Postmodernism and Social Theory

A new division has emerged in the social sciences between modernists and their post-modern critics. The former defend the project of a general theory with secure analytical foundations; the latter challenge the possibility and indeed the desirability of aspiring to create totalizing theories. Postmodernists contest the view of science as an autonomous sphere of knowledge and reflection.
This volume brings together leading theorists in the social sciences and philosophy to debate the respective merits of modernism and postmodernism as paradigms of social inquiry. It examines the relation between science, critique and narrative, addressing questions about the moral and political meaning of science today. List of Contributors vii

Introduction 1

Part I Toward Postmodernism: Reconfiguring Theory and Politics

1 General Social Theory, Irony, Postmodernism 17

2 Postmodern Social Theory as Narrative with a Moral Intent 47

3 On the Postmodern Barricades: Feminism, Politics, and Theory 82

4 The Strange Life and Hard Times of the Concept of General Theory in Sociology: A Short History of Hope 101

Part II Critics of Postmodernism: In Defense of Scientific Theory

5 Defending Social Science against the Postmodern Doubt 137

6 The Promise of Positivism 156

7 The Confusion of the Modes of Sociology 179

8 Daring Modesty: On Metatheory, Observation, and Theory Growth 199

Part III Between Modernism and Postmodernism: Toward a Contextualizing General Theory

9 Social Science and Society as Discourse: Toward a Sociology for Civic Competence 223

10 Culture, History, and the Problem of Specificity in Social Theory 244

11 The Tensions of Critical Theory: Is Negative Dialectics All There Is? 289

12 General Theory in the Postpositivist Mode: The "Epistemological Dilemma" and the Search for Present Reason 322

Name Index 369

Subject Index 376

Steven Seidman, Professor of Sociology at State University of New York at Albany, writes extensively in the areas of social theory, cultural sociology and sexual politics. He also wrote Contested Knowledge . A new division has emerged in the social sciences between modernists and their post-modern critics. The former defend the project of a general theory with secure analytical foundations; the latter challenge the possibility and indeed the desirability of aspiring to create totalizing theories. Postmodernists contest the view of science as an autonomous sphere of knowledge and reflection.
This volume brings together leading theorists in the social sciences and philosophy to debate the respective merits of modernism and postmodernism as paradigms of social inquiry. It examines the relation between science, critique and narrative, addressing questions about the moral and political meaning of science today.