Acknowledgments Preface Introduction: Marxism, Neo-Marxism, and American Sociology by Rhonda F. Levine and Jerry Lembcke Crisis and Vitalization: An Interpretive Essay on Marxist Theory by Albert Szymanski New Classes and Old Theories: The Impasse of Contemporary Class Analysis by Peter Meiksins Class and Class Capacities: A Problem of Organizational Efficacy by Jerry Lembcke Bringing Classes Back In: State Theory and Theories of the State by Rhonda F. Levine The Limits of the World-System Perspective by Alex Dupuy and Barry Truchil Race, Ethnicity and Class by James A. Geschwender Recent Ideological Tendencies in Urban and Regional Research: Neo-Liberalism and Social Democracy by Richard Peet Behind the Veil of Neutrality: Hegemony in the Academic Marketplace by Peter Seybold Feminism: A Marxist Critique by Albert Szymanski Thinking About Social Class: Structure, Organization, and Consciousness by Scott G. McNall List of Contributors
Defeated in the East and discredited in the West, Marxism has broken down as an ideology as well as a guide to governance. For all its profound and infirming flaws as a total ensemble of understanding and rule, Marxism remains an important tool for comprehending and questioning key aspects of modernity. In this work, Katznelson critically analyzes the development of Marxist scholarship on cities in the last quarter century. He not only demonstrates how some of the most important weaknesses in Marxism as a social theory can be remedied by forcing it to seriously engage with cities and spatial concerns, but explains the significant shortcomings even of this "improved" Marxism. Katznelson explores how a Marxism that is open to engagement with other social-theoretical traditions can help illuminate our understanding of cities and the patterns of class and group formation that have characterized urban life in the West. Clearly written, this book will interest not only students and scholars of social and political theory, but those involved with sociology, geography and political science as well as anyone concerned with urban studies.
Acknowledgments Introduction Structural Sociology and the Durkheimian Conception of Social Structure On the Prospects for a Nomothetic Theory of Social Structure The Concept of Purposive Action Purposive versus Mechanistic Explanations of Action Narrative and the Realist Philosophy of Science: Toward a New Model of Explanation The Durkheimian and Marxian Conceptions of Social Structure Carrying the Marxian Concept of Social Structure Beyond Marx Conclusion Notes Bibliography Index
In this time of great change in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, Karl Marx's relevance to modern social science may seem remote. However, this important study by Charles McKelvey shows just the opposite: Marx's concept of science can help social scientists gain a greater understanding of today's world society. Western ethnocentrism has, McKelvey argues, isolated the Euro-American sociologist from a true picture of the Third World. Modern sociology must rethink itself, McKelvey maintains, in light of Marxian concepts, Immanuel Wallerstein's "world systems perspective," and the cognitional theory of philosopher Bernard Lonergan.
Grimes provides an overview and critique of the major theories, conceptualizations, and measurements of class inequality, drawing exclusively on scholarly literature published by American social scientists in the 20th century. The volume proposes a framework for interpreting and understanding the theories and methodologies used by scholars to study class inequality, posits two "schools" of sociological theory-order and conflict, and concludes that there is evidence of a "convergence" among contemporary perspectives on class inequality.
"The Promise of the City proposes a new theoretical framework for the study of cities and urban life. Finding the contemporary urban scene too complex to be captured by radical or conventional approaches, Kian Tajbakhsh offers a threefold, interdisciplinary approach linking agency, space, and structure. First, he says, urban identities cannot be understood through individualistic, communitarian, or class perspectives but rather through the shifting spectrum of cultural, political, and economic influences. Second, the layered, unfinished city spaces we inhabit and within which we create meaning are best represented not by the image of bounded physical spaces but rather by overlapping and shifting boundaries. And third, the macro forces shaping urban society include bureaucratic and governmental interventions not captured by a purely economic paradigm.
Tajbakhsh examines these dimensions in the work of three major critical urban theorists of recent decades: Manuel Castells, David Harvey, and Ira Katznelson. He shows why the answers offered by Marxian urban theory to the questions of identity, space, and structure are unsatisfactory and why the perspectives of other intellectual traditions such as poststructuralism, feminism, Habermasian Critical Theory, and pragmatism can help us better understand the challenges facing contemporary cities.