Social Philosophy Books - Page 15

Wittgenstein, Rules and Institutions

David Bloor

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A Surprising Exposition of Insight 4 out of 5 stars.
6 of 7 people found this review helpful.

If you're interested in Wittgenstein's cryptic discussion of rule-following and Kripke's exposition of it in his influential/controversial book "Wittgenstein: On Rules and Private Language", this should be the next item on your reading list.

Bloor is more of a sociologist than a philosopher but this proves no detriment to his acute understanding of the philosophical divide about a "collectivist" or "individualist" conception of rule-following.

As far as I'm concerned, this is the most telling interpretation of Wittgenstein and one of the most important reviews of Kripke's book (if only because it is one of the few laudatory and respectful ones).

But there is so much beyond philosophy in this book. Read the chapter on the definition of social institutions and see how this conception allows for a much more robust collectivist collection of arguments. It's great stuff. To tell you the truth, I read this book for a research paper in philosophy and found it tremendously more exciting, cogent and insightful than all the other books I read except Kripke's.

I don't know why Bloor is not more well-known in philosophical circles. He deserves to be.

Editorial Review:

David Bloor's challenging new evaluation of Wittgenstein's account of rules and rule-following brings together the rare combination of philosophical and sociological viewpoints. Wittgenstein enigmatically claimed that the way we follow rules is an "institution" without ever explaining what he meant by this term.

Wittgenstein's contribution to the debate has since been subject to sharply opposed interpretations by "collectivist" and "individualist" readings by philosophers; in the light of this controversy, Bloor argues convincingly for a collectivist, sociological understanding of Wittgenstein's later work. Accessible and simply written, this book provides the first consistent sociological reading of Wittgenstein's work for many years.

Philosophy Without Women: The Birth of Sexism in Western Thought (Athlone Contemporary European Thinkers Series)

Vigdis Songe Moller, Vigdis Songe-Moller

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Editorial Review:

For most of its history, western philosophy has regarded woman as an imperfect version of man. Like so many aspects of European culture, this tradition builds on foundations laid in ancient Greece. Yet the first philosophers of antiquity were hardly agreed on first principles. Vigdis Songe-Muller examines the differences between Presocratic monists like Parmenides, and implicit pluralists such as Anaximander, and shows how the Greeks made intellectual choices that would prove fateful for half of humankind. The text re-evaluates Greek mythology, throws a harsh new light on the invention of democracy, and exposes Platonic harmony to be an ideal driven by a peculiarly masculine fear of death. It was a fear that could only be overcome by denying the significance of difference, and at times even the rightful existence of that which embodied difference. For the Greek man, the difference that mattered was nowhere more frighteningly apparent than in woman.

The Analysis of Ideology

Raymond Boudon

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Distinguished French sociologist Raymond Boudon presents here a critical theory history of the concept of ideology. His highly original and lucidly argued study addresses the core question of any account of ideology. How do individuals come to adhere to false or apparently irrational beliefs, and how do such beliefs become collectively accepted as true?

Boudon begins by providing an exhaustive and subtle critique of sociological explanations of ideology from early conceptions to its current usage in the works of Barthes, Foucault, Habermas, Sartre, and others. He then offers his own interpretation of the origins and emergence of ideological beliefs. In opposition to those views which associate ideology with irrationalism, Boudon shows that ideologies are a natural ingredient of social life; he develops a rationalist theory that helps to explain why certain ideas are believed by individuals and thereby effective in the social world. Finally, he examines case studies of two modern-day ideologies—developmentalism and Third Worldism.

Moving easily across disciplinary boundaries, Boudon's provocative contribution to a subject of growing significance will be of great interest to scholars in sociology and social theory, as well as philosophy, political science, and development studies.

Postmodernism, Religion and the Future of Social Work

Jean A Pardeck, John W Murphy, Roland Meinert

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German Ideology: From France to Germany and Back

Louis Dumont

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Editorial Review:

In this comparative anthropological analysis, Louis Dumont illuminates German and French ideology, European culture, and cultural interaction. His analysis of texts by Troeltsch, Thomas Mann, Goethe, and others, against the background of previously gathered evidence and of French common notions, specify the differences—otherwise frequently but vaguely alluded to—between French and German cultures.

Anyone interested in the fate of national ideology and the concept of the individual will benefit from this radical reinterpretation of modern values and the place of modernity in history.

"What François Furet did for French history, Dumont did for anthropology, turning it away from engaged politics and towards the sober study of the modern age." —Mark Lilla, London Review of Books

"There are many fine things in Dumont's study. Beyond any doubt, his cultural anthropology of the modern spirit highlights some of the key energies of the of the last two centuries. . . . [An] impressive . . . detailed analysis." —Martin Swales, Times Higher Education Supplement

"[An] unsettling, rich, demanding, profound study." —Publishers Weekly

Think No Evil: Korean Values in the Age of Globalization

C. Fred Alford

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Editorial Review:

In this investigation of the contemporary notion of evil, C. Fred Alford asks what we can learn about this concept, and about ourselves, by examining a society where it is unknown--where language contains no word that equates to the English term "evil." Does such a society look upon human nature more benignly? Do its members view the world through rose-colored glasses? Korea offers a fascinating starting point, and Alford begins his search for answers there. In conversations with hundreds of Koreans from diverse religions and walks of life--students, politicians, teachers, Buddhist monks, Confucian scholars, Catholic priests, housewives, psychiatrists, and farmers--Alford found remarkable agreement about the nonexistence of evil. Koreans regard evil not as a moral category but as an intellectual one, the result of erroneous Western thinking. For them, evil results from the creation of dualisms, oppositions between people and ideas.

Alford's interviews often led to discussions about imported ways of thinking and the impact of globalization upon society at large. In particular, he was struck by how Koreans' responses to globalization matched Westerners' views about evil. In much of the world, he argues, globalization is the ultimate dualism--attractive for the enlightenment and freedom it brings, terrifying for the great social and personal upheaval it can cause.

Understanding and Explanation: A Transcendental-Pragmatic Perspective (Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought)

Karl-Otto Apel

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Editorial Review:

The explanation versus understanding debate was important to the philosophy of the social sciences from the time of Dilthey and Weber through the work of Popper and Hempel. In recent years, with the development of interpretive approaches in hermeneutics, phenomenology, and language analysis, the problematic has become absolutely central. The broad literature to which it has given rise, while still split along "analytic" versus "continental" lines, shows increasing signs of a reunification in philosophy. G. H. von Wright's important book, Explanation and Understanding, originally published in 1971, is a good example of this trend.

In Understanding and Explanation, Karl-Otto Apel takes von Wright's work as a point of departure for a rigorous, penetrating analysis of the issues involved. After reviewing the failure of earlier discussions to resolve these issues, Apel develops his own approach in light of the turn from logico-semantic to pragmatic analysis of language in post-Wittgensteinian philosophy. In doing so, he constructs bridges that reach back to themes and positions of the German tradition of the Geisteswissenschaften, but from strikingly new angles.

Karl-Otto Apel holds the chair for social philosophy at the University of Frankfurt. His book is included in the series Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought, edited by Thomas McCarthy.

Critique of Violence: Between Poststructuralism and Critical Theory (Warwick Studies in European Philosophy)

Beatric Hanssen

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Beatrice Hanssen uses Walter Benjamin's essay "Critique of Violence" as a guide to analyze the heated controversy between poststructuralism and critical theory, shifting the emphasis from struggle to dialogue between the two parties.

Social Reality (Problems of Philosophy Their Past and Present)

Finn Collin

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Editorial Review:

Social reality is a key problem in the philosophy of social science. Outlining the major historical and contemporary issues raised by the social reality and social facts, this book has something to offer both philosophers and social scientists. To the former is shows how the well-worn topic of realism versus anti-realism assumes new and interestingly varied forms when social reality is substituted for physical reality. For the social scientist, the book offers conceptual clarification of key issues in recent social science which are really philosophical issues.

The Longing for Total Revolution: Philosophic Sources of Social Discontent from Rousseau to Marx and Nietzsche

Bernard Yack

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Bernard Yack seeks to identify and account for the development of a form of discontent held in common by a large number of European philosophers and social critics, including Rousseau, Schiller, the young Hegel, Marx, and Nietzsche. Yack contends that these individuals, despite their profound disagreements, shared new perspectives on human freedom and history, and that these perspectives gave their discontent its peculiar breadth and intensity.