Executive Committee 2023-2027

Geoffrey Pleyers, President of the ISA
Rabat, 6 July 2025

Over 4,000 sociologists and researchers have gathered in Rabat. We have travelled from all continents to take part in this 5th ISA Forum of Sociology.

For the first time, a major ISA event is being held in the MENA region. Learning from and with our colleagues from this region and integrating more research and knowledge from these countries will contribute to a deeper and more global understanding of the challenges of our times.

I want to thank Morocco, the University Mohammed V, and its president, and our colleagues from the Local Organising Committee for welcoming us, and particularly Prof. Abdelfattah Ezzine, the chair of the LOC, Prof. Abdelatif Kidai, dean of the Faculty of Education, and Ismail Kassou, Vice-President of the University, whose work made this Forum possible.

My warmest thanks to Cecilia Delgado Molina, and the whole ISA team (Nataly, Zouhair, Elena, Lola, Anna Maria and Priscilla), who have done an outstanding work to bring this Forum to life.

Allison Loconto, our Vice-President for Research and the President of this Forum, invites us to explore our work through three key concepts: “Knowledge, Justice and the Anthropocene”. Climate change, the devastation of nature, and the mass extinction of species have become a tangible reality for all living beings on this planet. This crisis is unlike others. It is a civilizational crisis that demands deep transformations in our subjectivities, our ways of living together, our understanding of society, and our way of doing sociology. It challenges us to revisit some of our core concepts and to confront the legacy of a discipline that remains rooted in modernity, with a vision shaped by the illusions of permanent growth, boundless accumulation, and infinite natural resources. Epistemic and social justice are crucial in addressing this new reality and in shaping alternative futures for living together on a finite planet.

We gather at a time marked by immense suffering. A genocide is underway in Gaza, and the situation in the West Bank is becoming direr by the day. We express our support and solidarity with our colleagues in Palestine who play a vital role in their society and in our global community. I am very grateful to the Palestinian colleagues who could make it to Rabat. Important panels will be dedicated to Palestine, and I warmly thank the colleagues who have organised them.

I would like to thank Allison Loconto, who has devoted her energy to making this Forum a reality, and for proposing such an insightful theme. My thanks also go to our Vice-President for Finance, Elina Oinas, for her careful stewardship of key aspects of the Forum and the ISA. I am also grateful to Bandana Purkayastha and Marta Soler, our two other VPs, for their dedication to our National Associations and overseeing our publications. I thank Ana Rivoir and the other members of the ISA Human Rights Committee (Tina, Michael, and Rhoda) for their crucial work in a time when academic freedom must be actively defended. I am also deeply thankful to each member of the ISA Executive Committee for our collective work and their trust as we are navigating the ISA through difficult times.

We are all especially grateful to the Program Coordinators of our Research Committees. They have carried out a time-consuming, largely invisible, and yet vital task: ensuring that each good abstract finds its place in a good panel. Our gratitude also goes to the session organisers and to every participant who often travelled from far away to join us.

To each one of you who joins this 5th ISA Forum of Sociology in Rabat: “Welcome. Thank you for coming. Good to see you. This is an important time to meet.”

We have come here to share our research, but also to remind ourselves why we are sociologists, that sociology matters in this world, and to claim that this is a time for sociology, which is the title of the declaration I would like to share with you today.

This 5th ISA Forum of Sociology convenes

At a time when state leaders are promoting distrust in science;

At a time when attacks on social sciences are multiplying;

At a time when fake news circulates more widely and with greater impact than research-based analysis;

At a time when many political leaders are spreading hate speech and denying part of the population the right to full citizenship;

At a time when the dehumanization of entire categories of people is once again becoming a widespread tool for asserting and consolidating power;

At a time when scientific evidence is being denied in order to dismiss systemic environmental and social emergencies;

At a time when states are repressing those who speak out against an ongoing genocide, systemic violence or systemic racism;

At a time when an unprecedented concentration of wealth allows a handful of people to control mass media and social media;

At a time when humanity is facing interconnected global crises that will determine the lives of generations to come;

At a time when academic freedom is under threat, even in established democracies;

We are gathering in Rabat to say that we believe that critical interventions by social scientists are more essential than ever.

We are gathering in Rabat to reaffirm the values at the core of our work as researchers, teachers, and public intellectuals with a shared commitment to knowledge, critical inquiry, and academic freedom.

We stand for a rigorous sociology based on facts and analysis, a sociology that rejects simplistic narratives and acknowledges that the world is complex;

We stand for an independent sociology that reminds us that the words of the powerful are not always true, and that a lie repeated a thousand times is still a lie;

We stand for a critical sociology that questions rising inequalities and challenges the myth of the self-made man, the simplistic emphasis on markets and consumerism, and alpha masculinity;

We stand for a public sociology that engages in civic debates, not from a pedestal of alleged intellectual superiority, but in dialogue with those striving to transform society and defend the common good;

We stand for a general sociology that resists the risks of hyper-specialization and fragmentation and addresses the urgent issues of our times;

We stand for a global sociology that learns from researchers and social actors from different regions of the world to understand and meet the challenges of the 21st century, a sociology that contributes to building a sense of shared humanity.

We firmly believe that social sciences and academic freedom are intrinsic to democracy and must be protected and promoted.

We believe that informed, historically grounded, and sociologically relevant public debate is vital to understanding and navigating the crises of our times.

We are convinced that sociology not only helps us understand the world but also helps us build a fairer, more livable, peaceful and sustainable future.

At a time of climate change, wars, rising inequality and hatred, sociology is an indispensable tool for living together on a limited planet.

This is why we gather in Rabat for this 5th ISA Forum of Sociology.

This declaration is available in English, French, Spanish and Arabic. Join us and endorse it on the ISA website and share it with your colleagues.

During this week, we will show in different ways that sociology is a vibrant discipline.

We will demonstrate sociology’s capacity to understand reality, foster dialogue, and inspire action.

We will show that this is a time for sociology.