Norbert Elias in Troubled Times, 1st ed. 2021 Figurational Approaches to the Problems of the Twenty-First Century Palgrave Studies on Norbert Elias Series

This edited collection brings together texts that discuss current major issues in our troubled times through the lens of Norbert Elias?s sociology. It sheds light on both the contemporary world and some of Elias?s most controversial concepts. Through examination of the ?current affairs?, political and social contemporary changes, the authors in this collection present new and challenging ways of understanding these social processes and figurations. Ultimately, the objective of the book is to embrace and utilise some of the more polemical aspects of Elias?s legacy, such as the exploration of decivilizing processes, decivilizing spurts, and dys-civilization. It investigates to what extent Elias?s sociological analyses are still applicable in our studies of the developments that mark our troubled times. It does so through both global and local lenses, theoretically and empirically, and above all, by connecting past, present, and possible futures of all human societies.

1. Troubled Times: Editors’ Introduction.- Part I: Renewing Classical Themes.- 2. The Question of Inequality: Trends of Functional Democratisation and De-democratisation.- 3. Vox Populi Then and Now.- 4. Figurational Sociology of the Rule of Law: A Case of Central and Eastern Europe.- 5. Transformations of Human Rights within Ruptures and Continuity: A Historico-Sociological Approach.- 6. Civilising Digitalisation: In Search of a New balance with Today’s Technological Innovations.- 7. Confronting Uncertainties: Process Sociology Converges with the Ecological Risk Society of the Becks.- Part II: Violence and Faces of the War.- 8. The Civilising Process, Decline of Homicide and Mass Murder Societies: Norbert Elias and the History of Violence.- 9. A Throwback to Violence? Outline for a Process-Sociological Approach to ‘Terror’ and ‘Terrorism’.- 10.  Violence and Power: The Kaiowá and Guarani Indigenous Peoples.- 11. Analysing European Defence with Elias’s Historical Sociology (1990–2020).- Part III: Established–Outsiders Relations and Habitus Issues.- 12. Weaving Elias’s Thought with Indigenous Perspectives and Lives: Proposal for a Research Agenda.- 13. A Question of Function: Unequal Power Ratios and Asylum Seekers in Ireland.- 14. Thoughts on Describing Established and Outsider Figurations in Inner Mongolia- 15. Generational Figuration and We-Group Formation in the Palestinian West Bank since the 1970s.- 16. The Israeli National Habitus and Historiography: The Importance of Generations and State Building.- 17. The Established and The Outsiders: An Incomplete Study?.- Part IV: Conclusive Reflections.- 18. Some Political Implications of Sociology from an Eliasian Point of View.

Applies Eliasian approaches in a new way, addressing primarily contemporary problems in society Focuses on social and political issues, including violence, war, terrorism, exclusion, the environment, migration, and beyond, to extend the typical applications of Eliasian theory and methods Compares the pragmatic and sociological relevance of Elias’s approach to that of other established social scientists working in the area of contemporary social and political problems