Scholars in the area of social action present new theories about this process, fashioning a social psychology of social movements that goes beyond theories currently in use.

This book presents essays reflecting the current state and near-term prospects of sociological theory.

seventeen contributions reflecting the many diverse approaches in the field todayThese seventeen contributions take up the most recent research in game theory, reflecting the many diverse approaches in the field today. They are classified in five general tactical categories - prediction, explanation, investigation, description, and prescription - and wit in these along applied and theoretical divisions. The introduction clearly lays out this framework.

This title was first published in 2001. This book tackles the important issue of the tasks that confront sociology in the third millennium. It examines the sociological interpretations of the World-Wide revolution which - amid unprecedented scientific and technological progress and the globalization of markets - has generated new inequalities, poverty, structural unemployment and mass conditionings. A number of the most distinguished living sociologists (including Boudon, Beck, Eisenstadt, Tiryakain, Wieviorka) furnish profound and innovative interpretations of changes in world society, while outlining the frontiers of sociological research for the 21st Century. The contributions to the book not only prompt reflection on the structure and organization of sociological research, but also revitalize sociological inquiry by conducting original and stimulating analysis of theoretical and methodological issues - an undertaking essential for the survival of the discipline itself.

The landscape of social theory has changed significantly over the three decades since the publication of Anthony Giddens and Jonathan Turner’s seminal Social Theory Today. Sociologists in the twenty-first century desperately need a new agenda centered around central questions of social theory. In Social Theory Now, Claudio E. Benzecry, Monika Krause, and Isaac Ariail Reed set a new course for sociologists, bringing together contributions from the most distinctive?sociological?traditions?in an ambitious survey of where social theory is today and where it might be going. The book?provides a strategic window onto social theory based on current research, examining trends in classical traditions and the cutting edge of more recent approaches. From distinctive theoretical positions, contributors address questions about?how social order is accomplished; the role of materiality, practice, and meaning; as well as the conditions for the knowledge of the social world. The theoretical traditions presented include cultural sociology, microsociologies, world-system theory and post-colonial theory, gender and feminism, actor network and network theory, systems theory, field theory, rational choice, poststructuralism, pragmatism, and the sociology of conventions. Each chapter introduces a tradition and presents an agenda for further theoretical development. Social Theory Now is an essential tool for sociologists. It will be central to the discussion and teaching of contemporary social theory?for years to come.

The 37th World Congress of the IIS focused on theory and research at the forefront of sociology and the relationship between sociology and its neighbouring disciplines. This volume constitutes a sustained effort by prominent sociologists and other social scientists to assess the current standing of sociology. It is a stocktaking of the unique nature of sociology in the light of advances within the discipline itself and within a range of neighbouring disciplines. Some of the chapters outline institutional and professional strategies for sociology in the new millennium. Others trace scholarly advances and propose ambitious research programmes drawing on recent developments not only within traditional neighbouring disciplines such as history, political science, and economics, but also within the cognitive, cultural and mathematical sciences.Contributors include: Hans-Peter Blossfeld, Raymond Boudon, Richard Breen, Christofer R. Edling, S. N. Eisenstadt, Jack Goldstone, Philip Gorski, Peter Gärdenfors, Ulf Hannerz, Peter Hedström, Hans Joas, Dietrich Rueschemeyer, Jens Rydgren, Neil Smelser, Aage B. Sørensen, Richard Swedberg, Piotr Sztompka, Peter Wagner and Björn Wittrock.