Böcker av Franco Ferrarotti

We live in a time of high Church membership, but low Church attendance. Franco Ferrarotti, arguably the most important sociologist of religion alive, captures the source of this paradox In the title of his new book, Faith without Dogma. For it is belief that propels membership, while the absence of dogma results in a reticence to accept hierarchical direction from above or beyond.Basing much of his analysis on the postwar struggles within Roman Catholicism, Ferrarotti views the demand for religious renewal and revival as part and parcel of the emergence of broad social agendas--agendas to which not even the Roman curia could remain impervious. The former easy relationships between Church and State, especially authoritarian states in Europe and Latin America, gave way to a critical defense of individual rights within a context of a broadened vision of Christian doctrine.In addition to issues Involved in internal affairs of religion, Ferrarotti explores a series of developments that have changed for all time the nature of Church survival. The critical element, one that goes beyond specific doctrinal accommodations, is the new primary connection of Church to people rather than Church to State. This came about through the widespread acceptance of science and technology as frames of intellectual reference, the emergence of secularization as mediating religious claims and the creation from the Enlightenment to the Postmodern eras of "civil religions."The volume concludes with a set of chapters on the nature of sacred events and objects, the emergence of new varieties of prayer, and concludes with a chapter on the relationship of ideology to theology prepared especially for the English language edition of Faith without Dogma. This is a book likely to attract a broad audience among religionists and culturologists, as well as social scientists.

Including time as a factor in sociological analysis is the only way to reintroduce the dynamic moment of social reality as a mental construct into an analytical process otherwise reified by the limits of quantitative methods.

With the advent of a new millenium little more than a decade away, Professor Ferrarotti has written a unique collection of futurological scenarios that stresses the importance of both the historical and a muti-disciplinary approach.

Franco Ferrarotti's essays are of special interest to social scientists working in social theory and cultural sociology. His insights are far-reaching and applicable to those studying the areas of religion, immigration, violence, and social movements.

Franco Ferrarotti turns his considerable erudition and insight to issues of theory and method in the human sciences, arguing that sociological investigations have been limited by their preoccupation with quantitative methods of investigation. Crucial social problems, from drug addiction to terrorism, can best be addressed by rediscovering autobiographical materials and the value of the individual. Ferrarotti hopes to lead sociologists away from overly reductionistic, technical measurement of their subjects_an approach that has increasingly been problematized by the natural sciences_toward an examination of the domain of lived experience using methods that are both interpretive and historical.

This text examines how many, in the waning years of the 20th century, are attempting to forget or reinvent history to serve the purposes of ethnic, racial, or religious separation. It focuses on anti-Semitism and its re-emergence among the "Skinheads" of the 1980s.

Franco Ferrarotti here offers a provocative look at the future of a world dominated by mass media--particularly television.

Franco Ferrarotti examines the ways in which we have come to cope with the problems unforeseen by the early idealists of the industrial age. While many writers have dealt with specific aspects of the modern industrial age, Ferrarotti faces squarely the general problem of the social and political impact of technologically based life.