A surprising examination of our understanding of science. Science is a swashbuckling book. Fuller's formidable scholarship takes no prisoners. Nature What qualifies such seemingly disparate disciplines as paleontology, high-energy physics, industrial chemistry, and genetic engineering as sciences, and hence worthy of sustained public interest and support? In this innovative and controversial introduction to the social character of scientific knowledge, Steve Fuller argues that if these disciplines share anything at all, it is more likely the way they strategically misinterpret their own...

This concise and comprehensive volume provides an accessible overview of the main debates on the sociology and philosophy of the social sciences. Exploring the changing conceptions of social science from the 16th century to today, sociologist Gerard Delanty argues how this group of disciplines is recovering its role as the critical voice of modernity.

Examines how policy is created and how it is used.

H. K. Colebatch investigates policy as a practical concept -- an idea that both politicians and outside observers use to make sense of public life and to participate effectively in it. Rather than describing particular sorts of policy, he analyzes how the policy process works by addressing the core questions: What do we mean by policy? What is it for? Who makes it?

Welfare's history can be traced from its eighteenth-century origins to its present-day manifestations. The second edition of this standard resource explores the unique relationship of the United States to welfare in a new final chapter.

This accessible and relevant book considers one of the central issues of international relations -- sovereignty, the set of issues involving the independence of states and their interactions with controlling authorities. John Hoffman proposes removing the nation-state from the definition of sovereignty and offers a complete overhaul of our understanding of individual action.