The main idea of this article is to reveal the logic of development of sociological method, in spite of "multiparadigmality" of sociology. The author doesn't treat sociological method as a set of particular devices and tools of research. Sociological method is treated as the specific approach to the study of social reality. In oder to analyse sociological method development, three ideal types of methodology are distinguished: classical, non-classical and post-non-classical ones. The distinguishing feature of classical methodology is absolutisation of the scientist's position and belief that there is the only true scientific method. Non-classical methodology reveals that the object under study is being constructed to a considerable extent by scientific methods and tools. Post-non-classical methodology clarifys the social determination of scientific knowledge and calls the position of science in question, therefore the main task of sociology is treated as clarification of its own position in social space.

The essay, first of all, tries to give a very brief historical and explanatory answer to the question: When begins the history of world society? World systems theory (Wallerstein) and systems theory (Luhmann) converge in locating the beginnings of world society in differentiation processes germane to 15th/16th-century Europe. The theory of world society is then the theory of the societal system emerging from this conjuncture. The essay, furthermore, adds two argumentative steps.

Firstly, it sketches three structural innovations which are of especial relevance for the genesis of world society: 1. Functional differentiation; 2. Organizations (especially: multinational enterprises and non-governmental organizations); 3. Communication technologies. There is something to be said for this list of structural innovations being an open one to which other innovations (networks, markets) may have to be added. Secondly, this argument on structural innovations is supplemented by three mechanisms or processual mechanisms: 1. Global diffusion of institutional patterns; 2. Global interrelatedness; 3. Decentralization in function systems. What is easily to be seen in developing this explanatory apparatus is that there are no convincing arguments for looking at world society as a system characterized by homogenized patterns of social structure and culture.

The article looks at the relationship between the use of organized force and the emergence of the market economy in Russia. In particular, it focuses on the values and norms (patterns of normative culture) that structure the day-to-day business activity of criminal groups and enable their reproduction, as well as at the institutional outcomes of this activity.

In the article are esteemed a social and cultural feature of malfeasance graft "bribe" in Russia of XIX-beginning XX. Our sociologists studied some factors instigating and replicating this phenomenon: 1) material neediness of a large part of the ordinary officials; 2) the huge terrain of empire have been resulted in simplification of the social control above the officials far from administrative centres; 3) moral disharmony to the positions; 4) graft bribe as the mandate for political loyalty; 5) bribe as the means and instruments of social, first of all of economical innovations. It is underlined, that the aged interpretations have not lost epistemological value till now.

The article is dedicated to description and interpretation of letters written by members of one Russian family in 1970 - 80s. The letters are considered to be a presentation of quotidian situations, needs, thinking, and practices, which are both the people reflections and constructions of social reality.

Presented are key ideas discussed by the participants of the Scientific Conference, which took place 25-28.06.1998 at the Faculty of Sociology of St. Petersburg State University. Debates were focused on four main subjects:

• models of training and professional activity of sociologists,
• sociological education and sociology as science,
• the sociology's teaching: a comparative analysis of the national and international experience, sociology in the structure of professional training.