Cited by 929Critical Realism in SociologyPhilosophical Ethics and TheoryContemporary Sociological Theory and Practice

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Why Things Matter to People: Social Science, Values and Ethical Life

Sayer, Andrew·2011·Cambridge University Press eBooks

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Abstract

Andrew Sayer undertakes a fundamental critique of social science's difficulties in acknowledging that people's relation to the world is one of concern. As sentient beings, capable of flourishing and suffering, and particularly vulnerable to how others treat us, our view of the world is substantially evaluative. Yet modernist ways of thinking encourage the common but extraordinary belief that values are beyond reason, and merely subjective or matters of convention, with little or nothing to do with the kind of beings people are, the quality of their social relations, their material circumstances or well-being. The author shows how social theory and philosophy need to change to reflect the complexity of everyday ethical concerns and the importance people attach to dignity. He argues for a robustly critical social science that explains and evaluates social life from the standpoint of human flourishing.

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Table of contents
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.toc
Acknowledgments
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.ack
Intellectuals and nation-building
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c3
Prelim pages
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.prelim
Serbia
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c4
List of references
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.refs
The post-Yugoslav context
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c2
Conclusion
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c8
Index
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.index
Bosnia and Herzegovina
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c6
Introduction
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c1
Croatia’s accession into the European Union in 2013
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.c5
The moral economy of solidarity: A study of the 2017 hunger strike in Mauritius
Sambajee, P. (2024) · Economic and Industrial Democracy · doi:10.1177/0143831x241306210
“…and capitalist processes are socially constructed, Sayer (2000a, 2007, 2011) embedded moral values within the normative aspect, using the concept of lay morality , which is the ability to morally evaluate and understand how people should treat others and be treated by them (Sayer, 2000a, 2011).”
Unlivably Accelerated Work: How Neoliberal Capitalist Temporalities Produce Labour Precarity
Hincapié, L. R. (2025) · Las Torres de Lucca International Journal of Political Philosophy · doi:10.5209/ltdl.95882
Conclusion: A Social Perspective on Moral Agency
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_10
Jonathan Haidt: Social Intuitionism and Moral Foundations Theory
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_9
George Herbert Mead: Morality from the Perspective of the Act, Self, and Experience
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_3
Seyla Benhabib: Interactive Universalism, the Concrete Other, and Discourse Ethics
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_7
Introduction
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_1
Kwame Anthony Appiah: Ethics, Identity, and Idealization
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_8
Alasdair MacIntyre: Virtue, Practices, Identity, and Traditions
Abbott, O. (2024) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-75181-3_5
Too many hats: The challenges of opening up funding agencies to ethical stakeholder participation
Schürz, S., & Fetting, C. (2025) · Open Research Europe · doi:10.12688/openreseurope.18761.1
A World of Values
Vittersø, J. (2025) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-69292-5_1 · Cited by 1
Conclusion: Dignity and Its Outsiders
Marks, S. (2025) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781009543262.007
Introduction
Marks, S. (2025) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781009543262.002
Marxismus vor der postkolonialen Herausforderung. Historischer Materialismus und Racial Capitalism
Lindner, K. (2025) · PERIPHERIE – Politik • Ökonomie • Kultur · doi:10.3224/peripherie.v44i3.04
Leveraging Large Language Models to Identify the Values Behind Arguments
Senthilkumar, R. A., Homayounirad, A., & Siebert, L. C. (2025) · Lecture notes in computer science · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-85463-7_6
An Outsider Looking In
Sayer, A. (2025) · doi:10.1093/9780191790355.003.0026
Self-citation
Historia doktryn politycznych i prawnych. Refleksja fronetyczna
Barwicka-Tylek, I. (2025) · Krakowskie Studia z Historii Państwa i Prawa · doi:10.4467/20844131ks.24.038.21022
Wertfreiheit und emanzipatorische Sozialwissenschaft
Ziegler, H. (2025) · Bildung und Gesellschaft · doi:10.1007/978-3-658-38943-7_4
Philosophical Foundations: Critical Realism
Elsehrawy, R., & Kumar, B. (2025) · doi:10.1680/978-1-83662-234-520251008
Methodology: Data-driven Multimethod Methodology [DM2]
Elsehrawy, R., & Kumar, B. (2025) · doi:10.1680/978-1-83662-234-520251009
Economic Value, Social Values and the Firm: Towards a Heuristic Framework
Edwards, P. K., Ram, M., & McCarthy, I. (2025) · Ethnic and Indigenous Business Studies. · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-84290-0_8
Einleitung: Subjektiver Journalismus als Gegenstand der Journalistik
Brinkmann, J. (2025) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-658-47012-8_2
Ethics and Social Welfare the Journal: Past, Present and Future
Clifford, D. (2025) · Ethics and Social Welfare · doi:10.1080/17496535.2025.2511437
Bioetiske komiteer og etiske eksperter: et normativt fundament
Christensen, E. (2025) · Norsk filosofisk tidsskrift · doi:10.18261/nft.60.1-2.3
List of references
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.lor
Index
(2020) · Discourse approaches to politics, society and culture · doi:10.1075/dapsac.88.index-group
Der Capabilities Ansatz im Kontext von Sozialpolitik
Ziegler, H. (2025) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-658-38616-0_87-1
Mapping key issues and useful theory to address remaining ethical, practical and political challenges in participatory research in health
Vincent, R., Harris, J., Loewenson, R. H., van der Westhuizen, H., Black, G. F., Wong, G., & Molyneux, S. C. (2025) · Wellcome Open Research · doi:10.12688/wellcomeopenres.24114.1
“…thought, including the recognition that ways of knowing and scientific enquiry process are always socially constructed, while retaining an interest in developing broadly generalisable insights and understandings about social life and some of the consistent causal processes that shape it 34,82 .”
Influential
From worker representation to the representation of work: Mobilisation, contestation and struggle over employee contribution during the pandemic in the United Kingdom
McBride, J., & Lucio, M. M. (2025) · Journal of Industrial Relations · doi:10.1177/00221856251334189
“There is a broad stream of academic study that has increasingly focused on the actual value of work in the sense of how it is perceived and/or appreciated – and the importance of valuing the person engaged with the tasks and job (Sayer, 2009, 2011; Gomberg, 2007).”
Introduction
Cattell, V., & Stansfeld, S. A. (2025) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-96582-1_1
Lower Grades and Social Relations
Cattell, V., & Stansfeld, S. A. (2025) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-96582-1_2
Theoretical Lens and Method
Yan, Z. (2025) · Springer eBooks · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-96794-8_2
Values, worldviews and historicity. Revisiting Weber’s theory of values
Croce, R. (2025) · Philosophy & Social Criticism · doi:10.1177/01914537251377680
A Sketch of a Pragmatist Account of the Relational Constitution and Enactment of Moral Agency
Abbott, O. (2025) · Palgrave Studies in Relational Sociology · doi:10.1007/978-3-031-93941-9_11
Creative pedagogic methods for self-guided embodied thinking and learning about animal research
Roe, E. J., Bailey, S. J., Mackenzie, L., et al. (2025) · Wellcome Open Research · doi:10.12688/wellcomeopenres.24930.1
“( Law, 2004:2) Law’s work emphasizes a re-conceptualising of how we understand human thought and action across the social sciences, as not wholly rational, but as affected by feelings, materialities and cultural context; his thinking in many respects is echoed later by Sayer (2011).”
37Chapter 3 Nurturing Lifestances: Levelling the Garden for Everyone
Cragun, R. T., Salonen, A. S., & Stephenson, K. (2025) · De Gruyter eBooks · doi:10.1515/9783111713649-003
Beyond Labor Mismatch: Moral Economies of Worth among Undocumented Filipino Workers
Basilio, J. L. (2025) · Social Currents · doi:10.1177/23294965251396076
“As morally evaluative beings, they assess their own behaviors and those of others, and make decisions based on these judgments (Hitlin and Vaisey 2013; Sayer 2011).”
Finance as Ideology: The Normative and Performativity Structure of Financial Economics
Krištofík, P. (2025) · Ekonomické rozhľady – Economic Review · doi:10.53465/er.2644-7185.2025.3.164-176
Introduction: The Possibilities of a Racially just Society, Towards Concrete Utopias
Goodwyn, A., Tsegay, S. M., & Majid, N. (2025) · Emerald Group Publishing Limited eBooks · doi:10.1108/978-1-83662-264-220251001
Doing Critical Realist Research: An Innovative Methodology for Organizational Studies
Danaeefard, H., Ardelan, O., & Danaeefard, M. K. (2025) · International Journal of Qualitative Methods · doi:10.1177/16094069251369309
“This step illustrates CR methodological pluralism by combining qualitative and quantitative methods to build patterns and investigate underlying causes, thus making possible an all-round organizational phenomenon analysis (Sayer, 2011; Zachariadis et al., 2013).”
The Poverty of Ethics
Clifford, D. (2025) · Ethics and Social Welfare · doi:10.1080/17496535.2026.2603084
Comics Is as Comics Does
Woo, B., & EARLE, H. E. H. (2025) · Palgrave studies in comics and graphic novels · doi:10.1007/978-3-032-09948-8_9
Empiricism in Interpretivist Sociolinguistics
Bouchard, J. (2026) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781009572859.007
What Makes Academic Writing Human(e)
Molinari, J. (2026) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781009572859.006
Introduction
Bouchard, J., & Zotzmann, K. (2026) · Cambridge University Press eBooks · doi:10.1017/9781009572859.001
Enhancing Career Studies with Realist Social Theory
Kozhevnikov, A., Mayrhofer, W., & Chudzikowski, K. (2026) · Work Employment and Society · doi:10.1177/09500170251408620
“…of RST draw upon established insights and more recent developments in career studies and cognate disciplines, in particular debates about temporality (Mayrhofer and Gunz, 2022), relational views (O’Mahoney, 2007; Schneidhofer et al., 2020) and research impact and actionability (Sayer, 2011).”
Influential
Causal Mechanisms and Emancipatory Interests: Critical Realism’s Transcendence of Binary Oppositions in Social Sciences
裴, 淏. (2026) · Advances in Philosophy · doi:10.12677/acpp.2026.152082
The Moral Economy of Untasted Food: Javanese Ingkung as Culinary Ethics and Sacred Ecology
Muaddab, H., & Nafisah, K. (2026) · Food Ethics · doi:10.1007/s41055-026-00211-6
“This interpretation aligns with Sayer’s concept of lay morality, which holds that economic practices are shaped by normative evaluations arising from everyday needs, commitments, and social relationships (Sayer 2004, 2005, 2011, 2015, 2020).”
Processes of integrating care: discussing sociological and Gestalt relational perspectives
Clark, M., Chidiac, M., & Denham‐Vaughan, S. (2026) · Journal of Integrated Care · doi:10.1108/jica-09-2025-0081
Suicide and the survivable prison
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0005
Aristotle’s Prison: Excess, deficit, and the masterpiece of penal order
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0009
Becoming a Thou in Frankland prison
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0007
Becoming a person and being alive: Discovering the I in I-Thou relations
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0008
Tables
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.002.0010
Key research projects with selected publications
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.005.0002
Preface
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.002.0005
The original moral quality dimensions values identified by prisoners with definitions (where developed), items, and main revisions
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.005.0001
Prisons, human vibrations, and the case for moral social scholarship
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0002
Abbreviations
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.002.0007
Epilogue
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0012
Person-centred social science, ethnography-led measurement, and intellectual craftsmanship
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0003
Creating anger in an I-It prison
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0006
What’s at stake? Prisons, punishment, and excessive suffering
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.003.0011
Figures
Liebling, A. (2026) · Oxford University Press eBooks · doi:10.1093/9780198992622.002.0009
Situated responsibility in interdisciplinary research ethics: Comparative perspectives from Moldova, Japan and France
Caracentev, S., & Roșca, D. (2026) · Research Ethics · doi:10.1177/17470161261427335
“We also integrate the idea that reasoning is shaped by embodied experiences and local, context-specific knowledge (Sayer, 2011), informing what actors perceive as meaningful.”
Leading Through Collective Wisdom: Integrating Hermeneutical Ethics in Humanistic Management
Huijser, D., & Nullens, P. (2026) · Humanistic Management Journal · doi:10.1007/s41463-026-00218-5 · Cited by 1
‘We are the backbone of the community’: Precarious multiple employment and the complex dynamics of dignity in, out and between work
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Is sociology a moral science?
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Processus de legitimation d'une entreprise familiale au service d'une innovation radicale
Zegwaard, E. C. (2017) · doi:10.70675/93c416e0z8101z4071z9ca9zcbd31b93add3
“(A Sayer, 2011).”
Background
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Vartan bhanji (Gift Exchange) as Social Capital in Punjabi Village : tradition in Transition
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Le sens au travail à l'épreuve des paradoxes
Boudaouine, H., Loose, F., & Loubès, A. (2026) · doi:10.3917/ems.loube.2026.01.0085
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“…ontological work across time, placing works in dialogue to enact what Levitas (2013) describes as processual ontology of becoming: the condition, as Sayer (2011) argues, of living suspended between present actuality and future possibility, where our sense of who we are remains inseparable from our…”
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Authors: Sayer, A.
Affiliations: Lancaster University (GB)
Corresponding author: Sayer, Andrew
ORCID: Sayer, Andrew
Venue: Cambridge University Press eBooks
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: 2011-01-20
DOI: 10.1017/cbo9780511734779
OpenAlex: W3188963984
Cited by: 929
References: 0
Citations by year: 2026: 73 · 2025: 72 · 2024: 69 · 2023: 74 · 2022: 55 · 2021: 59 · 2020: 84 · 2019: 60 · 2018: 65 · 2017: 63 · 2016: 76 · 2015: 66 · 2014: 36 · 2013: 49 · 2012: 22
FWCI: 44.69
Type: book
Language: en
Open access: closed
Licence: www.cambridge.org/core/terms (unspecified, 502 d)
Locations: Cambridge University Press eBooks (publishedVersion)
Topics: Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Critical Realism in Sociology
Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › Philosophy › Philosophical Ethics and Theory
Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice
Keywords: concern, values, critique of modernism, eudaimonia, human dignity, everyday ethics, social theory, philosophy of social science, well-being, interpersonal relationships, critique of social science

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Why Things Matter to People: Social Science, Values and Ethical Life

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