Neofunctionalism (Key Issues in Sociological Theory) Book

Neofunctionalism is the first volume in the series Key Issues in Sociological Theory and takes account of the developments in functionalist theory over the last twenty years. Reconsidering the work of Parsons, Merton, Homans et al during the 1930s and 1940s, Alexander suggests that functionalism is more than just a set of concepts, methods, models or ideologies. He argues that it is a tradition, that it has emerged from recent critical reflection as more a broad intellectual tendency than a theory. The papers in this volume, all original contributions by scholars from different sociological backgrounds, exemplify these tendencies. Neofunctionalism represents the contributors' sense of the future direction of the tradition as well as their discovery of its past. As such it will be of interest to social and political theorists, sociologists and political scientists.Jeffrey C. Alexander is Professor of Sociology at UCLA. He is the author of the multi-volumework, Theoretical Logic in Sociology, Twenty Lectures: Sociological Theory Since World War II and Structure and Meaning: Essays in Sociological Theory. He is past chair of the Theory Section of the American Sociological Association and is currently a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton.Read More