Thomas McCarthy

11.8k total citations · 5 hit papers
44 papers, 6.4k citations indexed

About

Thomas McCarthy is a scholar working on Sociology and Political Science, Philosophy and General Social Sciences. According to data from OpenAlex, Thomas McCarthy has authored 44 papers receiving a total of 6.4k indexed citations (citations by other indexed papers that have themselves been cited), including 15 papers in Sociology and Political Science, 6 papers in Philosophy and 4 papers in General Social Sciences. Recurrent topics in Thomas McCarthy's work include Critical Theory and Philosophy (12 papers), Philosophical Thought and Analysis (4 papers) and Political Philosophy and Ethics (2 papers). Thomas McCarthy is often cited by papers focused on Critical Theory and Philosophy (12 papers), Philosophical Thought and Analysis (4 papers) and Political Philosophy and Ethics (2 papers). Thomas McCarthy collaborates with scholars based in United States. Thomas McCarthy's co-authors include Jürgen Habermas, C. Fred Alford, Christian Lenhardt, Shierry Weber Nicholsen, David Weberman, Nanette Funk, Julius Sensat, Fred Dallmayr, William E. Connolly and Andrzej Rapaczynski and has published in prestigious journals such as Contemporary Sociology A Journal of Reviews, British Journal of Sociology and The Philosophical Review.

In The Last Decade

Thomas McCarthy

38 papers receiving 5.1k citations

Hit Papers

Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. 1979 2026 1994 2010 1992 1979 1986 1984 1980 500 1000 1.5k
What are hit papers?

Hit papers significantly outperform the citation benchmark for their cohort. A paper qualifies if it has ≥500 total citations, achieves ≥1.5× the top-1% citation threshold for papers in the same subfield and year (this is the minimum needed to enter the top 1%, not the average within it), or reaches the top citation threshold in at least one of its specific research topics.

  1. Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action.
    1992 1.9k citations David Weberman, Jürgen Habermas et al. The Philosophical Review profile →
  2. Communication and the Evolution of Society
    1979 1.4k citations Jürgen Habermas, Thomas McCarthy et al. New German Critique profile →
  3. The Theory of Communicative Action. Vol. 1: Reason and the Rationalization of Society.
    1986 667 citations Jürgen Habermas, Thomas McCarthy et al. The Philosophical Review profile →
  4. Reason and the rationalization of society
    1984 478 citations Jürgen Habermas, Thomas McCarthy profile →
  5. The Critical Theory of Jurgen Habermas.
    1980 397 citations Thomas McCarthy et al. The Philosophical Review profile →

Peers — A (Enhanced Table)

Peers by citation overlap · career bar shows stage (early→late) cites · hero ref

Name h Career Trend Papers Cites
Thomas McCarthy United States 19 2.7k 1.3k 960 848 700 44 6.4k
Joseph R. Gusfield United States 35 4.0k 1.5× 1.8k 1.4× 556 0.6× 416 0.5× 585 0.8× 104 7.2k
Steven Lukes United States 25 4.0k 1.5× 2.2k 1.7× 932 1.0× 656 0.8× 320 0.5× 93 8.7k
Richard J. Bernstein United States 31 2.6k 0.9× 1.2k 0.9× 1.3k 1.3× 1.5k 1.7× 212 0.3× 141 6.8k
Murray Edelman United States 22 3.5k 1.3× 2.7k 2.1× 728 0.8× 866 1.0× 1.3k 1.9× 56 8.5k
Richard K. Fenn United States 11 4.6k 1.7× 1.1k 0.9× 1.5k 1.6× 681 0.8× 545 0.8× 45 10.8k
Richard Sennett United States 30 3.2k 1.2× 948 0.7× 720 0.8× 316 0.4× 334 0.5× 98 6.7k
Alasdair MacIntyre United States 35 3.2k 1.2× 1.5k 1.2× 1.2k 1.3× 2.0k 2.4× 244 0.3× 184 9.2k
Craig Calhoun United States 48 6.4k 2.3× 3.0k 2.3× 1.0k 1.0× 697 0.8× 1.4k 2.0× 187 10.6k
Dwight Fee United States 5 2.1k 0.8× 778 0.6× 1.2k 1.3× 568 0.7× 756 1.1× 5 6.8k
Elizabeth Colson United States 24 3.0k 1.1× 770 0.6× 917 1.0× 274 0.3× 327 0.5× 76 6.7k

Countries citing papers authored by Thomas McCarthy

Since Specialization
Citations

This map shows the geographic impact of Thomas McCarthy's research. It shows the number of citations coming from papers published by authors working in each country. You can also color the map by specialization and compare the number of citations received by Thomas McCarthy with the expected number of citations based on a country's size and research output (numbers larger than one mean the country cites Thomas McCarthy more than expected).

Fields of papers citing papers by Thomas McCarthy

Since Specialization
Physical SciencesHealth SciencesLife SciencesSocial Sciences

This network shows the impact of papers produced by Thomas McCarthy. Nodes represent research fields, and links connect fields that are likely to share authors. Colored nodes show fields that tend to cite the papers produced by Thomas McCarthy. The network helps show where Thomas McCarthy may publish in the future.

Co-authorship network of co-authors of Thomas McCarthy

This figure shows the co-authorship network connecting the top 25 collaborators of Thomas McCarthy. A scholar is included among the top collaborators of Thomas McCarthy based on the total number of citations received by their joint publications. Widths of edges represent the number of papers authors have co-authored together. Node borders signify the number of papers an author published with Thomas McCarthy. Thomas McCarthy is excluded from the visualization to improve readability, since they are connected to all nodes in the network.

All Works

20 of 20 papers shown
1.
McCarthy, Thomas & Michael Müller. (2015). Rassismus, Imperialismus und die Idee menschlicher Entwicklung. Suhrkamp eBooks. 8 indexed citations
2.
3.
McCarthy, Thomas. (2007). From Modernism to Messianism: Liberal Developmentalism and American Exceptionalism. Constellations. 14(1). 3–30. 4 indexed citations
4.
McCarthy, Thomas. (2002). Vergangenheitsbewältigung in the USA. Political Theory. 30(5). 623–648. 36 indexed citations
5.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1997). Constructivismo y reconstructivismo kantianos: Rawls y Habermas en diálogo. Dialnet (Universidad de la Rioja). 35–62. 5 indexed citations
6.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1996). A reply to Georgia Warnke and David Couzens Hoy. Philosophy & Social Criticism. 22(2). 99–108.
7.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1995). Enlightenment and the Idea of Public Reason1. European Journal of Philosophy. 3(3). 242–256. 13 indexed citations
8.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1994). Kantian Constructivism and Reconstructivism: Rawls and Habermas in Dialogue. Ethics. 105(1). 44–63. 104 indexed citations
9.
Weberman, David, Jürgen Habermas, Christian Lenhardt, Shierry Weber Nicholsen, & Thomas McCarthy. (1992). Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action.. The Philosophical Review. 101(4). 924–924. 1905 indexed citations breakdown →
10.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1990). Filosofía y Teoría Crítica en los Estados Unidos. Foucault y la Escuela de Francfort. Isegoría. 49–84. 3 indexed citations
11.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1988). On the Margins of Politics. The Journal of Philosophy. 85(11). 645–648. 3 indexed citations
12.
Habermas, Jürgen & Thomas McCarthy. (1987). Lifeworld and system : a critique of functionalist reason. 293 indexed citations
13.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1985). Complexity and Democracy, or the Seducements of Systems Theory. New German Critique. 27–27. 45 indexed citations
14.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1984). Reflections on Rationalization in the Theory of Communicative Action. 4(2). 177–191. 18 indexed citations
15.
Habermas, Jürgen & Thomas McCarthy. (1984). Reason and the rationalization of society. 478 indexed citations breakdown →
16.
McCarthy, Thomas, et al.. (1982). Habermas and Hegel: Possible Contributions to a Unified Social Theory. Contemporary Sociology A Journal of Reviews. 11(6). 636–636.
17.
Rapaczynski, Andrzej & Thomas McCarthy. (1981). The Critical Theory of Jurgen Habermas.. Noûs. 15(3). 423–423. 82 indexed citations
18.
Held, David, Lawrence H. Simon, Jürgen Habermas, & Thomas McCarthy. (1976). Toward Understanding Habermas. New German Critique. 136–136. 6 indexed citations
19.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1973). A Theory of Communicative Competence. Philosophy of the Social Sciences. 3(2). 135–156. 23 indexed citations
20.
McCarthy, Thomas. (1973). On misunderstanding ?understanding?. Theory and Decision. 3(4). 351–370. 7 indexed citations

Rankless uses publication and citation data sourced from OpenAlex, an open and comprehensive bibliographic database. While OpenAlex provides broad and valuable coverage of the global research landscape, it—like all bibliographic datasets—has inherent limitations. These include incomplete records, variations in author disambiguation, differences in journal indexing, and delays in data updates. As a result, some metrics and network relationships displayed in Rankless may not fully capture the entirety of a scholar's output or impact.

Explore authors with similar magnitude of impact

Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Joseph R. Gusfield Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Steven Lukes Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Richard J. Bernstein Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Murray Edelman Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Richard K. Fenn Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Richard Sennett Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Alasdair MacIntyre Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Craig Calhoun Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Dwight Fee Breakdown of academic impact, for papers by Elizabeth Colson
Rankless by CCL
2026