Erich Fromm and Global Public Sociology

Neil McLaughlin is Professor in the Department of Sociology at McMaster University in Hamilton Ontario, Canada. In addition to have written extensively on Fromm’s critical theory, he has published widely in the sociology of ideas with case studies on Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, public sociology and public intellectuals in Canada and the United States, and on the sociology of creativity. He is currently researching the spread of Soros conspiracy theories in Hungary, Poland, the United States and Canada, the popularity of Jordan Peterson’s psychological writings and social media lectures and the politics of university funding in North America.

“McLaughlin has made an impassioned defense of public sociology, Erich Fromm, and Fromm’s status as a public sociologist. His scholarship ... is exhaustive and covers decades. His style of writing is clear and lucid, and the core arguments never get submerged by the considerable detail and exegesis. He has done a great service in emphasizing the need to reclaim Fromm as numbered among eminent public sociologists.” Symbolic Interaction

• Introduction: Erich Fromm’s Global Public Sociology 1 Sociology in a World at War: Escape from Freedom 2 How Optimal Marginality Created a Public Sociologist 3 The Cold War, Conformity, and the 1960s 4 How Fromm Became a Forgotten Public Sociologist 5 Fromm’s Political Activism in the 1960s 6 Studying Social Character and Theorizing Violence Conclusion: The Revival of a Global Public Sociologist