What is Deconstruction, and Where and When Does it Take Place? Making Facts in Science, Building Cases in Law

Datos Bibliográficos

ID5250484
AutoresStephan Fuch (0000-0002-1766-196X), Stephan Fuchs (0000-0002-1338-2699), Steven Ward (0000-0001-6084-2785)
Año1994
Volumen59
Número4
Páginas481
Fecha de publicación1994-08-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaAmerican Sociological Review (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0003-1224 • E-ISSN: 1939-8271
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.2307/2095926
OpenAlexW2318791680
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas38
Referencias citadas30

There are two forms of deconstruction. Radical DECONSTRUCTION is rare. It is a sign of deep crisis and extraordinary skepticism among intellectual workers facing high uncertainty. Moderate deconstruction, however, occurs wherever conflicts over knowledge are built into the competitive and adversarial structure of social fields. We illustrate the social dynamics of moderate deconstruction for two specific cases: making facts in science and building cases in law. There are strategies of deconstruction common to both science and law which generalize untrustworthiness and thus economize on deconstruction costs. These strategies are rhetoric, ideology, procedure (or method), and reputation. Under certain conditions, moderate deconstruction turns into radical DECONSTRUCTION. This is most likely to happen in revolutionary science and in loosely coupled textual fields that have minimal hardware and social solidarity

Deconstruction (building · Epistemology · Law and economics · Political science · Sociology · Contemporary Sociological Theory and Practice · Engineering · Law · Philosophy · Philosophy and History of Science · Philosophy, History, and Historiography