Social Structure

Social Structureargues for the importance of social structure to analysis within the discipline of sociology. The book provides a thorough introduction to the idea of social structure, laying out the range of difficult issues which arise in analyzing social structure. It examines the meanings of the term, the history of its usage within sociology, and looks at the more recent developments in thinking about social structure. It sketches a synoptic model for analyzing social structures, showing how its disparate elements might each be studied using a "toolkit" of approaches and conceptual resources to analyze particular aspects of social structure.

Charles Crothers is Professor of Sociology at the University of Natal, Durban.