On National Socialism

The essays in this collection are the by-products of that special period of intense commitment. They reflect a single dominant theme: National Socialist Germany is seen as a tragically flawed social system but one requiring the same rigorous analysis Parsons brought to more normal and normative systems. Since virulent authoritarianism and even more virulent anti-Semitism were the dominant traits of that system as he saw it, Parsons dedicated many pages to each aspect. While he did not know the full horror of the Nazi "war against the Jews" he was able to develop a theoretical framework that continues to be a foundation stone for the analysis of national socialism.
Gerhardt's editorial labors in the Parsons archive at Harvard have yielded nothing less than a "new book" by the foremost American sociological theorist of his time. This collection of both published and unpublished writings conveys Parsons' cohesive intent. To these otherwise fugitive and neglected essays Gerhardt contributes an introductory essay of her own: in part biography, in part intellectual and social history. She discovered Parsons work on National Socialism while studying his sociology of the professions and his use of medical practice to demonstrate how social science could become an antidote for fascism and authoritarianism.
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