Daniel Bell is perhaps the most famous sociologist of his generation. He has been hailed as the prophet of the emergence of a new society, the postindustrial society, and as one of the leading conservative critics of contemporary culture. In Daniel Bell Waters opens with an illuminating discussion of Bell's biography, his intellectual interests and associates, political affiliations and value commitments. Bell's conceptual and theoretical innovation is analysed and situated in relation to other theoretical tendencies within the field of sociological enquiry. Waters then follows Bell's intellectual trajectory from an early engagement with questions of work, the labour movement and American capitalism, through to more detailed discussions of his political extremism, the new post-industrial society and the disintegration of culture associated with postmodernism. The three books that have made Bell famous, The End of Ideology , The Coming of Post-Industrial Society and The Cultural Contradictions of Capitalism are drawn upon, as well as his lesser known works on education and social forecasting.
Waters concludes with an attempt to situate Bell, to place him within the sociological tradition and to determine his legacy. Throughout the discussion is well documented and carefully measured, Bell's arguments are presented clearly and fairly, as are the problems with his work. A thoroughly comprehensive account of a key, albeit highly controversial contemporary sociological figure.