Epistemological and Methodological Challenges

Abstract

This chapter explores some of the epistemological and methodological challenges that the breakthrough of global modernity entails. It argues that the eurocentrism of much past social scientific work had some justification insofar as earlier phases of modernity themselves followed an essentially eurocentric/westcentric ordering of the modern world. Under conditions of global modernity, however, it becomes unsustainable. These conditions make the development of a global sociology that treats the world as one single, if highly diverse and fragmented, social space both desirable and possible. Such a social science will also have to overcome the legacies of methodological nationalism and replace it by what might best be called methodological globalism.