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Introduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 July 2017

Christopher Adair-Toteff
Affiliation:
University of South Florida
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Summary

Any list of the most important sociologists is bound to include Ferdinand Tönnies. This is because he was so instrumental in developing sociology as a separate and important discipline in Germany and because his influence on sociology has been virtually worldwide. The fact that he did not hold a faculty position in sociology is irrelevant, not the least because sociology as an academic discipline had not yet been established in Germany. That it did happen around 1920 is due in large measure to Tönnies's growing reputation and increasing influence.

Tönnies's reputation rests primarily on his now famous distinction between Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. As will become clearer toward the end of this introduction, these two concepts are neither easy to comprehend nor to translate. Briefly, Gemeinschaft is the traditional, rural, organic community whereas Gesellschaft pertains more to the modern, urban, individualistic society. Tönnies's conceptual opposition has become one of the enduring contributions to sociology; people have tended to pay less attention to Tönnies because they erroneously believe that this was his only contribution. Unfortunately, this mistaken impression is not held just by laypeople; even some important sociologists have held this belief. For one important example: in 1957 Charles Loomis published his translation of Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft. In his foreword to this edition Pitirim A. Sorokin insisted that “Like many an eminent thinker Ferdinand Tönnies was a man of one central idea” (Tönnies 1988 [1957], vii). In 2001 Jose Harris and Margaret Hollis published a new translation of Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft. This volume appeared in the illustrious series Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought and Harris and Hollis, like Charles Loomis before them, believed that it was an “acknowledged classic” and that it legitimately belonged in the sociological-political canon (Tönnies 2001, xxix; 1988, xii). Both Loomis's and Harris and Hollis's opinions about Tönnies continue to be borne out, but Sorokin's claim has lost some currency. One goal of this volume is to demonstrate how important and relevant Tönnies's distinction between Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft remains, but a second goal is to show that Tönnies's importance is not just based on that “one central idea,” but that he had much of importance to say on a variety of topics, including many aspects of sociology and social theory.

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Publisher: Anthem Press
Print publication year: 2016

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