Social Philosophy (RLE Social Theory) PDF Download

Author: Hans Fink
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317651111
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 125

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Book Description
The programmes of political parties and movements are attempts to formulate policies or guidelines in relation to social change. Social philosophy concerns the fundamental issues on which those programmes divide. This introductory work gives an account of several highly influential systems of social philosophy – systems which serve as the landmarks by reference to which modern discussions still orientate themselves. The description of various stages in the history of social philosophy is set within an account of its changing social environment – from feudalism and the philosophy of Aquinas to the rise of the working class and socialism. The book confines itself to the Western tradition and one could say that it charts the rise and fall of the free market as the central institution and the key to the understanding of society.

Author: James B. Wilbur
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317650492
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 169

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Book Description
The annual Conferences on Value Inquiry bring together philosophers, scientists and humanists to discuss the many facets of the problem of value in the experience of the individual and in contemporary society. One of the criteria in choosing papers for the Conference is the ability to stimulate discussion and clarification. The papers in the present volumes show deep concern with the problems and responsibilities in making choices of value.

Author: Maurice Duverger
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000155897
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
Professor Duverger at last provides the student with an overall view of the methodology of the social sciences. He briefly traces the origin of the notion of a social science, showing how it emerged from social philosophy. Its essential elements and pre-conditions are described; the splintering of social science into specialist disciplines is explained, and the need for a general sociology confirmed. The techniques of observation used by social scientists are dealt with in some detail and the unity of the social sciences is illustrated by examples of the universal application of these techniques. Documentary evidence in its various forms are described along with the basic analytical techniques, including quantitative methods and content analysis. Other methods of gathering information through polls, interviews, attitude scales and participant observation are all described. Professor Duverger brings together the different kinds of analysis used to assess the information thus gathered. Arguing that observing and theorizing are not two different stages or levels of research, he examines the practical value and difficulties of general sociological theories, partial theories and models and working hypotheses. He both describes and assesses the limitations of experiment and the scope of comparative methods in the social sciences. He then gives elementary instructions for using and assessing the value of mathematical techniques. The possibilities of presenting social phenomena through graphs and charts are also explored. There are useful book lists and diagrams.

Author: Mariam Thalos
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317394941
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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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

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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: Hans Joas
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 9780226400419
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 112

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Book Description
Rising concerns among scholars about the intellectual and cultural foundations of democracy have led to a revival of interest in the American philosophical tradition of pragmatism. In this book, Hans Joas shows how pragmatism can link divergent intellectual efforts to understand the social contexts of human knowledge, individual freedom, and democratic culture. Along with pragmatism's impact on American sociology and social research from 1895 to the 1940s, Joas traces its reception by French and German traditions during this century. He explores the influences of pragmatism—often misunderstood—on Emile Durkheim's sociology of knowledge, and on German thought, with particularly enlightening references to its appropriation by Nazism and its rejection by neo-Marxism. He also explores new currents of social theory in the work of Habermas, Castoriadis, Giddens, and Alexander, fashioning a bridge between Continental thought, American philosophy, and contemporary sociology; he shows how the misapprehension and neglect of pragmatism has led to systematic deficiencies in contemporary social theory. From this skillful historical and theoretical analysis, Joas creates a powerful case for the enduring legacy of Peirce, James, Dewey, and Mead for social theorists today.

Author: Brian Fay
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317652282
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 107

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Book Description
This book examines the question of how our knowledge of social life affects, and ought to affect, our way of living it. In so doing, it critically discusses two epistemological models of social science – the positivist and the interpretive – from the viewpoint of the political theories which, it is argued, are implicit in these models; moreover, it proposes a third model – the critical – which is organised around an explicit account of the relation between social theory and practical life. The book has the special merit of being a good overview of the principal current ideas about the relation between social theory and political practice, as well as an attempt at providing a new and more satisfactory account of this relationship. To accomplish this task, it synthesises work from the analytic philosophy of social science with that of the neo-Marxism of the Frankfurt school.

Author: Rainer Forst
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520232259
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 359

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Book Description
This text offers an intervention into the debate between communitarianism and liberalism. It argues for a theory of "contexts of justice" that leads beyond the confines of the debate as it has been understood and posits the possibility of a new conception of social and political justice.

Author: Bryan S. Turner
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317652258
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 136

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Book Description
'In this remarkable collection of essays, Holton and Turner demonstrate that Parsonian sociology addresses the most central problems of our time – issues of sickness and health, power and inequality, the nature of capitalism and its possible alternatives. They develop a mature and original perspective on Parsons as the only classical theorist who avoided crippling nostalgia. Holton and Turner not only talk about Parsonian sociology in a profound and insightful way, they do it, and do it well. As sociology moves away from the rigid dichotomies of earlier debate, this book will help point the way.' – Jeffrey Alexander, Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in Sociology, UCLA

Author: Michel Rosenfeld
Publisher: Univ of California Press
ISBN: 0520917618
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 488

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Book Description
In the first essay, Habermas himself succinctly presents the centerpiece of his theory: his proceduralist paradigm of law. The following essays comprise elaborations, criticisms, and further explorations by others of the most salient issues addressed in his theory. The distinguished group of contributors—internationally prominent scholars in the fields of law, philosophy, and social theory—includes many who have been closely identified with Habermas as well as some of his best-known critics. The final essay is a thorough and lengthy reply by Habermas, which not only engages the most important arguments raised in the preceding essays but also further elaborates and refines some of his own key contributions in Between Facts and Norms. This volume will be essential reading for philosophers, legal scholars, and political and social theorists concerned with understanding the work of one of the leading philosophers of our age. These provocative, in-depth debates between Jürgen Habermas and a wide range of his critics relate to the philosopher's contribution to legal and democratic theory in his recently published Between Facts and Norms. Drawing upon his discourse theory, Habermas has elaborated a novel and powerful account of law that purports to bridge the gap between democracy and rights, by conceiving law to be at once self-imposed and binding.