Topic outline
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- Definitions
- Introduction
- Positivism definition
- Positivism examples Marx and Durkheim
- Post positivist challenges to positivism within the social sciences
- Conclusion
- References
Definitions
Post positivism─not a defined set of theoretical propositions, but a general and varied set of critical reactions to positivism within the philosophy of science. Thinkers such as Kuhn, Feyerabend, Quine, Putnam, and Lakatos are often referred to as post positivists. The term can also be used to refer to approaches such as interpretivism and hermeneutics.
Scientific realism─the view that the subject matter of scientific research and scientific theory exists independently of our knowledge of it, and that the goal of scientific research is to describe and explain both observable and unobservable aspects of the world. Scientific realism holds that there are knowable, mind-independent facts, objects, or properties (Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, 1999).
Rationalism─the principle or habit of accepting reason as the supreme authority in matters of opinion, beliefs, or conduct (The Macquarie Dictionary 1991).
Introduction
This topic introduces positivism and post positivist objections to positivism within the philosophy of science, before taking up the development of these ideas within social philosophy and social research in the topics that follow.
Two 'classical' social theorists are discussed as exemplars of a positivist understanding. Both postulated that society and the individual's relation to it could be scientifically or rationally understood, providing a guideline for the progress of society. Marx and Durkheim thought that social phenomena could be read to reveal deeper mechanisms driving the social world and the individual's relation to it, a world that could be theorised and predicted, and perhaps influenced in the interests of social reform.
Before moving on it is worth making a few points about the definition of positivism. The term is often used interchangeably with logical positivism, or is used to refer to approaches generally associated with a 'scientific method', such as naturalism, behaviourism, realism or empiricism, about which more will be said in the next topic. This can be confusing as there are important distinctions between these terms. In this topic and this series of web resources we will refer to positivism specifically to refer to its manifestation in the work of Marx and Durkheim. The more contemporary positions of logical positivism and realism will be discussed in the next topic.
Positivism definition
Summary taken from Hughes, J. and Sharrock, W. 1980. The Philosophy of Social Research, Third edition. Pearson Longman: London, and von Wright, G 1993, ‘Two traditions’, in Social research: philosophy, politics and practice, ed M Hammersley, Sage, London.
The central tenets of positivism as understood within philosophical thought emerged in the rejection of religious depictions of the world as God's creation by sixteenth and seventeenth century European thinkers. It was influenced jointly by Bacon's (1561–1626) emphasis upon experiment, induction and careful observation, the British empiricists' emphasis upon direct experience, and Descarte's (1596–1650) faith in logical foundations for knowledge.
In the social sciences, a positivist philosophy was first coined by Auguste Comte (1798–1857), who also invented the term 'sociology'─or the scientific study of the social world.
Central principles of Comte:
- The progress of knowledge is the motor of historical change.
- The social sciences are kin to the natural sciences basing their knowledge on science, theoretical laws, and empirical method rather than speculation or thought alone.
- Human society is driven by laws in the same way as nature.
- Individual free will, choice, chance, morality and emotions are less important in social processes.
- Society can be understood as a set of phenomenon which, despite the uniqueness and unpredictability of individuals, has real and predictable, large-scale regularities.
As a philosophy positivism:
- can be clearly seen in the central tenets of Marx and Durkheim who sought to reveal the forces underlying and shaping society;
- has an atomistic ontological view in which the world is understood to comprise discrete, observable elements and events that interact in an observable, determined and regular manner;
- assumes causality: individual cases are subsumed within hypotheses about general laws;
- assumes that human beings and human societies are subject to laws in the same way that the natural world is;
- assumes the unity of the scientific method (methodological monism): holds that all phenomenon should ultimately be understood with a scientific method;
- is deterministic, de-emphasising free will, emotion, chance, choice and morality;
- authorizes recommendations for social reform on the basis of truth claims and certainty.
The positivist thought of Marx and Durkheim was shaped by its social context─late 19th century Europe marked by:
- scientific rationality and advances in knowledge─for example Charles Darwin's (1809–82) theory of natural selection;
- the search for a corresponding 'science' of society.
Underpinning the theory of both, we see the positivist understanding that society and its constituent parts (moral rules, economic phenomena, laws, customs, institutions) are real, bounded, 'things', governed by laws, impacting upon one another, independent of individual will, driving inexorably towards certain pre-determined ends.
Karl Marx (1818–83)
Summary taken from Crotty, M 1998, The Foundations of Social Research, Allen and Unwin, Sydney, chapter 6, and Tucker, H. T. 2002, Classical Social Theory, Blackwell Publishers, Massachusetts, chapter three.
Some of the central tenets of Marx’s thought:
- Dialectical materialism (historical materialism)─societies are composed of inner contradictions that drive historical transformation (influenced by Hegel’s dialectic).
- Economic determinism─the means and forces of production (developments in the technological mode of subsistence) determine social relations of production.
- Unequal social relations or a division of labour arises when one group lives off the surplus produced by productive labour.
- Exploitation occurs when workers labour beyond what is necessary to reproduce their livelihoods and produce a surplus for capitalists.
- Different classes in society have different and conflicting interests. Class conflict drives social change.
- ‘Superstructure’─legal, political and cultural forms are built upon the ‘real foundation’ of the economic base.
- Ideology─the production and distribution of ideas by those who are economically dominant.
- ‘False consciousness’─accepting values and norms generated by the ruling elite that do not represent things as they really are. Universal rights, such as the freedom of speech, of assembly, and of religion, are ideologies. They obscure the inequalities that underpin society.
- Government is an extension of the ruling elite and does not represent the interests of workers.
- Marxist ontology─an understanding of human beings as productive in their very nature. Work is seen to express who we are and to fulfil us. Labour or creation, particularly socially organised labour, is what distinguishes us from animals and makes us truly human. Alienation (becoming a stranger to oneself)─within capitalism labour and its products become alien to us because they are owned by someone else. We no longer know ourselves, or find fulfilment in our labour.
- Capitalism is an internally contradictory and unstable economic system that is continually wracked by crises which cause unemployment, poverty and misery. Private ownership of capital without public regulation means that production is often out of step with consumption. This leads to economic collapse as too many commodities are produced which cannot be consumed. Capital depends on continual economic growth, reinvestment and opening up new markets. In order to cut costs and increase profits capitalists try to reduce labour costs, make workers work harder, and replace workers with technology. Capital is tolerant of unemployment because it keeps labour costs down. With the accumulation of capital, labour demand rises, unemployment goes down, the cost of labour increases, profits shrink, and capitalists curtail investment leading to a new cycle and further instability and human suffering.
- The international reach of capital means that local crises quickly become global leading to world wide crises.
- Capitalism and the pursuit of profit promotes imperialism and the brutal treatment and exploitation of native people's that goes with it.
- European imperialism destroys native industry without providing an alternative.
- History is progressive, and science, including social science, points the way to a society based on more objective principles than the market.
- A proletarian revolution is needed to restore humanity and to establish a more rational socialist, and later communist, organisation of production.
- European colonial expansion and the overthrow of the oppressive 'Asiatic mode of production' is necessary before there can be socialist progress.
- The new government must be decentralised, and based on local participation of workers rather than constitutional guarantees and representative institutions. Freedom can only be realised in a world where people are able to actively practice freedom and participate in creating the conditions within which they live.
Common critiques of Marx's thought:
- Eurocentric, and sees European societies as culturally and technologically superior to colonised societies;
- does not consider the cultural basis of determinations of rationality;
- the emphasis upon labour and economics neglects, or sees as derivative, cultural aspects of social life and power, such as gender, race, sexual orientation and administrative forms of surveillance.
Emile Durkheim (1858–1917)
Summary taken from Tucker, H. T. 2002, Classical Social Theory, Blackwell Publishers, Massachusetts, chapter four.
While Marx was concerned with the material conditions that shape the social world, Durkheim was interested in the symbolic conditions that hold society together. For Durkheim, the economy cannot be understood apart from the prevailing morality and culture that allows it to function in a stable manner. Durkheim was critical to the founding of a social science, and his work is often seen as founding the functionalist school of social thought. His work revolved around the symbolic bonds that hold society together. He believed that the level of social integration could be theorised in a scientific manner. He placed considerable emphasis upon the importance of working with careful definitions of 'social facts', their relations, effects, and underlying causal factors.
Some of the central tenets of Durkheim's thought:
- Religion and morality are given by social conditions rather than the divine.
- Religion is functional for society because it provides a stable set of social meanings and values. Religion was the cement that held pre-industrial societies together and with the demise of the importance of religion, there is a crisis of morality and a disintegration of the social bond. This is evidenced in increased suicide rates.
- Suicide is a social phenomenon, not an individual one, and is uniform within countries and groups. For example, Protestants commit suicide more than Catholics, unmarried men more than married men, and divorced people more than married people. There are four types of suicide: egoistic, altruistic, anomic and fatalistic. Egoistic suicide is caused by individual unhappiness as a result of poor social integration. Altruistic suicide is a sacrifice of the individual for a greater social good, and is caused by an over-integration of the individual within society (for example suicide bombers). Anomic and fatalistic suicide are tied to the level of social regulation of individual desires. Anomic suicide occurs when the desires of individuals are allowed to grow without restraint encouraging a selfish and greedy orientation to life (for example, anomic suicide can be caused by winning the lottery or when married men divorce). In fatalistic suicide people give up hope of ever changing the oppressive conditions of their lives (for example, prisoners or slaves who would rather die than continue to live under existing conditions).
- Healthy social integration depends upon avoiding the extremes of over and under integration in society.
- In the transition from pre-modern to modern societies there is a move from mechanical solidarity to organic solidarity. Mechanical solidarity is based in shared experience of labour, common beliefs and values, and clear rules. A sense of individuality and personal autonomy is weak or non existent in these societies. Organic solidarity is based on a strong sense of individuality and a weakened collective consciousness. In these societies social roles are highly specialised and there is a developed division of labour. Solidarity in these societies is based on people's dependence on one another to fulfil their needs, as well as upon the shared values of individualism and nationalism.
- The law and criminality provide a measure of social solidarity because they reflect the beliefs and values of a society. There is nothing inherent in an action that defines it as a crime. Crime and the law are socially constructed. They outline what is acceptable and what is not acceptable within a society.
- In societies based on mechanical solidarity, penal law aims to uphold collective values and tends to be repressive and punishing. In societies based on organic solidarity, the law is restitutive (compensatory) rather than retributive. Because the society is so diverse crime in a particular sphere does not provoke collective rage leading to the emphasis upon compensation instead of vengeance. A wide variety of legal contracts then bind people together instead of a shared set of ideals.
- Healthy societies are balanced and self-correcting. Within a well-functioning organic society the division of labour is based on the natural talents of workers. Workers will be happy because people do not want what is beyond their ability. People will accept a certain degree of inequality and there will be social cohesion as long as there is social mobility and meritocracy.
- Organic solidarity has broken down as a result of a forced, rather than an organically evolved, division of labour. A forced division of labour occurs in times of rapid industrialisation when Taylorism leads to overly regimented work, labour is replaced with machinery, workers are forced to work away from their families, and workers and employers, and producers and consumers, are separated from one another. Inherited wealth and inequality have also inhibited organic solidarity. The breakdown in organic solidarity is witnessed in unhappy workers, the conflict between workers and employers, and an increase in anomie in the society.
- A good education can prevent anomie in society. Education should not be purely vocational or instrumental. Education should prepare individuals for responsible citizenship and support a healthy democracy by encouraging critical thinking, self-discipline, and an awareness of the historically and culturally specific nature of political, social and economic life. Education must be based on empirical facts, and the values of rationality and self-reflexivity.
Common critiques of Durkheim's thought:
- does not consider that mainstream culture reflects ruling class values;
- assumes a given and shared sense of cultural values and ignores the emergence of cultural values via processes of struggle and conflict;
- assumes that people will find their level within a rational meritocracy and does not consider racial, class, gender and other forms of disadvantage.
Post positivist challenges to positivism within the social sciences
Summary taken from Hughes, J and W. Sharrock. 1997. The philosophy of social research. Pearson Longman, London, and von Wright, G 1993, ‘Two traditions’, in Social research: Philosophy, politics and practice, edited by M Hammersley, Sage, London.
Critical rationalism
Karl Popper (1902–1994) and the falsification thesis:
- argues that the defining feature of science, as opposed to pseudo-science or metaphysics, is its falsifiability;
- argues that true science does not understand reality by building theory, but by testing theory deductively;
- argues that rationality does not insist on proof, confirmation and positive argument;
- criticism is the defining characteristic of rationality.
Popper offered a significant modification of the positivist position by identifying what he saw as the distinctive features of the scientific method. Popper agreed with positivism that the methods of the natural sciences are relevant to the social sciences, but he rejected the idea that scientific knowledge of the social world is formed on the basis of general laws. He challenged the ‘scientific’ claims of social science knowledge such as Marxism and Freudianism on inductive grounds. Instead, Popper emphasised the importance of trial and error testing of general laws via new empirical observations of phenomenon. He argued that ‘true’ science does not seek to build unfalsifiable generalisations on the basis of empirically generated instances, nor does it seek to explain away failures in its predictions. ‘True’ science seeks to disqualify its theories by testing them against empirical data. One of the crucial conclusions of Popper’s view for social science theories is that attempts to reconstruct society in the name of general principles are not emancipatory, but suppress alternatives and invite tyranny.
Kuhn and the sociology of science
Although Popper could not be sure which scientific claims were true, because they are always open to further testing and refutation, he nevertheless believed that science progresses through critique and logical trial and error. This is challenged by Thomas Kuhn (1922–96).
Kuhn and the sociology of science:
- offers an argument against the view of scientific progress;
- revolutions in scientific thinking are not based on cumulative, gradual knowledge acquisition;
- new paradigms cut across the terms of the old, offering new concepts, questions, language, data, and new ways of seeing things (termed theoretical incommensurability)
- paradigms cannot therefore be compared within the same terms;
- acceptance of scientific theory is often based on political and cultural factors, rather than observable evidence.
Kuhn argued that Popper’s idealisation of true science rarely exists in reality. Rather than unrelenting criticism and testing, science has tended toward paradigmatic conformity and conservatism. For Kuhn, science is a social institution and scientists are socialised to accept the reigning values, beliefs, concepts, and rules of order and technique. Kuhn undermines the status of science as a rational and progressive development towards ‘truth’. According to Kuhn, shifts in scientific 'paradigms' (or disciplinary matrixes or exemplars) reflect the distribution of power, professional ambition, wider political and cultural factors, and the limits of existing theoretical paradigms. For Kuhn, theory enables a particular perception of reality, and reality opens itself to a variety of possible theorisations, none of which perfectly corresponds to the facts. Kuhn's work gave rise to a sociology of science which attempts to explain why some knowledge and beliefs come to be held as true while others are not.
Feyerabend and science as myth
Paul Feyerabend (1924–94):
- offers an argument against the view that a distinction can be made between observation and theory;
- argues that all observations are theory-laden, that is, told through the lens of cultural, linguistic and perceptual filters;
- since no neutral empirical evidence can be found to support a given theory, one theory is as good as another─at least in so far as its relationship to evidence is concerned;
- theories are chosen not on the basis of empirical confirmation, but idiosyncratic and social factors;
- it is not possible to differentiate the products of science from non-scientific entities like myths.
Despite their critique of scientific generalisation and the view of scientific progress, neither Popper nor Kuhn questioned the progressive nature of science per se. For Popper progress is secured by the history of trial and error. Kuhn did not dispute that science has progressed human knowledge, but the idea that it does so in a linear fashion, or in a way that is unrelated to social and historical conditions. Feyerabend argues that there is no scientific knowledge that can be said to be the product of objective reason or empirical fact. All knowledge is conditioned by factors such as self-interest, ideology and culture.
Conclusion
For post positivists, knowledge is shaped by:
- the researcher’s motivations and values,
- existing scientific theory,
- politics and power relations,
- cultural values and meanings,
- language.
Objections of this kind have been significantly developed in the social sciences and humanities and are introduced in the topics that follow.
Conclusion
From a social philosophy point of view, the thought of Marx and Durkheim reflects the values of rationality and science. Within both Marx and Durkheim we see the positivist faith in knowledge as the motor of progressive social change, and an attempt to understand the causal laws that underpin and explain the social world. For Marx and Durkheim, society becomes an entity which can be studied via the scientific method just as natural phenomena are studied in the sciences. Observable social phenomena are read for what they reveal about deeper underlying 'structures' or forces of social organisation. As we have seen these assumptions have been thoroughly challenged by post positivists.
The topics that follow provide different kinds of answers to the following ongoing questions/debates in social philosophy that arose as a reaction to positivism:
- Is science a superior way of knowing?
- How do we know things to be true or false; can we know things to be true or false?
- What inferences can legitimately be drawn from experience?
- Is scientific knowledge an adequate basis for governance?
- Can/should the social sciences emulate the natural sciences?
- Are social phenomena the same as natural phenomena?
- What role does the human mind and social action play in knowing?
- What role does language play in knowing?
- Is it possible to have a distinctively social science?
References
Crotty, M 1998, The Foundations of Social Research, Allen and Unwin, Sydney.
Hughes, J. and Sharrock, W. 1980. The Philosophy of Social Research, Third edition. Pearson Longman: London.
Tucker, H. T. 2002, Classical Social Theory, Blackwell Publishers, Massachusetts.
von Wright, G 1993, ‘Two traditions’, in Social research: philosophy, politics and practice, ed M Hammersley, Sage, London.
This resource was developed by Wendy Bastalich.
