Community and Society: (GEMEINSCHAFT AND GESELLSCHAFT) [Paperback]

Ferdinand Toennies (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English, German (translation)

Product Details

• Paperback: 298 pages
• Publisher: Transaction Publishers (January 1, 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0887387500
• ISBN-13: 978-0887387500
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 5.9 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #897,131 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A classic, January 9, 2001

By 

Tomas Cvrcek "old_chig" (Central, SC, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Community and Society: (GEMEINSCHAFT AND GESELLSCHAFT) (Paperback)

This book really is a classic in its field. Written towards the end of the nineteenth century it tried to cope with the whole universe of new phenomena that the young industrial European society encountered for the first time in its history. The book was not considered too influential at first but shortly before WW1 and even more so after it, it began to grow in influence. Tonnies's greatest contribution to sociology is perhaps the distinction he makes between a large society and a small community and the difference in the substance of the relationships prevailing in one and the other. He was largely a conservative, viewing the preindustrial world in rosy colours and in this way he served as one of the ideological sources of fascism (but then, Nazis abused and misinterpreted many other authors, so this is not anything against Tonnies). Strangely enough, even the totalitarian Left found him inspiring, thus cementing the view that both the big totalitarian ideologies of the twentieth century had lots in common.