Suchergebnisse

This paper is an attempt to suggest methods of approach to the materials of Canadian social history. As such it is an appeal for a greater utilization of historical data in the development of sociological principles. It should be admitted at the outset that the point of view advanced is partly the result of a bias in favour of what might be described as the documentary as opposed to the interview method of research. Certain problems can be studied only by means of the interview. There are times, however, when a greater understanding could be gained from documentary records with much less expenditure of time and energy. Furthermore, the interview method, if it is to yield fruitful results, must be employed by those with a particular aptitude for "feeling out" information in this way. It is no accident that the most successful research students in sociology very often have been those with experience in journalism or those with a flare for journalism who found an outlet for their inclinations in sociological research. The penetrating insight of a Sinclair Lewis or Sherwood Anderson cannot be matched by the finest tools forged in the laboratory of the sociologist.

The modern state whose youth was spent in strife has entered its turbulent old age. Now, as then, the old order is marshalling its forces of arms and ideas to defend itself against the impact of the new. Just as the medieval church-state was once attacked by the protagonists of the national state, so this latter is now attacked in turn by those seeking to break the bonds of a narrow nationalism. Beneath the struggle lies the ineradicable craving for fulfilment. Where once it was expressed in terms of unity under the headship of the Vicar of Christ, since the Reformation it has taken the form of unity within a sovereign state. And where once the claims of the Pope were subjected to a merciless criticism, now the claims of the sovereign are subjected to an equally relentless stricture. The opposition is no new thing, for the history of political thought in the last five centuries revolves around the attempt to impose restrictions upon the sovereign authority of the state. But it is significant that not until recently has the argument taken the form of a denial of sovereignty. This means, of course, that the assumptions underlying the political system are being challenged. Nor is it only ideas; it is also the social and economic institutions which are being poured into the crucible of criticism. The result of the withdrawal of reverence is to illuminate the nature of sovereignty, thereby enabling us to clarify its functions and to evaluate its worth.

Comte, writing a century ago, claimed that in human affairs we were just entering the scientific stage. Already the physical sciences had made an auspicious beginning. They have made spectacular advances since Comte's pronouncement. Nevertheless, extensive areas in the physical sciences remain to be explored. Still wider areas in the domain of the social sciences await systematic investigation and precise analysis. The need for scientific advances as a means of meeting recurring crises in human affairs seems more necessary than in the days of Comte. It is quite evident today that we have greater sophistication, more extensive questioning, and a more marked social self-consciousness. The word scientific, widely and loosely used, seems to symbolize the temper of our age.

It has become fashionable in recent years to bemoan the manner in which the social sciences lag behind the physical sciences. Few, however, of those who deplore the slowness of scientific advance in man's knowledge of himself, have any concrete suggestions to make towards increasing the speed of that advance, nor are they clear as to whether the lag is necessary and inevitable, or accidental and removable. The common opinion appears to be that the causes of the lag are entirely, or at least mainly, historical, residing in the fact that while the physical sciences started earlier and have by now advanced further, the social sciences began later, and are still, therefore, lagging behind. This explanation is at least implied in the frequent urging by editors and politicians that the social sciences should hurry to catch up with the physical sciences, or alternatively, that the physical sciences should slow down and wait for the social sciences to overtake them. Viewing the matter thus, as a simple foot-race between physical science and social science, with the latter handicapped only by a slow start, is not altogether desirable, since it appears to ignore certain difficulties involved in a scientific approach to human behaviour, which, while not entirely absent in physicial science, are nevertheless easier to cope with when dealing with non-human material than when dealing with human subject-matter. It is with these difficulties that the present paper will be concerned.The nature of these obstacles will perhaps be made a little clearer if we begin with a preliminary consideration of what a scientific sociology entails. There is no mystery about this. The programme for the new science was set forth clearly and in detail by the man who invented the word sociology, Auguste Comte.