Neo-classical sociology The prospects of social theory today
TL;DR: In this paper, a new theoretical synthesis that overcomes the fragmentation, specialization and professionalization within the social sciences is proposed, which is an alternative to utilitarianism and the c...
Abstract: This article calls for a new theoretical synthesis that overcomes the fragmentation, specialization and professionalization within the social sciences. As an alternative to utilitarianism and the c...
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TL;DR: In this paper, a conceptional framework uses the theoretical concepts of imaginaries, practices, and structures to study the possible futures of sustainability, specifically modernization, transformation, and control, as well as possible interdependencies between these developments.
Abstract: In the last three decades, sustainability has become a guiding principle for states, organizations, companies, and social movements as well as a general ideal for social change. While sustainability seems to be a rather inevitable path of development, there is no consensus over the goals and visions of the future associated with this concept. Proponents of a “Green Economy,” for instance, regard economic growth as a prerequisite for sustainable development and advocate a modernization of society, which implies moderate adjustments toward a sustainable economy within the current institutional framework. Critics of this ecological modernization approach see the imperative of economic growth as an obstacle for sustainable development and instead support a fundamental transformation of society. A third perspective tries to solve the problems of sustainable development with wide-ranging politics of control, using concepts such as “ecological state of emergency” or enforcing resilience measures for vulnerable populations while creating safe enclaves for a privileged few. These three possible ideal typical trajectories of social change—modernization, transformation, and control—are not fixed yet, but rather represent different and highly contested imaginaries of the future. These imaginaries then structure distinctive practices of sustainability in the fields of politics, the economy, civil society, and science. These practices in turn are interdependent with specific structures, such as material infrastructures or the ecological system of the earth. The proposed conceptional framework uses the theoretical concepts of imaginaries, practices, and structures to study the possible futures of sustainability, specifically modernization, transformation, and control, as well as possible interdependencies between these developments. It focuses on sustainability as a sociological category indicative for understanding socioeconomic change, the emergence of new conflicts, inequalities, hierarchies, and justification patterns that result from including sustainable criteria into different fields, institutions, and value systems. Deciphering futures of sustainability does not aim at providing prognoses or forecasts, but intents to work out an analytical concept that asks how contemporary societies change when they are guided by imaginaries of sustainability.
52 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a theory of decolonial recognition combining Axel Honneth's idea of recognition as love, rights and solidarity with David Scott's late-Foucauldian reworking of Frantz Fanon is presented.
Abstract: Since the 1988 Constitution, forest peoples of Brazilian Amazonia have been struggling for territorial recognition. Yet studies of recognition in post-colonial contexts, based on cases with clear settler/indigenous distinctions, are highly critical of recognition, seeing it as a form of ‘neoliberal multiculturalism,’ a co-option of subaltern identities with limited emancipatory potential. I question these critiques by examining struggles for legal and intersubjective recognition of subaltern identity categories ‘Indio’ and ‘Agroextractivista’ and corresponding territories of the ‘Terra Indigena’ and ‘Reserva Extractivista’ on the Madeira and Tapajos Rivers in Brazilian Amazonia, where heterogeneous origins of forest peoples belie simple settler/indigenous distinctions. I engage a key question–the relationships of subaltern peoples with state institutions, and highlight a finding – the relevance of the state’s ‘proximity’ - often underestimated in the literature. I build a theory of decolonial recognition combining Axel Honneth’s idea of recognition as love, rights and solidarity with David Scott’s late-Foucauldian reworking of Frantz Fanon. Herein, the Fanonian colonized subjectivity is shaped by the negation of love, rights and solidarity, that is to say, misrecognition. The subject requires legal and intersubjective recognition in order to positively incorporate love, rights and solidarity into their ‘practices of techniques of the self.’ On the Tapajos, territorial struggles are more successful owing to a stronger sphere of legal recognition - the presence of state institutions - and a history of Church and union grassroots organisation, both supporting greater intersubjective recognition among forest peoples. On the Madeira, a much weaker sphere of legal recognition has resulted in a situation of intractable conflict around territorial struggles which have correspondingly less intersubjective recognition. I conclude that a theory of decolonial recognition is of considerable utility in elucidating the dynamics of subaltern emancipatory struggles for territory.
18 citations
TL;DR: The philosophical assumptions that organize moral sociology as practical philosophy are the outcome of a secular quest to investigate the principles, norms and values behind the constitution of sociascope.
Abstract: The philosophical assumptions that organize moral sociology as practical philosophy are the outcome of a secular quest to investigate the principles, norms and values behind the constitution of soc
15 citations
01 Jan 2019
TL;DR: In this paper, weißen Vertreter einer green economy auf eine okologische Modernisierung von Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft ab, wahrend zivilgesellchaftliche Bewegungen eine grundlegende sozialokologische Transformation anstreben und Regierungen versuchen, Probleme der Nachhaltigkeit durch eine umfassende Politik der Kontrolle zu losen.
Abstract: Nachhaltigkeit ist in den letzten Jahrzehnten zu einem Leitbegriff gesellschaftlichen Wandels geworden, auf den sich Staaten, Organisationen, Unternehmen und soziale Bewegungen weltweit als normatives Prinzip beziehen. Doch werden mit diesem Begriff ganz unterschiedliche Ziele verbunden. So zielen Vertreter einer „Green Economy“ auf eine okologische Modernisierung von Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft ab, wahrend zivilgesellschaftliche Bewegungen eine grundlegende sozialokologische Transformation anstreben und Regierungen versuchen, Probleme der Nachhaltigkeit durch eine umfassende Politik der Kontrolle zu losen. Mit Modernisierung, Transformation und Kontrolle sind unterschiedliche Entwicklungspfade von Nachhaltigkeit umrissen, bei denen es sich um drei Moglichkeitsraume gesellschaftlichen Wandels handelt. Sie zeigen an, welche Imaginationen von Zukunft konflikthaft ausgetragen werden. Der Aufsatz stellt einen analytischen Bezugsrahmen vor, mit dem diese verschiedenen „Zukunfte der Nachhaltigkeit“ soziologisch untersucht werden konnen.
12 citations
References
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01 Jan 2003
TL;DR: In this article, Fraser and Honneth set out to advance the discussion in political philosophy regarding the increasingly polarized political positions of redistribution or recognition, or more simply, class politics versus identity politics.
Abstract: In this debate political philosophers Fraser and Honneth set out to advance the discussion in political philosophy regarding the increasingly polarized political positions of redistribution or recognition, or more simply, class politics versus identity politics.
1,966 citations
"Neo-classical sociology The prospec..." refers background in this paper
...The repercussions of Axel Honneth’s (1992) work and his debate with Nancy Fraser (Fraser and Honneth, 2003) suggest that the category of recognition (and its negation: invisibility, humiliation, alienation) taps into an unnamed reservoir of diffuse suffering among the population that deserves attention and repair if solidarity is to be maintained....
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...The repercussions of Axel Honneth’s (1992) work and his debate with Nancy Fraser (Fraser and Honneth, 2003) suggest that the category of recognition (and its negation: invisibility, humiliation, alienation) taps into an unnamed reservoir of diffuse suffering among the population that deserves…...
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01 Jan 1926
TL;DR: In this article, the authors discuss the role of groupements professionnels in remplir dans l' organisation sociale des peuples contemporains, and propose a model of a groupement professionnel.
Abstract: quelques remarques sur les groupements professionnels : en reeditant cet ouvrage, nous nous sommes interdit d' en modifier l' economie premiere. Un livre a une individualite qu' il doit garder. Il convient de lui laisser la physionomie sous laquelle il s' est fait connaitre. Mais il est une idee, qui etait restee dans la penombre lors de la premiere edition, et qu' il nous parait utile de degager et de determiner davantage, car elle eclairera certaines parties du present travail et meme de ceux que nous avons publies depuis. Il s' agit du role que les groupements professionnels sont destines a remplir dans l' organisation sociale des peuples contemporains. Si, primitivement, nous n' avions touche a ce probleme que par voie d' allusions, c' est que nous comptions le reprendre et en faire une etude speciale. Comme d' autres occupations sont survenues qui nous ont detourne de ce projet, et comme nous ne voyons pas quand il nous sera possible d' y donner suite, nous voudrions profiter de cette seconde edition pour montrer comment cette question se rattache au sujet traite dans la pII
1,065 citations
"Neo-classical sociology The prospec..." refers background in this paper
...As Durkheim famously said in his second Preface to De la division du travail social: ‘Sociology would not be not worth a single hour’s effort if it had no more than speculative interest’ (Durkheim, 1986: xxxix)....
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors discuss the role of groupements professionnels in remplir dans l' organisation sociale des peuples contemporains, and propose a model of a groupement professionnel.
Abstract: quelques remarques sur les groupements professionnels : en reeditant cet ouvrage, nous nous sommes interdit d' en modifier l' economie premiere. Un livre a une individualite qu' il doit garder. Il convient de lui laisser la physionomie sous laquelle il s' est fait connaitre. Mais il est une idee, qui etait restee dans la penombre lors de la premiere edition, et qu' il nous parait utile de degager et de determiner davantage, car elle eclairera certaines parties du present travail et meme de ceux que nous avons publies depuis. Il s' agit du role que les groupements professionnels sont destines a remplir dans l' organisation sociale des peuples contemporains. Si, primitivement, nous n' avions touche a ce probleme que par voie d' allusions, c' est que nous comptions le reprendre et en faire une etude speciale. Comme d' autres occupations sont survenues qui nous ont detourne de ce projet, et comme nous ne voyons pas quand il nous sera possible d' y donner suite, nous voudrions profiter de cette seconde edition pour montrer comment cette question se rattache au sujet traite dans la pII
945 citations
01 Jan 2002
TL;DR: The essay on le don de Marcel Mauss (1872-1950) as mentioned in this paper is one of the most important works of the anthropologie francaise, with a dimension spirituelle.
Abstract: L’Essai sur le don de Marcel Mauss est l’un des textes majeurs, si ce n’est le texte majeur, de l’anthropologie du XXe siecle. Par l’etude des systemes d’echange de la kula et du potlatch, il demontre que le don fut historiquement l’un des moteurs de nos societes. A l’encontre de tout rationalisme le potlatch, pratique chez certaines tribus amerindiennes, amene au sommet de l’echelle sociale les individus capables de se defaire de tout ce dont ils possedent. Un systeme qui se revele radicalement oppose au notre, ou les possedants detiennent le pouvoir. Dans cet ouvrage precurseur, Mauss bat en breche bon nombre d’idees recues sur les principes de l’echange et du don.
Par-dela leur dimension economique une dimension spirituelle. “Nous n’avons pas qu’une morale de marchand ” conclut Mauss.
Marcel Mauss (1872-1950) est la grande figure de l’anthropologie francaise, ainsi que le neveu du sociologue Emile Durkheim. Il a construit pendant plusieurs decennies une œuvre proteiforme et a marque en profondeur l’ensemble des sciences humaines de son siecle. Son essai anthropologique sur le don a bouleverse notre regard historique sur l’economie. Il a su conjuguer son travail de recherche a des convictions socialistes, et s’engagea en particulier en faveur du colonel Dreyfus.
885 citations
"Neo-classical sociology The prospec..." refers background in this paper
...…reflection on the phenomenon of the gift as a total social fact have convinced us that the concept of social relations one can deduce and extract from Marcel Mauss’s Essai sur le don (Mauss, 1950) can and should be extended beyond the immediate field of ethnology to all social sciences....
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...From this foundational perspective, Mauss’s discovery of the triple obligation of the gift – ‘to give, to accept and to return the gift’ (Mauss, 1950: 205–14) – appears to be the basis of social life in general....
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...We understand, therefore, that mutatis mutandis modern struggles for recognition are contemporary manifestations of the struggles to give – the ‘agonistic’ gift for recognition – as properly exhumed by Marcel Mauss (1950) in his study of archaic societies....
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