Sociology of Modernity: Freedom and Punishment

A sociological approach is perhaps needed more than ever in our country, where discussions about Europe, which has established itself as a project of modernity, are held with great confusion. Although sociology has observed modern society in the periods ranging from Weber and Durkheim to Parsons and later, it has not been able to keep a distinctive distance from modernity because it is located within the modern project and practices. There is definitely a need for a sociology of modernity that keeps this distance in order to understand the times we live in. This is what this book aims to do. There is a great wealth of sociological theories that attempt to explain the current state of modernity. From the "end of the subject" to the "new individualism"; from the "dissolution of society" to the re-emergence of "civil society"; There are many discussion topics, from "the end of modernity" to "another modernity" or "new modernization". Peter Wagner thinks that modernity needs to be described historically in order to understand the current situation. The Sociology of Modernity attempts to make a sociology of modernity in the light of the historical transformations experienced during the last two centuries; While doing this, he does not only look at Western Europe, which is considered the cradle of both modernity and sociology, but also looks at the examples of the USA and Soviet socialism, which experienced two different versions of modernism. The ambiguity underlying modernity, which emerges in the concepts of freedom and punishment, is examined in the book in three main dimensions: Individual freedom and political community; agency and structure, and finally the relationships between individual lives located within localities and broader social institutions. Wagner identifies two major historical transformations that modernity has undergone: The first of these is the 19th century. It started at the end of the century and caused a social transformation that can be called "organized modernity"; The second is XX. This is the transformation that emerged in the 19th century and coincided with the dissolution of organized modernity. It is this second transformation that gave new blood to some of the fundamental concerns of the "modern project", such as freedom, pluralism and individual autonomy. However, the same transformation also gives rise to other concerns directly related to these concerns; For example, the creation of social identities or the possibilities of common reasoning, in other words, doing politics itself as a communicative interaction... A book that manages to be original about a widely discussed subject. An important contribution to contemporary modernism/postmodernism debates... A first-class work that makes a theoretical synthesis about our time and makes very important observations.



Year of Printing: 2009


Language: Turkish
Publisher: Details Publications

First Print Year: 2009

Number of Pages: 0

Language Turkish