Ulrich Beck's legacy

Abstract

This article presents the core ideas of Ulrich Beck and his legacy is evaluated. The first part introduces the most widely known concepts, disseminated in the national and international contexts, centered on the works from the period following the publication of his book "Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity". The quest for transforming sociology, both theoretically and methodologically, was a central drive in the approach proposed by Beck, questioning the zombie concepts permeating the area. From social theory, Beck started to significantly influence other areas within the discipline, highlighting environmental sociology and risk theories. The second part presents more recent works, focusing on the cosmopolitanization concept. This is not part of a normative proposal, but rather an analytical one of a process that has seized our contemporary world, largely independently of our intentions. Reading this part of his work is highly relevant to understand both the intellectual and political challenges permeating the complex metamorphoses of our time. The axle of the final part is his last research into climate change and how Beck and his team were facing the need of empirically translating the richness of the sociologist's ideas and insights. Fundamentally, the aim of this article is to highlight how his legacy opens innumerable and creative possibilities of recreating the social sciences field.

The Critical Theory of World Risk Society: A Retrospective Analysis

“…In many respects, he was a social problem focused thinker. Indeed, the last major research project led by Beck involved researchers from different disciplines gauging the impacts of climate change in different parts of the globe and exploring the possibilities of new methodological tools of analysis (Guivant, 2016). Those inspired by him have been encouraged to approach social problems with tenacity and creativity.…”

Ulrich Beck: E-Special Introduction

“…In as much as 'cosmopolitanism' is expressive of an ideal, the process of 'cosmopolitization' was, for Beck, pervasively manifesting itself in everyday choices, actions and practices. Advancing the 'cosmopolitan turn' (Beck and Grande, 2010), he continued to move along the methodological tracks, promoting new modes of inquiry and urging international interdisciplinary co-operation between academics (see Guivant, 2016;Wieviorka, 2016). As explicated in the article by Beck published in the journal in 2016, he was curious to both plot and explore 'varieties of modernity' in different parts of the globe.…”

Transformational Communities: A Programmatic Ambivalence as a Learning Path for the Cognitive Planet

“…Class, as a category of social change, is replaced by these new social and political actors, who do have the possibility of challenging the dominant structures while organizing around everyday issues (feminism, environmentalism, anti-war, anti-nuclear, etc.)." (Guivant, 2006) Therefore, a top-down agenda must be linked and connected with a bottom-up agenda: certainly, in a Programmatic Ambivalence. The connection between the Anthropocene and the Programmatic Ambivalence origins in a Lobby of People and its circulating structures which enable new planetary coping processes.…”