The aim of the course is to highlight importance of historical currents of philosophical and social thought for contemporary sociological paradigms. While some thinkers (Charles Louis de Secondat Montequieu, Alexis de Tocqueville and others) laid foundations of their perspectives before establishment of sociology as a distinctive science, Émile Durkheim, Karl Marx and Max Weber have been considered to be founders of sociological theory and their intellectual heritage has been critically appropriated by several theoretical sociologists (Talcott Parsons, Jürgen Habermas, Jeffrey Alexander, etc.) In the framework of the course relevant theories of those thinkers will be presented who have contributed to theoretical interpretation of modern societies through the interdisciplinary perspective bordering on philosophy and political science such as Hannah Arendt, Sigmund Freud, Michel Foucault, etc.) Compulsory and optional readings can be found in MOODLE.

Lecture 1 - Introduction to the course. Thomas Kuhn and his thesis about paradigmatic character of social sciences (including sociology).

Lecture 2 - Paradigm Montesquieu (Laws about Nature and Society) I.

Lecture 3 − Paradigm Montesquieu (Laws about Nature and Society) II.

Lecture 4 − Alexis de Tocqueville and his reflection upon fading aristocratic order in Europe and an emerging democratic order in America.

Lecture 5 - Alexis de Tocqueville's views on equality, liberty and tyranny of majority in democratic order in America.

Lecture 6  −  Marx's perspective on interdependence between Christian and Jewish religion on the one hand and emancipation on the other.

Lecture 7 - Authority, classes versus status groups and typology of action through the perspective of Max Weber.   

Lecture 8 - Max Weber's approach to the role of religion and his thesis about elective affinity between protestant ethics and spirit of capitalism.

Lecture 9 - Émile Durkheim's conception of mechanical and organic solidarity and his understanding of elementary forms of religion life.   

Lecture 10 - Crucial elements of totalitarianism and the role of retroactive justice according to Hannah Arendt (Eichmann in Jerusalem).

Lecture 11 - Hannah Arendt's theory of power as communication and the role of communicative power in Habermas' theory of democracy. 

Lecture 12 - Concluding Remarks: Societies of twentieth century according to interdiciplinary theories of Jürgen Habermas and Michel Foucault.