Three prominent social thinkers discuss how modern society is undercutting its formations of class, stratum, occupations, sex roles, the nuclear family, and more. Reflexive modernization, or the way one kind of modernization undercuts and changes another, has wide ranging implications for contemporary social and cultural theory, as this provocative book demonstrates.

"Each of these essays--as well as the replies and critiques at the end of the book--is exemplary, original, and thoughtful, showing the vital state of social theory in coming to terms with the conditions of late modernity."--Choice