After Postmodernism - Back to Sociological Theory?

In: Sociology: the journal of the British Sociological Association, Volume 29, Issue 1, p. 117-132

Abstract

I outline and examine the reassertion by Nicos Mouzelis of some `traditionalist' elements in the idea of sociological theory, following what he sees as an excess of philosophising in the discipline. I argue that Mouzelis's recent work constitutes a weighty response to the prevailing climate of ambivalence about the purpose and type of social theory that is required today, and in so doing it also interestingly reflects a loose but noticeable neo-traditionalist revival, `after postmodernism'. At the same time, there are some conservative elements in the `back to sociological theory' movement which are decidedly questionable, and in any case Mouzelis's conceptual apparatus is more entangled in contemporary dilemmas and complexities than his more headline statements about the nature of sociology indicate.