Alex Law, "The Roots of Sociology: Scottish Enlightenment and the Civilising Process" (Routledge, 2026)

episode

New Books in Critical Theory not yet transcribed

▲ 0

Transcript

This episode hasn't been transcribed yet Upvotes decide what gets transcribed next — 0 so far. Sign in to upvote

More from New Books in Critical Theory

Leonhard Emmerling, "The Idiots: The History of the Homo Nullus" (Seagull Books, 2026) 54 min · 09 Sep 2026

All episodes from New Books in Critical Theory →

Report any issue

Source

Recorded02 Jun 2026

Publisherfeeds.megaphone.fm

Handlerec:18678792

Show notes

The thinkers of the Scottish Enlightenment have often been claimed for sociology. But, what does it mean to say these thinkers were sociologists, or at the very least precursors to the subject? Does it, for example, mean that intellectuals of 18th Century Scotland had the same concerns as we do today? Alternatively, does it mean we should think of sociology as an elite discipline, developed by men who were attached to power, albeit with some often critical insights? In turn, if we accept these thinkers as doing something distinct, how can this sociologically be explained? These are the questions which animate Alex Law’s The Roots of Sociology: Scottish Enlightenment and the Civilising Process (Routledge, 2026). Structured around two sections, Sociology and the Scottish Enlightenment, as well as Sociology of the Scottish Enlightenment, Law sees these thinkers as thinking through what Elias would later call the civilising process. He so doing he explores how questions of state formation, violence and emerging commercial society structured their interest and how the particular position of Scotland, a stateless nation experiencing rebellion, provided the space for what he calls their ‘pre-sociology’. In our podcast we discuss how Law’s attempt to see the Scottish Enlightenment thinks as concerned with the civilising process differs from other attempts to claim them for sociology, the legacy of the Act of Union for these writers and how one became a thinker in these times. We also discuss why Adam Smith is, for Law, an ‘ambivalent’ figure for sociology and what we can learn from these writers about the scope and historical insight sociology should have. Your host, Matt Dawson is Professor of Sociology at the University of Glasgow and the author of G.D.H. Cole and British Sociology: A Study in Semi-Alienation (Palgrave Macmillan, 2024) and co-editor of The Anthem Companion to Henri Lefebvre (Anthem Press, 2026) along with other texts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/critical-theory

Ask this episode

“What did the council decide on item 42?” — answered with the speaker and the moment.