Frameworks of Power Book

This textbook provides a coherent and comprehensive account of the different frameworks for understanding power which have been advanced within the social sciences. Though looking back to the classical literature on power with special emphasis on Machiavelli and Hobbes, the book concentrates on the modern analysis of power and develops upon its theory and its application.At the centre of the book are the contributions made by recent theorists - American political and social theorists such as Robert Dahl, Peter Bachrach and Morton Baratz, and Talcott Parsons; the British sociologists Steven Lukes, Anthony Giddens, and Michael Mann; the German critical theorists, J[um]urgen Habermas; and increasingly important contributions from the French School, including not only Michel Foucault but also Bruno Latour and Michel Callon.Not only does the book provide an overview of these various frameworks of power, but it also develops a new synthesis based on important work in both the sociology of science and the sociology of organizations. This approach is then applied to key questions in the comparative historical sociology of the emergence of the modern state.As well as being an essential textbook for all students in social science disciplines, this wide-ranging and innovative analysis will appeal to scholars in sociology, politics, organization studies and other disciplines.Read More