The Heart of Sociology

1
The Heart of Sociology James Moody The Ohio
State University Department Brown Bag, 4/29/05
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Introduction

• Points of Departure
• A battle for symbolic power
• Is anybody listening?
• What Knowledge?
• Where does sociology fit?
• Sociologically unique theory
• Making Sociology Relevant
• What do we want to say?
• How do we get the message out?
• Conclusions

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Points of Departure A battle over symbolic power
Why name it Public sociology?
Knowledge of the social world and, more
precisely, the categories which make it possible,
are the stakes par excellence of political
struggle, a struggle which is inseparably
theoretical and practical, over the power of
preserving or transforming the social world by
preserving or transforming the categories of
perception of that world. (p.236) Every field
is the site of a more or less openly declared
struggle for the definition of the legitimate
principles of division of the field.
(p.242) Pierre Bourdieu Language and Symbolic
Power
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Points of Departure A battle over symbolic power
Why name it Public sociology?

• The power to name is the essential step in any
  battle over the legitimate principles of
  division in a social field, such as the
  discipline of sociology.
• Appropriating sociology is an attempt to
  legitimate a political project
• Reifies the practice of appending non-scientific
  adjectives to sociology (Critical sociology,
  Policy Sociology, Professional Sociology)
• This is a brilliant tactical move,
• Uses our general practice of defining sub-fields
  (Organizational Sociology), but slyly changes
  the meaning of sociology in the process.
  Compare
• Political Sociology ?? Sociology of politics
• Public Sociology ? / ? Sociology of Public(s)
• Once the term is in circulation, the defining
  details are largely irrelevant. Power comes in
  establishing the term, not by filling in the
  particulars.

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Points of Departure A battle over symbolic power
Why name it Public sociology?

• How has this symbolic move been so easily
  perpetrated?
• Linguistic familiarity
• We are so used to the ltmodifiergt sociology
  construction in our scientific practice, that we
  easily misread the significance of the new
  appropriation.
• Repetition (mis)recognition
• Simple repetition in debates, talks, and
  plenary sessions reifies the concept by
  selectively (mis)recognizing the meaning
  content of these events as support for the
  project.
• This would be like counting the number of people
  at a rally without accounting for which candidate
  they supported.
• Plays on a social activist bias in the discipline

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Points of Departure A battle over symbolic power
Why name it Public sociology?

• Why do it?
• Internal
• The appropriation of power through naming is a
  covert way to change the direction and values of
  a field. Since this particular project plays
  well into the generally progressive politics of
  most sociologists, its often well-received.
• This move has a well-repeated history in
  sociology (see Abbotts Chaos of Disciplines).
• External
• By casting the project as sociology the
  legitimacy of a scientific field is appropriated
  for political projects.

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Points of Departure A battle over symbolic power
Why name it Public sociology?

• What should we do about it?
• Nothing
• The best response to this project would have been
  to simply ignore it. You kill a bad book by not
  reviewing it, not by giving it a bad review. The
  best counter-move in a symbolic battle is to not
  acknowledge the move in the first place.
• Turn the debate
• Its too late to do nothing, so lets change the
  focus of the question. We should use this as an
  opportunity to ask
• What is sociology and where does it fit in the
  social sciences?
• How can we make our scientific work relevant to
  wider audiences?

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Points of Departure Is anybody listening?

• What would effective public sociology look
  like?
• Burawoy says public sociology is
• A dialog between sociology and its publics
• Sociologists as sociologists engage in direct
  political discourse action.
• This should rest on moral questions regenerating
  sociologys moral fiber
• Effectiveness would thus imply getting noticed,
  failure is equal to public indifference.

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Points of Departure is anybody listening?

• Burawoy lists 5 recent exemplars of public
  sociology, all taken by the ASA, how many of them
  appeared in the press?
• Brief to supreme court on the Michigan decision
• Statements on Race (proposition 54, 2003
  importance)
• Resolution against the war in Iraq
• Resolution against a constitutional amendment
  banning same-sex marriage
• Protesting the imprisonment of Saad Ibrahim

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Points of Departure is anybody listening?

• What effect would effectiveness have?
• This is probably good news.
• Coupling sociology for politics is more likely to
  delegitimate sociology than legitimate our
  political programs.
• Consider Nadars involvement in the 2000 ASA
  meeting.
• The only coverage the N.Y. Times gave to that
  meeting was an editorial titled Sociologists to
  the Barricades1 that ridiculed the overly
  political, simplistic, and clearly ideologically
  motivated presentations, mocking any scientific
  activity.
• Richard Tommasson, summarized this by saying
  Three and four decades ago people confused
  sociology with social work, now they may confuse
  it with a revolutionary party.2
• If sociology is equated with liberal politics our
  scientific work will be similarly read. Our
  ability to remain above the fray is crucial to
  being heard at all.

1 http//www.crab.rutgers.edu/goertzel/asameeting
s.htm 2 http//www.asanet.org/footnotes/septoct00/
publicforum.htmlSociologists
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Points of Departure is anybody listening?

• What effect would effectiveness have?
• A counter argument is that sociology need not
  take a particular political stance.
• Public sociology has no intrinsic valence it
  can as well support Christian Fundamentalism as
  it can Liberation Sociology or Communitarianism
  -- Burawoy , p.11
• But every example weve seen so far has been for
  left and far-left causes and positions.
• It doesnt matter that this might well follow
  from good social science. It will be interpreted
  as just political.
• Ultimately, the goal of using sociology to
  legitimate politics is self-defeating. The same
  power of naming that allows claiming a space
  for public sociology will let those best
  skilled at using symbolic power simply equate
  sociology with politics.

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Points of Departure is anybody listening?

• This does not mean we should do nothing.
• The lack of direct political action can be
  politically relevant.
• Tendencies to stay out of politics can be seen as
  extremely conservative it favors what is
  currently in place.
• Fixing the points of debate
• The role of sociology (I think) should be to
  identify the social facts that political actors
  will have difficulty denying. We should provide
  the is to politicians ought.
• Which implies
• (1) We need to have something useful to say
• (2) What we say needs to be seen as legitimate
  descriptions of the world people are interested
  in.
• follows from sociologys unique empirical and
  theoretical position.
• Combines our claim to objective, scientifically
  grounded knowledge with disseminating that
  knowledge more widely.

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What Knowledge? where does sociology fit?

• Can sociology lay any legitimate claim to unique
  knowledge?
• Perennial debates over the existence of a
  theoretical core to the discipline
• Rapid growth in the internal diversity of topics
  sociologist study

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Number of ASA Sections
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
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What Knowledge? where does sociology fit?

• Can sociology lay any legitimate claim to unique
  knowledge?
• Rapid growth in the number of social science
  journals

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What Knowledge? where does sociology fit?

• Can sociology lay any legitimate claim to unique
  knowledge?
• This growth diversity has been seen as evidence
  for the ultimate emptiness of sociology as a
  scientific discipline.
• But disciplines are created dynamically by the
  exchange of ideas, not the number of ideas. That
  is, we recognize work as much by who they speak
  to as by what they speak about.
• The clearest empirical trace of this
  communication is citation.
• Disciplines can then be defined as clusters of
  work that speaks more to each other than to
  anyone else.

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What Knowledge? where does sociology fit?

• Can sociology lay any legitimate claim to unique
  knowledge?
• Sociology fits at the center of the social
  sciences. We are not as internally cohesive as
  Economics or Law, but more so than many
  (anthropology, allied health fields).
• This represents a tradeoff. We have traded
  unique dominance of a topic (markets, politics,
  mind, space, history) for diversity thus
  centrality.
• Sociology is interstitial discipline (Abbott,
  2004) in at least two-senses
• There is no content topic we can reasonably
  exclude
• We pull together, and generate, the ideas and
  topics covered by specialty disciplines.
• This makes us uniquely positioned to provide
  comprehensive insights on particular empirical
  questions.

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What Knowledge? Sociologically Unique Theory
Is there a set of unique theoretical tools
concepts that sociology uses to understand
substantive topics? These are the core
elements that form our scientific collective
conscious making possible the wider organic
solidarity that comprises the empirical
scientific work of the discipline. My strategy
is to ground the abstract ideas of structure and
agency embedded in Sewell, Giddens or Bourdieu by
embedding them in key action arenas (Networks,
Organizations, Markets ) which are intimately
linked to questions of meaning (culture) and
regular, repeated rules for social action
(institutions), all of which rest ultimately on
the distribution of people in places (population
ecology).
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What Knowledge? Sociologically Unique Theory
A proposed schema for primary sociological
elements
Networks
Scope of individual agency
Markets
Institutions
Culture
Determinacy of social structure
Population / Ecology
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What Knowledge? Sociologically Unique Theory
A proposed schema for primary sociological
elements
The Action arenas (Networks, Markets, and
Organizations) are were actors do things. We
have currently given much of this domain to other
disciplines, but theres no reason we cant
re-appropriate it. The meaning regions
(Culture Institutions) rest squarely on
Sewells treatment of schemas (rules that guide
social action but that are simultaneously
re-created in their use), differing only in their
regulatory power and resilience. Population
ecological distributions result from the combined
behaviors of actors use and reaction to the
meaning and regulatory dimensions, but in turn
shape the possible actions actors can take. (This
is nearly Durkheim wholesale).
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What Knowledge? Sociologically Unique Theory
A proposed schema for primary sociological
elements

• The typical substantive topics that sociologists
  deal with on a day-to-day basis then emerge from
  the intersection of these sets.
• For example
• Power or exploitation result from access to
  resources embedded in the action arenas and
  shaped by the meanings dimensions
• Categories like class, race or gender become a
  pattern of relations instead of essential social
  or biological elements.
• Any substantive domain can be treated in this way
  and, I think, typically is treated this way even
  if not put in this particular language.

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What Knowledge? Sociologically Unique Theory
A proposed schema for primary sociological
elements
The point, of course, is not the correctness of
this particular proposal. Its that our
interstitial position in the field of social
science allows us to take a wider view of the
social world than any other discipline. If,
as Arendt claims, science rests on the ability to
take a view from nowhere, then sociologists
have a distinct advantage, because we dont carry
with us the kinds of disciplinary blinders needed
to maintain strong boundaries. This should
allow us to more effectively communicate to the
wider public. But what do we want to say?
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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
A few empirical facts World HIV Prevalence 38M
in 2003
Source World Health Organization
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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
A few empirical facts Social isolation affects
suicide more for females than for males
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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
A few empirical facts but isolated males are
more likely to carry weapons than isolated
females.
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20
15
Percent Carrying Weapons
10
5
0
Outsiders (8)
Bridges (25)
Members (67)
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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
A few empirical facts Some racially
heterogeneous schools are socially segregated
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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
A few empirical facts while other
heterogeneous schools are socially integrated.
Why?
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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
and of course we could go on like this for many
more.

• Each of these empirical points are politically
  relevant
• HIV / AIDS ? questions about world position
  sexual behavior
• Social Isolation in Youth ? Role of schools,
  meaning of gender
• Racial Integration ? Meaning of race,
  Assimilation

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Making Sociology Relevant What do we want to say?
We need to ensure that those with political
agendas are getting the facts right. Our
training is in understanding explaining the
world, not in political action. We can win
debates and arguments about data, method and
findings. We cannot compete in the political
spin cycle. Often, however, the answer will be
We dont know. Hence the strong need for basic
social science research, research that is not
tied directly to a policy outcome, but instead
focuses on fundamental properties of social
interaction.
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Making Sociology Relevant How do we get the
message out?
Teaching

• Burawoy points out that one of our best arenas
  for political sociology is the classroom, since
  we graduate 25,000 majors a year.
• Note that this plays directly into the hands of
  those charging the academy with political bias.
• I agree that we should use our classes, but not
  to preach a specific political message.
• Instead, we need to generate a population of
  social science research literate graduates, who
  can be honestly critical of the kinds of data and
  claims they hear in the political realm.

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Making Sociology Relevant How do we get the
message out?
Research
Our best bet for being relevant will be to
advertise our findings. Most of our work is
funded by the public, either directly through
grants or indirectly through our university
salaries. We should be accountable for that
funding and do our best to expose them to our
research. This means using the media.
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Making Sociology Relevant How do we get the
message out?
Media Coverage

• The public finds (quality) research on social
  life as interesting as we do, and the science
  press is very eager to publish solid scientific
  findings.
• Ive had 3 pieces get significant media coverage.
  This work has appeared in
• Talk of the Nation (NPR) 3 Million Listeners2
• Time Magazine 4.1 Million (Circulation1)
• NY Times 1.1 Million (Circulation)
• Washington Post 746,000 (Circulation)
• Glamour 2.2 Million
• Mens Health 1.7 Million
• The Economist 800,000
• Harpers 800,0000
• Playboy 3.1 Million
• Total 16.75 Million readers, plus 2nd tier
  newspapers, wire web.

1. http//www.magazine.org/Circulation/circulation_tr
   ends_and_magazine_handbook/11186.cfm
2. http//www.npr.org/about/press/020319.recordbreak.
   html

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Making Sociology Relevant How do we get the
message out?
Media Coverage

• Working with the media comes with certain costs
• We have to make it accessible.
• They will get it wrong. But thats probably OK.
• The interest of the science press is inversely
  proportional to the prominence of political
  motives in the work.

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Conclusions

• The current push for public sociology is a
  classic exercise in symbolic power.
• The attempt to place public sociology as just
  another type of sociology is a ploy designed to
  borrow scientific legitimacy for a political
  project.
• The move risks a two-fold backfire
• Scientific sociology will be delegitimized by
  politics
• Illegitimate science will have no positive policy
  effect.
• As a discipline, sociology is uniquely situated
  (a) to bridge other social science disciplines,
  (b) bringing to bear unique theoretical insights
  (c) about empirical puzzles that are of genuine
  interest to the public.

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Conclusions
Marx famously said The philosophers have only
interpreted the world, in various ways the
point, however, is to change it. Theses on
Feuerbach, XI Before we can change the world,
we need to understand it. As it turns out, the
world is much more difficult to understand that
Marx and his optimistic 19th century companions
ever imagined. The sociologists primary
purpose is to contribute this understanding. It
is possible to change the world without
understanding, but you will rarely be happy with
the result.