The Sociology of Scientific Disciplines

On the Genesis and Stability of the Disciplinary Structure of Modern Science

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4516536
AutoresRudolf Stichweh (0000-0002-4028-0970, Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory, autor de correspondencia)
Año1992
Volumen5
Número1
Páginas3-15
Fecha de publicación1992-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaScience in Context (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0269-8897 • E-ISSN: 1474-0664
EditorialCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/s0269889700001071
OpenAlexW2160600170
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas59
Referencias citadas9

The ArgumentThis essay attempts to show the decisive importance of the "scientific discipline" for any historical or sociological analysis of modern science. There are two reasons for this:1. A discontinuity can be observed at the beginning of modern science: the "discipline," which up until that time had been a classificatorily generated unit of the ordering of knowledge for purposes of instruction in schools and universities, develops into a genuine and concrete social system of scientific communication. Scientific disciplines as concrete systems (Realsysteme) arise as a result of (a) the communicative stabilization of "scientific communities" at the end of the eighteenth century and the formation of "appropriate" roles and organizational structures (in universities); (b) the structural differentiation of the new scientific disciplines from the established professions (law, theology, medicine) in Europe; (c) the formation of scientific communication in the standardized form of scientific publication; the distinction of the separate action-type "scientific research" and the differentiation of these two elementary acts of all future scientific endeavor in relation to each other.2. The scientific discipline as primary unit of the internal differentiation of science has, since its genesis, been stabilized by two conditions: (a) The fact of a science differentiated into a plurality of (competing, mutually stimulating) disciplinary perspectives becomes the chief causal factor underlying the developmental dynamism of modern science; (b) Similar to the way in which the discipline functions as a cognitive address within the system of science, science also links the discipline up as a structural unit (utilized in both systems) with curricular structures in the system of education - i.e., it is stabilized by the central system/environment relation of science

Discipline · Dynamism · Engineering ethics · Epistemology · Mathematics education · Scientific communication · Social science · Sociology · Sociology of scientific knowledge · Chemistry · Computer Science · Engineering · Philosophy · Psychology · scientometrics and bibliometrics research