The Actuality of Karl Mannheim

Karl Mannheim is a central figure of Weimar sociology. Best known for Ideology and Utopia, his work bridges major philosophical traditions (neo-Kantianism, hermeneutics, phenomenology) and classical sociology in a compelling diagnosis of his times. The sociology of knowledge he develops there is at once a political sociology of the “intellectual situation,” a cultural sociology of worldviews drawn directly from Wilhelm Dilthey, and a sociology of conflict indebted to Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Georg Simmel.

In this session, we wish to continue the work that David Kettler and Volker Meja carried out within RC 16 and to reflect on the actuality of Mannheim's sociology of culture and knowledge as a comprehensive framework for understanding the present. We welcome papers on the intellectual currents of his time, his relation to the Frankfurt School, his general sociology, his analyses of worldviews, generations and gender, and his later writings on militant democracy and planning.

Session Organizer:

Frederic VANDENBERGHE, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, fredericvdbrio@gmail.com

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