Public Sociologies Reader (review)

Public Sociologies Reader marks a turning point in U.S. sociology, a moment of lively reflexivity about how we should define the boundaries of our discipline, how we should engage with diverse publics, and what we should be doing in the classroom. To accentuate the question of boundaries, this lively volume includes colorful work from more than just sociologists, but public educators and activists, and more than straight scholarship but also poetry and photographs of public art, public protest and public meetings.

The most comprehensive chapter is from Mr. Public Sociology himself, Michael Burawoy. Here, he advocates for a public sociology of human rights through an argument that links historical shifts in the global political economy with those in the discipline. The first wave of marketization invokes Karl Polanyi's notion of the free-wheeling early 19^th century market in England, which sparked both a "countermovement by society for its self-protection"(7) and the birth of sociology as utopian and reflecting the ills and demands of labor. The second wave of state-dominated markets in the early to mid-20^th century generated a policy sociology focused on social rights. Today, neoliberalism has wrought many disasters but has also been the nurturing ground for a public sociology steeped in a human-rights consciousness. Burawoy argues that this wave of public sociology works for a "common language through which we can recognize common experiences at different ends of the world order."(13)

In calling for U.S. sociology to be more reflexive, more historical, more actively engaged in the struggles of the people who cannot typically afford our public universities, the authors of this fine collection are asking us to rethink our work. But what does it mean to extend our dreams and desires outward to other countries, and how can we engage in these practices without reproducing the colonial/imperial practices of many other global projects originating from U.S. professional classes?

As Barbara Risman argues in her chapter "Feminist Strategies for Public Sociology," feminist sociologists have always been public sociologists as they have had always to reach beyond the discipline in terms of their strong moral beliefs about social justice, intellectual teachers, methodologies and audiences. In an effort to pin down the normative order of this latest effort, she asks if it is necessary to support and fight for social justice in order to be a public sociologist. I think the authors here would say "absolutely," but they are silent on the repercussions of such a response.

Some authors suggest that public sociology is fundamentally a translation project to an American public that believes what Charles A. Gallagher calls "white liberalism," that Americans deliver democracy and freedom abroad and at home live in a class-less and post-racist/sexist society brimming with equal opportunity. Implicit in Gallagher's insightful chapter on these "illusions of inclusion" is the question of why haven't sociologists been able to disabuse the majority public of these misconceptions.

Other significant contributions include research on the persistent public confusion in the social security debate (Deana Rohlinger and Jill Quadagno), the neoliberalization of international health organizations working in Latin America (Antonio Ugalde and Nuria Homedes), and the case against sweatshop labor (Robert Pollin). One of the book's highlights is the excellent discussion of teaching public sociologies by Angela Hattery and Earl Smith. They invoke C. Wright Mills in arguing that students need more than information, they need to become active participants in a democratic society through a quality of mind that will help them use the information.

The book's emphasis is on how we can transform teaching, learning and research, and less on the fractured history of our discipline in the world, especially its U.S. centrism. Questions to ask of this public-sociology movement include: How do sociologists from outside of the United States judge the role of American sociology's effects on their life worlds? How can we learn more from those worlds of...