Contributions to Social Ontology [Hardcover]

Recent years have seen a dramatic re-emergence of interest in ontology. From philosophy and social sciences to artificial intelligence and computer science, ontology is gaining interdisciplinary influence as a  popular tool for applied research. Contributions to Social Ontology focuses specifically on these developments within the social sciences. The contributions reveal that this revived interest in social ontology involves far more than an unquestioning acceptance or application of the concepts and methods of academic philosophers. Instead as ontology permeates so many new areas, social ontology itself is evolving in new and fascinating ways. This book engages with these new developments, pushing it forward with cutting-edge new material from leading authors in this area, from Roy Bhaskar to Margaret Archer. It also explicitly analyzes the relationship between the new ontological projects and the more traditional approaches.

This book will be of great interest to students and researchers alike across the social sciences and particularly in philosophy, economics and sociology. 

1. Introduction  Ontology, Philosophy and the Social Science  Part 1 Ontology and Social Theory  2. The Ontological Status of Subjectivity  3. Technology, Technological Determinism and the Transformational Model of Technical Activity  4. Ontological Theorising and the Assumptions Issue in Economics  5. Wittgenstein and the Ontology of the Social: Some Kripkean Reflections on Bourdieus Theory of Practice  6. Deducing Natural Necessity from Purposive Activity: The Scientific Realist Logic of Habermass Theory of Communicative Action and Luhmanns Systems Theory  7. Underlabouring for Ethics: Luk?css Critical Ontology  Part 2 - Ontology and PhlӮ