MARXIST Sociology: There are three different forms of sociology, each with its own distinctive objects of study & methodology. One kind of sociology studies social facts & causes; another kind studies social interaction & meaning & a third kind studies social formations & structures. The first kind of sociology uses scientific method, the second kind uses direct involvement & the third kind uses a dialectical approach. The first kind seeks knowledge through explanation, the second kind through interpretation & the third through dialectics. The first kind of sociology is mostly associated with the work of Emile Durkheim, the second kind with the work of Max Weber & the third kind with the work of Karl Marx. The first kind is associated with political ideology of paternalistic conservatism, the second kind with liberalism including neoliberalism, & the third kind with socialism although some socialists feel at home with the works of Max Weber or Emile Durkeim. Sociology: The only sociologist to involve himself with Mr Blair & New Labour has been Anthony Giddens, who developed the notion of the Third Way from it American origins. Giddens is a follower of Emile Durkheim & re-wrote the work of Durkheims book The (New) Rules of Sociological Method by bringing the work of Durkheim & Weber as a directly anti-Marxist handbook for sociologists. 3.2.3 Social Science Next, it is important to understand what social science is and what it is not. It is not a form of physics, which became the paradigm case of science, that is of knowledge. Here knowledge was equated with certainty. However, much early social science, particularly economics and psychology, did not model their work on physics. It is interesting that it is only recently that economics has started to treat laws as hypotheses, and to make empirical studies of the social reality underlying the facts with which they work. Karl Marx came to the work of the English economists from the study of German philosophy and the tradition of the French Enlightenment with its twin threads of humanism and science. It was this original reduction of human beings to the equal of two human factors, by both the owners of capital in social reality and their new helpers in social theory, which caused Marx most concern. Colin Burgess May 2014 Towards a theory of social reality Marxist Sociology: a provenance for an everyday-life model.
Posted on: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 11:30:24 +0000
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