Talcott Parsons Today offers a reappraisal and extension of the work of the most significant and influential twentieth-century sociologist. The volume consists of original essays by prominent Parsons scholars from the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and Germany. Finally, and most important, it makes a significant contribution to the current controversy surrounding an important sociological figure. The book consists of 10 essays, nine of which are original pieces; all are written by well-known scholars who are intimately acquainted with Parsons' body of work.

The most influential sociologist to have emerged in the United States, Talcott Parsons developed a distinctive theoretical synthesis which drew on Weber, Smobart, Durkheim and Marx. He was the moving spirit behind the interdisciplinary Department of Social Relations at Harvard, and he became a central figure in the development of the social sciences in post-war America. Interest in his theories is now reviving, after a period of neglect, and Bruce C. Wearne's study will help a generation of scholars to reassess his work. Drawing on unpublished papers, Wearne describes Parson's religious background and his education and traces the impact of German and other social theory on his development as a scholar. The book concludes with a thorough and fresh reading of his classic work, The Social System.