Table of Contents

Austin Harrington: Introduction: What is Social Theory?
1: Austin Harrington: Classical Social Theory, I: Contexts and Beginnings
2: Antonino Palumbo and Alan Scott: Classical Social Theory, II: Karl Marx and Émile Durkheim
3: Gianfranco Poggi: Classical Social Theory, III: Max Weber and Georg Simmel
4: John Holmwood: Functionalism and its Critics
5: William Outhwaite: Interpretivism and Interactionism
6: Dennis Smith: Historical Social Theory
7: Douglas Kellner: Western Marxism
8: Anthony Elliott: Psychoanalytic Social Theory
9: Samantha Ashenden: Structuralism and Post-Structuralism
10: Anthony King: Structure and Agency
11: Lisa Adkins: Feminist Social Theory
12: Barry Smart: Modernity and Postmodernity: Part I
13: Gerard Delanty: Modernity and Postmodernity: Part II
14: Robert Holton: Globalization
Austin Harrington: Conclusion: Social Theory for the Twenty-First Century

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Provides coverage of both classical and contemporary social theory in a single volume, offering a one-stop guide to all the major topics in the theoretical foundations of modern sociology.

About the Author

Austin Harrington is Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Leeds. He has published three books: Art and Social Theory: Sociological Arguments in Aesthetics, Polity Press, 2004; Hermeneutic Dialogue and Social Science: A Critique of Gadamer and Habermas, Routledge, 2001 and The Protestant Ethic Debate: Max Weber's Replies to his Critics, 1907-1910, Liverpool University Press, 2001, edited with D. Chalcraft.