Discourse and Civil Repair

Aclio11 a11d Its E11viro111ne11ls: To111ards a New Sy11the.ris(1988), and Fi11 de siecle Social Theory: Refalivis111 1 Re-d11ctio11, a11d the Proble111 of Reaso11 (1995) arc essential to understanding contemporary theoretical debates within sociology.Alexander's cultural sociology has had a great impact.J Tis call for the autonomous sta tus of culture in sociological analysis has been quite influential, as sociologists are theorizing culture in new and necessary ways.In his new book, Alexander develops a theory of the civil sphere emphasizing the role of culture in shaping the structures of our political life.Alexander was invited as the 2002 l"all Distinguished Author in Social Theory by the Committee on ocial Theory at the University of Kentucky.During his visit, Alexander delivered two talks entitled "Theorizing the Possibilities of Justice: The Split Life of the Civil phere" and "Civil ociety and the American Civil Rights Movement."Afterwards, disCloS11re had the opportunity to discuss these talks and his new manuscript with him.disClosure: You arc just now completing a book on civil society.Could you discuss the origins of this project and situate your argu ment within recent studies of civil society?Jeffrey Alexander: T his book comes out of the experiences 1 had in the 1980's.I laving come back from China in 1989, I realized there was a small body of literature that was developing about civil society and that there had been a transformation of Marxism into a kind of radical democratic theory.