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Critical Thinking in SociologyDIETER VANDEBROECK
1 Towards A Sociological Approach - Social science and sociology is the
“interpretation of interpreting beings”
To ‚Critique‘
- Alfred Schütz: sociological theories are
theories of the “second-degree”
Positivism: a philosophy that states that the
- Harold Garfinkel: sociology is an “account of
only authentic knowledge is scientific
accounts”
knowledge; central to the foundation of
- Sociologists are NOT the only ones producing
academic sociology
“theories” about the social world
- They compete with both lay and professional
De-naturalization: the core task of the social
(journalists, politicians, writers, commentators,
sciences; what presents itself as natural,
celebrities, etc.) producers of social theory
actually does have social causes
- In contrast to natural sciences: minerals do
- „natural“ in a double sense: not seek to develop an understanding of
1. self-evident, normal, manner-of-fact
us
2. biological, genetic, innate
- uncover through the history of our everyday The way that sociologists perceive and
practices (genealogy - the contrast in TIME)
judge the world is shaped by their position
and through anthropology (contrast in SPACE)
in society.
Genealogy: Ahnenforschung
Sociological syllogism: perception shaped by
Historicization: important tool of view of sociologist; unlearning habitual patterns
denaturalization; socially constructed character
shows — e.g. different sexual practices and How is objective knowledge possible?
preferences in the past like biting eyelashes of, - discovering qualitative new aspects of reality
or preferring women with more body fat - un-learning -> de-habituating
Culturalization: anthropologists - novel perspective through the familiar
—-> both create distance X people rely on their common sense;
connotations
De-naturalization through de-
individualization: show that the “unique”, the CRITIQUE:
“subjective”, and the “personal” very often have Immanuel Kant: “Critique of Pure Reason”
general, objective, and impersonal causes — (1781): Consciousness shapes the world
social classes — runs counter to the dominant around it - Copernican Revolution; categories of
social philosophy of our society = consciousness are a priori, innate —> analysis
INDIVIDUALISM — resistance among privileged needs to turn inwards
groups — Bourdieu: „our object objects“ Karl Marx: “Capital: A Critique of Political
Double hermeneutics: mutual interpretative Economy” (1867): economic/material
interplay between social science and those reproduction determines human relations,
whose activities compose it subject matter; culture, beliefs, and consciousness; our social
social scientists have no absolute monopoly being precedes our consciousness; study
either upon innovative theories or upon historical developments —> analysis has to turn
empirical investigations of what they study outwards and examine the material conditions
,that shape how social actors think, feel and biological/psychological explanation falls too
perceive the world short
Central division in social theory:
Kant: subjectivism/constructivism: should
study how actors actively create a “common
sense”-world and the “spontaneous sociologies”
they produce in the process
VS.
Marx (& Engels): objectivism/structuralism:
the relationship between social analyst and
social actors = asymmetrical; sociology should
break with “spontaneous” sociology of actors;
sociology has a strong emancipatory function;
“The first and most basic rule is to consider
Sociology should explain WHY people do what
social facts as things.”
they do, reveal the reasons “behind” their
actions and thoughts; social theory is “The subject matter of research must only
qualitatively better than lay theory, which is include a group of phenomena defined
often partial, biased, false beforehand by certain common external
characteristics and all phenomena which
correspond to this definition must be so
2 Sociology against “common included.”
sense” Durkheim - Marx & Engels
“[I]f we follow common use, we risk
Durkheim: established academic sociology; like distinguishing what should be combined, or
geocentrism went to heliocentrism, egocentrism combining what should be distinguished, thus
becomes sociocentrism; substituting pre- mistaking the real affinities of things, and
notions for things; warns against „ideological accordingly misapprehending their nature. Only
comparison affords explanation....But these
analysis“ - the study of concepts, rather than natural affinities of entities cannot be made
things; prénotions; comparative method - only clear safely by such superficial examination as
method that is suitable for Sociology; mistrust produces ordinary terminology…“
any definition or category you have not made
yourself; beware of predefined objects of “The term suicide is applied to all cases of death
resulting directly or indirectly from a positive or
common sense - ignoring existing terminology
negative act of the victim himself, which he
—> negative rule: deny himself the use of knows will produce this result.”
concepts; define phenomena independent of
the subjective perception/opinions that both “How discover the agent’s motive and whether
social actors and social analysts have of them, he desired death itself when he formed his
e.g. criminal behaviors - punishment; legal rules resolve, or had some other purpose? Intent is
too intimate a thing to be more than
- law has a thing-like character; wants to approximately interpreted by another. It even
demarcate sociology from psychology; escapes self-observation. How often we mistake
rationalist; positivist; thing-like characters the true reasons for our acts! We constantly
important to study; anti-psychology explain acts due to petty feelings or blind routine
by generous passions or lofty considerations.“
Le Suicide - as an index of the well-being of the
Prénotions (premise): partial, schematic,
society - not only of the individual; observe
incorrect representations of the social world
external characteristics like gender, religious
embedded in everyday words and expressions;
identity,..; “Suicide” is innovative for its use of
developed for practical action and judgment, not
statistical comparison as a tool of sociological
scientific understanding; „Categories“ of
analysis —> Suicide rates are determined by
everyday life - denounce, criticize, attack [“elite”,
variations in the degree of SOCIAL
the “1%”, the “poor”, the “Muslim community”,
INTEGRATION and SOCIAL REGULATION;
the “working class”, the “Europeans”, the
fatalistic: prisoners; altruistic: terrorists;
“average Belgian”, the “refugeex crisis”]
anomic: bankrupt CEO; egoistic: hermits;
defined by regulation and integration; purely
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,How to determine social facts? - How to state control over intellectual life - cause:
measure (changes in) social solidarity? religion (Protestantism) influence on state and
• “The Division of Labor in Society” (1893): public policy — solution: transcend religion
social solidarity has not declined in modern
societies, it has fundamentally changed in as the final obstacle to the realization of
nature human emancipation
• Durkheim: NOT by...
…studying philosophical tractates, literary
texts or religious texts
• …asking people about their’ subjective degree
of solidarity’
• …analyzing diaries, testimonies, etc.
• BUT: looked at the evolution of the quantity
and quality of legal rules
• WHY? Law has a “thing-like” character
Francis Bacon: Idols of the Market Place; Young Hegelians: Bruno Bauer, David Strauss,
stereotypes; words stand in the way against Ludwig Feuerbach, Max Stirner
change [ - because people of alliances of words
and names] Marx is strongly indebted to Hegelian
philosophy: focus on historicity, the role of
______________________________________
conflict in human history, dialectical
Durkheim does not ask where these pre- method; social actors as driven by forces that
notions come from and just leave them out. elude their consciousness; Inspired by atheism
and materialism of “Young Hegelians”, but
—> Marx and Engels try to explain the social blames them for being too philosophical and a-
origins of „common sense“ political (i.e. too speculative, not empirical
______________________________________ enough)
Marx: becomes in Berlin involved with the Marx: Y.H. mistake the “symptom” (religion)
philosophy of Hegel and Young Hegelians for the cause (socio-economic injustice)
“Religious suffering is, at one and the same
Hegel: criticizes Kant for leaving out the time, the expression of real suffering and a
objective world and being too static —> relation protest against real suffering. Religion is the
between consciousness and world is more in sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a
the nature of a “dialogue” or a “dialectic”; heartless world, and the soul of soulless
human history is the process through which conditions. It is the opium of the
“consciousness” slowly progresses towards people.....The abolition of religion as the illusory
ultimate Reason and Freedom; at the origin of happiness of the people is the demand for their
world history is Spirit (Geist) an absolute, real happiness. To call on them to give up their
omnipotent and omniscient being (God??? illusions about their condition is to call on them
Maybe…); Spirit can only attain self- to give up a condition that requires illusions.
consciousness, by objectifying itself in reality The criticism of religion is, therefore, in
and thereby “alienating” from itself; History is a embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of
succession of distinct periods, each of which is which religion is the halo.”
characterized by a particular “Zeitgeist” (culture) - Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Hegel’s
reflected in the prevailing institutions, laws, and Philosophy of Right (1844)
customs; Each new period is marked by a
higher degree of Reason and Freedom than the ”The Young Hegelians are in agreement with the
one that preceded it; human history is moving Old Hegelians in their belief in the rule of
towards its end, i.e. Spirit attaining full self- religion, of concepts, of a universal principle
consciousness in the existing world. Only, the one party attacks
after Hegel’s death: Is 19th century Prussia this dominion as usurpation while the other
really the epitome of freedom and reason? Y.H.: extols it as legitimate.”
No, high degree of political censorships and - The German Ideology (1992) [1845]: 35
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, a definite society in a definite age it has
Marx went from being a philosopher to be a become "sensuous certainty" for Feuerbach.“ -
political activist and has been followed by the The German Ideology (1998) [1845]: 45“
state moving from Cologne, to Paris, to
Brussels. Marx went to Paris and met Engels — nature that FB implies is a product of human
there, he published most books with him and economic activity
was for Marx a financial and intellectual The premises from which we begin are not
supporter. Engels was the sociologist of the arbitrary ones, not dogmas, but real premises
duo. FROM ASPIRING PHILOSOPHER TO from which abstraction can only be made in the
POLITICAL ACTIVIST imagination. They are the real individuals, their
activity, and the material conditions under which
Ludwig Feuerbach: “You are what you eat”
they live, both those which they find already
.. contra Hegel: man creates Spirit/God, not vice
existing and those produced by their activity.
versa; by aggrandizing God, Man belittles
These premises can thus be verified in a purely
himself; religion “alienates” man from his true
empirical way...The first premise of all human
“species essence” (Gattungswesen), a
history is, of course, the existence of living
sensuous, desiring, lustful creature filled with
human individuals. Thus the first fact to be
appetites; advocates for a “materialist”
established is the physical organization of these
philosophy — religion let’s people loose sexual
individuals and their consequent relation to the
materialistic side
rest of nature...The writing of history must
always set out from these natural bases and
Criticism on Feuerbach
their modification in the course of history
M & E: Feuerbach’s materialism remains too
through the action of men.”
philosophical, it is both ‘inconsistent’ and
- The German Ideology (1998) [1845]: 37-38
‚contemplative’; conceives the relationship
between subject and world too much as a What separates human beings from animals?
thinking relationship; a “sensuous” or “real” “Men can be distinguished from animals by
world that F. portrays, is not the world as it is, consciousness, by religion or anything else
i.e. the world of social (economic) relations; FB: you like. They themselves begin to distinguish
fake materialist themselves from animals as soon as they begin
“As far as Feuerbach is a materialist he does to produce their means of subsistence, a
not deal with history, and as far as he considers step which is conditioned by their physical
history he is not a materialist” organization. By producing their means of
subsistence men are indirectly producing
“[Feuerbach] does not see how the sensuous their actual material life.“
world around him is, not a thing given direct – The German Ideology (1998) [1845]: 37
from all eternity, remaining ever the same,
but the product of industry and of the state — animals: develop highly specialized abilities
of society; and, indeed, in the sense that it is a (smell, night vision, etc.) to survive in a given
historical product, the result of the activity of a habitat; BUT: the flip side of specialization is
whole succession of generations, each standing high dependence on a particular type of
on the shoulders of the preceding one, environment for survival
developing its industry and its intercourse, — humans: are relatively “unspecialized”, but
modifying its social system according to the this grants them great flexibility in surviving in
changed needs….“ different types of environments; instead of being
...Even the objects of the simplest "sensuous ‘exposed’ to Nature, humans are capable of
certainty" are only given him through social actively transforming it and of creating their
development, industry and commercial own nature (and in the process destroying
intercourse. The cherry tree, like almost all fruit Nature...)
trees, was, as is well known only a few Praxis not Logos
centuries ago transplanted by commerce into M & E: Humans’ relationship to the world is not
our zone, and therefore only by this action of primarily one of thinking, but of doing, i.e. of
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