Main trends of research in the social and human ... - unesdoc - Unesco

64 P. F. Lazarsfeld
States for several reasons. The lack of governmental institutions for social
bookkeeping relegated much of this activity to private enterprise; at the same
time, the rapid growth of cities,‘filling continuously with waves of immigrants,
made the need for sociological information especially urgent. As a result, sociolo-
gy became part of the university curriculum. Thus, America trained thousands
of sociologists at a time when European countries had only a few dozen.
The re-importation of empirical techniques into Western Europe and their
utilization in other parts of the world can be partially explained by imitation
and by the development of similar conditions everywhere. Yet, every country
hopes for an individual expression, and local variation should add color to the
present uniformity of the international sociological scene. The Indians cherish
their philosophical tradition dating back thousands of years ; the Soviets are
Marxists; the British seek to link sociology to the problems of the welfare state;
and the French would like sociology to pay more attention to the problem of
power. Obviously, the substantive topics are different. Only in India can one
study the role of the caste system, only in France or Italy the role of strong
Communist Parties. Does this enlarge the fund of concepts and research tech-
niques? We would like to think so, but there are as yet few signs of it. A ‘soci-
ology of sociology’ is needed, and the present study must raise this issue, even if
there cannot yet be any clear answer.
Finally I turn to the relation between sociology and the other social sciences.
After a general discussion of the trend I briefly review anthropology, political
science and economics as they relate to our main topic. Social psychology is
treated in considerable detail; it is often impossible to say where it ends and
sociology begins. The topic of this section is really a special case of the ‘uses of
sociology’. An increasing number of social groups, among them important poli-
cy makers, are influenced or make use of sociological analysis and research.
Such applications raise new problems and have an important feedback effect on
the core of sociological work.
I. CONCEPTUAL CONTRIBUTION OF SURVEY ANALYSIS TO GENERAL SOCIOLOGY
The background
In all periods of history, it has been important for administrators and intellec-
tuals to obtain information on social matters. The ‘intendants’ of the Ancien
Regime, as well as the consultants to the Convention, carried out ‘enqu@tes’
with the techniques available to them. In 18th century England, members of the
Royal Commissions were avid collectors of social facts, and, later, a dispute
between Charles Booth and several socialist friends led to his famous survey
of poverty. In the early 20th century in Germany, Max Weber supervised
studies of agriculture and factory labour. Along somewhat different lines, the
Italian, Nicefero, published extensively on the nature of measurement in the
social sciences, an interest which undoubtedly grew out of his investigations of
the underdeveloped southern parts of his country.
There are roughly three phases in this tradition of research. In the first, the