About the book: 2008 / In the book of the outstanding Russian scientist, thinker A.A. Zinoviev (1922–2006) provides a systematic presentation of the methodological and logical foundations of his sociological theory. The work formulates the categories and principles of the methodology he developed, ensuring the scientific reliability and logical rigor of sociological research, introduces the basic concepts of his sociology, and identifies the laws of the functioning and development of social objects and social systems. On this basis, theories are built of two trends and types of human evolution that have actually emerged in modern history - the theory of communism and the theory of Westernism. The author substantiates the concept according to which, at the stage of super-society into which the world enters, the development of history moves from the natural-historical phase to the planned-controlled phase.