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Stefan Collini
(1) Talcott PARSONS, The Structure of natural dispostion of the English intellec-
Social Action. A study in social theory tual climate to positivistic modes of think-
with special reference to a group of recent ing'.
European writers (New York 1937; 3rd (2) For example Perry ANDERSON, Com-
edition, 2 vols, Glencoe 1968); H. Stuart ponents of the National Culture, New Left
HUGHES, Consciousness and Society. The Review, (1968), 1-57, on 'The sociology of
reorientation of European social thought no sociology' : 'Britain may be defined
1830-1330 (New York 1958; repr. London as the European country which—uniquely—
1967); Noel ANNAN, The Curious Strength never produced either a classical sociology
of Positivism in English Political Thought. or a national Marxism'; 'Why did Bri-
L. T. Hobhouse Memorial Lecture (Lon- tain never produce a Weber, a Durkheim,
don 1959). Parsons' analysis also provides a Pareto or a Lenin, a Lukacs, a Gramsci ?
the framework for the outstanding study The peculiar destiny of the nineteenth-
of British social thought in the preceding century industrial bourgeoisie in Britain is
period, J. W. Burrow's Evolution and the secret of this twin default', pp. 11,
Society: A study in Victorian social theory 15. Philip ABRAMS, The Origins of
(Cambridge 1966; second edition, 1970), British Sociology 1834-1314. An essay
as is explicitly acknowledged on pp. XII- with related papers (Chicago 1968) : 'The
XIII and 260-1, where he deftly discusses history of British sociology before 1914—
the question 'why did England make no indeed before 1945—is in no sense a success
distinct contribution to the rethinking of story' and the 'problems of institution-
the fundamental concepts of social thought alization' constituted the chief reason
at the turn of the century', and recognizes for 'this failure', p. 4.
the temptation to find the answer in 'the
(3) And it is still the case that the lack as such. Talcott PAHSONS, Economics and
of 'a climate of theoretical speculation' Sociology: Marshall in relation to the
and the 'conspicuous absence of a cohe- thought of his time, Quarterly Journal of
rent body of theory' are considered to Economics, XLVI (1931-2), p. 337, n.
distinguish sociology in Britain. 'British (5) It is indisputable that Idealism was
sociology continues to be influenced by a the single most important philosophical
tradition of commonsense empiricism movement in Britain during most of this
tempered to the concerns of middle range period, and there is no need here to go
domestic problems and enlightened social into the intricate problems of the extent
policy'. David MORGAN, British Social and duration of its 'dominance'. For a
Theory, Sociology, IX (1975), 119-24. brisk assertion that it was the dominant
(4) From his earliest studies, Parsons school, see Anthony QUINTON, Absolute
argued 'it is ultimately the character of Idealism, Proceedings of the British Aca-
English philosophy which shuts out sociol- demy, LVII (1971), 303-29.
ogy' in the sense of a study of the social
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
(6) Indeed, one sociologist has recently sociology was like before Parsons'. John
announced, rhetorically but revealingly, GOLDTHORPE, An Introduction to Sociology
that 'it is impossible now to think of what (Cambridge 1968), p. 54.
STEFAN COLLINI
into an account of what they were interested in. Only the assumed
teleology then enables this to masquerade as an answer to the initial
question.
However, where past thinkers had access to the appropriate range
of concepts and were interested in the relevant set of problems, then
it can be illuminating to consider why their thought did not develop
further in a certain direction, if only as a way of focussing on the limits
and presuppositions of their actual thinking. The nature of sociology
was a much discussed question in the circles in which Idealism
nourished, and, I shall argue, the structure of the Idealists' thought
and the range of their interests were such as to make it plausible to
begin by reflecting on why they did not have a greater impact on socio-
logical theory in Britain. Moreover, a considerable historiography
has grown up around the question of the absence of a certain kind
of sociological theory in Britain during this period, and so although
I want to distance myself from this approach and to emphasise the
doubtful assumptions upon which it rests, it seems expedient to begin
by addressing myself to the question in these terms.
The second danger in the conventional way of stating the question
is the likelihood of exaggerating the contrast between the state of
sociology in Britain and that in the other leading European countries
(in practice these reduce to France and Germany, with minor parts
being given to Italy and, occasionally, Austria) (7). The result
is that one all too easily ends up wondering why Englishmen failed
to be Weber and Durkheim, whilst losing sight of the fact that this
was an achievement which eluded all the compatriots of the latter
pair as well. This leads to the tendency to produce explanations
which are so overdetermined that it becomes hard to see how any
thinking about society was managed in Britain, so unfavourable
are the conditions made out to be. The risk of such exaggeration
is reduced if one distinguishes at the outset between the degree to
which sociology was successfully institutionalised, the amount of
attention given to the subject, and the level of theoretical achievement
(bearing in mind that the latter will be judged in terms of the residue
of subsequently interesting theory which it deposits). Of course,
these three features are to be separated only for the purposes of
preliminary analysis, since in practice they are always interrelated,
(7) Most historians follow Hughes in Austria are well brought out in John
dealing with what he called the ' "heartland" TORHANCE, The Emergence of Sociology in
of Western society: France, Germany Austria, Archives europe'ennes de sociologie,
(including Austria) and Italy', op. cit., XVII (1976), 185-219.
p. 12. The peculiarities of the situation in
6
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
(10) E.g., Havelock Ellis reviewed tution, p. 782. Bendix and Roth suggest
Durkheim's Le Suicide in 1898, George that Weber was by no means a famous
Unwin reviewed Simmel's Philosophic des figure in Germany before 1914 (Scholarship
Geldes in 1901, and so on. and Partisanship, ch. 11).
(11) SHILS, Tradition, Ecology and Insti-
8
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
II
(12) Although the influence of the Neo- of course, Parsons has testified to the crucial
Kantians is well established, Weber's rela- importance of the German speculative
tionship to the Hegelian tradition is noted tradition, and its recognition of varying
by Bendix who suggests that it has been levels of abstraction, for the initial develop-
rather neglected in previous studies of ment of his own theory: Talcott PARSONS,
Weber's intellectual development. Rein- 'On Building Social Systems Theory: A
hard BENDIX, Max Weber: An intellectual Personal History, Daedalus, XCIX (1970),
portrait (London 1966 [first published p. 830.
New York 1959]), p. 388 and note. And,
STEFAN COLLINI
(13) This is well brought out in the essays of Philosophy Lectures, V (London 1972).
dealing with Green's 'individualism' in (14) Quinton, among others, insists upon
H.D. LEWIS, Freedom and History (London this very strongly ('Absolute Idealism',
1962), and in J. KEMP, T.H. Green and the previously cited); see also Hiralal HALDAR,
ethics of self-realization, in G.N. VESEY Neo-Hegelianism (London 1927).
(ed.), Reason and Reality, Royal Institute
10
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
Let us take a man, an Englishman as he is now, and try to point out that, apart
from what he has in common with others, apart from his sameness with others, he
is not an Englishman—nor a man at all; that if you take him as something by himself,
he is not what he is. Of course we do not mean to say that he cannot go out of
England without disappearing, nor, even if all the rest of the nation perished that
he would not survive. What we mean to say is, that he is what he is because he is
a born and educated social being, and a member of an individual social organism;
that if you make abstraction of all this, which is the same in him and in others,
what you have left is not an Englishman, nor a man, but some I know not what
residuum, which never has existed by itself, and does not so exist. If we suppose
the world of relations, in which he was born and bred, never to have been, then
we suppose the very essence of him not to be; if we take that away, we have taken
him away; and hence he now is not an individual, in the sense of owing nothing to
the sphere of relations in which he finds himself, but does contain those relations
within himself as belonging to his very being; he is what he is, in brief, so far as he
is what others also are (pp. 166-7).
So, the individual 'into whose essence his community with others
does not enter, who does not include relations to others in his very
being, is, we say, a fiction' (p. 168). Obviously, some kind of theory
of internal relations is being made to do a lot of work here, and Bradley
(15) F.H. BRADLEY, Ethical Studies (16) It is an indication of the prevailing
(London 1876 [second edition, revised with mode of treating such topics that Bradley
additional notes by the author: Oxford pointedly remarks that 'we will not call
1927]); all citations are from the Oxford to our aid the life of animals, nor early
Paperback edition, with Introduction by societies, nor the course of history, hut
Richard Wollheim (London 1962). we will take men as they are now' (p. 166).
II
STEFAN COLLINI
(17) This he took to be the teaching of of sociability as such: 'It all holds good
science: 'On the descent of mental qualities, against individualism, but does not all
modern investigation and popular expe- hold in favour of this or that particular
rience, as expressed in uneducated vulgar community as distinct from others of more
opinion, altogether, I believe, support one or less the same general character'. Note
another' (p. 169). In a note added in his added to p. 170.
1924 revision, he had to reconsider: 'Are (18) Bernard BOSANQUET, The Philoso-
civilized tendencies hereditary? How far phical Theory of The State (London 1899).
is very doubtful'. He also recognised All citations are from the fourth edition
that his arguments only suggested the action (London 1923).
12
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
13
STEFAN COLLINI
(20) He even suggested that 'wealth (21) This affinity, and its relation to the
has weight because people give it weight; underlying optimism of Bosanquet's social
but no one need give weight to wealth philosophy, is commented upon in Stefan
in politics or social intercourse unless he COLLINI, Hobhouse, Bosanquet and the
likes', and he took a very idealised view of State: philosophical idealism and political
how 'labourers and mechanics' could argument in England 1880-1918, Past and
realize the qualities of a 'gentleman' (p. 289 Present, LXXII (1976), 86-111.
and n.).
14
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
The truth is that there is no such thing as wholly individual experience, beyond
mere uninterpreted feeling and blind willing. It is human society [...] with its
accumulated stock of concepts, that makes our experience a more or less organic
system. The psychologists with their individualistic standpoint are, I think,
responsible for much more confusion than even Mr. Ward admits. It takes more
than one man to know anything, or to have an ideal end for volition (34).
(26) In this context he remarked that and Austinian jurisprudence: 'In each case
'the attempt to escape history in dealing the attempt to work out "pure theory"
with human phenomena makes the restor- unadulterated by history, has resulted in
ation of the particular historical background the ' 'theory'' being unintelligible and inex-
of the theorist essential to the understanding plicable except in the immediate surround-
of the professedly abstract theory'. He ings of those who have enunciated it'
offered as examples Ricardian economics (p. 157 and n.).
16
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
from this extreme position to one which merely asserts that social
institutions are the outcome of human action and so subject to alter-
ation by human action (27). (It was important to establish this point
against the popularized assumptions of classical political economy
as part of his Socialistic critique of existing economic and political
arrangements). None of these points is made at any length (and
I have somewhat schematized Ritchie's more casual presentation
of them), nor, though he recognized the inadequacies of existing social
science (28), were they followed up in the remainder of his relatively
brief writing career (29). But they suggest a range of interests and
a set of concepts which it is not mere present-mindedness to regard as
propaedeutic to sociology.
Although Ritchie did not systematically develop these specific
points elsewhere, the rest of his work exhibited the same general
approach to social issues, albeit that his intention in most of his
essays was more directly political and polemical (30). And I would
suggest that a similar approach to that sketched for Bradley, Bosanquet
and Ritchie informed, often loosely and sometimes in much feebler
form, the social philosophy of British Idealism as a whole. It is
certainly the case that I have chosen my examples from the strongest
representatives of this approach, but diluted versions of such state-
ments could be drawn from a host of other sources, from Muirhead
on the family, Mackenzie on social philosophy, Hetherington and
(27) Cf. his discussions of language on the question of the attitude of Ritchie and
pp. 168-70 with his claim on p. 171 that the other Idealists towards existing 'sociol-
'there are very many economic phenomena ogy' in section III, below.
which are dependent on individual action (29) The bulk of Ritchie's essays were
and social approval, e.g. the different forms written when he was in his thirties and a
of land-tenure, the degree in which freedom Fellow of Jesus College, Oxford. After
of bequest is permitted, and the kind of taking the chair of Logic and Metaphysics
contracts which are sanctioned by law and at St. Andrews in 1894, he was heavily
custom. All these may be and have been involved in teaching and administrative
altered—not indeed by the arbitrary will responsibilities, and increasingly suffered
of individuals acting in isolation, but by various sorts of illness until his death in
the will of individuals approved of by the 1903. The duties of his chair meant
general consent, or submitted to by the that what writing he did do during these
general acquiescence of the community'. years was more concerned with the tradi-
(28) Which he saw as dominated by tional problems of epistemology and meta-
'the dogmatic exaggeration of Mr. Benjamin physics than with social theory (see the
Kidd' and 'the facile metaphors of the late memoir by Latta, pp. 11-15).
Henry Drummond'. D.G. RITCHIE, review (30) See, for example, Darwinism and
of Robert MACKINTOSH, From Comte to Politics (London 1889), The Principles of
Benjamin Kidd: The Appeal to Biology or State Interference (London 1891), and
Evolution for Human Guidance (London Studies in Political and Social Ethics (London
1899), in The International Journal of 1902), all of which are collections of his
Ethics (1899-1900), at p. 252. I take up occasional political writings.
17
STEFAN GOLLINI
society no more than the individual mind can be understood apart from the idea
of system [...] The working ideas of Sociology should be those of function, structure
and organization—of a true identity in difference, not a mere contagion of similars.
If you are going to explain society in terms of mind, you must at any rate take mind
where it is most, not where it is least, mind: any casual association of psychical
units no more explains the structure and working of a mind than any mere association
of human units explains the structure and working of a State (33).
(31) J.H. MUIRHEAD, IS the Family ogy, Mind, N.S., X (1901), pp. 161-2.
Declining, International Journal of Ethics, Ball is not included in the standard dis-
VII (1896), 33-55; J.S. MACKENZIE, An cussions of British Idealism, presumably
Introduction to Social Philosophy (Glasgow because he wrote so little actual philosophy,
1890)—see also his Outlines of Social but he surely belongs here. He was a
Philosophy (London 1918), which was disciple of Green's at Oxford in the late
intended to replace the earlier volume, and 1870s before going to study at Gottingen;
his Lectures on Humanism, with Special as 'Greats' Tutor at St. John's College,
Reference to its Bearings on Sociology Oxford, he expounded a generally Idealist
(London 1907); H.J.W. HETHERINGTON philosophy. His more specifically political
and J.H. MUIRHEAD, Social Purpose: A writings (he was the founder of the Oxford
contribution to a philosophy of civic society Fabian Society and an advocate of 'moral
(London 1918). Socialism') are certainly informed by an
(32) Henry JONES, The Working Faith of a Idealist viewpoint. See Oona Howard
Social Reformer and Other Essays (London BALL, Sidney Ball: Memories and Impressions
1910), pp. s i , 56. of'An Ideal Don' (Oxford 1923).
(33) Sydney [sic] BALL, Current Sociol-
18
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
III
By the late nineteenth century, 'Sociology' was already a term
with a great future behind it, but in Britain in the last two decades
of the century it was enjoying something of a revival. Its vogue
was closely bound up with debates about, on the one hand, the
causes of and remedies for the 'Social Question', and, on the other,
the frequently related issue of the nature and conditions of progress
(or social development—the rather loose equation of the two was of
some importance here). It became a label which could be tied to a
variety of intellectual baggage in order to indicate that the discovery
of the 'laws of social life' was its destination, and that it thereby
merited first-class treatment. However, as is so often the case with
exotically-labelled luggage, this frequently led to its being roughly
handled. For the term was overwhelmingly associated with the
grandiose constructions and implausible analogies of Comte's and
Spencer's evolutionary theories, and that was enough to guarantee
it a hostile reception from most British philosophers of the period,
including the Idealists. Indeed, what needs to be emphasized is
the extent to which the Idealists shared the understanding of, and
attitude to, sociology which prevailed in established intellectual
circles. And the chief target of this barrage of philosophical criticism
was the claim that the proper task of sociology was to apply Darwinian
(and, in practice, Lamarckian) theories of evolution to the study of
society, or, as it was put by the best-selling popularizer Henry Drum-
mond, 'more than ever, the method of Sociology must be biolog-
ical' (34).
It is this understanding of what constituted the activity referred to
as 'sociology' which needs to be recovered if we are to make sense of
the development of the subject in Britain. For the tendency to
equate sociology with variations of biological social theory meant that
the criticisms so widely directed at the latter were for long assumed to
dispose of the claims of the former. I cannot here detail the range of
these criticisms, so I shall restrict myself to the views of one repre-
sentative critic, Henry Sidgwick. Actually, Sidgwick's caution and
scrupulous fairness mean that he only represents the most moderate
versions of such criticism, but as 'the last utilitarian', who had done
battle with the champions of Idealism on countless issues, he will
(35) Of course, such debates presupposed, Quotation from this and the two succeeding
rather than denied, the existence of some essays is from this edition.
common ground. Exaggerating this point, (37) Benjamin KIDD, Social Evolution
C.J. Dewey has suggested that there was a (London 1894); the book ran to nineteen
'convergence' between Sidgwick's moral printings in its first four years, according
and social theory and that of the Idealists, to Halevy (Elie HALEVY, Imperialism and
in 'Cambridge Idealism': utilitarian revisio- the Rise of Labour [first edition, in French,
nists in late-nineteenth century Cambridge, 1926] London 1961, p. 19). As a result
Historical Journal, XVII (1974), 63-78. The of the success of his book, Kidd was asked
evidence against this suggestion is presented to write the article on 'Sociology* for the
in Stefan COLLINI, Idealism and 'Cambridge 10th Edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
Idealism', ibid., XVIII (1975), 171-77. in 1902, where he could authoritatively
(36) H. SIDGWICK, The Scope and confirm the equation of the subject with
Methods of Economic Science (the Presi- biological social theory. This was the
dential Address to the 'Economic Science first edition of the Encyclopaedia to include
and Statistics' section of the British Associ- an article on sociology, itself an indication
ation), reprinted in his Miscellaneous of the increased attention recently paid to
Essays and Addresses (London 1904). it.
20
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
(38) Social Evolution, pp. 33, 35. In order to induce the world to accept any
(39) Political Prophecy and Sociology change they desire, they endeavour to
(first published in 1894 in The National show that the whole course of history has
Review), in Miscellaneous Essays, p. 333. been preparing the way for it [...] It is
Sidgwick perceptively noted that the success astonishing how easy it is plausibly to
of Kidd's book reflected a very general represent any desired result as the last
belief in laws of social development: 'When inevitable outcome of the operation of the
this attitude of mind is widely prevalent laws of social development'(pp. 218-9).
among educated persons generally, innov- (40) The Relation of Ethics to Sociology
ators whose social and political ideals are (first published in 1899 in International
really in their inception quite unhistorical, Journal of Ethics), in Miscellaneous Essays,
are naturally led to adopt the historical p p , 249, 263.
method as an instrument of persuasion.
21
STEFAN COLLINI
22
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
23
STEFAN COLLINI
(45) BOSANQUET, The Philosophical Theory recognition of the different degrees to which
of the State, pp. 40, 42, 47, 48-9; BALL, individuals can enter into the 'real end of
Current Sociology, p. 171. society'.
(46) MACKENZIE, Lectures on Humanism, (48) I have in mind the way in which
pp. 1, 5-6, 9; he was referring to the expo- Hobhouse, Maclver, Ginsberg and others
sition of the idea of 'orthogenic evolution' made a criticism of Idealism, particularly
as the line of 'the growth of mind' in the theory of the General Will, one of the
L.T. HOBHOUSE, Democracy and Reaction foundations on which they built their own
(London 1904), ch. iv. It is hardly surpris- sociological constructions. For HOBHOUSE,
ing that Idealists looked favourably on this in addition to his famous The Metaphysical
concept, since it was essentially a working Theory of the State (London 1918), see how
out of an Idealist notion of teleology in his own theory is related to a criticism of
biological terms. (I am, at present, engaged Idealism in his essay Sociology, in
in a much larger study of the place of R. J.S. MCDOWALL (ed.), The Mind (London
Hobhouse's thought in relation to the 1927); R.M. MACIVER, Community, A
turn-of-the-century debates about Liber- sociological study (London 1917), esp.
alism and Sociology, in which I hope to Appendix on 'A Criticism of the Neo-
document and substantiate this interpre- Hegelian Identification of Society and State';
tation more fully). also his The Modern State (London 1926);
(47) HETHERINGTON and MUIRHEAD, Morris GINSBERG, IS there a General
Social Purpose, pp. 78, 100, 119. The Will?', Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society
passages selected for praise are usually XX (1920), 89-112; also his Sociology (Lon-
those where these writers come closest to don 1934). I develop this point more fully
an Idealist view, e.g. p. 100 on Maclver's below.
24
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
25
STEFAN COLLINI
will in effect look in more detail at the attitudes of the British Idealists
to a range of issues relating to the understanding of society, since only
by recovering their responses to the problems raised by these issues
can we begin to appreciate the complex part they played in the intel-
lectual life of the period.
IV
(54) This section draws on material (55) Quoted by Latta in the memoir in
discussed more fully in COLLINI, Hobhouse, RITCHIE, Philosophical Studies, p. 42.
Bosanquet and the State.
26
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
political theory (56); but the standard account of this distinction was
one which British Idealists repudiated in principle, even if, in altered
form, they often accepted it in practice.
This point can be made in another way by considering how those
writers who did develop sociology in Britain in the first part of this
century were nearly always critics of Idealism on this issue. An
attack on the neo-Hegelian theory of the state became almost a rite
de passage for the budding social scientist (57). Hobhouse probably
provides the best-known example of this. As the first Professor of
Sociology in Britain from 1907 till his death in 1929, as the first editor
of the Sociological Review, and as the author of several standard texts
on the subject, Hobhouse has been recognized as the 'decisive' figure
in the development of British sociology, the man 'who made sociol-
ogy [•••] m Britain' (58). But he is also the best-known critic of
Idealist political philosophy, his Metaphysical Theory of the State
still being recognized as the standard demolition of the theory of the
General Will. And the first chapter of that work was precisely an
elaboration of the distinction between sociology and social philosophy,
with the charge that Idealism systematically confused them, and the
claim that 'the foundation of true social method is to hold the ideal
and the actual distinct'. The central premise of Hobhouse's argu-
ment is that the state is only 'one of the ways in which human beings
are grouped [...] To confuse the state with society and political with
moral obligation is the central fallacy of the metaphysical theory of
the state' (59). Hobhouse certainly had political reasons for wishing
to insist on this distinction, but, as his later works make clear, he also
found it essential to his conception of sociology as 'the study of human
society, which means in its most general sense the tissue of relations
into which human beings enter with one another', and even his
specifically sociological works frequently repeat his charge against
(56) Among the best known examples are (58) ABRAMS, Origins of British Sociology,
R. ARON, The Main Currents of Sociological p. 87; Donald G. MACRAE, Leonard
Thought, I (London 1968 [first published Trelawny Hobhouse 1864-1929, L.S.E.
in French in 1965]), esp. Introduction; The Magazine of the London School of
W.G. RUNCIMAN, Social Science and Polit- Economics, XLIII (1972), p. 10. Cf.
ical Theory (Cambridge 1963), passim; Ronald FLETCHER, The Making of Sociology,
Sheldon WoLiN, Politics and Vision (Boston Vol. II (London 1971), p. 13s; 'Hobhouse,
i960), esp. chs. IX and X. from 1907 to his death in 1929, was prob-
(57) Abrams rightly remarks that 'modern ably the most dominant influence on the
British sociology was built, more than making of sociology in Britain'.
anything else, as a defense against Spencer' (59) L.T. HOBHOUSE, The Metaphysical
(Origins of British Sociology, p. 67), but by Theory of the State (London 1918), pp. 17,
1920 the negative importance of Bosanquet 77.
was almost as great.
27
STEFAN COLLINI
28
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
3O
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
(72) Peter WINCH, The Idea of a Social commentary by Pierre Fruchon (Paris
Science and its Relation to Philosophy 1965).
(London 1958); one of the best discussions (75) Except in a few occasional essays,
of it is Alasdair MACINTYRE, The Idea of a ranging from D.G. RITCHIE, Rationality in
Social Science, reprinted in Alan RYAN History, in A. SETH and R.B. HALDANE (eds.),
(ed.), The Philosophy of Social Explanation Essays in Philosophical Criticism (London
(London 1973), which also contains other 1883), to A.S. PBINGLE-PATTISON (to
articles relevant to this controversy. which Seth changed his name in 1898),
(73) R.M. MACIVER, Sociology 1904-29, The Philosophy of History, Proceedings
reprinted in BRAMSON (ed.), On Community, of the British Academy (1921-3), pp. 515-29.
Society and Power, p. 229. I am grateful to Mr. Peter Nicholson for
(74) F.H. BRADLEY, The Presuppositions this last reference, and generally for allowing
of Critical History (London 1874), reprinted me to profit from his unrivalled command
in his Collected Essays, Vol. I (Oxford 1935). of the literature of British Idealism.
There is a useful critical edition with
31
STEFAN COLLINI
(from about 1910 to 1925) did these questions receive much philo-
sophical attention, and it could be argued that not until Collingwood,
and perhaps Oakeshott, did British Idealism lead to a serious engage-
ment with the philosophical problems of historical knowledge (76).
The limits of the British Idealists' involvement with concrete
historical problems are harder to indicate. Certainly they wrote a
good deal on the history of philosophy, and some of their major works
were organized around the treatment of the subject matter by previous
philosophers (77). However, the history of philosophy is perhaps in
itself less suggestive of sociological reflection than is, say, the study of
social change or economic development, and the Idealists were not
only not involved in these latter studies (it has always to be remembered
that they were for the most part professional philosophers) but they
never really seemed to grapple with the larger issues which such studies
raised. It may have been that the contemporary practice of history
did not encourage such speculation. The historians themselves were
usually hostile to the claims of sociology, associating it with biological
reductionism, inaccuracy, and Spencer; the self-proclaimed sociol-
ogists frequently reciprocated this hostility, which was compounded
by antagonism towards the academic establishment (78). The
(76) Collingwood was drawn to the German (Kant and Lotze as well as Hegel),
philosophical problems of history at a very and that indefatigable entrepreneur of
early stage, but his most famous statement philosophy, J.H. Muirhead, was involved
was, of course, The Idea of History (Oxford in several enterprises in the history of
1946); see p. 145 where he quotes philosophy, and also edited the (subse-
Bosanquet's characterization of history as quently named) 'Muirhead Library of
'the doubtful story of successive events' Philosophy' for fifty years.
which, constituted 'a hybrid form of expe- (78) The attitude of many historians
rience, incapable of any considerable is captured by Maitland's reported remark
degree of "being or trueness" ', and about Political Science—"either it is
criticizes him for 'conceiving the proper history or it is humbug"—but even those
object of knowledge platonically as a timeless who were more sympathetic, like J.B. Bury
world of pure universality'. By contrast, he or Oscar Browning, accepted that, as the
referred to OAKESHOTT'S Experience and its latter put it, 'at present the whole field of
Modes (Cambridge 1933) as 'the high- sociology is too vague for our purposes'.
water mark of English thought upon Both quotations from G. Kitson CLARK,
history' (p. 159). Oakeshott, and even A hundred years of the teaching of history
to some extent Collingwood himself, at Cambridge 1873-1973, Historical Journal,
ought perhaps to be regarded as sympathetic XVI (1973), p. 543. For an example of
to the tradition of British Idealism rather Bury's positivistic sympathy for sociology,
than as belonging to it. see: The place of modern history in the
(77) BOSANQUET'S History of Aesthetic perspective of knowledge (1904), in Harold
(London 1892) is a well-known example of TEMPERLEY (ed.), Selected Essays of
the first category, and GREEN'S Lectures J.B. Bury (Cambridge 1930). Spencer
on the Principles of Political Obligation was notoriously hostile to the historians
(first published separately, London, 1895) and constantly berated 'the ordinary
of the second. In addition, of course, they historian who, thinking of little else but
undertook or sponsored the translation the doings of kings, court-intrigues, and
of important philosophical works from the international quarrels, victories and defeats,
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Indeed, the same line was taken by those who were to be important in
developing a non-reductionist sociology: Hobhouse, for example,
objected that 'it attributes the phenomena of social life and develop-
ment to the sole operation of the economic factor, whereas the begin-
ning of sound sociology is to conceive society as a whole in which all
the parts interact' (117). It was a sign of the prevalence of this view
of Marxism that when, in 1913, A.D. Lindsay wrote an introduction
to a translation of a selection of Croce's essays on Marxism, he had to
explain that 'much of the difficulty of Marx's work comes from his
relation to Hegel', and that, in particular, this meant that he was
writing at a certain level of abstraction: 'Only darkness and confusion
can result from mistaking the abstraction for reality and from the
production of those a priori histories of the stages of civilization or the
development of the family which have discredited Marxianism in the
eyes of historians' (118).
als Sociologie (Leipzig 1897), which receiv- some indication of the distance between our
ed some attention in Britain (it was revie- understanding of Marxism and Bonar's
wed by G. Dawes HICKS in Mind, N.S., that he found Engels 'more philosophical
VIII (1899), 114-7). It may well have than Marx' and endowed with 'a much
accounted for much of the difference clearer philosophical vision than his mas-
between Bosanquet's 1897 article and the ter'. BONAR, Philosophy and Political Eco-
corresponding chapter in The Philosophical nomy, pp. 344, xvi, 346.
Theory, since he seems to have read Barth's (117) L.T. HOBHOUSE, Liberalism (New
book and in the latter work follows his York 1964 [first published London, 1911]),
classification in several places. p. 88.
( u s ) RITCHIE, What are economic laws ?, (118) Benedetto CROCE, Historical Mate-
p. 173. rialism and the Economics of Karl Marx,
(116) BOSANQUET, Philosophical Theory translated by C M . Meredith, with Intro-
of the State, p. 28. Bonar dealt at some duction by A.D. Lindsay (London 1913),
length with Marx's economics, but found pp. XII-XHI. Lindsay was to make a fur-
his theory 'as strictly deductive as RicardoV, ther contribution to the recovery of the
and repeated the usual criticisms of his Hegelian dimension of Marx in Britain
one-sided view of history. It is perhaps with his Karl Marx's Capital: An intro-
42
SOCIOLOGY AND IDEALISM IN BRITAIN
ductory essay (London 1925), which grew the relevant parts of Stanley PIERSON,
out of that fusion of the Glasgow-Balliol Marxism and the Origins of British Social-
tradition with W. E. A. and Clydeside ism: The struggle for a new consciousness
experience so characteristic of British (Ithaca 1973).
socialist thought at this time. See Drusilla (120) On this tradition, see ABRAMS,
SCOTT, A.D. Lindsay, A biography (Oxford Origins of British Sociology, and T.S. and
1971), esp. pp. 97-9. M.B. SIMEY, Charles Booth: social scientist
(119) This impression is borne out by (Oxford i960).
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'Those who can, do; those who can't, write the history of it'
might, with pardonable exaggeration, be said of many an academic
discipline (including sociology), where becoming its historian so fre-
quently fills in the years between achievement and retirement. This
ceased to be the case in the natural sciences some time ago, and there
are signs of change in the historiography of the social sciences. But
the history of sociology is still largely written by sociologists, and the
professional concerns of the practising sociologist all too easily inhibit
a properly historical reconstruction of the past (133). In his search
for ancestors, he tends to reduce history to its lowest form, genealogy,
and his chief explanatory concept is 'begat' (or 'influenced', which
in practice often amounts to much the same thing). Moreover, since
only a very recent generation is assumed to have really 'achieved'
sociology, the whole affair becomes like a retrospective prizegiving
in which no candidate before a certain date can be more than pro-
xime accessit. So the dominant mode is still for a whiggish or trium-
phalist account of the past to be based on a parochial preoccupation
with the current controversies of the profession. As with 'official
histories' in recently-established republics, rival teams of great
predecessors may be assembled, ostensibly to proclaim and honour a
tradition of surprising antiquity, but in fact to legitimate the claims of
the current protagonists in the struggle for power.
(133) Consider, for example, Andreski's ters what has become untenable, their
injuction to ignore 'everything that appears contributions dovetail like parts of a jigsaw
[...] to be mistaken or superseded' in the puzzle'. Stanislav ANDHESKI, 'Introduc-
work of previous 'sociologists', their tion' to Herbert Spencer, The Principles of
'errors and foibles', on the grounds that Sociology (London 1969), pp. ix-x.
'if we cut out from the works of old mas-
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It is, of course, undeniable that the past will only answer the ques-
tions we put to it, and that in framing these questions we are inesca-
pably under the sway of our present interests. Fifty years ago, a
rather different story was told of sociology's past (134), and recent
accounts, including my own, are obviously shaped by changes which
have taken place since then in sociologists' conceptions of their activity
(not, of course, that there is any consensus of such conceptions).
But it seems to me to be equally undeniable that the history of socio-
logical theory is doomed to anachronism unless it is considered in the
context of a more general intellectual history. This is not to deny
the legitimacy or the necessity of the division of intellectual labour,
but rather to insist that it is a mistake to assume, in advance of histor-
ical investigation, that there is a self-contained subject called 'sociology'
which, like the hero of an old-fashioned novel, has adventures rather
than identity-crises. In reconstructing the thought of the past,
however much we must select from it, we are committed to trying to
recover its understanding of its enterprises, and these may well not
correspond to the divisions and definitions of the disciplines which
prevail in the present. Again, this does not mean that the history
of sociology can be equated with a history of the uses of the term
'sociology': the former remains dependent on our criteria for selection,
while the latter may both include activities which are not now so
classified and exclude activities which are. But, as I have tried to
suggest in this article, the recovery of an earlier period's criteria
for the application of the term 'sociology' may well help us, at the very
least, to understand why the two did not correspond more closely.
The adequacy of the precursors' parade as a form of history is now
being challenged even in the case of sociology, but the new orthodoxy
which is growing up seems to me to conceal at least one very dubious
methodological assumption of its own. In rejecting the mere summary
of previous 'systems', the advocates of this approach urge, as J.D.Y.
Peel puts it in his excellent study of Spencer, that we need to be told
less about how sociologists 'saw the world' and more 'about that world
itself. For it is claimed that 'each new sociological generation's
writing is shaped primarily by what social features distinguish their
age from previous ones'. So to account for the differences between
the theories of these generations 'we should not look first at the
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* This article was written in the Spring of 1976, and a shortened version was
presented at the 1976 Social Science History Association Conference in Philadelphia.
I am indebted to the University of Sussex and to the Committee on the History
and Epistemology of the Sciences of Man for sponsoring my participation in that
conference, and I am grateful to many friends and colleagues there and elsewhere
for suggestions and criticisms.—This article was to have been published in 1977,
but, for editorial reasons, had to be held over to the present issue. The editors
wish to express their regret at this delay.
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