The article is an attempt to develop a synthetic conception of power based on Weber's, Parsons's and Foucault's writings. The aim is, first, to build a bridge between the so-called resource theories of power (Weber, Parsons) and the structural approach (Foucault) and, second, to do this in the form of a conception which would be usable on both macro- and micro-levels at the same time. Four theories are discussed: (1) the distributive approach (Weber); (2) the collective approach (Parsons); (3) the structural approach (Foucault); and (4) the neostructuralist approach (this article). It is argued that these approaches can be ordered on a scale on which the complexity of analysis increases as one moves from (1) to (4), and that the selection of an appropriate level of analysis in an empirical study is a practical issue relative to the aim of the study. The types of analyses characteristic of the more complex levels are illustrated by a discussion of the problem posed by Big Case Comparison in historical sociology (level 3) and everyday conversation (level 4), including comments on phenomenological sociology and conversation analysis.

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Phenomenological sociology was founded at the beginning of 1930s by Alfred Schutz. His mundane phenomenology sought to combine impulses drawn from Husserl's transcendental phenomenology and Weber's action theory. It was made famous at the turn of 1960s and 1970s by Garfinkel's ethnomethodology and Berger & Luckmann's social constructionism. This paper deals with the notable accomplishments of Schutz and his followers and then proceeds to a shared shortcoming, which is that the phenomenological approach is unable to understand meaning in any other way but as actors's knowledge. Therefore, phenomenological sociologists are forced to describe the actor's interpretations of meaning as transparent to the actor him/herself, even if they sometimes make heroic attempts to escape the limitations of the phenomenological conception. The limitation is apparent in Husserl's and Schutz's definition of meaning as a “reflective intentional act”, Garfinkel's use of the term “accounting” to refer to a signifying effect, and the way Berger and Luckmann describe their social theory as “sociology of knowledge”. Today, similar confusions are present in Michael Polanyi's “tacit knowledge”and in Giddens' structuration theory.

English The great transformation to modernity made the economy the major organizing factor of the social synthesis, thus bringing forth the issue of the economy/society relationship as the central problem of modern social theory. This article deals with two broad approaches to this problem: Parsons's and Habermas's variants of structural-functionalism, on the one hand, and various currents of (neo)institutionalism, on the other. An attempt to synthesize the benefits of these conflicting approaches is made from the point of view of semiotic institutionalism. What emerges is a general theoretical framework, which is better equipped than the original structural-functionalist and institutionalist conceptions for the analysis of the economy/society relationship. French Les grandes transformations vers la modernité ont fait de l'économie le principal facteur organisateur de la synthèse sociale, portant sur le devant de la scène la question de la relation économie/société en tant que question centrale de la théorie sociale moderne. L'article s'intéresse à deux grandes approches de cette question: les variantes structuro-fonctionnalistes de Parsons et Habermas d'une part, et divers courants du (néo)institutionnalisme de l'autre. L'auteur s'efforce de faire la synthèse des points forts de ces deux approches conflictuelles du point de vue de l'institutionnalisme sémiotique. Il en émerge un cadre théorique général plus adapté que les conceptions structurofonctionnalistes et institutionnalistes à l'analyse de la relation économie/société.