How do global processes affect personal and social consciousness? What interplay exists between local and global forces? In Global Modernities, a stellar cast of contributors--including Zygmunt Bauman, Jonathan Friedman, Ann Game, and Goran Therborn--offer superb commentary and analysis on the interplay between the local and the global across a broad range of areas. Focusing on two major themes--social theory and social change--contributors provide powerful critiques of previous positions on the study of modernity that have tended to prioritize history. They argue for a self-reflexive approach to modernity, stressing the fluid character of interdependence and movement. Identity, memory, association, and practice are viewed as nonreducible to the nation-state. Similarly, the western path of social development is subjected to principled criticism.