Review Essay: Boudon's European Diagnosis of and Prophylactic against Relativism

In: Philosophy of the social sciences: an international journal = Philosophie des sciences sociales, Band 38, Heft 2, S. 279-292

Abstract

Raymond Boudon is the doyen of French sociology. His 2004 book The Poverty of Relativism counters the relativist plague with philosophical, historical, and comparative deconstruction and proposes an alternative: a cognitive notion of values that rehabilitates the notions of reason, correctness, and progress. More surprising is his rehabilitation of moral evolutionism that restores to it a human face. Will his efforts staunch relativism? Some considerations pro and con are offered.