Introduction: the crowd problem; 1. Setting the stage: crowds and modern French society; 2. Disciplinary struggles: the crowd in early French sociology; 3. Weimar developments: toward a distinctively sociological theory of crowds; 4. Liberal attitudes: crowd semantics in the USA; 5. From crowd to mass: problematizing classless society; 6. Reactions to totalitarianism: new fusions of sociological and psychological thinking; 7. The culmination and dissolution of crowd semantics; 8. Postmodern conditions: the rise of the post-political masses; Epilogue: the politics of crowds.
This book analyses sociological discussions on crowds and masses since the late nineteenth century, covering France, Germany and the USA.
Christian Borch is Associate Professor at the Department of Management, Politics and Philosophy, Copenhagen Business School, Denmark. His PhD was on the history of modern crime semantics where he studied how notions of crime and criminals evolved in the twentieth century and what responses were launched to deal with crime. In his more recent research Borch has focused on crowds, architecture and urban theory. He has published widely on these issues as well as on key social theorists such as Gabriel Tarde, Niklas Luhmann and Peter Sloterdijk. He is co-founder and editor-in-chief of Distinktion: Scandinavian Journal of Social Theory.
'There are over seven billion people on the planet, many of them
crammed into cities. The result is that a politics of crowds is not
a curio. It is a pivotal means of understanding how we are moved by
the world. Christian Borch's book is the clearest and best guide
you could possibly have to the opportunities as well as the risks.'
Nigel Thrift, University of Warwick
'A truly fascinating, learned and deeply thought-provoking reminder
of the importance of crowd theory to the discipline of sociology.
[The] Politics of Crowds persuasively explains why the 'problem of
crowds' would have arisen in both the general and the academic
culture of the 1880s, threatened to overwhelm the social sciences
through the mid-twentieth century, and then (most fascinating of
all) ebbed away again.' John Plotz, Brandeis University
'As The Politics of Crowds usefully reveals the persistent and
hidden presence of crowd in social theory and the tensions that are
intrinsic in such uncomfortable presence, one cannot but concur
with its author in his final call: 'let the spectre of crowds once
again haunt sociological thought!'. In short, this almost amounts
to a renewal of sociology's own program.' Andrea Mubi Brighenti,
University of Trento
'The book traces a series of modifications of 'crowd semantics':
disciplinary frontiers, intradisciplinary struggles and historical
conditions are brought together to account for the rise and decline
of crowds as analytical objects of predilection for sociological
research.' Claudia Aradau, Radical Philosophy
'Far more than an essay on the concept of the crowd, [The Politics
of Crowds] is a virtual encyclopedia of scholarship and debate
about the concept, well documented, clearly written, and full of
insight and clarification.' Christopher Kelty, Institute for
Society and Genetics, University of California, Los Angeles
'We have here a study that indeed provides novel insights for both
the history of sociological thought as well as for the sociology of
modernity, given that the book covers major experiences of
late-nineteenth- and twentieth-century European and North American
socio-political life and their interpretations by concerned,
scholarly informed and often politically motivated actors. The book
delivers a narrative that may defy some concerns of methodology or
intra-disciplinary positioning, as the author is well aware, but
that increases our understanding of both the sociological
enterprise and the world we live in. As such, it is without doubt a
remarkable achievement.' Peter Wagner, ICREA and University of
Barcelona
'In this authoritative, extremely learned and well organized book,
Christian Borch, who is Associate Professor of Political Science at
the Copenhagen Business School, traces the development of a
specific 'crowd semantics' that cuts across the history of
sociology since its inception … Borch makes a powerful argument
that, despite their being increasingly marginalized or
reconfigured, crowds have remained as sort of indelible residuum of
all sociological theories and categories that form the backbone of
twentieth-century sociological lexicon.' Journal of Cultural
Economy
'This is a powerful and interesting interpretation of the history
of sociology … In bringing the crowd in from the cold, Borch has
done a great service to sociologists, political scientists and
social psychologists.' John Scott, Acta Sociologica
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