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Legacy

From the 1940s to the 1970s, Parsons was one of the most famous and most influential but also most controversial sociologists in the world, particularly in the US. His later works were met with criticism and were generally dismissed in the 1970s by the view that his theories were too abstract, inaccessible, and socially conservative.

Recently, interest has increased in Parsons' ideas and especially often-overlooked later works. Attempts to revive his thinking have been made by Parsonsian sociologists and social scientists like Jeffrey Alexander, Bryan Turner, Richard Münch, and Roland Robertson, and Uta Gerhardt has written about Parsons from a biographical and historical perspective. In addition to the United States, the key centers of interest in Parsons today are Germany, Japan, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

Parsons had a seminal influence and early mentorship of many American and international scholars, such as Ralf Dahrendorf, Alain Touraine, Niklas Luhmann, and Habermas. His best-known pupil was Merton. Parsons was a member of the American Philosophical Society.