SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY
FOURTH EDITION
George Ritzer University of Maryland
THE McGRAW-HILL COMPANIES, INC. New York St. Louis San Francisco Auckland Bogota Caracas Lisbon London Madrid Mexico City Milan
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CONTENTS
LIST OF BIOGRAPHICAL AND AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES xxi
PREFACE XXÜi
PART 1 CLASSICAL SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 1
1 A HISTORICAL SKETCH OF SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY:
THE EARLY YEARS 3
INTRODUCTION 4
SOCIAL FORCES IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 6
Political Revolutions 6
The Industrial Revolution and the Rise of Capitalism 6
The Rise of Socialism 7
Urbanization 7
Religious Change 8
The Growth of Science 9
INTELLECTUAL FORCES AND THE RISE OF SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 9
The Enlightenment and the Conservative Reaction to It 9
The Development of French Sociology 13
The Development of German Sociology 20
The Origins of British Sociology 31
Key Figures in Italian Sociology 38
Turn-of-the-Century Developments in European Marxism 39
2 KARL MARX 41
THE DIALECTIC 44
HUMAN POTENTIAL 50
Powers and Needs 50
Consciousness 51
Activity 54
xiii
XiV CONTENTS
Sociability 55
Unanticipated Consequences 56
ALIENATION 56
Components of Alienation 57
Distortions Resulting from Alienation 58
Emancipation 60
THE STRUCTURES OF CAPITALIST SOCIETY 61
Commodities 62
Capital 64
Private Property 65
Division of Labor 66
Social Class 67
CULTURAL ASPECTS OF CAPITALIST SOCIETY 68
Class Consciousness and False Consciousness 69
Ideology 70
MARX'S ECONOMICS: A CASE STUDY 70
3 EMILE DURKHEIM 75
SOCIAL FACTS 77
THE DIVISION OF LABOR IN SOCIETY 79
Dynamic Density 80
Law 81
Anomie 84
Collective Conscience 84
Collective Representations 85
SUICIDE AND SOCIAL CURRENTS 86
The Four Types of Suicide 88
A Group Mind? 91
RELIGION 92
Sacred and Profane 93
Totemism 94
Collective Effervescence 94
SOCIAL REFORMISM 95
Occupational Associations 96
Cult of the Individual 97
THE ACTOR IN DURKHEIM'S THOUGHT 98
Assumptions about Human Nature 98
Socialization and Moral Education 100
Dependent Variables 103
INDIVIDUAL ACTION AND INTERACTION 106
EARLY AND LATE DURKHEIMIAN THEORY 106
4 MAX WEBER 109
METHODOLOGY
History and Sociology
110 110
CONTENTS XV
Verstehen 114
Causality 116
Ideal Types 117
Values 120
SUBSTANTIVE SOCIOLOGY 122
What Is Sociology? 123
Social Action 124
Class, Status, and Party 126
Structures of Authority 127
Rationalization 135
Religion and the Rise of Capitalism 146
5 GEORG SIMMEL 155
PRIMARY CONCERNS 155
Dialectical Thinking 158
INDIVIDUAL CONSCIOUSNESS 161
SOCIAL INTERACTON ("ASSOCIATION") 162
Interaction: Forms and Types 163
SOCIAL STRUCTURES 168
OBJECTIVE CULTURE 169
THE PHILOSOPHY OF MONEY 171
The Tragedy of Culture in Its Broader Context 177
SECRECY: A CASE STUDY IN SIMMEL'S SOCIOLOGY 178
PART 2 MODERN SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY: THE MAJOR SCHOOLS 185
6 A HISTORICAL SKETCH OF SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY: THE LATER YEARS 187
EARLY AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 190
Politics 190
Social Change and Intellectual Currents 190
The Chicago School 194
WOMEN IN EARLY SOCIOLOGY 199
SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY TO MID-CENTURY 200
The Rise of Harvard, the Ivy League, and Structural
Functionalism 200
The Chicago School in Decline 206
Developments in Marxian Theory 207
Karl Mannheim and the Sociology of Knowledge 208
SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY FROM MID-CENTURY 208
Structural Functionalism: Peak and Decline 208
Radical Sociology in America: C. Wright Mills 209
The Development of Conflict Theory 210
XVi CONTENTS
The Birth of Exchange Theory 212
Dramaturgical Analysis: The Work of Erving Goffman 214
The Development of Sociologies of Everyday Life 215
The Rise and Fall(?) of Marxian Sociology 218
The Challenge of Feminist Theory 220
Structuralism and Poststructuralism 222
SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY IN THE 1980s AND 1990s 223
Micro-Macro Integration 223
Agency-Structure Integration 224
Theoretical Syntheses 225
Metatheorizing in Sociology 227
SOCIAL THEORY: TOWARD THE FIN DE SIECLE 228
The Defenders of Modemity 228
The Proponents of Postmodemity 229
Multicultural Social Theory 230
7 STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM, NEOFUNCTIONALISM,
AND CONFLICT THEORY 233
STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM 234
The Functional Theory of Stratification and Its Critics 235
Talcott Parsons's Structural Functionalism 237
Robert Merton's Structural Functionalism 249
The Major Criticisms 253
NEOFUNCTIONALISM 259
CONFLICT THEORY 265
The Work of Ralf Dahrendorf 266
The Major Criticisms 269
A More Integrative Conflict Theory 271
8 VARIETES OF NEO-MARXIAN THEORY 278
ECONOMIC DETERMINISM 278
HEGELIAN MARXISM 280
Georg Lukäcs 280
Antonio Gramsci 282
CRITICAL THEORY 283
The Major Critiques of Social and Intellectual Life 284
The Major Contributions 288
Criticisms of Critical Theory 291
The Ideas of Jürgen Habermas 292
Critical Theory Today 295
NEO-MARXIAN ECONOMIC SOCIOLOGY 297
Capital and Labor 297
Fordism and Post-Fordism 305
HISTORICALLY ORIENTED MARXISM 307
The Modern World-System 307
CONTENTS XVÜ
POST-MARXIST THEORY 314
Analytical Marxism 314
Postmodern Marxian Theory 320
After Marxism 322
Criticisms of Post-Marxism 325
9 SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM 327
THE MAJOR HISTORICAL ROOTS 327
Pragmatism 328
Behaviorism 329
Between Reductionism and Sociologism 330
THE IDEAS OF GEORGE HERBERT MEAD 332
The Priority of the Social 332
The Act 332
Gestures 335
Significant Symbols 336
Mental Processes and the Mind 338
Seif 341
Society 346
SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM: THE BASIC PRINCIPLES 347
Capacity for Thought 348
Thinking and Interaction 348
Learning Meanings and Symbols 349
Action and Interaction 350
Making Choices 351
The Seif and the Work of Erving Goffman 351
Groups and Societies 361
CRITICISMS 363
TOWARD A MORE SYNTHETIC AND INTEGRATIVE SYMBOLIC
INTERACTIONISM 364
Redefining Mead and Blumer 364
Micro-Macro Integration 367
Symbolic Interactionism and Cultural Studies 368
THE FUTURE OF SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM 370
10 ETHNOMETHODOLOGY 373
DEFINING ETHNOMETHODOLOGY 373
THE DIVERSIFICATION OF ETHNOMETHODOLOGY 375
SOME EARLY EXAMPLES 378
Breaching Experiments 378
Accomplishing Sex 380
CONVERSATION ANALYSIS 380
Telephone Conversations: Identification and Recognition 381
Initiating Laughter 382
Generating Applause 383
XViii CONTENTS
Booing 384
The Interactive Emergence of Sentences and Stories 386
Formulations 387
Integration of Talk and Nonvocal Activities 387
Doing Shyness (and Self-Confidence) 388
STUDIES OF INSTITUTIONS 389
Job Interviews 389
Executive Negotiations 390
Calls to Emergency Centers 390
Dispute Resolution in Mediation Hearings 391
CRITICISMS OF TRADITIONAL SOCIOLOGY 392
STRESSES AND STRAINS IN ETHNOMETHODOLOGY 394
SYNTHESIS AND INTEGRATION 396
11 EXCHANGE, NETWORK, AND RATIONAL CHOICE THEORIES 400
EXCHANGE THEORY 401
Behaviorism 401
Rational Choice Theory 401
The Social Psychology of Groups 402
The Exchange Theory of George Homans 404
Peter Blau's Exchange Theory 412
The Work of Richard Emerson and His Disciples 416
NETWORK THEORY 422
RATIONAL CHOICE THEORY 427
Rationality and Society 427
Foundations of Social Theory 428
Criticisms 434
12 CONTEMPORARY FEMINIST THEORY
By Patricia Madoo Lengermann and Jill Niebrugge 436
THE BASIC THEORETICAL QUESTIONS 438
THE MAJOR HISTORICAL ROOTS 440
Feminism: 1600-1960 440
Sociology and Feminism: 1830-1960 441
VARIETES OF CONTEMPORARY FEMINIST THEORY 444
Gender Difference 446
Gender Inequality 449
Gender Oppression 457
Third-Wave Feminism 468
A FEMINIST SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 470
A Feminist Sociology of Knowledge 471
The Macro-Social Order 474
The Micro-Social Order 476
Subjectivity 479
A MICRO-MACRO SYNTHESIS 483
CONTENTS XIX
PART 3 RECENT INTEGRATIVE DEVELOPMENTS IN SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 487
13 MICRO-MACRO INTEGRATION 489
MICRO-MACRO EXTREMISM 489
THE MOVEMENT TOWARD MICRO-MACRO INTEGRATION 491
EXAMPLES OF MICRO-MACRO INTEGRATION 494
George Ritzer: Integrated Sociological Paradigm 494
Jeffrey Alexander: Multidimensional Sociology 498
Norbert Wiley: Leveis of Analysis 500
James Coleman: Micro-to-Macro Model 502
Randall Collins: The Micro Foundations of Macrosociology 504
SOME PROMISING DIRECTIONS 507
MICRO-MACRO INTEGRATION: WORK TO BE DONE 509
BACK TO THE FUTURE: NORBERT ELIAS'S FiGURATIONAL
SOCIOLOGY 511
The History of Manners 513
Power and Civility 519
Case Studies: Time and Sport 523
14 AGENCY-STRUCTURE INTEGRATION 526
INTRODUCTION 526
MAJOR EXAMPLES OF AGENCY-STRUCTURE INTEGRATION 528
Anthony Giddens: Structuration Theory 528
Margaret Archer: Culture and Agency 533
Pierre Bourdieu: Habitus and Field 536
Jürgen Habermas: Colonization of the Life-World 548
MAJOR DIFFERENCES IN THE AGENCY-STRUCTURE LITERATURE 553
AGENCY-STRUCTURE AND MICRO-MACRO LINKAGES 556
Basic Similarities 556
Fundamental Differences 556
EXPLAINING AMERICAN-EUROPEAN DIFFERENCES 558
PART 4 FROM MODERN TO POSTMODERN SOCIAL THEORY 563
15 CONTEMPORARY THEORIES OF MODERNITY 565
CLASSICAL THEORISTS ON MODERNITY 565
THE JUGGERNAUT OF MODERNITY 567
THE RISK SOCIETY 573
HYPERRATIONALITY, McDONALDIZATION, AND AMERICANIZATION 576
Hyperrationality 576
McDonaldization 578
XX CONTENTS
Americanization 580
Risky or Not? 581
MODERNITY AND THE HOLOCAUST 582
MODERNITY'S UNFINISHED PROJECT 586
16 STRUCTURALISM, POSTSTRUCTURALISM, AND THE
EMERGENCE OF POSTMODERN SOCIAL THEORY 592
STRUCTURALISM 593
Roots in Linguistics 594
Anthropological Structuralism: Claude Levi-Strauss 595
Structural Marxism 595
POSTSTRUCTURALISM 596
The Ideas of Michel Foucault 598
POSTMODERNISM 607
Moderate Postmodern Social Theory: Fredric Jameson 612
Extreme Postmodem Social Theory: Jean Baudrillard 616
Postmodemism and Sociological Theory 619
NDIX SOCIOLOGICAL METATHEORIZING AND A
METATHEORETICAL SCHEMA FOR ANALYZING
SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 621
METATHEORIZING IN SOCIOLOGY 622
The Gains from Metatheorizing 627
The Critics of Metatheorizing 629
The Current Explosion of Interest in Metatheorizing 630
Factors Involved in the Maturation of Metatheorizing 631
Pierre Bourdieu's "Socioanalysis" 633
THE IDEAS OF THOMAS KUHN 635
SOCIOLOGY: A MULTIPLE-PARADIGM SCIENCE 637
Major Sociological Paradigms 640
TOWARD A MORE INTEGRATED SOCIOLOGICAL PARADIGM 642
Levels of Social Analysis: A Review of the Literature 643
Levels of Social Analysis: A Model 646
REFERENCES 651
INDEXES
Name Index 731
Subject Index 741
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