Within American cultural sociology, Jeffrey Alexander’s strong program has emerged as the strongest attractor in the field. Having made a name as a social theorist before moving into cultural sociology, Alexander has been able to deploy his own approach both as a general sociology of culture in the neo-Durkheimian tradition, and as a sociological theory of the middle range that can be applied over and over again in case studies that show how codes, meanings and performances bring society together, or drive it apart.