Analytical sociology and critical realism

This chapter compares analytical sociology and critical realism, focusing on the criticisms of the former developed by theorists of the latter. In defending the research program of analytical sociology, we argue that these criticisms are unconvincing. The article consists of four parts. The first argues that critical realism is based on a foundationalist theory about the unobservable deep structures of reality that is incompatible with the fallible and non-foundationalist metaphysical assumptions of analytical sociology. The second shows that the accusations of atomism leveled by critical realists at analytical sociology are mistaken because this approach is committed to a non-atomistic variant of MI that allows for a structural analysis of social phenomena. In the third the differences between the analytical and the critical realist conceptions of social mechanisms and causation are outlined. The final part presents the main differences in the research agenda of analytical sociology and critical realism.

Causation · Critical realism (philosophy of perception) · Epistemology · Foundationalism · Metaphysics · Realism · Sociology · Critical Realism in Sociology · Philosophy

• The recent turn in analytical sociology

  Open Access•K D Opp•Social Science Information•2024

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