Abstract
Investigations into social imaginaries have burgeoned in recent years. From 'the capitalist imaginary' to the 'democratic imaginary', from the 'ecological imaginary' to 'the global imaginary' - and beyond - the social imaginaries field has expanded across disciplines and beyond the academy.
The recent debates on social imaginaries and potential new imaginaries reveal a recognisable field and paradigm-in-the-making. We argue that Castoriadis, Ricoeur, and Taylor have articulated the most important theoretical frameworks for understanding social imaginaries, although the field as a whole remains heterogeneous.
We further argue that the notion of social imaginaries draws on the modern understanding of the imagination as authentically creative (as opposed to imitative).