Page 44 - Contemporary Political Sociology Globalization Politics and Power

30 Changing Definitions of Politics and Power

1.5 Cultural Politics

Although the Foucauldian analytics of power has been an important

influence on contemporary political sociology, more is needed to properly
understand how politics works today. In addition to theoretical debates
around Foucault ’ s work, contemporary political sociology has also been
influenced from three other main sources. The fi rst is the intellectual

work carried out within and on behalf of social movements. Sociologists
from the 1970s onwards have been active participants in movements,
especially in feminism and anti - racism, and have therefore been directly
called on to think about politics in new ways (see Eyerman and Jamison,
1991 ). We will explore the politics of social movements more fully in
chapter 3 , and how they have been translated into struggles over defi ni-
tions of citizenship rights and identities in chapter 4 . The second infl u-
ence, itself related both to the signifi cance of Foucault ’ s work and to that
of social movements, was the rise of the “ anti - disciplinary ” discipline of
cultural studies. The story of the relationship between cultural studies
and sociology is long and complex, and I do not have space to do it
justice here (see Denzin, 1992 ; Hall and du Gay, 1996 ; Long, 1997 ;
Oswell, 2006 ). Perhaps the chief effect cultural studies has had on soci-
ologists is to renew interest in the importance of symbolic meanings in
social life. This interest has a long history in sociology (from Weber and
Durkheim through to phenomenology and ethnomethodology), but it has
always been somewhat marginalized in the macro - theorizing of society
which has dominated the discipline, and especially the sub - discipline of
political sociology. In this respect, contemporary political sociology is
closely linked to the “ cultural turn ” that is still ongoing in sociology.
Thirdly, and more recently, given how the prominence of the state has
been called into question in globalization, sociologists working on this
topic have also had to rethink power and politics. We look at globaliza-
tion more fully in chapter 2 . Here we consider Manuel Castells ’ s theori-
zation of power and politics, which draws on, but goes beyond Foucault ’ s
infl uential “ analytics of power. ”
There are two main ways of understanding “ culture ” currently in the
social sciences. According to one version, the “ epistemological variant, ”
culture is implicated in all social practices because, as human beings, we
have access to reality, we know it and manipulate it, only through social

classifications. This variant has been very much infl uenced by Foucault ’ s

theory of discourse. Culture is “ constitutive ” ; it is not reflective or expres-
sive of other social practices; it is not determined by them, nor can it be