Berkeley
Fleming
 Dean of Social Sciences
Professor, B.A., M.A. (McGill)
• Social
Theory Links
•
Social Theory Images
• Social Theory Videos
•
Research Interests
• Selected Publications
Email: bfleming@mta.ca
Office:
Avard-Dixon, Rm 225
Phone: (506) 364-2203
Research
Interests
Over the years, I have been engaged in a number of somewhat varied research
projects. Substantive topics have included landlord-tenant relations
in Montréal in the 1960s, the budworm spraying controversy in
New Brunswick in the 1980s, and post-secondary education in the Maritimes
in the 1990s. I have also published on issues relating to French second
language teaching and learning. Above all, however, I am interested in understanding
the social, intellectual, and biographical contexts of the development
of ideas, as well as the patterns of influence that particular individuals'
perspectives have had on the development of social thought. For example,
I have examined the influence of the neo-functionalist American sociologist,
Robert K. Merton, on four of his students (Lipset, Gouldner, Selznick,
and Blau), arguing that he helped them use the insights of the early-twentieth
century German sociologist Max Weber to understand the relationship
between bureaucracy and democracy in mid-twentieth century American
society. I have also written extensively on the life and work of Max
Weber himself.
My major current project is the writing of an intellectual
biography of the economic historian, Karl Polanyi (1886-1964). Polanyi's
work has had considerable influence within many social science and humanities
disciplines, particularly anthropology, sociology, economics, history,
and classics. There is also a current revival of interest in his ideas,
particularly because of their perceived significance for understanding
human struggles against market logic and globalization.
Selected Publications
 |
"Polanyi, Karl". American National Biography Online (May, 2008 update). http://www.anb.org/articles/14/14-01154.html
Fleming,
Berkeley. "Three Years in Vermont: The Writing of
Karl Polanyi's The Great Transformation."
On website of the Karl Polanyi Institute of Political Economy.
http://artsandscience.concordia.ca/polanyi/conf/pdf/Fleming.pdf
(2001)
Campbell,
Brian and Berkeley Fleming. “Access to Excellence?
The Social Background of Mount Allison Students as Compared to
Those in Four Other Universities in the Maritimes,”
in Christine Storm, ed., Liberal Education in the Small University
in Canada (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press,
1996), pp. 56-86. |
| |
|
 |
Fleming,
Berkeley and Frank Strain, “Poverty in Canada,”
About Canada (Sackville: Centre for Canadian Studies,
Mount Allison University, 1994), 4 pp..
Fleming,
Berkeley and Margaret Whitla, eds.. So You Want Your
Child to Learn French! (Ottawa: Canadian Parents
for French, 1990), xiv, 146 pp..
Fleming,
Berkeley, ed.. Beyond Anger and Longing: Community
and Development in Atlantic Canada (Sackville and
Fredericton: Centre for Canadian Studies, Mount Allison University,
and Acadiensis Press, 1988), 120 pp.. |
| |
|
 |
Fleming,
Berkeley and Thomas Goff. "Sociological Perspectives."
In Michael Rosenberg et al., eds., An Introduction to Sociology
(Toronto: Methuen Publications, 1983), pp. 23-69.
Krohn,
Roger, Berkeley Fleming, and Marilyn Manzer. The Other
Economy: The Internal Logic of Local Rental Housing
(Toronto: Peter Martin Associates, 1977), xiii, 173 pp.. |
|
