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Author: Frank Hearn Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1000155838 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 346
Book Description
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: Routledge ISBN: 1000155838 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 346
Book Description
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: Axel Honneth Publisher: John Wiley & Sons ISBN: 0745680062 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 450
Book Description
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: Mariam Thalos Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 131739495X Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 278
Book Description
In A Social Theory of Freedom, Mariam Thalos argues that the theory of human freedom should be a broadly social and political theory, rather than a theory that places itself in opposition to the issue of determinism. Thalos rejects the premise that a theory of freedom is fundamentally a theory of the metaphysics of constraint and, instead, lays out a political conception of freedom that is closely aligned with questions of social identity, self-development in contexts of intimate relationships, and social solidarity. Thalos argues that whether a person is free (in any context) depends upon a certain relationship of fit between that agent’s conception of themselves (both present and future), on the one hand, and the facts of their circumstances, on the other. Since relationships of fit are broadly logical, freedom is a logic—it is the logic of fit between one’s aspirations and one’s circumstances, what Thalos calls the logic of agency. The logic of agency, once fleshed out, becomes a broadly social and political theory that encompasses one’s self-conceptions as well as how these self-conceptions are generated, together with how they fit with the circumstances of one’s life. The theory of freedom proposed in this volume is fundamentally a political one.
Author: Frederick NEUHOUSER Publisher: Harvard University Press ISBN: 0674041453 Category : Philosophy Languages : en Pages : 351
Book Description
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: Bert N. Adams Publisher: Pine Forge Press ISBN: 9780761987802 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 390
Book Description
A concise, yet surprisingly comprehensive theory text, given the range of ideas, historical context, and theorists discussed. Unlike other books of the type, Classical Sociological Theory focuses on how the pivotal theories contributed not only to the development of the field, but also to the evolution of ideas concerning social life.
Author: Donald N. Levine Publisher: Routledge ISBN: 1351489429 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 350
Book Description
In this unprecedented collection, Donald N. Levine rejuvenates the field of social theory in the face of lagging institutional support. The work canvasses the universe of types of theory work in sociology and offers probing examples from his array of scholarly investigations.Social Theory as a Vocation throws fresh light on the texts of classic authors (Comte, Durkheim, Simmel, Weber, Park, Parsons, and Merton). Ranging widely, its substantive chapters deal with the sociology of strangers and the somatic dimensions of social conflict; the social functions of ambiguity and the use of metaphors in science; contemporary dilemmas of Ethiopian society; logical tensions in the ideas of freedom and reason; and the meaning of nationhood in our global era. The book includes Levine's transformative analysis of the field of Ethiopian studies, and his acclaimed interpretation of the discontents of modernity. It makes the bold move to merge philosophically informed analyses with empirical work.Finally, Levine focuses on what he views as the contemporary crisis of liberal education, and offers suggestions for ways to stimulate new efforts in teaching and learning to do social theory. This book is an integral contribution to social science collections and should be read by all interested in the future of the social sciences.
Author: Michele Dillon Publisher: John Wiley & Sons ISBN: 1405170026 Category : Social Science Languages : en Pages : 577
Book Description
Combining carefully chosen primary quotes with extensive discussion and everyday illustrative examples, this book provides an in-depth introduction to classical and contemporary theory. Uses a wide range of newspaper examples to illustrate the relevance to sociological theory Contains excerpts from theorists’ primary texts Includes chapter-specific glossaries of all theoretical concepts discussed in the book Short biographies and historical timelines of significant events provide context to various theorists’ ideas Incorporates a range of pedagogical features Supporting website includes multiple choice and essay questions, PowerPoint slides, a quotation bank, and other background materials Visit www.wiley.com/go/dillon for additional student and instructor resources.
Author: Philip Hodgkiss Publisher: Anthem Press ISBN: 1783087854 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 210
Book Description
The relation between changes in society over historical time and the concomitant transformation of a concept that depicts something of intrinsic value in that society is complex and contingent. Social Thought and Rival Claims to the Moral Ideal of Dignity attempts to see if we can get any closer to a rounded, three-dimensional view of dignity by drawing on the historical record, on philosophy and social thought more widely and, finally, on contributions that present dignity in a rather more public and political light. In thus tracing the fortunes of human dignity we find that it has not always been viewed as a straightforwardly laudable principle. Social Thought and Rival Claims to the Moral Ideal of Dignity examines the reasons behind what turns out to be, really quite pronounced, the ambiguous status of the idea and ideal of dignity.
Author: Frank Hearn
Author: Frank Hearn
Author: Frank Hearn
Author: Axel Honneth
Author: Mariam Thalos
Author: 
Author: Frederick NEUHOUSER
Author: Bert N. Adams
Author: Donald N. Levine
Author: Michele Dillon
Author: Philip Hodgkiss