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Sociology as Anti-Utilitarianism

If one were to go by the incredible variety of writings that lay claim to the sociological label, or the improbable heterogeneity of training programmes in sociology – at every university what is taught under this name is different – one would have to conclude that the discipline exists only in the form of a fiction and that, as much as it would like to be scientific, it closely resembles an unattainable science of imaginary questions or solutions. In no other field of thought with pretensions to specialized knowledge does one find so great a gap between equally possible and accepted definitions of the object or of the method. As to its aim: following the French positivist tradition (from Saint-Simon to M. Mauss via A. Comte and Durkheim), sociology can be seen as the other name designating social science in general, including anthropology, history and part of economics and political philosophy, or else, on the contrary, as one particular social science discipline among others. And each of these two choices – the generalist or the particularist one – opens in its turn onto a whole series of possible options. Thus, the generalist aim can be pursued in a systemic perspective, with a strong emphasis on synchrony. Then the main focus of attention is on the more or less fragmentary unity of society and on the way in which it breaks down into more or less systemic and functional sub-systems, more or less mutually compatible or more or less irreducible and ‘differentiated’ (ausdifferenziert). Or else, on the contrary, priority is given to history, to chance, to contingent events, and the very idea of society or of a possible systemic coherence of the spheres of social action in their entirety is then minimized, if not ruled out altogether. The first option, which extends from Durkheim to Luhmann via Talcott Parsons, LéviStrauss and Louis Dumont, is that of the French sociological school, of functionalism, culturalism and structuralism. The second opens onto the gigantic field of comparative historical sociology whose incontestable champion is Max Weber. But it should be added that each of these two possible options is only able to fulfil its true potential by creating space within itself for the opposite option. European Journal of Social Theory 10(2): 277–286