John A. Hall is the James McGill Professor of Comparative Historical Sociology at McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada. He is the author of many books linking social theory with historical studies, constantly moving back-and-forth between these fields. His books include (with J. L. Campbell) The Paradox of Vulnerability: States, Nationalism and the Financial Crisis (Princeton, 2017), The World of States (with J. L. Campbell, Bloomsbury 2015), The Importance of Being Civil: The Struggle for Political Decency (Princeton, 2013), Ernest Gellner: An Intellectual Biography (Verso, 2010), International Orders (Polity, 1996), Coercion and Consent: Studies on the Modern State (Polity, 1994), Liberalism: Politics, Ideology and the Market (Paladin, 1988), and Powers and Liberties: The Causes and Consequences of the Rise of the West (Basil Blackwell, 1985).

• Volume One: Historical Social Science: Presuppositions and PrescriptionsIntroductionTowards Integration and Unity in the Human Sciences: The Project of Historical SociologyA Classical ExordiumCritical Studies in the Logic of the Cultural Sciences - Max WeberFoundations of the Critique of Political Economy - Karl MarxPART ONE: HISTORY AND THE SOCIAL SCIENCESUnity and Diversity in the Human Sciences - Fernand BraudelFrom Social History to the History of Society - Eric HobsbawmThe Historical Method in Social Science - M M PostanHistory, Sociology, Historical Sociology - Philip AbramsFuture History - Charles TillyHistory and Anthropology - Bernard CohnThe State of PlayHistory and Anthropology - Clifford GeertzWhy Is Economics Not an Evolutionary Science? - Thorstein VeblenEconomic History and Economics - Robert SolowNot Just What, but When - Paul PiersonTiming and Sequence in Political ProcessesThe Use and Abuse of Psychology in History - Frank ManuelTowards the Problem of the Historical Nature of Psychological Processes - Alexander LuriaSocial Psychology as History - Kenneth GergenVolume Two: Foundations of Historical-Sociological InquiryIntroductionThe Historicality of Human Social Existence: The Search for a Grounded, Synthesizing Analytics PART TWO: Ontology of the Social-HistoricalSection One: Nominalism, Social Realism and Dialectical TotalityHolism versus Individualism in History and Sociology - Ernest GellnerHistorical Explanation in the Social Sciences - J W N WatkinsReply to Mr Watkins - Ernest GellnerSociology and Empirical Research - Theodore AdornoContributions to a Phenomenology of Historical Materialism - Herbert MarcuseReification and the Sociological Critique of Consciousness - Peter Berger and Stanley PullbergExplanation and Understanding - Paul RicoeurOn Some Remarkable Connections among the Theory of the Text, Theory of Action and Theory of HistoryMorphogenesis versus Structuration - Margaret ArcherOn Combining Structure and ActionTheory of Action, Dialectic and History - William Sewell JrComment on ColemanActors and Actions in Social History and Social Theory - James ColemanReply to SewellTranscending General Linear Reality - Andrew AbbottSection Two: Temporality and CausalityTemporality - Jean-Paul SartrePhenomenology of the Three Temporal DimensionsTime - George Herbert MeadHistory and the Social Sciences - Fernand BraudelThe Longue Dur[ac]eeThe TimeSpace of World-Systems Analysis - Immanuel WallersteinHistorical Sociology and Time - Ronald AminzadeTemporality and Process in Social Life - Andrew AbbottCauses, Connections and Conditions in History - Michael ScrivenHistory, Differential Equations and the Problem of Narration - Donald McCloskeyComparing Historical Sequences - A Powerful Tool for Causal Analysis - Dietrich Rueschemeyer and John StephensVolume Three: The Logic of Historical-Sociological InquiryIntroductionEvidence, Interpretation and Explanation in Historical Social Science PART THREE: EXPLANATORY DISPUTES AND CHALLENGESSection One: From Laws That ′Cover′ to Narratives That ′Bind′? The Uses of History in Sociology - John GoldthorpeReflections on Some Recent TendenciesEvidence and Explanation in History and Sociology - Joseph M BryantCritical Reflections on Goldthorpe′s Critique of Historical SociologyJohn Goldthorpe and the Relics of Sociology - Nicky HartIn Defence of ′Grand′ Historical Sociology - Nicos MouzelisIn Praise of Macro-Sociology - A Reply to Goldthorpe - Michael MannHave Historical Sociologists Forsaken Theory - Jill Quadagno and Stan KnappNarrative and the Real World - David CarrAn Argument for ContinuitySection Two: Historical Evidence and the Logic of HermeneuticsEvidence and Inference in History - Raymond AronFour Types of Inference from Documents to Events - Vernon K DibbleEvidence and Proof in Documentary Research, I and II - Jennifer PlattThe Wrong Way through the Telescope - Peter LaslettA Note on Literary Evidence in Sociology and in Historical SociologyArchaeological Cables and Tacking - Alison WylieColonial Archives and the Arts of Governance - Ann Laura StolerSection Three: Emplotment, Rhetoric and the Postmodernist ChallengeThe Discourse of History - Roland BarthesThe Question of Narrative in Contemporary Historical Theory - Hayden WhiteOn Sources and Narratives in Historical Social Science - Joseph M BryantProgress in Historical Studies - Raymond MartinVolume Four: Social Worlds in Flux: Legacies and TransformationsIntroductionTheories and Methods Applied: Research Exemplars in Historical Social SciencePART FOUR: EXPLICATING THE DIALECTIC OF STRUCTURE, CULTURE AND AGENCYSection One: Origins, Trajectories, LegaciesTechnological Innovation and Economic Progress in the Ancient World - M I FinleyOrigins and Traditions in Islam and Christianity - Bryan S TurnerA Modified View of Our Origins - Louis DumontThe Christian Beginnings of Modern IndividualismThe Islamic Commerical Crisis - Timur KuranInstitutional Roots of Economic Underdevelopment in the Middle EastBlood and Debt - Miguel Angel CentenoWar and Taxation in Nineteenth-Century Latin AmericaThe Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis - Lynn White JrClio and the Economics of QWERTY - Paul A DavidSection Two: Conjunctures, Ruptures, TransformationsConquistador y Pestilencia - Alfred CrosbyThe First New World Pandemic and the Fall of the Great Indian EmpiresThree Faces of Cruelty - Randall CollinsTowards a Comparative Sociology of ViolencePump and Circumstance - Steven ShapinRobert Boyle′s Literary TechnologyTime, Work Discipline and Industrial Capitalism - E P ThompsonGoodbye to Tristes Tropes - Marshall SahlinsEthnography in the Context of Modern World HistoryWere the Perpetrators of Genocide ′Ordinary Men′ or ′Real Nazis′? Results from Fifteen Hundred Biographies - Michael MannThe Production of Possession - Aihwa OngSpirits and the Multinational Corporation in MalaysiaBureaucracy, Friends and Money - Frank PiekeThe Growth of Capital Socialism in China