Postmodernism and Social Theory

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