Alan Sica - Böcker

The late 1960s are remembered today as the last time wholesale social upheaval shook Europe and the United States. College students during that tumultuous period - epitomized by the events of May 1968 - were as permanently marked in their worldviews as their parents had been by the depression and World War II. Sociology was at the center of these events, and it changed decisively because of them. "The Disobedient Generation" collects newly written autobiographies by an international cross-section of well-known sociologists, all of them "children of the '60s." It illuminates the human experience of living through that decade as apprentice scholars and activists, encountering the issues of class, race, the establishment, the decline of traditional religion, feminism, war, and the sexual revolution. In each case the interlinked crises of young adulthood, rapid change, and nascent professional careers shaped this generation's private and public selves. This is an intensely personal collective portrait of a generation in a time of struggle.

This book explores the latest thinking about Max Weber and his continuing influence on theoretical and empirical interests today. Bringing together the work of leading scholars from a variety of disciplines, it illuminates Weber’s thought in a number of key areas, including the methodology and philosophy of social science, comparative religion, the rationalization process, political sociology, the sociology of law, and the Protestant ethic and the development of capitalism.An international collection that demonstrates the enduring importance of Weber’s thought to contemporary sociology and the discipline’s major concerns, The Routledge International Handbook on Max Weber will appeal to scholars in a range of disciplines, including sociology, social theory, politics, philosophy, law, and international relations.

This book explores the latest thinking about Max Weber and his continuing influence on theoretical and empirical interests today. Bringing together the work of leading scholars from a variety of disciplines, it illuminates Weber’s thought in a number of key areas, including the methodology and philosophy of social science, comparative religion, the rationalization process, political sociology, the sociology of law, and the Protestant ethic and the development of capitalism.An international collection that demonstrates the enduring importance of Weber’s thought to contemporary sociology and the discipline’s major concerns, The Routledge International Handbook on Max Weber will appeal to scholars in a range of disciplines, including sociology, social theory, politics, philosophy, law, and international relations.

Despite immediate appearances, this book is not primarily a hermeneutical exercise in which the superiority of one interpretation of canonical texts is championed against others. Its origin lies elsewhere, near the overlap of history, psychoanalysis, aesthetics, and social theory of the usual kind. Weber, Pareto, Freud, W. I. Thomas, Max Scheler, Karl Mannheim, and many others of similar stature long ago wondered and wrote much about the interplay between societal rationalization and individual rationality, between collective furor and private psychopathology—in short, about the strange and worrisome union of “character and social structure” (to recall Gerth and Mills). Pondering the history of social thought in this century can lead to the unpleasant realization that such large-scale questions slipped away, especially from sociologists, sometime before World War II. Or, if not entirely lost, they were so transformed in range and rhetoric that a gap opened between contemporary theorizing and its European background. Perhaps this partly explains Weber’s continuing appeal. By dealing with him, one might again broach topics long at odds with “social science” of the last forty years.—From the Preface This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1988.

Despite immediate appearances, this book is not primarily a hermeneutical exercise in which the superiority of one interpretation of canonical texts is championed against others. Its origin lies elsewhere, near the overlap of history, psychoanalysis, aesthetics, and social theory of the usual kind. Weber, Pareto, Freud, W. I. Thomas, Max Scheler, Karl Mannheim, and many others of similar stature long ago wondered and wrote much about the interplay between societal rationalization and individual rationality, between collective furor and private psychopathology—in short, about the strange and worrisome union of “character and social structure” (to recall Gerth and Mills). Pondering the history of social thought in this century can lead to the unpleasant realization that such large-scale questions slipped away, especially from sociologists, sometime before World War II. Or, if not entirely lost, they were so transformed in range and rhetoric that a gap opened between contemporary theorizing and its European background. Perhaps this partly explains Weber’s continuing appeal. By dealing with him, one might again broach topics long at odds with “social science” of the last forty years.—From the Preface This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1988.

An innovative and wide ranging collection of original essays by today's leading social theorists aiming to clarify the current uses being made of philosophical ideas in the creation of social thought.

An innovative and wide ranging collection of original essays by today's leading social theorists aiming to clarify the current uses being made of philosophical ideas in the creation of social thought.

Max Weber is a magisterial figure in the social sciences. His fundamental contributions to the methodological and conceptual apparatus of sociology remain of continuing relevance to contemporary debates. His astonishing range and quality of work on topics ranging from the comparative sociology of religion to political sociology, and the sociology of law to the sociology of music, have established Weber as a permanent point of reference for modern scholarship. Scholarly debates on the nature, significance and purpose of Weber's work demonstrate a significance for sociology's self-image that extends beyond their immediate interpretive importance. This volume, edited by one of the world's leading Weber scholars, offers an unparalleled selection of key Weber scholarship organized thematically and spanning the range of his sociological influence.

The most profound and enduring social theorist of sociology's classical period, Max Weber speaks as cogently to concerns of the new century as he did to those of the past. Over the past seventy years, those special ideas that have become identified as "Weberian" have become especially pertinent to those who would analyze today's socioeconomic and cultural life. They offer the possibility of a more acute understanding of our immediate future than reliance on the ideas of any other social theorist in the pantheon. Alan Sica demonstrates Weber's preeminent position and lasting vitality within social theory by applying them to topics of contemporary concern. The result will appeal to experts and novices alike.Max Weber and the New Century documents the continuing usefulness of Weber's unrivalled social thought. Sica offers a series of linked studies that treat Weber's concept of rationalization as expressed in different cultural forms, the role of Weberian ideas in contemporary historiography, the uses of Weber's image in the popular imagination, the rhetorical structure of Economy and Society, and Weber's relationship to modern philosophical thought. Conceptually and practically, this volume is a companion piece to the author's forthcoming Max Weber: A Comprehensive Bibliography--a 3,600-item bibliography of works by and about Weber in English--which, for the first time, will allow scholars to explore the universe of Weberian analysis.Max Weber and the New Century is a valuable addition to the library of social scientists, historians, philosophers, economists, and students of intellectual history. It shows that Weber--the scholar as much as his ideas--continues to inspire fruitful social and cultural analyses.

The most profound and enduring social theorist of sociology's classical period, Max Weber speaks as cogently to concerns of the new century as he did to those of the past. In Max Weber and the New Century, Alan Sica demonstrated Weber's preeminent position and lasting vitality within social theory by applying his ideas to a broad range of topics of contemporary concern. Max Weber: A Comprehensive Bibliography is a companion volume that offers some 4,600 bibliographic listings of work on Weber, making it the most complete guide to the literature in English and a testament to the continued vitality of Weber's thought.Sica's work supersedes all previous bibliographical efforts covering the Weber literature, both in the quantity and accuracy of its references, and the clarity and convenience of its format. In order to demonstrate the enormous variety of Weberiana in English, Sica has adopted a liberal criterion for inclusion, rather than a critical one, choosing to mix the best with what may be more routine work. Following a preface in which previous bibliographies and bibliographic problems are discussed, the volume opens with a series of five specialized bibliographies. The first lists Weber's works in English translation. The second lists reviews of Weber's major works including those translated into English, while the third covers reviews of recent books and other work on Weber. The fourth section contains a selection of dissertations and theses relating to Weber or his ideas. The fifth includes primary and secondary sources treating Weber on rationality and rationalization processes. The last and largest section offers a comprehensive Weber bibliography of works in English.This large-scale endeavor attempts to identify with accuracy and completeness the entire universe of Weber scholarship in English. It will be an essential scholarly tool for sociologists, historians, economists, and students of cultural and intellectual history.

Edited and introduced by Alan Sica.Paul Honigsheim is unique. One of the select few who regularly participated in the Weber-Kreis in Heidelberg during the 1910s, Honigsheim's special place within Weber's world adds a degree of credibility to his writings matched by few others. In the late 1940s Honigsheim published four essays from what might be called Weber's "lost decade," the period during which Weber established his reputation in Germany as the most versatile and brilliant of the younger social scientists. Together in one volume for the first time, these essays reveal portions of Weber's work previously unavailable in English.In the opening essay, "Max Weber as Rural Sociologist," Honigsheim treats Weber's essays on Russia, Poland, and other works in economic history. He offers a point of departure for those wishing to probe Weber's celebrated and misconstrued distaste for traditional Slavic social structure. In "Max Weber as Applied Anthropologist," Honigsheim examines Weber's commitment to the study of race, ethnicity, and nationalism as mediated by ethnic attachments, social policy formation, handicraft economies, and what he calls "Ethno-Politics." "Max Weber as Historian of Agriculture and Rural Life" is a masterpiece of exegesis and comparative inquiry. The final essay, "Max Weber: His Religious and Ethical Background and Development," acts as a minor corrective and addendum to Marianne Weber's biography. The book concludes with Honigsheim's reminiscences of the Weber circle.Interest in the work and person of Max Weber grows with each year. From his writings the reader may glean the finer shades and contours of thoughts that arise from private exchanges between Honigsheim and Max Weber. This volume will interest a broad spectrum of social scientists.

Thirty-five years ago Joseph Gabel pub­lished a modern masterpiece, which in 1975 appeared in English as False Con­sciousness: An Essay on Reificalion . Combining his special knowledge of existential psychiatry, axiology, Marx­ism, and political history, Gabel pro­posed the utterly novel idea that victims of serious mental disturbances (espe­cially paranoia and schizophrenia) re­produce those distorted thought pat­terns commonly associated with ideo­logical beliefs at the collective level. Such beliefs initially had been laid bare in the 1920s by Gabel's intellectual progenitors, Karl Mannheim and George Lukacs. Gabel's remarkable innovation was to transfer the private crisis of mental collapse into the analytic frame­work previously reserved for ideological critique, making him an expert on what was later called "the micro-macro prob­lem."Ideologies and the Corruption of Thought includes Gabel's essays over the last 40 years, characteristically treating micro and macro theoretical matters simultaneously. Originally writ­ten in French and German, they have been recast in idiomatic English and bibliographically updated. Using a unique mode and vocabulary of analy­sis, Gabel offers theoretical investiga­tions of McCarthyism and Stalinism (original and more recent types), as well as Althusser, Orwell, and Jonathan Swift in his capacity as a psychiatric theorist. He also explores anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, and a fascinating case study of a paranoid who regarded him­self as the pope. In addition this volume includes a range of general commentar­ies on ideological "thought," utopianism, and false consciousness.This rich feast of social and political analysis and theory illuminates a range of contemporary concerns - racism, Utopian fantasy, ethnocentrism, anti-Semitism, the interplay of social struc­ture and mental illness, and ideological transformations of social life - which only Gabel's unique mixture of the clini­cal and the political could achieve. It will be studied with interest by all theo­rists and politically alert readers in the social sciences, philosophy, and related fields of study.

The most profound and enduring social theorist of sociology's classical period, Max Weber speaks as cogently to concerns of the new century as he did to those of the past. In Max Weber and the New Century, Alan Sica demonstrated Weber's preeminent position and lasting vitality within social theory by applying his ideas to a broad range of topics of contemporary concern. Max Weber: A Comprehensive Bibliography is a companion volume that offers some 4,600 bibliographic listings of work on Weber, making it the most complete guide to the literature in English and a testament to the continued vitality of Weber's thought.Sica's work supersedes all previous bibliographical efforts covering the Weber literature, both in the quantity and accuracy of its references, and the clarity and convenience of its format. In order to demonstrate the enormous variety of Weberiana in English, Sica has adopted a liberal criterion for inclusion, rather than a critical one, choosing to mix the best with what may be more routine work. Following a preface in which previous bibliographies and bibliographic problems are discussed, the volume opens with a series of five specialized bibliographies. The first lists Weber's works in English translation. The second lists reviews of Weber's major works including those translated into English, while the third covers reviews of recent books and other work on Weber. The fourth section contains a selection of dissertations and theses relating to Weber or his ideas. The fifth includes primary and secondary sources treating Weber on rationality and rationalization processes. The last and largest section offers a comprehensive Weber bibliography of works in English.This large-scale endeavor attempts to identify with accuracy and completeness the entire universe of Weber scholarship in English. It will be an essential scholarly tool for sociologists, historians, economists, and students of cultural and intellectual history.

The most profound and enduring social theorist of sociology's classical period, Max Weber speaks as cogently to concerns of the new century as he did to those of the past. Over the past seventy years, those special ideas that have become identified as "Weberian" have become especially pertinent to those who would analyze today's socioeconomic and cultural life. They offer the possibility of a more acute understanding of our immediate future than reliance on the ideas of any other social theorist in the pantheon. Alan Sica demonstrates Weber's preeminent position and lasting vitality within social theory by applying them to topics of contemporary concern. The result will appeal to experts and novices alike.Max Weber and the New Century documents the continuing usefulness of Weber's unrivalled social thought. Sica offers a series of linked studies that treat Weber's concept of rationalization as expressed in different cultural forms, the role of Weberian ideas in contemporary historiography, the uses of Weber's image in the popular imagination, the rhetorical structure of Economy and Society, and Weber's relationship to modern philosophical thought. Conceptually and practically, this volume is a companion piece to the author's forthcoming Max Weber: A Comprehensive Bibliography--a 3,600-item bibliography of works by and about Weber in English--which, for the first time, will allow scholars to explore the universe of Weberian analysis.Max Weber and the New Century is a valuable addition to the library of social scientists, historians, philosophers, economists, and students of intellectual history. It shows that Weber--the scholar as much as his ideas--continues to inspire fruitful social and cultural analyses.

Max Weber wrote these methodological essays in the closest intimacy with actual research and against a background of constant and intensive meditation on substantive problems in the theory and strategy of the social sciences. They were written between 1903 and 1917, the most productive of Max Weber's life, when he was working on his studies in the sociology of religion and Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft.Weber had done important work in economic and legal history and had taught economic theory. On the basis of original investigations, he had acquired a specialist's knowledge of the details of German economic and social structure. His always vital concern for the political prosperity of Germany among the nations thrust him deeply into discussion of political ideals and programs.Weber's methodology still holds interest for us. Some of its shortcomings, from the contemporary viewpoint, may be attributed to the fact that some of the methodological problems that he treated could not be satisfactorily resolved prior to certain actual developments in research technique. These few qualifications aside, the work remains a pioneering work in large scale social research, from one of the field's masters.

Paul Honigsheim is unique. One of the select few who regularly participated in the Weber-Kreis in Heidelberg during the 1910s, Honigsheim's special place within Weber's world adds a degree of credibility to his writings matched by few others. In the late 1940s Honigsheim published four essays from what might be called Weber's "lost decade," the period during which Weber established his reputation in Germany as the most versatile and brilliant of the younger social scientists. Together in one volume for the first time, these essays reveal portions of Weber's work previously unavailable in English.In the opening essay, "Max Weber as Rural Sociologist," Honigsheim treats Weber's essays on Russia, Poland, and other works in economic history. He offers a point of departure for those wishing to probe Weber's celebrated and misconstrued distaste for traditional Slavic social structure. In "Max Weber as Applied Anthropologist," Honigsheim examines Weber's commitment to the study of race, ethnicity, and nationalism as mediated by ethnic attachments, social policy formation, handicraft economies, and what he calls "Ethno-Politics." "Max Weber as Historian of Agriculture and Rural Life" is a masterpiece of exegesis and comparative inquiry. The final essay, "Max Weber: His Religious and Ethical Background and Development," acts as a minor corrective and addendum to Marianne Weber's biography. The book concludes with Honigsheim's reminiscences of the Weber circle.Interest in the work and person of Max Weber grows with each year. From his writings the reader may glean the finer shades and contours of thoughts that arise from private exchanges between Honigsheim and Max Weber. This volume will interest a broad spectrum of social scientists.

Edited and with a new introduction by Robert J. Antonio and Alan Sica.Max Weber wrote these methodological essays in the closest intimacy with actual research and against a background of constant and intensive meditation on substantive problems in the theory and strategy of the social sciences. They were written between 1903 and 1917, the most productive of Max Weber's life, when he was working on his studies in the sociology of religion and Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft.Weber had done important work in economic and legal history and had taught economic theory. On the basis of original investigations, he had acquired a specialist's knowledge of the details of German economic and social structure. His always vital concern for the political prosperity of Germany among the nations thrust him deeply into discussion of political ideals and programs.Weber's methodology still holds interest for us. Some of its shortcomings, from the contemporary viewpoint, may be attributed to the fact that some of the methodological problems that he treated could not be satisfactorily resolved prior to certain actual developments in research technique. These few qualifications aside, the work remains a pioneering work in large scale social research, from one of the field's masters.

Scholars have been puzzling over the "future of the book" since Marshall McLuhan's famous maxim "the medium is the message" in the early 1950s. McLuhan famously argued that electronic media was creating a global village in which books would become obsolete. Such views were ahead of their time, but today they are all too relevant as declining sales, even among classic texts, have become a serious matter in academic publishing.Does anyone still read long and complex works, either from the past or the present? Is the role of a professional reader and reviewer of manuscripts still relevant? Book Matters closely analyses these questions and others. Alan Sica surmises that the concentration span required for studying and discussing complex texts has slipped away, as undergraduate classes are becoming inundated by shorter, easier-to-teach scholarly and literary works. He considers such matters in part from the point of view of a former editor of scholarly journals. In an engaging style, he gives readers succinct analyses of books and ideas that once held the interest of millions of discerning readers, such as Simone de Beavoir's Second Sex and the works of David Graham Phillips and C. Wright Mills, among others.Book Matters is not a nostalgic cry for lost ideas, but instead a stark reminder of just how aware and analytically illuminating certain scholars were prior to the Internet, and how endangered the book is in this era of pixelated communication.

Scholars have been puzzling over the "future of the book" since Marshall McLuhan's famous maxim "the medium is the message" in the early 1950s. McLuhan famously argued that electronic media was creating a global village in which books would become obsolete. Such views were ahead of their time, but today they are all too relevant as declining sales, even among classic texts, have become a serious matter in academic publishing. Does anyone still read long and complex works, either from the past or the present? Is the role of a professional reader and reviewer of manuscripts still relevant? Book Matters closely analyses these questions and others. Alan Sica surmises that the concentration span required for studying and discussing complex texts has slipped away, as undergraduate classes are becoming inundated by shorter, easier-to-teach scholarly and literary works. He considers such matters in part from the point of view of a former editor of scholarly journals. In an engaging style, he gives readers succinct analyses of books and ideas that once held the interest of millions of discerning readers, such as Simone de Beavoir's Second Sex and the works of David Graham Phillips and C. Wright Mills, among others. Book Matters is not a nostalgic cry for lost ideas, but instead a stark reminder of just how aware and analytically illuminating certain scholars were prior to the Internet, and how endangered the book is in this era of pixelated communication.

Comparative research methods are central to sociology and its associated disciplines. This four-volume set brings together 77 articles and book chapters from key sources, spanning the history of comparative analysis in the social sciences, from ancient to modern works. The selections cover not only explanations of how to carry out comparative analysis in a reliable and creative way, but also exhaustively explore the fields of sociology, political science, anthropology and education.

Edited and with an introduction by Alan Sica.In 1975 Joseph Gabel published a modern masterpiece which appeared in English as False Consciousness: An Essay on Reification. Combining his special knowledge of existential psychiatry, axiology, Marxism, and political history, Gabel proposed the utterly novel idea that victims of serious mental disturbances (especially paranoia and schizophrenia) reproduce those distorted thought patterns commonly associated with ideological beliefs at the collective level. Such beliefs initially had been laid bare in the 1920s by Gabel's intellectual progenitors, Karl Mannheim and George Lukacs. Gabel's remarkable innovation was to transfer the private crisis of mental collapse into the analytic framework previously reserved for ideological critique, making him an expert on what was later called "the micro-macro problem." Ideologies and the Corruption of Thought includes Gabel's essays over the last 40 years, characteristically treating micro and macro theoretical matters simultaneously. Originally written in French and German, they have been recast in idiomatic English and bibliographically updated. Using a unique mode and vocabulary of analysis, Gabel offers theoretical investigations of McCarthyism and Stalinism (original and more recent types), as well as Althusser, Orwell, and Jonathan Swift in his capacity as a psychiatric theorist. He also explores anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, and a fascinating case study of a paranoid who regarded himself as the pope. In addition this volume includes a range of general commentaries on ideological "thought," utopianism, and false consciousness.This rich feast of social and political analysis and theory illuminates a range of contemporary concerns: racism, utopian fantasy, ethnocentrism, anti-Semitism, the interplay of social structure and mental illness, and ideological transformations of social life, which only Gabel's unique mixture of the clinical and the political could achieve. It will be studied with interest by all theorists and politically alert readers in the social sciences, philosophy, and related fields of study.