Introduction: the sociological promise of Norbert Elias

The aim of the Anthem Companion to Norbert Elias is to quarry Elias’s central model for its ongoing possibilities as a leavening agent for sociology. The very idea of an integrated theoretical model is anathema for a hyper-specialised field where a thousand flowers may bloom – but rarely cross-pollinate. The Anthem Companion demonstrate the critical vigour of Elias’s reconstruction of classical sociology as an empirically controlled orientation to the dilemmas, tensions, fears and possibilities of the changing power ratios of interdependent people. The fecundity of Elias’s legacy is rooted in his model-setting study of the civilising process. By developing and refining his central model of civilising processes Elias made significant contributions to a broad range of sociological problems including, inter alia, community studies, sport and leisure, art and artists, time, science, ageing and death, decivilising processes, ideological partisanship, nationalism, and language.