Explorations in Social Theory : From Metatheorizing to Rationalization

by George Ritzer

• ISBN13: 9780761967729
• ISBN10: 0761967729
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-06-04
• Publisher: Sage Publications Ltd

Summary

George Ritzer is one of the leading social and cultural commentators of the present day. In this essential new book he considers some of the main tendencies in contemporary social theory. Included here are Ritzer's latest reflections on the uses and misuses of metatheory. According to Ritzer, sociology is a multparadigm science. The differences and intensities of rivalries between paradigms are often very confusing for students and even for professional sociologists. This book seeks to find a way out of the confusion by sketching out the lineaments of a new integrated sociological paradigm and demonstrates how this paradigm can be applied. It shows the various ways in which Ritzer has developed rationalization theory to shed light on professional integration, the shape of consumer culture, hyperrationality and the state of sociology today. Assured, penetrating and always compelling, the book is a major contribution in contemporary social theory. It will be of interest to sociologists and students of social theory.

Table of Contents

Preface	ix
Acknowledgements	xi
Introduction	1	(10)
Part One Metatheorizing	11	(164)
Metatheorizing in Sociology	13	(21)
The Delineation of an Underlying Architectonic	34	(24)
Sociology: A Multiple Paradigm Science	58	(21)
Toward and Integrated Sociological Paradigm: Image of the Subject Matter	79	(21)
Potential Exemplars for an Integrated Sociological Paradigm	100	(28)
Methodological Relationism: Lessons for and from Social Psychology	128	(17)
From Exclusion to Inclusion to Chaos (?) in Sociological Theory	145	(9)
The Implications of Postmodern Social Theory for Metatheorizing in Sociology	154	(21)
Part Two Rationalization Theory	175	(97)
Rationalization and Deprofessionalization of Physicians	177	(21)
The McDonaldization of Society	198	(20)
Hyperrationality: An Extension of Weberian and Neo-Weberian Theory	218	(18)
Mannheim's Theory of Rationalization: An Alternative Resource for the McDonaldization Thesis?	236	(20)
The McDonaldization of American Sociology: A Metasociological Analysis	256	(16)
References	272	(21)
Index	293