Outlines of a Theory of Plural Habitus

Download Outlines of a Theory of Plural Habitus PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 100053071X
Total Pages : 109 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Outlines of a Theory of Plural Habitus by : Miklós Hadas

Download or read book Outlines of a Theory of Plural Habitus written by Miklós Hadas and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2021-11-14 with total page 109 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book explores the thought of Pierre Bourdieu, one of the most influential sociologists of the twentieth century, proposing a modification and extension of his concept of habitus. Building on Bourdieu’s notion of the translational reproduction of social structure – the idea that while social classes move in the same direction, dominant groups are able to preserve their relative power position, thus maintaining the structure of the gap – the author proposes that as social structures change, habitus change correspondingly, and thus become plural. Informed by Norbert Elias’ process sociology, this volume offers examples of habitus pluralisation, arguing that this modification of Bourdieu’s thought renders it more suitable for the study of social changes and represents the development of a path that Bourdieu himself had begun to explore in the later stages of his career. As such it will appeal to scholars of sociology and social theory with interests in historical sociology, process sociology, social structures and the thought of Bourdieu.

Critical Theory of Coloniality

Download Critical Theory of Coloniality PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 100056956X
Total Pages : 326 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Critical Theory of Coloniality by : Paulo Henrique Martins

Download or read book Critical Theory of Coloniality written by Paulo Henrique Martins and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-04-19 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book reveals how the critique of the domination of capitalism inaugurated by the Frankfurt School becomes pluriversal, motivating the historical Critical Theory of Coloniality (CTC) dialogue between the Global South and the Global North. CTC expresses the emergence and historical actuality of a set of intellectual fields aimed at denouncing domination and promoting emancipatory ideas at the borders of colonial capitalism. The book argues that the actuality of the CTC relies on the importance of valuing theoretical and methodological pluralism in the context of the necessary redefinition of the directions of global society. It reveals a plural reflection of scientific, moral, and aesthetic character in different areas of former planetary colonisation such as Asia, Africa, and America but also on the borders of Europe. This book is aimed at researchers and students in the social sciences as well as in interdisciplinary studies. It is attractive to those who are interested in the plural development of theoretical criticism outside the European universe and who seek to understand how capitalist power has metamorphosed with planetary coloniality. Considering this book implies important reflections on topics such as development, modernity, tradition, imperialism, dependency, and democracy, it is interesting to specialists in development issues, international relations, and policymakers.

Karl Polanyi and the Paradoxes of the Double Movement

Download Karl Polanyi and the Paradoxes of the Double Movement PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000569853
Total Pages : 327 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Karl Polanyi and the Paradoxes of the Double Movement by : John Vail

Download or read book Karl Polanyi and the Paradoxes of the Double Movement written by John Vail and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-04-19 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book offers a critical reconstruction of the double movement, the central thesis of Karl Polanyi’s The Great Transformation, one of the most influential books of the 20th century. The double movement is the establishment of a free market economy and the subsequent effort by society to ameliorate the destructive effects of the market. In Polanyi’s bold vision, the double movement constituted the hidden gear of social change and historical transformation within capitalism. The book is a forensic examination and critique of Polanyi’s argument. It develops an interpretive framework of the double movement as four interrelated social processes: the establishment of the self-regulating market, the rise of a market society that deepens and extends market imperatives, a social protection phase that constrains the market and safeguards society, and the contradictions and crises that result from this clash of social principles. The book will be an indispensable guide for students and scholars across the social sciences which illuminates the relevance of Polanyi’s insights to a critical understanding of the contemporary era –the scourge of insecurity and inequality, the multiple crises of neoliberalism, the rise of right wing populism- as well as those interested in egalitarian and emancipatory alternatives to capitalism.

Making Citizenship Work

Download Making Citizenship Work PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1000615103
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (6 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Making Citizenship Work by : Rodolfo Rosales

Download or read book Making Citizenship Work written by Rodolfo Rosales and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2022-08-24 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Making Citizenship Work seeks to address questions of how a community reaches a place where it can actually make citizenship work. A second question addressed is "What does citizenship represent to different communities?" Across thirteen chapters a collection of experts traverse multiple disciplines in analyzing citizenship from different points of access. Each chapter revolves around the premise that empowerment of communities, and individuals within the community, comes in different forms and is governed by multiple needs and visions. Authors utilize case studies to demonstrate the different roles that communities from a broad sector of our society adopt to accomplish constructing democratic processes that reflect their goals, needs, and cultures. Concurrently authors address the structural obstacles to the empowerment of communities, arguing that the democratic process does not and cannot accommodate the diverse communities of society within a single universalistic model of citizenship. They conclude that fundamentally citizenship is not simply a legal right, an obligation, a state of rights, but a practice, an action on the behalf of community. Making Citizenship Work challenges conventional thinking about politics while also encouraging readers to go beyond the box that deters us from visualizing a human society. It is an ideal book for undergraduate and graduate courses in political science, sociology, history, social work and Ethnic Studies.

Gabriel Tarde

Download Gabriel Tarde PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000570398
Total Pages : 180 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Gabriel Tarde by : David Toews

Download or read book Gabriel Tarde written by David Toews and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-06-09 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents the core ideas of early sociologist Gabriel Tarde and suggests a new pathway for sociology based on his foundational work. Rejecting anthropocentrism, Tarde highlights the contrast between the natural and the artificial, uniquely emphasizing the positive significance of the artificial in an age in which people have come to distrust it profoundly. Recovering Tarde’s theory today in the context of contemporary as well as classical scholarship and recognizing how it fits with such phenomena as quantum physics and digital media, this book develops the concept of the cosmological imagination as the context for a critical Tardian analysis of artifice that can bring together what we know about our contemporary future-oriented global societies. How we know the universe, our place in it, the place of other animals and objects in it, our global socialities, our human claims of power and privilege within it, are pointed questions Tarde asks as he wonders whether a future temporality conducive to constant artifice has become our normal human way of life. Considering our ambivalence about modern products and modernity in general, our thinking about the future, and our tendency to forget what nature used to signify in its presentation of problems beyond our control, such as illnesses and epidemics, Gabriel Tarde: The Future of the Artificial demonstrates the reasons for which we need to return to Tarde’s work to rediscover its relevance for public debate as we seek to think through the new era and its societies in which culture and nature are no longer distinct. This book will appeal to scholars of social and political theory with interests in our digital age, new sociologies of materials and objects, neomonadology, and the thought of Gabriel Tarde.

Nationalism and Hegemony

Download Nationalism and Hegemony PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000572323
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Nationalism and Hegemony by : Michaelangelo Anastasiou

Download or read book Nationalism and Hegemony written by Michaelangelo Anastasiou and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-04-15 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book develops a contemporary theory of nationalism that addresses 21st century political challenges, exploring theoretical and empirical understandings of the concepts of ‘the nation’ and ‘nationalism’ and the failure of various theoretical accounts to decipher the diverse manner by which nationalism comes to be embedded in our social and political world. Accounting for the dynamism and ‘intertextuality’ of nationalism, Nationalism and Hegemony shows how ‘the nation’ and ‘nationalism’ come to be consolidated as conceptual and experiential power structures and how the interests of political groups are advanced through diverse nationalist modalities, which can at any time be activated for political purposes. A critique of the various and diverse manifestations of nationalism, this contribution to both theory and political practice will appeal to scholars working in the fields of sociology and social and political theory.

Anatomies of Modern Discontent

Download Anatomies of Modern Discontent PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000550966
Total Pages : 246 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Anatomies of Modern Discontent by : Thomas S. Henricks

Download or read book Anatomies of Modern Discontent written by Thomas S. Henricks and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-03-03 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides an overview and analysis of the thought of figures across the human and social sciences on the character, causes, and consequences of discontent in modern societies. Exploring the important social and cultural conditions associated with modernity, it focuses on the contributions of 38 prominent scholars from the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries – philosophers, historians, and social scientists – on the subject of discontent and social malaise, and individual and collective well-being. Thematically organized, this volume offers brief portraits of the lives and key ideas of these thinkers, leading toward a presentation of modernity as a “differentiated complaint.” Reclaiming an important tradition in the human and social sciences that sees life on a grand scale, that integrates personal affairs with social and cultural matters, and that dares people to recommit themselves to this broader vision of human involvement, Anatomies of Modern Discontent will appeal to readers across the social sciences and humanities, particularly those with interests in social theory, sociology, and philosophy.

Towards a Sociology of the Open Society

Download Towards a Sociology of the Open Society PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1000783634
Total Pages : 186 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (7 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Towards a Sociology of the Open Society by : Masoud Mohammadi Alamuti

Download or read book Towards a Sociology of the Open Society written by Masoud Mohammadi Alamuti and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2022-11-30 with total page 186 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book applies the general theory of critical rationalism in order to develop a new sociology of the open society, in general, and a new analysis of the transition from a closed society to an open society in particular. It presents a criticism of Karl Popper’s analysis of human action for opening up a closed society, followed by a critical study of the mainstream sociology to show how justificational models of knowledge and rational action have prevented sociology from addressing the contribution of human action to social change. This book provides new sociologies of closed and open societies. It argues that in the closed society "a low level" of critical rationality is activated by people to define the meaning of the good life and social institutions of law, polity and economy. Masoud Mohammadi Alamuti proposes five mechanisms of opening up closed society through the model of social change, inspired by the philosophy of critical rationalism. This volume is "the first systematic attempt" to apply the philosophy of critical rationalism in order to present a "normative sociology of the open society". It will be of interest to postgraduate researchers and professional readers in philosophy, sociology, moral science, law, politics and economics. In addition, this book would benefit research centres, policymakers and civil society activists interested in the ideas of critical rationalism and the open society.

Lockean Property Ethics and Restitution

Download Lockean Property Ethics and Restitution PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Taylor & Francis
ISBN 13 : 1000602524
Total Pages : 146 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (6 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Lockean Property Ethics and Restitution by : David Jarrett

Download or read book Lockean Property Ethics and Restitution written by David Jarrett and published by Taylor & Francis. This book was released on 2022-07-20 with total page 146 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this book, David Jarrett argues that the influential Lockean thesis of justice in property, which traces back to John Locke, seems to entail much egalitarian property redistribution. Put briefly, Lockeans argue that people justly own: (1) any unowned natural resources they labour on, (2) any resources they receive via voluntary transfer from a legitimate owner, and (3) any resources they legitimately receive in compensation for harm done to their person or legitimately held property. However, a question that has been largely overlooked by Lockeans is how to address the problem of property which did not arise in line with Lockean justice. What do we do about property which derives from feudal and colonial conquest, for example? Drawing on a range of theoretical and historical sources, this book argues that the legal concept of restitution is the most reasonable way to address the problem. If we apply this concept, it appears that much property in the world is held unjustly and should be redistributed in an egalitarian manner. Lockean Property Ethics and Restitution will be of interest to political theorists and philosophers alike.

The Challenge to Academic Freedom in Hungary

Download The Challenge to Academic Freedom in Hungary PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
ISBN 13 : 3110749939
Total Pages : 344 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (17 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Challenge to Academic Freedom in Hungary by : Andrew Ryder

Download or read book The Challenge to Academic Freedom in Hungary written by Andrew Ryder and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2022-02-21 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Challenge to Academic Freedom in Hungary: A Case Study in Culture War, Authoritarianism and Resistance presents a case study as to how an authoritarian regime like the one in Hungary seeks to tame academic freedom. Andrew Ryder probes the reasons for ideological conflict within the academy through concepts like ‘culture war’ and authoritarian populism. He explores how the Orbán administration has introduced a series of reforms leading to limitations being placed on the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Gender Studies no longer being recognized by the State, the relocation of the Central European University because of government pressure and new reforms that ostensibly appear to give universities autonomy but critics assert are in fact changes that will lead to cronyism and pro-government interference in academic freedom.

Marcel Gauchet and the Crisis of Democratic Politics

Download Marcel Gauchet and the Crisis of Democratic Politics PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000540863
Total Pages : 273 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Marcel Gauchet and the Crisis of Democratic Politics by : Natalie J. Doyle

Download or read book Marcel Gauchet and the Crisis of Democratic Politics written by Natalie J. Doyle and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-02-25 with total page 273 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents, for the first time in the English language, Marcel Gauchet’s interpretation of the challenges faced by contemporary Western societies as a result of the crisis of liberal democratic politics and the growing influence of populism. Responding to Gauchet’s analysis, international experts explore the depoliticising aspects of contemporary democratic culture that explain the appeal of populism: neo-liberal individualism, the cult of the individual and its related human rights, and the juridification of all human relationships. The book also provides the intellectual context within which Gauchet’s understanding of modern society has developed—in particular, his critical engagement with Marxism and the profound influence of Cornelius Castoriadis and Claude Lefort on his work. It highlights the way Gauchet’s work remains faithful to an understanding of history that stresses the role of humanity as a collective subject, while also seeking to account for both the historical novelty of contemporary individualism and the new form of alienation that radical modernity engenders. In doing so, the book also opens up new avenues for reflection on the political significance of the contemporary health crisis. Marcel Gauchet and the Crisis of Democratic Politics will be of great interest to scholars and postgraduate students of social and political thought, political anthropology and sociology, political philosophy, and political theory.

The Genesis and Structure of the Hungarian Jazz Diaspora

Download The Genesis and Structure of the Hungarian Jazz Diaspora PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1000590631
Total Pages : 179 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (5 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Genesis and Structure of the Hungarian Jazz Diaspora by : Ádám Havas

Download or read book The Genesis and Structure of the Hungarian Jazz Diaspora written by Ádám Havas and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2022-05-18 with total page 179 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Hungary, jazz was at the forefront of heated debates sparked by the racialised tensions between national music traditions and newly emerging forms of popular culture that challenged the prevailing status quo within the cultural hierarchies of different historical eras. Drawing on an extensive, four-year field research project, including ethnographic observations and 29 in-depth interviews, this book is the first to explore the hidden diasporic narrative(s) of Hungarian jazz through the system of historically formed distinctions linked to the social practices of assimilated Jews and Romani musicians. The chapters illustrate how different concepts of authenticity and conflicting definitions of jazz as the "sound of Western modernity" have resulted in a unique hierarchical setting. The book's account of the fundamental opposition between US-centric mainstream jazz (bebop) and Bartók-inspired free jazz camps not only reveals the extent to which traditionalism and modernism were linked to class- and race-based cultural distinctions, but offers critical insights about the social logic of Hungary’s geocultural positioning in the ‘twilight zone’ between East and West to use the words of Maria Todorova. Following a historical overview that incorporates comparisons with other Central European jazz cultures, the book offers a rigorous analysis of how the transition from playing ‘caféhouse music’ to bebop became a significant element in the status claims of Hungary’s ‘significant others’, i.e. Romani musicians. By combining the innovative application of Pierre Bourdieu’s cultural sociology with popular music studies and postcolonial scholarship, this work offers a forceful demonstration of the manifold connections of this particular jazz scene to global networks of cultural production, which also continue to shape it.

The Logic of Practice

Download The Logic of Practice PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Stanford University Press
ISBN 13 : 9780804720113
Total Pages : 348 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (21 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Logic of Practice by : Pierre Bourdieu

Download or read book The Logic of Practice written by Pierre Bourdieu and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 1990 with total page 348 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Our usual representations of the opposition between the "civilized" and the "primitive" derive from willfully ignoring the relationship of distance our social science sets up between the observer and the observed. In fact, the author argues, the relationship between the anthropologist and his object of study is a particular instance of the relationship between knowing and doing, interpreting and using, symbolic mastery and practical mastery—or between logical logic, armed with all the accumulated instruments of objectification, and the universally pre-logical logic of practice. In this, his fullest statement of a theory of practice, Bourdieu both sets out what might be involved in incorporating one's own standpoint into an investigation and develops his understanding of the powers inherent in the second member of many oppositional pairs—that is, he explicates how the practical concerns of daily life condition the transmission and functioning of social or cultural forms. The first part of the book, "Critique of Theoretical Reason," covers more general questions, such as the objectivization of the generic relationship between social scientific observers and their objects of study, the need to overcome the gulf between subjectivism and objectivism, the interplay between structure and practice (a phenomenon Bourdieu describes via his concept of the habitus), the place of the body, the manipulation of time, varieties of symbolic capital, and modes of domination. The second part of the book, "Practical Logics," develops detailed case studies based on Bourdieu's ethnographic fieldwork in Algeria. These examples touch on kinship patterns, the social construction of domestic space, social categories of perception and classification, and ritualized actions and exchanges. This book develops in full detail the theoretical positions sketched in Bourdieu's Outline of a Theory of Practice. It will be especially useful to readers seeking to grasp the subtle concepts central to Bourdieu's theory, to theorists interested in his points of departure from structuralism (especially fom Lévi-Strauss), and to critics eager to understand what role his theory gives to human agency. It also reveals Bourdieu to be an anthropological theorist of considerable originality and power.

The Plural Actor

Download The Plural Actor PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Polity
ISBN 13 : 0745646859
Total Pages : 297 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (456 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis The Plural Actor by : Bernard Lahire

Download or read book The Plural Actor written by Bernard Lahire and published by Polity. This book was released on 2011-02-07 with total page 297 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The individual that the social sciences take as an object is most often studied in a particular context or from a single dimension. The actor is analysed as a student, worker, consumer, spouse, reader, sportsperson, a voter etc. However, in societies where individuals live often through simultaneously and successively heterogeneous and sometimes contradictory social experiences, each person inevitably carries a plurality of roles, ways of seeing, feeling and acting. The aim of this study is to consider the ways in which this plurality of worlds and experiences are incorporated into the being of each individual and to observe the individual's actions in a variety of settings. In addition to his sociological viewpoint, the author engages with psychology, history, anthropology and philosophy. His reflections lead him to embark on a program of psychological sociology to highlight the complexities of this plural view of the social.

A Postmodern Theology of Ritual Action

Download A Postmodern Theology of Ritual Action PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Wipf and Stock Publishers
ISBN 13 : 1532649533
Total Pages : 250 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (326 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis A Postmodern Theology of Ritual Action by : Jonathan L. Best

Download or read book A Postmodern Theology of Ritual Action written by Jonathan L. Best and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2019-02-26 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A Postmodern Theology of Ritual Action is a unique work that seeks to explore where we find meaning within ritual and actions within the church. Bridging hermeneutics, philosophy, and postmodern thought, this work seeks to explore how to do theology with the community through conversation. Beginning with the mindset that meaning is already present within ritual action rather than outside it, Best engages the practice of foot washing among the Original Free Will Baptist denomination of eastern North Carolina. Foot washing suggests a new future for theology, a future that models love, service, and acceptance. Incorporating insights gained from conversing with philosophy, theology, and the Original Free Will Baptists, foot washing points toward a future relational practical theology. A Postmodern Theology of Ritual Action is a captivating work that draws from both philosophers and theologians to show that we can learn much by listening to the voices of religious practitioners.

Pierre Bourdieu: A Heroic Structuralism

Download Pierre Bourdieu: A Heroic Structuralism PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : BRILL
ISBN 13 : 9004442618
Total Pages : 206 pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (44 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Pierre Bourdieu: A Heroic Structuralism by : Jean-Louis Fabiani

Download or read book Pierre Bourdieu: A Heroic Structuralism written by Jean-Louis Fabiani and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2020-11-30 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Can one speak dispassionately about Pierre Bourdieu? Jean-Louis Fabiani’s book is an attempt to apply Bourdieu’s analytical tools to his own work. Testing their limitations and their potential ambiguity allows the author to shed new light on the social genesis of his main concepts and on the complex relationship between science and politics.

Bourdieu's Theory of Social Fields

Download Bourdieu's Theory of Social Fields PDF Online Free

Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1317678591
Total Pages : 309 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (176 download)

DOWNLOAD NOW!


Book Synopsis Bourdieu's Theory of Social Fields by : Mathieu Hilgers

Download or read book Bourdieu's Theory of Social Fields written by Mathieu Hilgers and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-11-13 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bourdieu’s theory of social fields is one of his key contributions to social sciences and humanities. However, it has never been subjected to genuine critical examination. This book fills that gap and offers a clear and wide-ranging introduction to the theory. It includes a critical discussion of its methodology and relevance in different subject areas in the social sciences and humanities. Part I "theoretical investigations" offers a theoretical account of the theory, while also identifying some of its limitations and discussing several strategies to overcome them. Part II "Education, culture and organization" presents the theory at work and highlights its advantages and disadvantages. The focus in Part III devoted to "The State" is on the formation and evolution of the State and public policy in different contexts. The chapters show the usefulness of field theory in describing, explaining and understanding the functioning of the State at different stages in its historical trajectory including its recent redefinition with the advent of the neoliberal age. A last chapter outlines a postcolonial use of the theory of fields.