Politics of Mass Society / Edition 1

by William Kornhauser

Overview

The Politics of Mass Society explores the social conditions necessary for democracy and the vulnerabilities of large scale society to totalitarian systems. Mass movements mobilize people who are alienated from the social system, who do not believe in the legitimacy of the established order, and who are therefore ready to engage in efforts to destroy. Contrary to the psychological approach prevalent in European doctrines of mass movements, Kornhauser persuasively argues that social order is the critical factor. The greatest number of people available to mass movements are located in those segments of society that have the fewest ties to social order.The book draws on a wide range of materials - from classical political theory contemporary sociological analysis, historical and intuitional studies, public opinion surveys, and other published and unpublished data. Kornhauser selected political phenomena in organizations, communities, classes, and whole societies. He examined support for communism and fascism in a variety of countries in relation to rates of urbanization and, industrialization, employment, suicide and homicide, among other phenomena. In his new introduction, Irving Louis Horowitz identifies Kornhauser's book as a seminal work of the great tradition in political sociology at mid-twentieth century.Kornhauser points out that modern democratic systems possess a distinct vulnerability to mass movements. He spells out and identifies factors that tend to increase or decrease this vulnerability - not least the health and strength of elites. In this way, the book reveals new clues to the origins and nature of mass political movements. The Politics of Mass Society remains the most complete analytical account of the sociological approach to mass society in advanced industrial societies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780415605410
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	10/19/2010
Series:	International Library of Sociology
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	256
Product dimensions:	5.44(w) x 8.50(h) x (d)

About the Author

William Kornhauser was educated at the University of Chicago, taught early in his career at Columbia University, and spent most of his academic life at the University of California in Berkeley from 1953 until his death in 1994. He also authored many articles and a work in 1962 on scientists in industry. Irving Louis Horowitz, who wrote the new introduction, is Hannah Arendt University Professor Emeritus at Rutgers University.

Table of Contents

Part I Theory of Mass Society; Chapter 1 Two Views of Mass Society; Chapter 2 Conditions of Mass Society; Chapter 3 Structure of Mass Society; Chapter 4 Culture and Personality in Mass Society; Part II Social Sources Of Mass Movements; Chapter 5 Political Vulnerability of Mass Society; Chapter 6 Discontinuities in Authority; Chapter 7 Discontinuities in Community; Chapter 8 Discontinuities in Society; Part III Social Composition of Mass Movements; Chapter 9 Social Classes and Mass Movements; Chapter 10 Unattached Intellectuals; Chapter 11 Marginal Middle Classes; Chapter 12 Isolated Workers; Part IV Conclusion; Chapter 13 Mass Society and Democratic Order;