The book is a collection of articles and essays devoted to important studies conducted by Polish sociologists in the course of more than a hundred years. It displays not only the discipline’s scholarship but also the society studied, with its questions and problems, from the end of the 19th to the beginning of the 20th century, from partition times through the interwar period to the Great Depression, and then from real socialism to the fall of communism and the systemic transformation toward democracy. In this sense, sociological research is Stendhal’s "mirror carried along a high road", where Polish society parades. The findings have been important sources for the social history of Poland.

Antoni Su?ek has taught in the Institute of Sociology at the University of Warsaw since 1968. His research interests cover sociological methodology, history of social research and Polish-Jewish relations. In the years 1994-1998, he served as president of the Polish Sociological Association.