What objects exist in the social world and how should we understand them? Is a s
pecific Pizza Hut restaurant as real as the employees, tables, napkins and pizza
s of which it is composed, and as real as the Pizza Hut corporation with its hea
dquarters in Wichita, the United States, the planet Earth and the social and eco
nomic impact of the restaurant on the lives of its employees and customers? In t
his book the founder of object-oriented philosophy develops his approach in orde
r to shed light on the nature and status of objects in social life. While it is
often assumed that an interest in objects amounts to a form of materialism, Harm
an rejects this view and develops instead an immaterialist method. By examining
the work of leading contemporary thinkers such as Bruno Latour and Levi Bryant,
he develops a forceful critique of actor-network theory .
