The Sociological Uses of History

There have been three decided trends in sociological investigation in recent years, the statistical, social psychological, and historical. This essay is concerned with the latter. The history that sociology utilizes is the "new history." Among the uses which sociology has made of history are the following: the ability to interpret the present, the substantiation of social evolution, the proof of the rality of social change, the perception of cause and effect in social phenomena, its substitution for impossible experimentation, the recognition of the fact that all social effort must take recent trends into consideration, the use of trends and tendencies to anticipate future effects, the conclusion that progress must come by telic activity, as a guide in the determination of the antecedents and consequences of social revolutions, and the provision of knowledge useful in curing or preventing them, the presentation of social psychological data, and facts concerning the development, role, and decadence of institutions, the introduction of purpose and organization into social thought, the demonstration of how ruling ideas develop, the significance of imaginary characters and events, a basis for intellectual freedom, the establishment of a foundation for sociological thought, a demonstration of the mechanics of the realization of ideals, and the part of ideals in modifying human conduct. The facts provided by the new history are continually increasing both in number and accuracy and will be used more and more by sociology as time goes on, in spite of the development of other factfinding agencies

Epistemology · Political science · Social change · Social science · Sociological theory · Sociology · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Law · Philosophy

• Sociology as a historical science

  Open Access•Elisabeth S Clemens•The American Sociologist•2006

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