Die von Anthony Giddens nahegelegte Blickrichtung auf die Unterschiede zwischen modernen und vormodernen Gesellschaften läßt erkennen, daß die Moderne eine Dynamik aufweist, die vor dem 17. Jahrhundert in vergleichbarer Form nicht existiert hat. Diese Dynamik sieht Giddens als Folge dreier Hauptfaktoren. Der erste Faktor ist das Auseinandertreten von Raum und Zeit: In engem Zusammenhang damit steht der zweite Faktor: die Entwicklung sozialer Mechanismen, durch die bestimmte gesellschaftliche Tätigkeiten aus dem früher ortsgebundenen "Bett" ihres Geschehens herausgehoben und über große...

"A landmark study in the struggle to contain climate change, the greatest challenge of our era. I urge everyone to read it."
Bill Clinton, 42nd President of the United States of America

Since it first appeared, this book has achieved a classic status. Reprinted many times since its publication, it remains the only work that looks in detail at the political issues posed by global warming. This new edition has been thoroughly updated and provides a state-of-the-art discussion of the most formidable challenge humanity faces this century.

If climate change goes...

This book provides an interpretation of one of the key aspects of Max Weber's work: the relationship between his political and sociological writings. Weber's sociological studies have often been treated as if they were completely separate from his political attitudes and interests, and in general his political writings have remained less well-known than his sociological work.

The book contains three main sections. The first of these analyses the principal concerns underlying Weber's political assessment of the prospective development of post-Bismarckian Germany. The second...

The studies which comprise this book are essentially organized around a critical encounter with European social theory in its 'classical period' - i.e. from the middle years of the nineteenth century until the First World War - and have the aim of working out some of the implications of that encounter for the position and prospects of the social sciences today. The issues involved relate to the following series of problems: method and epistemology; social development and transformation; the origins of 'sociology' in nineteenth-century social theory; and the status of social science as...

Winner of the 2014 European Book Prize.

A "United States of Europe," Winston Churchill proposed in 1946, could "as if by a miracle transform" that "turbulent and mighty continent." "In this way only," he continued, "will hundreds of millions of toilers be able to regain the simple joys and hopes which make life worth living."

Today, nearly seventy years later, over 500 million people live in the member states of the European Union - a greater number than in any other political community save for China and India. The currency of the Union, the euro, is used...

Social life is in a constant process of change, and sociology can never stand still. As a result, sociology today is a theoretically diverse enterprise, covering a huge range of subjects and drawing on a broad array of research methods. Central to this endeavour is the use of core concepts and ideas which allow sociologists to make sense of societies, though our understanding of these concepts necessarily evolves and changes.This clear and jargon-free book introduces a careful selection of essential concepts that have helped to shape sociology and others that continue to do so. Going beyond...

Anthony Giddens has been described as -the most important English social philosopher of our time.- Over 25 years, with a dazzling series of books that attest to his unrelenting productivity, he has established himself as today's most widely read and widely cited social theorist. In recent years, his writings have become more explicitly political, and in 1996 he became Director of the London School of Economics and Political Science. It is in this position that he has been accepted as the key intellectual figure of Tony Blair's New Labour government. Giddens's interests have always been...