We are delighted to announce that on Thursday 17^th and Friday 18^th February, the distinguished political sociologist Claus Offe (Humboldt University, Berlin) will be in Warwick to deliver the Social Theory Centre’s Annual Lecture and to give a workshop on his research.   This will be jointly organised by the Centre and the Warwick Institute for Governance and Public Management.  Claus Offe is the author of numerous ground-breaking essays and books in substantive social theory, political sociology and public policy.  These include Contradictions of the Welfare State (MIT Press 1984) Disorganised Capitalism (Polity 1985) and Modernity and the State (Polity 1996).  In recent years his attention has turned to the economic, social and political dilemmas facing post-communist and new EU states.  His essays on these topics can be found in Varieties of Transition (Polity 1996) and in the volume authored with Ulrich Preuss and Jon Elster, Institutional Design in Post-Communist Societies (C.U.P. 1998).

The Social Theory Centre Annual Lecture is entitled: ‘European Perceptions of America: de Tocqueville, Weber, Adorno’.  It will take up themes introduced in his Selbstbetrachtung aus der Ferne: Tocqueville, Weber und Adorno in den Vereinigten Staaten (Frankfurt, Suhrkamp 2004).  The lecture will take place in H0.51 (Humanities Building) at 6pm.  

On Friday 18^th February Claus Offe will lead two seminars, one on The Future of the Welfare State (10.00 to 12.00); the second on The Social Dimension of EU Enlargement (13.30 to 15.30).  These will take place in A0.01, Warwick Business School Teaching Centre, Scarman Road. The Friday seminars are open to the public but booking in advance is necessary with: Jane Miller IGPM     024 7652 8199    Jane.Miller@Warwick.ac.uk or Linda Carrington IGPM    0-24 7657 5794 IGPMTEMP.IGPMtemp@wbs.ac.uk.