Norbert Elias

Norbert Elias (born June 22, 1897, Breslau, Ger. [now Wrocław, Pol.]—died Aug. 1, 1990, Amsterdam, Neth.) was a sociologist who described the growth of civilization in western Europe as a complex evolutionary process, most notably in his principal work, Über den Prozess der Zivilisation (1939; The Civilizing Process: The History of Manners).

Elias studied medicine, philosophy, and sociology and taught at the universities of Heidelberg (1924–29) and Frankfurt (1930–33). With the rise of Nazism, however, he fled to France, and in 1935 he settled in England, where he remained until 1975.

Über den Prozess der Zivilisation is a detailed study that examines the gradual development of a generally accepted code of manners and social conduct and the attendant growth of structured states in which rulers centralized the legitimate use of violence. The book attracted little attention when it was first published (in Switzerland), and Elias returned to teaching at the University of Leicester (1954–62) and at the University of Ghana (1962–64). His magnum opus was successfully reissued in 1969. Among his other works are The Established and the Outsiders (1965), Die Gesellschaft der Individuen (1987; The Society of Individuals), and Studien über die Deutschen (1989; “Studies of the Germans”).