Czech Experience and Sociological Refl ection: Notes on Pavel Machonin’s Book Czech Society and Sociological Knowledge Cover Image

Česká zkušenost a sociologická refl exe Poznámky ke knize Pavla Machonina Česká společnost a sociologické poznání, Praha: ISV nakladatelství 2005, 288
Czech Experience and Sociological Refl ection: Notes on Pavel Machonin’s Book Czech Society and Sociological Knowledge

Author(s): Johann Arnason
Subject(s): Review
Published by: AV ČR - Akademie věd České republiky - Sociologický ústav
Keywords: modernization theory; multiple modernities; Czech sociology– history of; Pavel Machonin; sociology of knowledge

Summary/Abstract: The article deals with some key arguments in Pavel Machonin’s book Czech Society and Sociological knowledge, but does not review the whole book. Critical comments focus on four themes. Machonin’s conception of sociology as a discipline and a tradition does not do full justice to the inherent pluralism of the sociological imagination. It is useful to link sociological debates to the ideological contest between socialism (more particularly Marxism) and liberalism, but this problematic is more complex than Machonin’s analyses tend to suggest; that applies, in particular, to the interpretations of freedom and equality as fundamental modern values. Machonin’s attempt to reconstruct modernization theory is open to some criticisms, especially with regard to the debate on „multiple modernities.“ Finally, the concept of state socialism does not help to grasp the complex patterns of modernity that developed under Communist rule.

  • Issue Year: 43/2007
  • Issue No: 04
  • Page Range: 809-820
  • Page Count: 12
  • Language: Czech
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