Abstract
Social studies cannot abstract from reality, as do mathematics and the logical-formal sciences, for the investigation of reality is precisely their object; yet nor can they adhere strictly to reality, as does the observation-verification method. Put another way, while too great abstraction passes over the object of the social sciences, the ever intensifying rate of social change precludes employment of an observation-verification method based upon the repetitiveness (or, in biology, the quasi repetitiveness) of events. Social reality is the product of the organizational action of man and his inventiveness, yet it is also deeply rooted in the basic content of situation. It follows that the method appropriate to the analysis of social reality must combine the observational and organizational views, thereby encompassing the realms of both being and doing. Moreover, that method must be able to distinguish organizational necessities from choice-possibility and creativeness. This distinction is indispensable if we are to hope to discern the different currents and contributory streams within the flow of social change and capture basic and long-lasting aspects of social systems. In this chapter we identify those basic elements fostering duration and those initiating the propulsive forces of social systems. These elements are denominated, respectively, functional imperatives and ontological imperatives. We also underline the role of long-lasting choices in the history of civilizations. This allows us to make two steps. Firstly, to show how functional imperatives change over long periods, with their nature at any particular moment indicative of a particular historical age. Secondly, to delineate a theory of social and historic processes founded on the operation and interaction of functional imperatives, ontological imperatives and civilizations. Our methodological discussion encompasses also ethical values. These results are in stark contrast to the ethical relativism that contemporary analyses are obliged to embrace due to the innate incapacity of observation verification method to allow a scientific treatment of values. Our methodological approach also takes note of the nature of forms of power and other organizational aspects of social systems.
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Notes
- 1.
For intensive discussion on this point, see the analyses on K.R. Popper in two of my books (2010 and 2014) cited in footnote 1.
- 2.
A recent book by T. Piketty (see Piketty 2014) underlines the large and growing inequalities in income distribution at the advantage of capital and managerial incomes. The book presents an illuminating historic analysis of important economic variables, but disregards the problem of method, in particular the combination between observational and organizational aspects, being and doing, which is indispensable to grant a scientific standard to social studies. Such a disregard prevents from suggesting more efficacious solutions to the problems he points out.
- 3.
In this respect, M. Archer’s view that a measure of the appropriateness of social theory is its ability to represent human freedom and constraints appears illuminating see Archer (1997).
- 4.
From page 42 of such a book, let me quote the following: “To summarize, the method of social sciences must be deductive and must derive deductions from realistic postulates on the basis of the principle of organizational rationality. Moreover, it must be centered on the specification of rules and procedure of classification that lead scholars in their research into and corroboration of significant initial postulates,…. i.e. warranting the solidity of deductions notwithstanding the impossibility of an empirical verification of the theory.”
- 5.
We can see, therefore, that methodology cannot do without ontology, just as M. Archer writes above: “Ontology without methodology is deaf and mute, methodology without ontology is blind” see Archer (1997), p. 40.
- 6.
Under this respect, Pellicani’s analysis on the worth of capitalist civilization is useful and appropriate see Pellicani (1988); unfortunately, the analysis does not go beyond such acknowledgement, for instance with regard to the capitalist forms of power, the links between income production and distribution and the implied question of social justice (see Chaps. 6 and 8 of this booklet).
- 7.
An important teaching emerges from the analytical categories above: the world is not only condemned to suffer the harsh conflicts among civilizations, as underlined by Huntington (1997); it is also joined by important organizational necessities and the need of propulsive factors expressed by functional and ontological imperatives.
- 8.
For instance, it is impossible to solve the problem of substituting capitalism with a different civilization form if the distinction between necessity and choice-possibility and the notion of ontological imperative are left out. In fact, such a transformation of society needs the a priori indication of the functional imperatives of modern societies, followed by the checking of the civilization forms congenial with them and that respect ontological imperatives, and finally the choosing of the preferred civilization. We shall see that democratic procedures and choices cannot concern the field of ‘necessity’ (since this is a matter of science), but must concern the field of ‘choice-possibility’. The reference of democracy to the field of necessity may cause great errors and abuses.
- 9.
See Pascal (1952), Les Pensées, B.U.R., Milan, thought n° 304.
- 10.
The theories of social value (for instance the contributions of Commons and Dewey in the matter) are strongly damaged by the absence of the notion of objective (scientific) ethical values and the distinction of these from the ethical values concerning ‘choice-possibility’. I think that such a distinction is crucial for the theory of social values, but unfortunately it is currently ignored, as far as I know; an ignorance inevitable in the absence of an organizational view on method, with such a view replaced by the observational experimental one that simply sees and considers the operation of human interests and passions, what makes the distinction above impossible. Some consideration in Chap. 8, Section “The Circuit of Production, the Abolition of the Wage Company and the Dimension of the Private Sphere in the Dunatopian Economy of Full Employment”, on the theory of labor value and Chap. 12 on ethics will add clarification.
- 11.
But the model must not be assimilated to the evolutionary social thought inspired by Lamarckian and Darwinian biology even if with some minor adjustment however ignoring the notions of: civilization, ontological and functional imperatives, basic features of social change and innovation and, in sum, ignoring the main substance of the evolution of human societies. In this regard, a critical reference to important evolutionary social students is obliged: for instance, a recent stimulating book by G.M. Hodgson and T. Knudsen, entitled ‘Darwin’s Conjecture’, (see the Appendix) and the higher flexibility in the matter by U. Witt. The analysis by A. Hermann on institutional economics and its interdisciplinary orientation (see A. Hermann 2015) can provide some useful illustration on the subject.
It is inappropriate to deduce from the trial and error process, which is typical of the growth of knowledge in all fields and of human action at large, the explanatory fecundity of Darwinian or Lamarckian variation-selection-replication. In fact, that deduction is mistaken if trial and error is (or can be) complemented by intelligent decision-making and is not a merely casual stance.
- 12.
See Fusari (2014), Chap. 4.
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Fusari, A. (2016). The Scientific Frame of This Story. In: Understanding the Course of Social Reality. SpringerBriefs in Sociology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-43071-3_2
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