Peter Wagner 
A History and Theory of the Social Sciences 
Not All That Is Solid Melts into Air

Divided into two parts, this book examines the train of social theory from the 19th century, through to the ′organization of modernity′, in relation to ideas of social planning, and as contributors to the ′rationalistic revolution′ of the ′golden age′ of capitalism in the 1950s and 60s. Part two examines key concepts in the social sciences. It begins with some of the broadest concepts used by social scientists: choice, decision, action and institution and moves on to examine the ′collectivist alternative′: the concepts of society, culture and polity, which are often dismissed as untenable by postmodernists today. This is a major contribution to contemporary social theory and provides a host of essential insights into the task of social science today.

Inhoudsopgave

PART ONE: RECONSIDERING THE HISTORY OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

As a Philosophical Science Unjustifiable, as an Empirical Science Anything Else but New

Classical Sociology and the First Crisis of Modernity

Time of Politics, and Not of Law

Political Analysis during the First Crisis of Modernity

Adjusting Social Relations

Social Science and the Organization of Modernity

The Mythical Promise of Societal Renewal

Social Science and Reform Coalitions

Out of Step

The Social Sciences in the Second Crisis of Modernity

PART TWO: RETHINKING KEY CONCEPTS OF THE SOCIAL SCIENCES

Choice and Decision-Making

Action and Institution

Culture (with
Heidrun Friese )

Society

Polity

Modernity

Over de auteur

Peter Wagner is Professor of Social and Political Theory in the Department of Political and Social Sciences, European University Institute, Florence