Loïc Wacquant and Norbert Elias: advanced marginality and the theory of the de-civilising Process

John Rodger takes up Wacquant's concept of ‘advanced marginality’ arguing that this idea can be situated as a complement to Norbert Elias' well known discussion of ‘civilising processes’. Rodger argues that a weakness in Elias' social theory is in understanding situations, including the present, in which ‘decivilising processes’ arrest and reverse the historical tendencies to liberal democracy and the decline of violence in western societies, including how states respond. The suggestion is that Wacquant's concept of the advanced marginality and the penal state can fill some important gaps in Elias' argument.