Understanding Modernity

Originally issued in 1988, this study sets out to rethink how modern society came into being and how it developed, using the ideas of Émile Durkheim and Max Weber as its starting points. Its central idea is that different spheres of action, the 'interpenetration' of them, drive the process.

Richard Münch first compares where Durkheim and Weber agree and where they part ways. From Durkheim he develops a new account of social order, one made up of factors that order society, keep it in motion, shape collective identity and set its goals. He also proposes a fresh theory of personality development that draws on Durkheim's notion of a dual human nature.

The book closes by examining Weber's contribution to explaining how modern social order arose. Its argument is that the distinctive traits of modern society grew out of the mutual interpenetration of cultural, political, communal and economic spheres in action.