Political Sociology

Abstract

By focusing on the difference between politics and the political as well as on current trends towards post-democracy, this paper attempts an assessment of German-language contributions to contemporary political sociology. Even though the subject is still searching for its native disciplinary territory and its disciplinary boundaries, scholars in German-speaking countries have only recently begun to engage with new approaches that have arisen from science and technology studies (STS) or other fields that have pursued innovative research and theories of the political. This argument is underpinned in some detail by comparing three contributions from German-speaking sociologists to the debate on post-democracy. Given the far-reaching events and transformations in recent history that have put politics in flux and exerted strain on democracy, political sociology has appeared to be rather hesitant to veer from its established ways of thinking and explore new territory.