The Anthem Companion to Talcott Parsons

Description

‘The Anthem Companion to Talcott Parsons’ offers the best contemporary work on Talcott Parsons, written by the best scholars currently working in this field. Original, authoritative and wide-ranging, the critical assessments of this volume will make it ideal for Parsons students and scholars alike.

‘Anthem Companions to Sociology’ offer authoritative and comprehensive assessments of major figures in the development of sociology from the last two centuries. Covering the major advancements in sociological thought, these companions offer critical evaluations of key figures in the American and European sociological tradition, and will provide students and scholars with both an in-depth assessment of the makers of sociology and chart their relevance to modern society.

Contributors; Introduction -A. Javier Treviño; Part I: Political and Humanist Concerns ; 1. Fighting the Deadly Enemy of Democracy: Sociology against National Socialism -Uta Gerhardt; 2. Parsons’s Critique of the “Power Elite” Thesis: Foundations for a Comprehensive Theory of Power -John Scott; 3. The Expressive Revolution and the University: Parsons vs. Gouldner -James J. Chriss; 4. Parsons, Psychoanalysis and the Therapeutic Relationship -A. Javier Treviño; 5. Meanings of Life and Death: Insights of the Human Condition Paradigm -Victor Lidz; 6. Luhmann’s Reception of Parsons -Sandro Segre; Part II: Social Evolution and the American Societal Community; 7. Explaining Modernity: Talcott Parsons’s Evolutionary Theory and Individualism -Matteo Bortolini; 8. Talcott Parsons’s Historical Analysis and the Cultural-Political Freeze in China: A Reinterpretation -Jens Kaalhauge Nielsen; 9. Talcott Parsons and American Exceptionalism -Frank J. Lechner; 10. American Society and the Societal Community: Talcott Parsons, Citizenship and Diversity -Giuseppe Sciortino; 11. Parsons and Nisbet: Two Versions of Sociological Communitarianism -Hon-Fai Chen

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique
• Sociology

Informations

• Publié par: Anthem Press
• Date de parution: 19 juin 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781783085453
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

Extrait

The Anthem Companion to Talcott Parsons
ANTHEM COMPANIONS TO SOCIOLOGY
Anthem Companions to Sociology offer authoritative and comprehensive assessments of major figures in the development of sociology from the last two centuries. Covering the major advancements in sociological thought, these companions offer critical evaluations of key figures in the American and European sociological tradition and will provide students and scholars with an in-depth assessment of the makers of sociology and chart their relevance to modern society.
Series Editor
Bryan S. Turner-City University of New York, USA and Australian Catholic University, Australia
Forthcoming titles in this series include:
The Anthem Companion to Hannah Arendt
The Anthem Companion to Pierre Bourdieu
The Anthem Companion to Auguste Comte
The Anthem Companion to Everett Hughes
The Anthem Companion to Karl Mannheim
The Anthem Companion to C. Wright Mills
The Anthem Companion to Robert Park
The Anthem Companion to Phillip Rieff
The Anthem Companion to Georg Simmel
The Anthem Companion to Gabriel Tarde
The Anthem Companion to Ferdinand T nnies
The Anthem Companion to Ernst Troeltsch
The Anthem Companion to Thorstein Veblen
The Anthem Companion to Max Weber
The Anthem Companion to Talcott Parsons
Edited by A. Javier Trevi o
Anthem Press
An imprint of Wimbledon Publishing Company
www.anthempress.com
This edition first published in UK and USA 2016
by ANTHEM PRESS
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or PO Box 9779, London SW19 7ZG, UK
and
244 Madison Ave #116, New York, NY 10016, USA
2016 A. Javier Trevi o editorial matter and selection; individual chapters individual contributors
The moral right of the authors has been asserted.
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Trevi o, A. Javier, 1958- editor.
Title: The Anthem companion to Talcott Parsons /
edited by A. Javier Trevi o.
Description: London; New York, NY : Anthem Press, 2016. | Series: Anthem
companions to sociology | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016002467 | ISBN 9780857281838 (hardback : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Parsons, Talcott, 1902-1979. | Sociologists-United States. |
Sociology-United States-History.
Classification: LCC HM479.P38 A58 2016 | DDC 301.092-dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016002467
ISBN-13: 978 0 85728 183 8 (Hbk)
ISBN-10: 0 85728 183 6 (Hbk)
This title is also available as an e-book.
CONTENTS
Introduction
A. Javier Trevi o
Part I.
Political and Humanist Concerns
Chapter One
Fighting the Deadly Enemy of Democracy: Sociology against National Socialism
Uta Gerhardt
Chapter Two
Parsons s Critique of the Power Elite Thesis: Foundations for a Comprehensive Theory of Power
John Scott
Chapter Three
The Expressive Revolution and the University: Parsons vs. Gouldner
James J. Chriss
Chapter Four
Parsons, Psychoanalysis and the Therapeutic Relationship
A. Javier Trevi o
Chapter Five
Meanings of Life and Death: Insights of the Human Condition Paradigm
Victor Lidz
Chapter Six
Luhmann s Reception of Parsons
Sandro Segre
Part II.
Social Evolution and the American Societal Community
Chapter Seven
Explaining Modernity: Talcott Parsons s Evolutionary Theory and Individualism
Matteo Bortolini
Chapter Eight
Talcott Parsons s Historical Analysis and the Cultural-Political Freeze in China: A Reinterpretation
Jens Kaalhauge Nielsen
Chapter Nine
Talcott Parsons and American Exceptionalism
Frank J. Lechner
Chapter Ten
American Society and the Societal Community: Talcott Parsons, Citizenship and Diversity
Giuseppe Sciortino
Chapter Eleven
Parsons and Nisbet: Two Versions of Sociological Communitarianism
Hon-Fai Chen
Contributors
Index
INTRODUCTION
A. Javier Trevi o
There is perhaps no sociologist whose theories, sentiments and political activities have been more misunderstood and subject to mistreatment than Talcott Parsons. This state of affairs stems partly from Parsons s seemingly inscrutable communicative style and partly from ideologically motivated libel-but it is perhaps mostly due to an actively pursued ignorance of his ideas, stemming from any number of reasons. And while Uta Gerhardt s splendid book Talcott Parsons: An Intellectual Biography has done much to clarify and put into proper perspective Parsons s thinking and actions, it has yet to command the attention it deserves in all quarters of the sociological community. 1
In light of these circumstances, this volume is intended to achieve several objectives. First, it is the latest in a continued effort to inform a rising generation of scholars about the life and work of one of, if not in fact, the most influential American sociological theorist of the twentieth century. 2 Second, it is meant as a corrective to the misinformed but still pervasive notion that Parsons was no more than a mindless structural functionalist, a tool of elitist interests and a grand theorist who had no understanding of actual social problems. And while it took only one generation of sociologists to unjustly characterize Parsons in these ways, it will doubtlessly take several years more before a full rectification, a truly balanced and fair treatment of him, can be realized. Finally, it is, to say the least, regrettable to have to begin a book on the social thought of a prominent thinker by stating what he is not , and so the third and main reason for this volume is an affirmative one: to enter into an earnest discussion of the many important contributions that Parsons made to sociology, sociological theory and particularly to understanding the various social events of the day-then and now.
Before discussing the 11 original chapters that constitute this volume, written by scholars enlisted to address the aforementioned three objectives, I first present a brief life-and-work profile of Parsons for the purpose of providing context for the chapters. For good or ill, the following intellectual portrait (if I may use such a lofty term for what follows) is composed of information derived from one source: Harvard University s daily newspaper, The Harvard Crimson . 3 While hardly an exhaustive or even a supposedly accurate record of Parsons s ideas and engagements, the Crimson did chronicle many events, some highly significant, other less so, that directly or indirectly involved him throughout his four decades-from the 1930s through the 1970s-as a faculty member at the university. Admittedly, exclusive reliance on the Crimson admits of a certain selectivity given that the portrait rendered is limited to information about Parsons that the editors of the newspaper deemed worthy of printing and given that I depend only on those articles in which Parsons s involvement figures prominently or that pertain to an event that was of some significance to him. All this notwithstanding it nonetheless provides, I think, a good aperture into Parsons and his lifework. What follows is a chronological account arranged by decade.
1930s
The first mention of Parsons in The Crimson is perhaps in an article that appeared in 1930, the year that his English translation of Max Weber s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism was published and three years after he first arrived at Harvard as a young instructor in the department of economics. 4 In the article Talcott Parsons, Instructor in Economics and Tutor in Sociology and Social Ethics, Parsons is listed as having been appointed as a nonresident tutor at the newly founded undergraduate residence Adams House. 5 Robert K. Merton, who attended the first course in sociological theory offered by Parsons the year Adams House opened in 1931, recalls that in an effort to better understand Parsons s nascent ideas, his students induced him to form an informal study group. That group, writes Merton, met for some years in his tutorial quarters in Adams House-as I remember, in G-34-which inevitably became tagged as the Parsonage. 6 Although not then known to the students, and indeed even to Parsons himself, the lectures that he gave in that theory course-with the impossibly long title Sociological Theories of Hobhouse, Durkheim, Simmel, Toennies and Max Weber -along with the Adams House discussions, would eventually provide the material for his first book, The Structure of Social Action . 7
Despite his small frame and relatively short stature, the 29-year-old Parsons was no mere geeky intellectual. Indeed, in addition to publishing several articles on institutional economics, including two essays on capitalism in the prestigious Journal of Political Economy , to say nothing of his grueling teaching load, he evidently found time to participate in intra-house tournaments of League C squash at which he represented Adams House. 8 In two Crimson articles from 1932, Parsons is listed as playing in two matches; the first article notes that the decidi