Between the primacy of politics and economic development : Raymond Aron's sociological conception of industrial societies
Abstract
This article presents an analysis of Raymond Aron's sociological conception of 'industrial society', with an emphasis on the idea of the 'primacy of politics'. The discussion of Aron's conceptual and empirical treatment of 'industrial society' is based on an analysis of a selection of his major works.
The author explains in what sense this is a genuinely sociological conception and to what degree it is inspired by classical political philosophy. He identifies where Aron departed from the theory of the convergence of capitalist and communist political systems and shows how Aron's conception of industrial society contradicted the central tenets of both classical and official Soviet Marxism.
In the article, Aron's conception of industrial society is examined within the context of various strands of comparative political sociology. The author asks whether different approaches than those so successfully put to use by Aron in his analyses of 20th-century societies are necessary in order to fully understand the new realities that only became visible years after Aron's death.