Speakers


SZAKOLCZAI, Arpad


Curriculum

BA, MA (1981, University of Economics, Budapest), PhD (1987, University of Texas at Austin).
Research interests : social theory; historical sociology; history of sociological thought; sociology of values; East European transition (within a comparative historical framework).

More: http://www.ucc.ie/ucc/depts/sociology/staff.htm

Measuring the Emotional Economy in Europe

Foundational troubles in the Human Sciences: A manifesto for an event-based approach

Arpad Szakolczai offered a theoretical base for experience- or event-based social measurement. In his interpretation the traditional dual perception of the world is neither valid nor useful; he suggests that events and their observation are the key to understand social interactions better. He considers events are the transitions from one state to another, most of the times just "suffered" as experiences, whereas in other cases the experiences produce emotions, even passions in humans. He concluded that through measuring events we can get closer to the logic according to which people and their interactions work.

presentation (pdf)


Recent and major publications

The Genesis of Modernity, Routledge, London and New York, 2003.

'Civilization and Its Sources', in International Sociology 16 (2001), 3: 371-88.

'Eric Voegelin's History of Political Ideas: A Review Essay', The European Journal of Social Theory 4 (2001), 3: 351-68.

'Stages of a Quest: Reconstructing the Outline Structure of the History of Political Ideas ', No. XXV in the 'Occasional Papers' of the Eric-Voegelin-Archiv, Ludwig Maximilians Universität, Munich, 2001.

'Michel Foucault (1926-84)' (A biographical entry), in Neil J Smelser and Paul B Baltes (eds.), International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences. (Elsevier, N.Y., 2001), vol. 9, pp. 5750-4.

'In a Permanent State of Transition: Theorising the East European Condition', in Limen 1 (2001), 1. (http://www.mi2.hr/limen)

'Norbert Elias and Franz Borkenau: Intertwined Life-Works', in Theory, Culture and Society 17 (2000), 2: 45-69.

'Modernity Interpreted through Weber and Foucault', in Bo Strath and James Kaye (eds), Enlightenment and Genocide: Contradictions of Modernity (Presse Interuniversitaire Européen / Peter Lang, Brussels, 2000), pp.103-23.

Reflexive Historical Sociology, London, Routledge, 2000.

Identita, riconoscimento e scambio: Saggi in onore di Alessandro Pizzorno (Identity, recognition and exchange: essays in honour of Alessandro Pizzorno), (ed, with Donatella Della Porta and Monica Greco). Bari, Laterza, 2000, (forthcoming)

'The Spiritual Character of Modernity: Preemption, Crisis and Return', in Elemér Hankiss (ed.), Europe after 1989: A Culture in Crisis?' (Center for German and European Studies, Georgetown University, 1999).

'Experiences of Democratisation: Elements of a Comparative and Historical Framework', in Richard Sakwa (ed.), The Experience of Democratisation in Eastern Europe (London, Macmillan, 1999).

'Assessing the Legacy of Communism: Continuities and Discontinuities in Value Preferences in Hungary, 1977-1997', EUI Working Paper SPS No. 99/4 (1999).

'The Global Monastery', World Futures 49 (1998), 1-17.

Max Weber and Michel Foucault: Parallel Life-Works. London, Routledge, 1998.

'Reflexive Historical Sociology', The European Journal of Social Theory 1 (1998), 2: 209-27.

'Reappraising Foucault: A Review Essay', American Journal of Sociology 103 (1998), 5: 1402-10.

'Value Systems in Axial Moments: A Comparative Analysis of 24 European Countries', European Sociological Review 14 (1998), 3: 211-29 (with László Füstös).

'Thinking Beyond the East West Divide: Foucault, Patocka, and the Care of the Self', Social Research 61 (1994), 2: 297-323.

The Dissolution of Communist Power: The Case of Hungary. London, Routledge, 1992 (with Agnes Horváth).

'Information Management in Bolshevik-type Party States: A Version of the Information Society', East European Politics and Societies 5 (1991), 2: 268-305 (with Agnes Horváth).

'Political Instructors and the Decline of Communism in Hungary: Apparatus, Nomenclatura and the Issue of Legacy', The British Journal of Political Science 21 (1991), 4: 469-488 (with Agnes Horváth).