Truth and Social Science - From Hegel to Deconstruction

This exciting and accessible guide to the discussions of truth in the social sciences can also be read as an account of the collapse of modernity, and the rise of new forms of thought which treat difference and ambivalence as positive values.

Ross Abbinnett traces the debate on truth from the `objectifying powers' of Kant through more than 200 years of critique and reformulation to the unravelling of truth by Lyotard, Foucault and Derrida.

List of contents

Introduction
IDEALISM AND SOCIAL THOUGHT
THE RATIONAL AND THE SOCIAL
Kant and the Origins of Social Science
Hegel¿s Concept of Rational Life
Speculative Thought and Modernity
THE STRUCTURAL ORGANISATION OF TRUTH
Structure, Functions and Systems
Marx¿s Critique of Capital
The Powers of Totality
THE IDEALISM OF AUTONOMY
Weber and the Concept of Social Action
Habermas and the Ethics of Communication
POSTSTRUCTURALISM AND THE VIOLENCE OF TRUTH
Foucault and the Modern Domains of Power
Lyotard and the Community of Judgement
Violence, Rationality and Community
TRUTH AND MODERNITY
Marx and Weber
Utopic and Dystopic Ends
Community, Modernity and Speculative Judgement
Hegel, Derrida and the Metaphysics of Race
Bibliography
Index

About the author

Ross Abbinnett is a Lecturer in the School of Social and Historical Studies at the University of Portsmouth

Summary

The author traces the debate from the "objectifying powers" of Kant through more than 200 years of critique and reformulation to the unravelling of the debate by Lyotard, Foucault and Derrida. The book includes a look at the collapse of modernity and the rise of new forms of thought.

Product details

• Authors: Dr. Ross Abbinnett, Ross Abbinnett, Abbinnett Ross
• Publisher: Sage Publications Ltd
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 29.01.1998
• EAN: 9780803975934
• ISBN: 978-0-8039-7593-4
• No. of pages: 208
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Philosophy > General, dictionaries; Natural sciences, medicine, IT, technology > Natural sciences (general); Non-fiction book > Philosophy, religion > Philosophy: general, reference works; Social sciences, law, business > Political science > Political science and political education; Social Theory, PHILOSOPHY / History & Surveys / General, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Sociology / Social Theory, Philosophical traditions and schools of thought, History of Western philosophy, Philosophy;Social Theory