To show that sociology was a science with its own distinctive subject matter Durkheim chose to study suicide. He believed if he could show this highly individual act had social causes it would establish sociology’s status as a scientific discipline. Using quantitative data from official statistics Durkheim observed patterns in suicide rates. Rates for Protestants were higher than Catholics, thus he concluded patterns could not be the products of motives of individuals, but were social facts. Thus they must be caused by other social facts – forces acting on members of society to determine their behaviour. Durkheim argues the social facts responsible for determining suicide rates were levels of integration and regulation. As Catholics were more successful of integrating individuals they were less likely to commit suicide. Thus Durkheim claims to have discovered a real law, that different levels of integration produce different suicide rates. He claimed to have demonstrated that sociology had its own unique subject matter, social facts, and they can be explained scientifically. Thus positivists disagree with the statement that sociology cannot and should not be a science.
Interpretivist sociologists however do not believe sociology should model itself on the natural sciences. Interpretivist criticise positivists scientific approach as inadequate for the study of human beings.
All interpretivists seek to understand actors’ meanings, however divided whether or not we can combine this understanding with positivist style casual explanation of human behaviour. Interactionists argue we can have casual explanations. However they reject the positivist view that we should have a definite hypothesis before we start our research. Glaser and Strauss argue it risks imposing our own view of what is important rather than the actors, so we end up distorting the reality we’re trying to capture. Glaser and Strauss favour a bottom up approach, or grounded theory. Rather than entering research with a fixed hypothesis at the start, our ideas should emerge from observations during the course of the research. These ideas can later be used to produce a testable hypothesis.
Postmodernists argue against the idea of a scientific sociology. They regard natural science as a meta-narrative. Despite the claim to have special action to the truth, science is another big story; its account of the world is no more valid than any other. Thus there’s no particular reason why we should adopt science as a model for sociology. Given the postmodernist view that there are as many different truths as there are points of view, a scientific approach is dangerous as it can claim a monopoly of truth and exclude other points of view. Thus scientific sociology not only makes false claims about the truth it’s also a form of domination. Feminists, such as post structural feminists share this view of scientific sociology. They argue the quest for a single scientific feminist theory is a form of domination as it excludes groups of women. Other feminists argue the quantitative scientific methods favoured by positivists are oppressive and cannot capture the reality of women’s experiences. Some writers argue that science is an undesirable model for sociology to follow as in practice science has not led to the progress that positivists believe it would. For example the emergence of risk society, with scientifically created dangers such as nuclear weapons and global warming, has undermined the idea that science inevitably brings benefits to human kind. If science produces such negative consequences it’s argued it would be inappropriate for sociology to adopt it as a model.
Popper differs from positivists in that he rejects their view that the distinctive feature of science lies in inductive reasoning and verificationism. The main reason why we should reject verificationism is because of the “fallacy of induction”. Induction is the process of moving from the observation of particular instances of something to arrive at a general statement. Popper uses swans to demonstrate this. By observing a large number of white swans, he generalised that all swans are white. It’s easy to make further observations to verify this. However despite how many swans we observe we cannot prove all swans are white as a single observation of a black swan will destroy the theory. Thus we can never prove a theory true simply by producing more observations that verify this.
Popper argues what makes science unique form of knowledge is the opposite of verificationism, a principle called falsificationism. A scientific statement is one that in principle is capable of being falsified by the evidence. We must be able to say what evidence would count as falsifying the statement when we come to put it to the test. Popper argues a good theory has two features. It is falsifiable but when tested, stands up to attempts to disprove it. It is also bold; it claims to explain a great deal. It makes generalisations that predict a large number of cases, thus is at greater risk of being falsified then a more timid theory that explains a small number of events.
For a theory to be falsifiable it must be open to criticism from other scientists. Popper argues science is a public activity. Everything is open to criticism thus flaws in a theory can be readily exposed and better theories developed. Popper explains this is why science has grown so rapidly. Popper argues science thrives in open or liberal societies, societies where ideas are open and open to challenge. Contrastingly closed societies are dominated by an official belief system that claims to have absolute truth. Such belief systems stifle growth of science as they conflict with the nature of science.
In conclusion, sociologists are divided about whether sociology is a science. While positivists favour adopting natural sciences as a model interpretivists reject the view that sociology can be scientific. This division is based in the disagreement of the nature of sociology and subject matter. Positivists see sociology as the study of causes. Social facts cause individuals to behave as they do. Positivists see this as the same as the natural sciences approach, to discover the causes of patterns they observe. Interpretivists see sociology the study of meaningful social action. Internal meanings are why actors behave the way they do. Human actions are not governed by external causes thus cannot be studied the same way as natural sciences. However while positivists and interpretivists disagree about whether sociology can be a science they both accept the positivist view of natural sciences of verificationism. Different pictures of science have emerged, having implications for sociology. Popper rejects verificationism in favour of falsificationism, thus much sociology is unscientific but has the potential to b e so. Kuhn argues sociology can only become a science if it develops its own paradigm. Realists argue science doesn’t only deal with observable phenomena as positivists argue but underlying unobservable structures. Thus Marxism and interpteivism can be seen as scientific.
by
imadaya (student)
