Classical Sociological Theory

George Ritzer is Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland, where he has also been a Distinguished Scholar-Teacher and won a Teaching Excellence Award. He was awarded the Distinguished Contributions to Teaching Award by the American Sociological Association, an honorary doctorate from LaTrobe University in Australia, and the Robin Williams Lectureship from the Eastern Sociological Society. His best-known work, The McDonaldization of Society (8th ed.), has been read by hundreds of thousands of students over two decades and translated into over a dozen languages. Ritzer is also the editor of McDonaldization: The Reader; and author of other works of critical sociology related to the McDonaldization thesis, including Enchanting a Disenchanted World, The Globalization of Nothing, Expressing America: A Critique of the Global Credit Card Society, as well as a series best-selling social theory textbooks and Globalization: A Basic Text. He is the Editor of the Encyclopedia of Social Theory (2 vols.), the Encyclopedia of Sociology (11 vols.; 2nd edition forthcoming), the Encyclopedia of Globalization (5 vols.), and is Founding Editor of the Journal of Consumer Culture. In 2016 he will publish the second edition of Essentials of Sociology with SAGE. Jeffrey Stepnisky is an Associate Professor of Sociology at MacEwan University in Alberta, Canada, where he teaches classical and contemporary social theory. He has published in the area of social theory, especially as it relates to questions of subjectivity, in journals such as The Journal for the Theory of Social Behavior and Social Theory & Health. Along with this book he is co-author of Sociological Theory, Classical Sociological Theory, and Modern Sociological Theory, and has co-edited the Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Major Social Theorists, all with George Ritzer.

• PrefaceAcknowledgmentsAbout the AuthorsPart I: Introduction to Classical Sociological TheoryChapter 1: A Historical Sketch of Sociological Theory: The Early YearsIntroductionPremodern Sociological TheorySocial Forces in the Development of Sociological TheoryIntellectual Forces and the Rise of Sociological TheoryThe Development of French SociologyThe Development of German SociologyThe Origins of British SociologyThe Key Figure in Early Italian SociologyNon-European Classical TheoryThe Contemporary Relevance of Classical Sociological TheorySummaryChapter 2: A Historical Sketch of Sociological Theory: The Later YearsEarly American Sociological TheorySociological Theory to MidcenturySociological Theory from MidcenturyLate Twentieth-Century Integrative TheoryTheories of Modernity and PostmodernitySocial Theory in the Twenty-First CenturySummaryPart II: Classical Sociological TheoryChapter 3: Alexis de TocquevilleComparative StudyAmerican PoliticsThe Sociology in Tocqueville’s WorkThe Key Sociological Problem(s)Freedom, Democracy, and SocialismColonialismContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 4: Auguste ComteComte’s Profound AmbitionsComte’s SociologyTheory and PracticeCriticisms and ContributionsSummaryChapter 5: Herbert SpencerSpencer and ComteGeneral Theoretical PrinciplesSociologyThe Evolution of SocietyEthics and PoliticsCriticisms and Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 6: Karl MarxIntroductionThe DialecticDialectical MethodHuman PotentialThe Structures of Capitalist SocietyMaterialist Conception of HistoryCultural Aspects of Capitalist SocietyMarx’s Economics: A Case StudyCommunismCriticismsContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 7: Emile DurkheimIntroductionSocial FactsThe Division of Labor in SocietySuicideThe Elementary Forms of Religious LifeMoral Education and Social ReformCriticismsContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 8: Max WeberMethodologySubstantive SociologyCriticismsContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 9: Georg SimmelPrimary ConcernsIndividual Consciousness and IndividualitySocial Interaction (“Association”)Social Structures and WorldsObjective CultureThe Philosophy of MoneySecrecy: A Case Study in Simmel’s SociologyCriticismsContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 10: Early Women Sociologists and Classical Sociological Theory: 1830–1930Harriet Martineau (1802–1876)Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935)Jane Addams (1860–1935) and the Chicago Women’s SchoolAnna Julia Cooper (1858–1964) and Ida Wells-Barnett (1862–1931)Marianne Schnitger Weber (1870–1954)Beatrice Potter Webb (1858–1943)Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 11: W. E. B. Du BoisIntellectual InfluencesStudying Race Scientifically: The Philadelphia NegroTheoretical ContributionsEconomicsKarl Marx, Socialism, and CommunismContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 12: Thorstein VeblenIntellectual InfluencesBasic PremisesSubstantive IssuesCriticisms and Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 13: Joseph SchumpeterCreative DestructionSchumpeter’s Broader Economic TheoryToward a More Dynamic Theory of the EconomySchumpeter’s SociologyThe FutureContemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 14: Karl MannheimThe Sociology of KnowledgeIdeology and UtopiaRationality and the Irrationality of the TimesCriticisms and Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 15: George Herbert MeadIntellectual RootsThe Priority of the SocialThe ActMental Processes and the MindSelfSocietyCriticisms and Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 16: Alfred SchutzThe Ideas of Edmund HusserlScience and the Social WorldTypifications and RecipesThe Life-WorldIntersubjectivityRealms of the Social WorldConsciousness, Meanings, and MotivesCriticisms and Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryChapter 17: Talcott ParsonsParsons’s Integrative EffortsGeneral PrinciplesThe Action SystemChange and Dynamism in Parsonsian TheoryCriticisms and Contemporary ApplicationsSummaryReferencesName IndexSubject Index