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Cet article met l’accent sur le parallele entre le concept de Simmel de Roi clandestin (heimlicher Konig) d’une ere culturelle dans la theorie sociale de Durkheim, Bergson et Castoriadis. Tous ces auteurs partagent le point de vue selon lequel les societes et d’autres formes d’identites collectives sont des imaginaires fondes sur un signifiant vide, ou Roi clandestin, qui fournit ce que nous appelons la fondation en dehors de l’existence collective. Partant de l’idee de Castoriadis selon laquelle: a) les societes sont des institutions imaginaires et b) chaque societe est informee par une signification imaginaire centrale, notre reflexion affirme que la complexite des societes heterogenes sur les plans ideologique, politique et religieux ne peut etre reduite a un seul imaginaire central, ou un seul roi clandestin. Nous suggerons d’elargir le concept de Castoriadis concernant l’institution imaginaire de la societe, d’abord avec la notion de constitutif de Staten et, en second lieu, avec le concept d’antagonisme hegemonique de Mouffe et Laclau (tous deux fondes sur Derrida). La derniere partie de l’article traite des perspectives methodologiques de recherche, en s’appuyant sur la conceptualisation suggeree du roi clandestin en tant que fondement imaginaire de l’identite et de l’unite collective.

As the gap between the world’s rich and poor grows wider and the limitations of institutional solutions such as foreign aid continue to be exposed, students of development are shifting their focus toward individualistic business-based solutions that seek to draw members of marginalized communities into the global marketplace. This focus on the individual, however, raises three interconnected issues: it privileges a view of the human person as individualistic versus relational, it proposes isolated solutions that are not scalable, and it can leave would-be change agents feeling hopeless. Drawing on insights from sociology, political philosophy, and Catholic social thought, the current paper presents an alternative path to educating for an inclusive economy by arguing that our greatest structural challenges require us not to abandon institutional solutions but rather to develop better institutions rooted in a fuller notion of the human person. Specifically, by cultivating a mindset of relationality through immersion experiences and mindfulness practices, we propose that business education can empower students to develop hope-filled solidarity with the marginalized, understand their role in the global economic system, and as future business leaders, build virtuous institutions for the common good.

Social problems can be discussed in different ways. One is a philosophical interpretation of the essence of the problem, another is a historical consideration of the origin of the problem, and the third is a sociological analysis of the relationship between the problem and the development, namely decadence, of social life. However, all this belongs to the scientific method of social research, when we try to approach the analysis and solution of the problem by perceiving the problem as a phenomenon with certain characteristics and properties. Nevertheless, there is also a way when we just want to point out the problem, to draw people's attention to its harmfulness, to remind them that they are largely accustomed to it, to the extent that they no longer notice it even though its harmfulness is still obvious, perhaps even more than ever before. This is exactly the method that some writers, satirists, opt for. They offer a caricature of the social situation, because they believe that this is the only way we will get startled and realize how unconscious and unscrupulous we have been in relation to certain harmful circumstances in which we live and raise our children and future generations. Very often satirists do not offer any concrete solution, because that is not what they intend to do. Their method is not scientific, so that we would expect them to analyze a problem and then propose a solution. Their intention is solely to shake up the members of their community, wake them up from the dream they have fallen into, and encourage them to do something. Not more than that. In this paper, we will try, holding probably the greatest satirist in the history of Islam, Ubayd Zakani, as an example, to find out to what extent satirical thought could have been useful in the period following the Mongols' occupation of almost all Muslim territories.

Ever since the emergence of Islam in the Arabian Peninsula, the question of the relationship between religion and government, or more specifically, the issue of the relationship between representatives of religious thought and life with authorities has always been highly topical. The Prophet of Islam already formed the first Islamic rule in Medina, as a model of concretization of a new form of social life. His successors tried to preserve this model even after his death, even though they were not most successful in that. The institution of the caliphate was formed very quickly, which was not a bad idea, but in practice it proved to be a far cry from the initial ideals of Islam and the Prophet. First the Umayyad and then the Abbasid caliphates, and after them many other dynasties in various ruling forms such as sultanates and ilkhanates, ruled according to the traditional models of their ancestors, trying, at least formally, to approach some Islamic principles. In such circumstances, the special duty of representatives of Muslim thought, philosophers, lawyers, theologians and all others, was to clarify various practical models according to which Islamic dogma will appear in the clearest and most concrete form in the ruling structure and its ideological background. Thus, different models of relationships between representatives of religious thought and rulers appeared, and consequently, between religion and government itself. One of the most famous theories that explains this relationship was the theory of wilayat al-faqih, which advocates the idea that in the period after the Prophet and his true successors, it is necessary that Muslim jurists and thinkers, i.e. ulama, be included in power. The level of their participation in government can be maximum or minimum, and will vary depending on the political will of the governing structure dominant in society at a given moment. This theory became especially prominent in recent times when it was very extensively analysed and expressed by Ayatollah Ruhulah Khomeini, who even founded the structure of the newly formed Islamic Republic of Iran on its foundations. The truth is, however, that this theory has a very long history, more than a few hundred years old. In this paper, we will try to present some of the main models that this political and social idea has given rise to throughout history, and especially since the formation of the Safavid dynasty (16th century).

Travel journals are primarily a literary genre in which the writer expresses his impressions about the geographical and other characteristics of the region through which he travels, along with demographic, cultural, religious, cognitive and ethical characteristics of the people he encounters during his travels. This literary genre has an extraordinary potential to reveal the cognitive frameworks of the collective thought of a nation that is directly or indirectly manifested through various folk customs and traditions. Travel journals are beneficial in two ways when it comes to social thought. First, an author who visits new regions and meets a people that he has not had the opportunity to talk to before, informs his readers about the customs, beliefs, fears and hopes of that people. Demographic descriptions and analyses of all interesting, and sometimes strange, events that he witnessed, are a testimony to his modern readers about the existence of different views of the world, not so far away from them. Moreover, it will provide later readers with authentic information about how people once thought and how a community functioned. Secondly, an author who writes about his impressions after encountering a new tradition inadvertently makes his own judgment about it. In that way, he implicitly and indirectly points to the collective consciousness that he brings through his subjective judgments from the region which he belongs to, from his homeland. This aspect is most noticeable with later readers, because they can observe from a certain distance both the people to whom the author belongs to and the people about whom the author reports. If the author is affected by a certain phenomenon, it means that the collective consciousness of his people would not approve of such an action, and if he supported a tradition, it meant that his people would also agree with it. In this paper, we will try to offer a brief insight into the history of travel journals in Islam, and to present sociological potentials of some of the main travel journals prepared by Muslim authors during their arduous and difficult journeys.

This document engages with discourses surrounding prison abolishment, defund/refund movements, COVID-19, and education as it relates to the Prison-Industrial Complex through a critical, poetic discourse analysis. Through a combination of artistic and analytic considerations, the work seeks to examine how systemic structures are being confronted in our temporal frame, focusing on the discourses of activists, government statements, and media outlets.

Ushbu maqolada qayd etiladiki, fuqarolik jamiyati ma'naviy-axloqiy muhitini tadqiq qilish paradigmasida jamiyatning ma'naviy-axloqiy muhiti ijtimoiy borliqni to'ldiradi va uning barcha qismlarida faol ishtirok etadi. Jamiyat ma'naviy-axloqiy muhitini konstruktiv-ratsional tashkillashtirishning potentsial imkoniyatlari, istiqboldagi vazifalarini belgilash sog'lomlashtirishga doir xorijiy tajribalarni umumlashtirib, O'zbekistonda ulardan ijodiy foydalanishga doir metodologik tavsiyalarni ishlab chiqish ishlarini tizimlashtirish esa jamiyat ma'naviy-axloqiy muhitini tadqiq qilish jarayonidagi “paradigma”, “xarakatlar strategiyasi” va uning asosiy besh ustuvor yo'nalishi nuqtai nazaridan ishlatish mumkin, This article notes that in the paradigm of studying the spiritual-moral environment of civil society, the spiritual-moral environment of society complements the social being and actively participates in all its parts. Potential opportunities for constructive and rational organization of the spiritual and moral environment of the society, the definition of future tasks, the systematization of work on the development of methodological recommendations for their creative use in Uzbekistan, summarizing foreign experience in health, and in the process of studying the spiritual and moral environment paradigm ”,“ strategy of action ”and its five main priorities.

O presente artigo pretende realizar uma reflexão crítica e historiográfica acerca do termo “pensamento social brasileiro”. Neste sentido, retomaremos seus processos e mudanças de significados e usos, assim como sua incorporação pelo campo das ciências sociais brasileiras. Assim, recompomos as variantes do pensamento social brasileiro na história intelectual brasileira, apontando alguns de seus usos e mobilizações na imprensa e, posteriormente, a sua consolidação acadêmica e universitária, a fim de atestarmos sua pertinência conceitual. Ao final do artigo, propomos uma revisão crítica acerca de tal perspectiva frente a algumas questões teóricas contemporâneas a partir do conceito de cultura intelectual.

This paper discusses the Brazilian essayism of the first decades of the twentieth Century by identifying the key topics, and issues around which an authentically sociological imaginative horizon gradually has been built in Brazil. We argue that the issue of colonization, slavery, and the large-scale rural ownership constituted the ways which Sociology systematicity in Brazil by defining a common repertoire of concepts, categories and, methods. The arguments are developed in the following sequence: a) the analytic place of essayism in Brazilian social thought; b) the analysis of the theoretical proposals and, interpretative results achieved by three emblematic authors of the period – Gilberto Freyre (1900–1987), SergioBuarque de Holanda (1902–1982) and, Caio Prado Junior (1907–1990). More than that, we draw the historicity of their ideas and, highlight some theoretical convergences and, divergences among them; c) the reach and, limits of these interpretations on Brazil considering their present-day relevance.

This article argues that Goldberg’s Modernity and the Jews in Western Social Thought fills an important gap: Jews are not only ‘good to think’ (Lévi-Strauss) but also essential for Western social theorists to critically interpret modernity and ambivalence towards it. In the article’s first part, devoted to the book’s epistemological and methodological underpinnings, I raise the following points: the book’s disciplinary focus prevents it from engaging more fully with broader intellectual and sociocultural currents, its national- cum-thematic structure precludes the exploration of transnational comparisons and nationally exogenous factors, the neglect of Jewish exile and cosmopolitan identity in the face of antisemitism and lack of clarity as to whether the book conforms to a realist epistemology or a symbolic one. In the article’s second part, I raise points about Goldberg’s rereading of the sociological canon, notably regarding Durkheim, Simmel and Weber.

The objective of this research is to elaborate on Islam and agrarian on Nahdlatul Ulama's thought of religion. The method of this research is descriptive qualitative and library research. The result of this study reveals that NU as a social organization involved in struggling Indonesia to expel the colonial and to increase social life level with agrarian reinforcement as well. The cause of the Nahdhatul Ulama involved is on its ideology method related to the reality of Indonesian society. The ideologies of Nahdhatul Ulama are (1). To make Indonesia a peaceful country (Dār al-Salām), not Dār al-harb (unpeaceful country); (2). Going back to Khittah 1926: NU as Jam’iyah Diniyyah wal Ijtimā‘iyyah, not Jam’iyyah Siyāsiyyah; and (3). Ahlu Sunnah wal jama’ah (ASWAJA) as Manhaj al-Fikr (way of thinking). Keywords: Nahdlatul Ulama; Ahlu Sunnah wal Jama'ah; Agrarian; Manhaj al-Fikr; a way of thinking. الملخص يعرض هذا البحث نتائج البحث فى الفكر الإسلامي عند نهضة العلماء عن الإسلام والزراعة، ويستخدم الطريقة الوصفية النوعية والدراسة المكتبية. وجدت نتائج البحث ان نهضة العلماء تمثل اجتماعية تشارك في الدفاع عن الدولة الإندونيسية بالمشاركة في طرد الغزاة وهي تساهم فى تحسين حياة الناس من خلال تعزيز الشؤون الزراعية. ولقد شاركت هذه ال في كل هذه الأنشطة لأن أسس تفكيرها أو أساليب تفكيرها لا يمكن فصلها عن واقع المجتمع الإندونيسي. أما الأسس الفكرية التي تعتمد عليها نهضة العلماء، هي (1) جعل إندونيسيا دار السلام وليست دار الحرب. (2) الرجوع إلى الخطة سنة 1926 التي تنص على أن نهضة العلماء كالمنظمة الدينية والاجتماعية ليست منظمة سياسية. (3) جعل منهج أهل السنة والجماعة منهجا فكريا سائدا. الكلمات الرئيسية: نهضة العلماء, وأهل السنة و الجماعة, والزراعة, منهج الفكر. Abstrak Tulisan ini menyajikan hasil penelitian tentang pemikiran keislaman Nahdlatul Ulama tentang Islam dan agraria. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode kualitatif deskriptif dan studi kepustakaan. Hasil penelitian menemukan bahwa Nahdlatul Ulama sebagai organisasi sosial kemasyarakatan turut terlibat dalam memperjuangkan negara Indonesia dalam mengusir penjajah serta turut andil dalam meningkatkan taraf kehidupan masyarakat lewat penguatan agraria. Organisasi Nahdlatul Ulama ikut terlibat disebabkan alas pikir atau metode berpikirnya tidak bisa dipisahkan dari realitas masyarakat Indonesia. Adapun alas pikir Nahdlatul Ulama yakni (1). Menjadikan Indonesia sebagai Dar al-Salam, bukan Dar al-Harb; (2). Kembali Ke Khittah 26: NU sebagai Jam'iyah Diniyyah wal Ijtimaiyyah, bukan Jam'iyah Siyasiyah; dan (3). Ahlu sunnah wal jama'ah (ASWAJA) sebagai Manhaj al-Fikr. Kata kunci: Nahdlatul Ulama, Ahlu Sunnah wal Jama'ah, Agraria, Manhaj al-Fikr.

The reissue of Orlando Patterson’s Slavery and Social Death provides an opportunity to reflect on developments in studies of slavery, postcolonial sociology, and comparative-historical sociology since the book’s initial release in 1982. In this special issue of Theory and Society, contributors from ancient history, anthropology, and sociology examine the book’s broader intellectual significance by situating it in Patterson’s corpus, covering a range of works including his fiction and scholarly publications, early work on Jamaican slave revolts, and private correspondence with key thinkers. The volume’s ambit, then, is not a single book but rather a broader field of social thought. As the articles in this issue demonstrate, the concepts and theories introduced by Patterson are still vital. In some ways, we argue, a Pattersonian sociology has only recently come to its full fruition, thanks to ongoing developments in postcolonial studies, critical race studies, anthropological and historical study of slavery, globalization studies, and feminist theory.

Durba Mitra, Indian Sex Life: Sexuality and the Colonial Origins of Modern Social Thought. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2020, 290 pp.

Resumen La Universidad Autónoma de Manizales articula el proceso de enseñanza y de aprendizaje al contexto cotidiano, a través de la práctica social de Paz y Competitividad, ésta vincula estudiantes de últimos semestres a los territorios de la Ecorregión Cafetera Colombiana. Objetivo. Develar las representaciones sociales de los estudiantes con relación a la comprensión del territorio, para lograr el diseño de una unidad didáctica que permita abordar las representaciones susceptibles de intervención. Metodología. Se utilizó la investigación cualitativa con inflexiones de la teoría fundamentada. En los resultados se obtuvieron representaciones sociales en el campo de concepciones y comprensión del territorio, pensamiento social, ciudadanía y arraigo. Conclusiones. Independientemente de una intervención en aula, hay representaciones que no se transforman y que necesitan tanto de docentes cualificados en didáctica de las ciencias sociales como de unidades didácticas diseñadas según las condiciones de los estudiantes y sus contextos. Abstract Universidad Autonoma de Manizales articulates the teaching and learning process to the daily context through the social practice of students in the Peace and Competitiveness program that links them from the last semesters to the territories of the Colombian Coffee Ecoregion. Objective. To reveal the social representations of students in relation to the understanding of the territory to achieve the design of a didactic unit that allows addressing the representations susceptible of intervention. Methodology. Qualitative research with inflections of grounded theory. Results. Social representations in the field of conceptions and understanding of the territory, social thought, citizenship and roots were obtained in the results. Conclusions. Regardless of an intervention in the classroom, there are representations that are not transformed and that require both qualified teachers in didactics of the Social Sciences teaching and didactic units designed according to the conditions of the students and their contexts.

Este trabajo rastrea la emergencia, desarrollo y cambios en los conceptos de “cuestión social”, “problema social” y “justicia social” en el socialismo, anarquismo, marxismo, liberalismo y catolicismo, como corrientes de pensamiento social en México. Al aplicar el método de la historia conceptual de Reinhart Koselleck, se concluye que las corrientes de pensamiento comparten en su ideología los conceptos adaptados, en diferentes grados y sentidos. Los resultados muestran que el desarrollo de las corrientes fue heterogéneo, como la función de los conceptos en sus ideologías. El aporte es un panorama del pensamiento social mexicano de larga temporalidad que permite observar lógicas del lenguaje social, del modus operandi de las ideologías en México y de las convergencias de la teoría y práctica de la política nacional con el mundo.

Given its current preeminence, the “new genetics” serves as a source for creating identities among social and even national groups. Genetic narratives interact with historical and social narratives; what is extremely new (genomics) impacts, interacts with, and in many cases chafes against what is old (race and typologies). This article analyzes the debates among biologists, social scientists, social movements, and other actors regarding the interpretation of genetic data from studies conducted in Brazil. The findings and implications of this research (known as “Molecular Portrait of Brazil”) go beyond the academy, serving as a battleground that ranges from activists from Brazil’s black movement to even members of far-right European groups, for example. A contextualized analysis of these debates proves helpful in better understanding the complex interactions between anthropology, genetics, and society in today’s world. Compte tenu de sa prééminence actuelle, la « nouvelle génétique » contribue à créer des identités parmi les groupes sociaux et même nationaux. Les récits génétiques interagissent avec les récits historiques et sociaux ; ce qui est extrêmement nouveau (la génomique) interagit avec et, dans de nombreux cas, s’élève contre ce qui est ancien (la race et les typologies). Cet article analyse les débats entre biologistes, spécialistes des sciences sociales, mouvements sociaux et autres acteurs concernant l’interprétation des données génétiques issues d’études conduites au Brésil. Les résultats et les implications de ces recherches (rassemblées sous le nom de « Portrait moléculaire du Brésil ») débordent du champ académique, installant un champ de bataille qui va par exemple des militants du mouvement noir brésilien aux membres de groupes européens d’extrême droite. Une analyse contextualisée de ces débats s’avère utile pour mieux comprendre les interactions complexes entre l’anthropologie, la génétique et la société dans le monde d’aujourd’hui.

One strand of social thought believes that democracies cannot restrict the rights of antidemocrats without losing their democratic character in the process. On the contrary, the concept of “militan...

Reviewed by ERNEST WALLWORKIn his new book, philosopher and psychoanalyst Jonathan Lear, the John U. Nef Distinguished Service Professor in the Committee on Social Thought at the University of Chic...

This article offers a critical but appreciative reading of Chad Alan Goldberg’s Modernity and the Jews in Western Social Thought. It frames that reading around the section of the book titled “Why the Jews Are Good to Think,” a phrase that is a take on Claude Lévi-Strauss’s claim that totemic emblems are chosen, “not because they are ‘good to eat’ but because they are ‘good to think’.” The article contends that the book is predicated on a view that, at least for the scholars Goldberg scrutinizes, Jews were considered to occupy a unique social space in western Europe and North America, one in which they constituted an Other unlike any other Other. As such, they offered unique insights into specifying the meaning and significance of the premodern and modern.

Goldberg’s Modernity and the Jews in Western Social Thought examines the central place of Jews within foundational social theory in Germany, France, and the United States. In this essay, I provide my take on Goldberg’s argument and provide some notes of appreciation for the better purchase it provided me on several authors’ positions. I also raise three interrelated points of discussion and critique, related to the relative weight given to the twin themes of modernity and belonging that framed social theorists’ understanding of Jews, the question of why it was Jews and not other groups in this central role, and the degree to which comparison to other groups is possible. I argue that giving more central place to the issue of solidarity helps to illuminate the dilemmas Jews were seen to raise, while also highlighting how Goldberg’s theoretical framework can help modern theorists to understand the position of other groups.

This article attempts a self-clarification of practice theory by providing a genetic history of ‘practice’ as a figure in social thought. This locates two different versions of practice theory in Marx’s ‘practical question’ and Hobbes’ ‘Kingdom of Darkness’, respectively, and shows how both historically comprise a practical critique of testing reason. This article examines how the practical critique performs a dialectic of politicization and depoliticization that finds family resemblances and paradoxical alignments between the political left and right. The article evaluates the strength of the practical critique and asks whether it results in a power politics with both left and right versions.

This essay is part of a symposium on Modernity and the Jews in Western Social Thought (University of Chicago Press, 2017) and responds to comments on the book by Angel Adams Parham, Joseph Gerteis, Peter Kivisto, and Fuyuki Kurasawa. As all these commentators recognize, the history of social theory at its best involves more than conserving, inculcating, and consecrating the sociological canon or even remaking the canon through the addition of previously neglected authors. The history of social theory also allows scholars to address fundamental questions in the sociology of knowledge, the comparative investigation of different kinds of alterity, and the study of social solidarity and belonging. This essay reflects on how best to address these questions and suggests ways that new research in the history of social thought can build upon and extend existing scholarship.

N. K. Bose, a close disciple of Gandhi, was the author’s Indian mentor in anthropology and with respect to Gandhi’s social thought as well. Gandhi visualised a village society integrated by mutual interdependence but freed from the inequality of caste. The author’s fieldwork in West Bengal villages found two opposed ritual postures that were struck during the two most important community rituals of the year, that is, Gajan in the spring and Durga Puja in the autumn. During Gajan, the ordinary people became temporary ascetics ( sannyasi) and gave up distinctions of caste and rank among themselves, like the disciples of Gandhi, who were expected to free themselves of such differences. During Durga Puja, the traditional caste occupations of the dependents of the former zamindars were mobilised to play differentiated roles in the ritual even when those occupations no longer provided their livelihoods; the jajmani system still prevailed during the puja. Gandhi’s social theory aspired to elements of both ritual postures: the radical equality and ‘communitas’ of the Gajan ascetics, and the mutual contributions to the community of occupationally specialised castes, which, however, have not escaped inequality.

Atlanta University, W.E.B. Du Bois, and professional social work education are forever linked in social thought, social reform, and progressive thinking that served African Americans. As a nascent ...

This article seeks to subject Fred Block and Margaret Somers’ influential reconstruction of Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation to a systematic review. I show that Block & Somers’s central claim—that Polanyi’s thinking underwent a “theoretical shift” as he wrote his seminal book—is not supported by archival evidence. I demonstrate that all the narrative keys that Block & Somers advance to lend plausibility to their discovery of a “theory of the always-embedded market economy” in The Great Transformation, wither under critical probing. While this article does not advance a comprehensive alternative reconstruction of Polanyi’s main work, the essential continuities it uncovers in his social thought suggest that Polanyi’s book is best understood as the culmination of his long-standing efforts to rebuild a radically transformative socialism on non-Marxist foundations. The recognition that Polanyi’s political purposes extend far beyond regulated capitalism or social-democracy, I conclude, makes it possible—and indeed necessary—to read The Great Transformation as an internally coherent work of social theory.

Natural law contains much social thought that predates sociology and related disciplines, and can be seen as part of the prehistory of the human sciences. Key concerns of natural law thinkers include the achievement of social life and society, and the individual’s place therein. However, there is an enduring tendency within sociology to dismiss the ahistoricism and universalism of natural law, and therefore to reject natural law thought in its entirety. This article proposes an approach that rescues the sociological relevance of natural law. It draws on the respective methods of Chris Thornhill and Gary Wickham, who each seek to recover the importance of natural law for sociology. Thornhill treats natural law as a valid sociological object by focusing on its functions within society rather than engaging with its ahistorical concepts. His focus on the external functions of natural law, however, leads to a neglect of the internal conceptualisations of the social world in natural law thought. This in turn leads to a misinterpretation of Hobbes and voluntarist natural law. Wickham, on the other hand, explores in detail Hobbesian conceptions of society and the individual that Wickham argues can be utilised within contemporary sociology. This article revises Thornhill’s methodological framework in order to secure a space for the recovery of natural law as social thought. This approach allows for the recognition of natural law as an important piece of the epistemological background against which contemporary understandings of the human and society emerged.