction. Similar issues beset the presentation of diverse patterns in recent history as all variants of 'second modernity'. Lastly, I note that ironically, given the declared 'methodological cosmopolitanism' of the authors, the empirical studies here all focus on national cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical cosmopolitanism is an emerging direction in social theory and reflects both an object of study and a distinctive methodological approach to the social world. It differs from normative political and moral accounts of cosmopolitanism as world polity or universalistic culture in its conception of cosmopolitanism as socially situated and as part of the self-constituting nature of the social world itself. It is an approach that shifts the emphasis to internal developmental processes within the social world rather than seeing globalization as the primary mechanism. This signals a post-universalistic kind of cosmopolitanism, which is not merely a condition of diversity but is articulated in cultural models of world openness through which societies undergo transformation. The cosmopolitan imagination is articulated in framing processes and cultural models by which the social world is constituted; it is therefore not reducible to concrete identities, but should be understood as a form of cultural contestation in which the logic of translation plays a central role. The cosmopolitan imagination can arise in any kind of society and at any time but it is integral to modernity, in so far as this is a condition of self-problematization, incompleteness and the awareness that certainty can never be established once and for all. As a methodologically grounded approach, critical cosmopolitan sociology has a very specific task: to discern or make sense of social transformation by identifying new or emergent social realities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the generally neglected place of Lorenz yon Stein in the paradigmatic bifurcation of social theory during the nineteenth century. As a student of Hegel who rejected the idealist approach of his teacher, von Stein anticipated the major arguments of historical materialism; but, unlike Marx, he did not postulate an inexorable proletarian revolution which would ultimately resolve societal contradictions. Instead, he proposed a fundamentally reformist political strategy in which the state guides the distribution of economic resources in a form that would prevent the class polarization envisioned by Marx. While yon Stein is little known by contemporary social scientists in the English literature, he has been recognized in Europe beyond his time as a theorist and as a governmental consultant whose ideas became materialized in social reforms, offering a ‘political realism’ that was designed to prevent the consequences seen by Marx in the development of capitalism, as well as to avoid the fallacies of the liberal belief in free and unregulated pursuit of individual self-interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Some form of communicative understanding is central to all cross-cultural ethnographic research. A Verstehende approach typifies most English- language interpretive social science. At best this involves understanding-in- context, but at worst amounts to little more than an attempt to 'put oneself in the other's shoes'. Charges that this approach discards the informants' discourse in favour of the researcher's narrative are surveyed along with theoretical attempts within sociology to refute these critiques by modifying Verstehen. It is argued that Verstehende methods are unethical by contemporary standards of research ethics. Rather than privileging the understanding of one or another person, whereby one agent (an informant) possesses the truth and other (the researcher) does not, a focus on the interaction between researcher and informant is proposed. This 'dialogical' model, drawn from the work of Mikhail Bakhtin, provides a theoretical basis for research on the social and shared nature of understanding. The 'truth' is between the interacting agents. Poetic though this may seem, this view is strongly theorized by ethicists and grounded in both the work of German neo-Kantianism and Hegel, where 'truth' is always aporetic and liminal. Untranslated work by Bakhtin is presented, including his commentaries on the problem of cross-cultural understanding. This paper argues that a 'dialogical verstehen' provides an equitable foundation for field research in the social sciences which avoids the problem of a research 'speaking as' and 'speaking for' discarded and potentially silenced respondents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The `Willis thesis' has two component claims. The first is that class inequalities in educational outcomes occur in part through working-class misbehaviour in schools, and that underachievement is associated with male and female forms of gender traditionalism. The second claim is that this misbehaviour constitutes a working- class cultural resistance. In this paper the first component is operationalized and tested in a statistical model of student plans in Ontario, Canada. Results show that misbehaviour is a weak conduit for differential class outcomes, though expected gender patterns emerge. While noting that findings may reflect British/Canadian differences and that recent de-industrialization may mute traditional class-related student responses, I argue that Resistance theorists have over-extended their claims, and that gender, rather than class background, is a more durable source of cultural reproduction through school underachievement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is concerned with the adequacy of economic and sociological theories of the enterprise as a basis for analysing industrial democracy. An outline of the major strands in these disciplines' theories in this area is given. It is argued that despite their different starting points, there are considerable similarities in the theoretical approaches of the two disciplines, especially their deployment of concepts of profit-making, interest and certain notions of organization. Griticisms of the use of these concepts are followed by an attempt to suggest more helpful approaches to understand firms and hence to understanding the possible meaning and implications of industrial democracy in firms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]