This volume examines the Enlightenment's influence on modern Western societies and democracies, emphasizing ideals such as liberty, equality, and social justice. Through a comparative-historical lens, it analyzes the impact on cultural development, political science, and civil society, while also addressing counter-Enlightenment philosophies.
The Calvinist Predestination of a New Society
Exploring the Weberian method, the book delves into the profound impact of Calvinism on American society, asserting that its influence extends well beyond the realms of free market capitalism. Zafirovski examines how Calvinist principles have shaped various aspects of American culture, ethics, and social structures, providing a nuanced understanding of the interplay between religion and economic systems.
The book explores the market as a complex social category, merging economic and sociological frameworks for analysis. It delves into the nature of the market, examining concepts like market laws, equilibrium, and prices through an integrated approach. This original examination provides a deeper understanding of the interplay between market dynamics and societal influences, offering enlightening insights into how these frameworks can coexist and inform one another.
Challenging conventional views on network exchange theory, the author presents a fresh interpretation that integrates economic sociology with a neo-Weberian perspective. By employing an interdisciplinary approach, the book explores how social and institutional structures influence market exchanges, positing that economic actions stem from social interactions rather than being the primary drivers. This analysis offers a nuanced understanding of the interplay between social action and economic processes, reshaping the discourse around economic exchanges in society.
Puritanism, Democracy, and Society
Focusing on the interplay between Protestant Puritanism and authoritarianism, this book examines its historical and modern impacts on political democracy and civil society, particularly in Great Britain and America. It traces the evolution of Puritan influences from the 17th century to the 21st century, highlighting how these religious roots have shaped contemporary political and social structures in regions historically influenced by Puritan ideals.
Exploring the evolution of Western civilization, this book argues that liberal modernity remains the defining force, while conservatism is portrayed as a relic of the past. It challenges the notion that liberalism is in decline, asserting that claims of its demise are significantly overstated. Through a critical lens, the author reexamines the dynamics between liberalism and its adversaries, offering a fresh perspective on their ongoing relevance in contemporary society.
Liberty versus Conservatism in the New Millennium
The book delves into the relationship between conservatism and the principles of free society and liberty in Western nations. It critically examines how conservative ideologies may challenge or undermine the values of modern democratic societies, posing essential questions about their compatibility and impact on individual freedoms. Through this exploration, it seeks to illuminate the tensions between conservative beliefs and the ideals of a free and open society.
In Identifying a Free Society Milan Zafirovski offers a holistic sociological approach to modern free society as a total social system. The book examines the main conditions and indicators of modern free society such as democracy, a free economy, a free culture, and a free civil society, hence political, economic, cultural, and individual liberty entwined with equality and justice. It provides specific and aggregate free-society estimates for Western and related societies based on a variety of objective rankings, data, and reports. On the basis of these estimates, the book identifies liberal societies as the freest as a whole, and their anti-liberal opposites as the most unfree.
Though once thought anathema to one another, in contemporary society, Zafirovski shows that Capitalism and Dictatorship are increasingly codependent.
In this scathing critique of the reactionary values dominating contemporary America, Milan Zafirovski exposes the `societal curse' that inflicts this so-called promised land today. Based on a sociological as well as historical analysis, he shows how the triangle of capitalist dictatorship, fundamentalist theocracy and exclusionary democracy perpetually creates the `New Dark Ages' that defines today's lived reality in North America. This much-needed intervention holds the mirror to a land whose perverted slave-and-master economy leaves no refuge or escape to those lured by the idea of freedom and happiness. Brutally honest and uncompromising, `Curse in the ``Promised Land''?' is a must-read for everyone willing to unmask the destructive conservative ideology that drives America.