Routledge State, Culture and Life-Modes: The Foundations of Life-Mode Analysis (Routledge Revivals)

Product Description This title was first published in 2003. This book offers a challenging new approach to social theory, building on the concept of life-modes. Thomas Hojrup invites us to look at cultural analysis within a state perspective. He develops a mode of analysis based on principles of structural dialectics inspired by Aristotle, Leibniz, Bachelard and Hjelmslev. In doing so he offers a fresh perspective on classical theoretical problems in both the social sciences and humanities, a perspective which allows us to think beyond some of the dominant paradigms of these disciplines. The book is addressed to scholars from a variety of disciplines who are interested in new solutions to some of the fundamental theoretical problems concerning state, society and culture. Review 'Thomas Hojrup has been the most distinctive voice in Danish social science since the publication of The Forgotten People some twenty years ago. He has developed the concept of "life modes" from the work of Anders Boserup and this book is a powerful example of such analysis. This is a body of work that has been neglected in English and with which Anglophone social scientists ought to make the effort to become acquainted.' Paul Hirst, Birkbeck College, University of London, UK 'Thomas Højrup's synthesis of the traditions of historical materialism with a specifically Danish model of life-mode analysis is innovative and exciting. It promises to make an important contribution to rescuing Marxist social theory from the exile to which it has been condemned by post-1989 intellectual fashion. He is never less than challenging.' Richard Jenkins, University of Sheffield, UK ’State, Culture and Life-Modes offers an extremely ambitious and exciting new approach to social sciences and humanities. It is a fascinating and highly original book. It challenges all dominant controversies in social theory by redefining social theory as a critical practice based upon continental theory in particular Hegel, Clausewitz, Marx and Althusser. It shows how the antinomies of agent-structure, subjectivism-objectivism and state-society are unsustainable. It deserves to be read widely.’ Lars Bo Kaspersen, University of Copenhagen, Denmark