Craig Calhoun serves as the University Professor of Social Sciences at Arizona State University where he holds joint appointments in several schools, including the Schools of Politics and Global Studies, the School of Public Affairs, the School for the Future of Innovation in Society, the School of Sustainability, the School of Arts, Media and Engineering, and the Thunderbird School of Global Management. In addition to his role at Arizona State, he is also a Centennial Professor at the London School of Economics.
His newest book is Degenerations of Democracy, with Charles Taylor and Dilip Gaonkar (Harvard University Press 2022). He is also the editor, with Benjamin Fong, of The Green New Deal and the Future of Work (Columbia University Press, 2022) and, with a group of his former students, of the most widely used anthologies of Classical and Contemporary Sociological Theory (Blackwell, 4th ed, 2022).
He is the author of nine earlier books including Neither Gods nor Emperors: Students and the Struggle for Democracy in China; Critical Social Theory: Culture, History, and the Challenge of Difference; Roots of Radicalism and Does Capitalism Have a Future? (with Immanuel Wallerstein, Randall Collins, Georgi Derluguian and Michael Mann), has edited more than twenty more, and published over 150 peer-reviewed papers, articles and chapters.
Craig Calhoun is a comparative and historical sociologist, social theorist, and scholar, known for his interdisciplinary work in anthropology, communications, economics, history, international studies, political science, philosophy, and science and technology studies. His latest book, “Degenerations of Democracy,” co-authored with Charles Taylor and Dilip Gaonkar, was published by Harvard University Press in 2022. He edited “The Green New Deal and the Future of Work” with Benjamin Fong (Columbia University Press, 2022) and has collaborated with former students to create widely used anthologies covering classical and contemporary sociological theory. Calhoun has authored nine books and published over 150 peer-reviewed papers, articles, and chapters.
Dr. Calhoun’s current research focuses on contemporary transformations, and possible futures: for the political economy of the modern world-system, for universities and knowledge institutions, for democracy, and for shifting structures of social solidarity from local communities to nations, transnational relations, and the reorganization of regions. More philosophically, he is exploring the relationship between transformation and transcendence in understanding human existence itself.
Reversing the Degenerations of Democracy
Panel on Immanuel Wallerstein's Contributions to Social Science
Global Leadership in Troubled Times
Public Understanding and Use of Statistics in Relation to the Pandemic
Between State and Civil Society: Who Protects Individual Liberties and Human Dignity?
