[6] His works are divided into four stages: The first one involved outlining a new vision of what sociology is, presenting a theoretical and methodological understanding of that field based on a critical reinterpretation of the classics.

In the most recent stage, Giddens has turned his attention to a more concrete range of problems relevant to the evolution of world society, namely environmental issues, focusing especially upon debates about climate change in his book The Politics of Climate Change (2009); the role and nature of the European Union in Turbulent and Mighty Continent (2014); and in a series of lectures and speeches also the nature and consequences of the Digital Revolution.

In 1969, Giddens was appointed to a position at the University of Cambridge, where he later helped create the Social and Political Sciences Committee (SPS, now HSPS).

[13] He has also been a vocal participant in British political debates, supporting the centre-left Labour Party with media appearances and articles (many of which are published in New Statesman).

He was given a life peerage in June 2004 as Baron Giddens, of Southgate in the London Borough of Enfield[14] and sits in the House of Lords for the Labour Party.

Giddens, the author of over 34 books and 200 articles, essays and reviews, has contributed and written about most notable developments in the area of social sciences, with the exception of research design and methods.

Giddens has commented not only on the developments in sociology, but also in anthropology, archaeology, psychology, philosophy, history, linguistics, economics, social work and most recently political science.

He rejected Durkheim's sociological positivism paradigm which attempted to predict how societies operate, ignoring the meanings as understood by individuals.

Because social actors are reflexive and monitor the ongoing flow of activities and structural conditions, they adapt their actions to their evolving understandings.

Systems here mean to Giddens "the situated activities of human agents"[21] (The Constitution of Society) and "the patterning of social relations across space-time"[21] (ibid.).

Giddens suggests that structures (traditions, institutions, moral codes and other sets of expectations—established ways of doing things) are generally quite stable, but they can be changed, especially through the unintended consequences of action when people start to ignore them, replace them, or reproduce them differently.

On a micro scale, one of individuals' internal sense of self and identity, consider the example of a family in which we are increasingly free to choose our own mates and how to relate with them which creates new opportunities yet also more work as the relationship becomes a reflexive project that has to be interpreted and maintained.

[17] In contrast, in post-traditional society people (actors or agents) are much less concerned with the precedents set by earlier generations and they have more choices, due to flexibility of law and public opinion.

[30]In A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism, Giddens concludes:[21] In the age of late and reflexive modernity and post-scarcity economy, the political science is being transformed.

[21] Relying on his past familiar themes of reflexivity and system integration which places people into new relations of trust and dependency with each other and their governments, Giddens argues that the political concepts of left and right are now breaking down as a result of many factors, most centrally the absence of a clear alternative to capitalism and the eclipse of political opportunities based on the social class in favour of those based on lifestyle choices.

In addition, The Third Way supplies a broad range of policy proposals aimed at what Giddens calls the "progressive centre-left" in British politics.

By utopian, he means that this is something new and extraordinary, and by realistic he stresses that this idea is rooted in the existing social processes and can be viewed as their simple extrapolation.

Other recipients of the prize that year included Woody Allen,[37] the inventor of the World Wide Web Tim Berners-Lee[38] and conductor Daniel Barenboim.

In a letter to Abdullah Senussi, a high-ranking Libyan official in July 2006, Monitor Group reported as follows: We will create a network map to identify significant figures engaged or interested in Libya today. ...

[40]Giddens' first visit to Libya resulted in articles in the New Statesman, El País and La Repubblica,[40] where he argued that the country had been dramatically transformed.

[40] During the second visit, Monitor Group organised a panel of three thinkers (Giddens, Gaddafi, and Benjamin Barber, author of Jihad vs. McWorld) chaired by Sir David Frost.

Within 'The Politics of Climate Change' Giddens places attention on global environmental conferences such as the 1997 Kyoto summit, whereby an agreement was drawn up so that developed countries would cut their emissions by an average of 5.2 per cent.

The Kyoto protocol was to become a part of international law, and the developed countries who accounted for at least 55 per cent of total emissions from the industrial states, would have to sign up.

[46] In his latest work, Giddens has returned to the subject of the European Union, discussed in 2007 in his book Europe in the Global Age[47] and in a diversity of articles.

Giddens writes as a committed pro-European, but he accepts that fundamental reforms must be made if the European Union is to avoid stagnation or worse.

Reforms must confer qualities absent from much of the European Union's history, but which are now required for its future such as flexible and quick-acting leadership, coupled to the greater democratic involvement of citizens.

[49] In recent years, while continuing to pursue some of the core themes of his earlier works he has become preoccupied with the impact of the Digital Revolution on world society and on everyday life.

Emerging developments in artificial intelligence look likely to propel these changes into a new phase of social transformation, whose outlines at present remain hazy, but which look certain to be quite profound.

In a much-publicised speech given in 2017, Russian President Vladimir Putin observed of advances in artificial intelligence that "whoever becomes the leader in this sphere will become the ruler of the world".

[61] In June 2020 it was announced that Giddens had been awarded the Arne Naess Chair and Prize at the University of Oslo, Norway, in recognition of his contributions to the study of environmental issues and climate change.