Civil Sphere Theory ~ Related Publications and Events

Solidarity, Justice, and Incorporation: Thinking through The Civil Sphere ~ Cambridge University Press, 2015

Edited by Peter Kivisto & Giuseppe Sciortino

This book seeks to reengage Jeffrey C. Alexander’s The Civil Sphere several years after its initial appearance. It does so at a moment when Alexander has extended and applied his framework to events that have occurred since 2006, specifically the election of Barack Obama, the Arab Spring, and the Occupy movement. The book begins with the a lengthy chapter by the editors that provides an overview of Alexander’s understanding of the civil sphere and the various components crucial to its functioning, particularly the role of public opinion and social movements. How solidarity is achieved in highly differentiated societies is the central concern of the book, and related to it how multicultural incorporation can serve to achieve unity in diversity in a way that advances the cause of justice. It then turns to six eminent international scholars who comment on the book now that the intellectual dust has settled from its initial reception: Robert N. Bellah, Axel Honneth, Bryan S. Turner, Mario Diani, Chad Alan Goldberg, and Farhad Khosrokhavar. Alexander’s rejoinder is intended to both respond to the commentators and to further clarify and develop his thesis.

Cultural Sociology: Special Issue - Civil Sphere Theory (Volume 17 Issue 1, March 2023)

From Author to Network: The Coming of Age of Civil Sphere Theory
Peter Kivisto and Giuseppe Sciortino

Presidential versus Civil Power: Public Opinion, Second-Wave Feminism, and Party Politics in the USA 
Willa Sachs and Jeffrey C Alexander

Struggles for Horizontal Identification: Muslims, Jews, and the Civil Sphere in Germany 
Elisabeth Becker

The Civil Sphere and Social Class
Celso M. Villegas

Performative Feelings for Others: The Civil Repair of Organised Competitive Sports 
Trygve B. Broch

Interstitial Institutions 
Liv Egholm

Encountering the Civil Sphere Through Cinema: The Cinematic Gap as a Pathway to Civil Evaluation and Repair
Jessie Dong

‘Our (Civil) Way of Life’: The Folkloric Civil Sphere 
Hizky Shoham

Philosophy and Society: Special Issue ~ Resilience and/or Vulnerability of the Civil Sphere (Volume 36 Issue 1, 2025)

Edited by  CCS Faculty Fellow Bernadette Nadya Jaworsky, CCS Faculty Fellow Elisabeth Becker, and Milica Resanović.

From the Introduction to the special issue: “This special issue arose out of a conference hosted at Heidelberg Univer­sity “The Civil Sphere: Global Perspectives on Culture and Politics,” from Oc­tober 18-19, 2023. The conference united scholars working in the field of cul­tural sociology from across the globe, with the shared goal of engaging with and further developing Civil Sphere Theory, considering its global dimensions, in particular. While the conference provided an intellectual opportunity for scholars across neighboring disciplines to employ cultural sociological theory and methods in order to speak to key sociopolitical shifts, including contem­porary refugee and migration waves, global environmental degradation, en­during racism, and political waves of populism, we have since entered into a time of notably increased democratic crisis. We believe that the contributions in this special issue, both as individual papers and as a whole, are therefore more relevant than ever–both in and beyond the academy.”