On Critique: A Sociology of EmancipationISBN: 978-0-7456-4963-4
Hardcover
200 pages
April 2011, Polity
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Other Available Formats: Paperback
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In critical sociology, description in terms of power relations
underscores the potency of mechanisms of oppression, the way the
oppressed passively endure them, going so far in their alienation
as to
adopt the values that enslave them. Pragmatic sociology, by
contrast, describes the actions of human beings who rebel but who
are endowed with reason. It stresses their ability, in certain
historical conditions, to rise up against their domination and
construct new interpretations of reality in the service of critical
activity.
In this major new book Boltanski develops a framework that makes it possible to reconcile these seemingly antagonistic approaches - the one determinist and assigning the leading role to the enlightening science of the sociologist, the other concerned to stick as closely as possible to what people say and do. This labour of unification leads him to rework central notions such as practice, institution, critique and, finally, ‘social reality,' all with the aim of contributing to a contemporary renewal of practices of emancipation.