Constructing Social Research Objects: Constructionism in Research Practice

The third volume on theoretical driven methodology in the social sciences, again edited by Håkon Leiulfsrud and Peter Sohlberg, explains how to identify sociological research objects, and the art of living theory. Theoretical concepts such as social structure, the Global South, social bonds, organisations and management are explore and developed by a broad range of authors. The methodological chapters, including critical notes on sociology and uses of statistics, the value of thought experiments in sociology, researching subjects in time and space, and an academic ’star war’ between Pierre Bourdieu and Dorothy E. Smith are indispensible for researchers and students interested in theoretical construction work in the social sciences.

Contributors are: Göran Ahrne, Michela Betta, Harriet Bjerrum Nielsen, Michael Burawoy, Raju Das, David Fasenfest, Raimund Hasse, Johs Hjellbrekke, Håkon Leiulfsrud, Emil A. R yrvik, John Scott, Peter Sohlberg, Karin Widerberg and Richard Swedberg.

Håkon Leiulfsrud, Ph.D. (1991), Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), is Professor in Sociology at NTNU. He has published his work in the field of sociology with a special interest in social inequality, class and social stratification, labour market and welfare state issues. He has been teaching sociological theory, courses in social inequality and welfare state, and research methods in Trondheim since the mid 1990s. Peter Sohlberg, Ph.D. (1997), Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU), is Professor in Philosophy of Social Science and Sociology at NTNU. He has published his work in the fields of philosophy of science, sociology and social psychology. He has been teaching social theory and philosophy of social science since the early 1990´s in Uppsala, Stockholm and Trondheim. His most recent book is Functionalist construction work in social science. The lost heritage (Routledge, 2021).