Fuyuki Kurasawa

To invite sociologists to engage with the media at this particular moment hardly appears propitious. A proliferation of populist nationalisms and religious fundamentalisms is emboldening politicians and celebrities – categories that seem increasingly blurred in our infotainment era – to openly profess hostility towards or ignorance of any type of expertise. Sociologists may confront political animus or popular indifference, for we reveal inconvenient...

Given Ulrich Beck’s unrelenting commitment to cosmopolitanism – something that he not only theorized, but lived and deeply felt – perhaps it is appropriate that a commemorative article about his role in North American sociology should be written by a Japanese-French-Canadian sociologist. While I had long been familiar with Beck’s work, I first met him when he visited Toronto in the mid-2000s. I vividly remember his fascination with...