Post-Philosophical Sociology

In a hyper-individualistic age and in the face of the narrowly focused, policy-oriented research ubiquitous in the social sciences, this book revisits the humanistic world-view that is integral to Norbert Elias¿s preeminent figurational-process sociology, with its aim of increasing the fund of sociological knowledge that has the human condition as its horizon.

Clarifying the contentious ¿post-philosophical¿ aspects in order to supplement standard histories of sociology with new insights, it offers incisive evaluations of some of the bewildered attempts by prominent sociologists to diagnose the malaise of contemporary globalised society. It also challenges the orthodox limitation of the empirical scope of sociology to ¿modernity¿.

With its ominous warnings of the destructive prevalence of ¿overcritique¿ in the discipline and lack of an in-depth sociological psychology, Post-Philosophical Sociology will appeal to scholars of sociology, psychoanalysis, social philo