The article discusses three liberal arguments about freedom of movement: immigration as a remedy for global injustice in the distribution of opportunities, freedom of movement as an integral aspect of individual autonomy, and immigration control as implied in democratic self-determination and citizenship. The article shows how these apparently irreconcilable stances can be reconstructed as partially overlapping once we realize that liberal citizenship provides not only reasons for closure but entails a bundle of mobility rights and is open for access by migrant stakeholders.

This article studies Durkheim's views on altruism and selfishness and, therefore, on modern individualism. In contrast to Comte and Spencer, Durkheim used these concepts in his empirical work on suicide and then as intellectual tools for explaining his view on the professional and political organization required in a modern democracy. Finaly, the article examines how Durkheim's views were modified by the Durkheimian, notably with Marcel Mauss’ emphasis on interested/desinterested behaviors in gift-giving processes which are the empirical and symbolical roots of social solidarity.

In this article, I review my recent book Protestant Modernity. Weber, Secularisation and Protestantism, which reconstructs Weber's theory of secularisation and argues that this is formulated within a liberal Protestant framework. I argue that this theory is a part of his Protestant account of modernity. I also sketch some of the major issues involved in developing a Catholic account of modernity and provide some worked through examples of the sociological implications of this change of confessional presuppositions.

A major thinker and inspiring teacher, Karl Polanyi's contributions have long been influential in a variety of disciplines, notably economic sociology and economic history. Two of his innovations, substantivist economic anthropology and the “double movement thesis,” are recognized as seminal. All of the works for which he is known, however, were written late in life, when in exile, and very little is known of his Hungarian writings, virtually none of which had, until now, been translated. Despite his fame, the biographical literature on Polanyi remains modest: some studies provide invaluable insights, yet all are brief. This article attempts to make some headway in remedying these lacunae. It sketches the contours of that extraordinary historical-geographical conjuncture in which he was formed, and explores his intellectual and political engagements in the Galilei Circle and the Radical Bourgeois Party. It seeks in particular to elucidate the complex roles played by questions of nation, ethnicity and class in the life of the young Karl Polanyi.

The present article addresses the question of secularism in Greece. It discusses the prevalent modernist and civilisationist explanations of the recent crisis in state-church relations in Greece. Based on the idea that there is neither a single route to, nor a single pattern of, modernity and secularism, the article argues that the entanglement between state and church in modern Greece does not necessarily indicate either incomplete modernity or incomplete secularism. The paper emphasises both the structural weakness of the Orthodox Church in the modern Greek state and the secularisation of the church's ideology as core dimensions of the particular pattern of secularism in this country. The recent crisis is interpreted as a result of the twofold challenge of democratisation and globalisation that this historically grown pattern of secularism is facing over the last decades. Further, the article seeks to demonstrate that the nationalist stance of the Church of Greece should not be seen as persistent blind traditionalism and anti-modernism.