From alienation to capability deprivation

Reconstructing a sociological concept

Bibliographic Data

ID3062161
AuthorsSpiros Ganga, Spiros Gangas (Deree the American College of Greece, Athens, Greece, corresponding author)
Year2014
Volume53
Issue1
Pages54-75
Publication date2014-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Science Information (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0539-0184 • E-ISSN: 1461-7412
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0539018413509910
OpenAlexW1964610831
LanguageEN
Citations received9
References cited75

Among sociology's normative narratives, alienation figures as one of the most captivating, influential and contested. Anchored in Hegel and Marx, the idea of alienation generated valuable theoretical and empirical tools for explanation as well as offering a normative critique of modernity. However, I argue that the concept of alienation needs to be reconstructed, suggesting that it can be renewed via Amartya Sen's idea of capability deprivation. The article seeks to accomplish the dual task of showing what capability deprivation can replace in the standard accounts of alienation and what can be productively retained. It reconstructs alienation's normative core, discussing it within the context of Sen's and Nussbaum's versions of capabilities. Having already inaugurated a novel research program in economics and political philosophy, the article proposes that the capabilities approach can contribute to improving sociological reasoning on pressing social problems and can serve as an explanatory partner to sociology's scientific tools. I argue, therefore, that the explanatory power and normative appeal of the concept of alienation has waned considerably and that whatever correct intuitions about human sociality supported it and gave it its impetus for several decades no longer continue do so

Alienation · Epistemology · Hegelianism · Modernity · Normative · Political science · Politics · Social science · Sociology · Critical Realism in Sociology · Income, Poverty, and Inequality · Law · Philosophy · Political Philosophy and Ethics

Tools

Open DOISci-Hub