George McCarthy

This introductory course for first-year students traces the development of modern social theory from the 17th to the 20th century. It begins by examining the fundamental social institutions and values that characterize modern society and the Enlightenment in the works of Descartes, Locke, Dickens, Weber and J.S. Mill: rise of modern state, political democracy and utilitarianism; market economy, industrialization and economic liberalism; new class system and capitalism; modern personality (self) and individualism; and principles of natural science, technological reason and positivism. The course then turns to the dreams and imagination of Romanticism in the 19th and 20th centuries with its critique of modernity in the works of Marx (socialism), Freud (psychoanalysis), Camus and Schopenhauer (existentialism) and Nietzsche (nihilism). We outline the development of the distinctive principles and institutions of modernity in the following works: Dickens' "Hard Times," Marx's "Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844," Weber's "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" and "Science as a Vocation," Locke's "Second Treatise of Government," Mill's "On Liberty," Descartes' "The Meditations Concerning First Philosophy," Freud's "Dora: An Analysis of a Case of Hysteria" and "Five Lectures on Psychoanalysis," Camus' "The Fall," Schopenhauer's "The World as Will and Representation," and Nietzsche's "Twilight of the Idols." Students may take only one introductory-level course. This course is open only to first-year students. This counts toward the foundation requirement for the major. No prerequisite. Offered every semester.

The first part of this course examines the underlying philosophical and sociological foundations of modern science and rationality. It begins by examining the differences between the ancient Greek and medieval views of physics, causality and organic nature; and the modern worldview of natural science in Galileo, Descartes and Newton. We then turn to the debates within the philosophy of science (Burtt, Popper, Kuhn, Quine, Feyerabend and Rorty) and the sociology of science (Scheler, Ellul, Leiss, Marcuse and Habermas) about the nature of scientific inquiry and the social/political meaning of scientific discoveries. Does science investigate the essential reality of nature, or is it influenced by the wider social relations and practical activities of modern industrial life? Does science reflect the nature of reality or the nature of society? We deal with the expanded rationalization of modern society: the application of science and technological rationality (efficiency, productivity and functionality) to economic, political and social institutions. We examine the process of modernization and rationalization in science, labor, politics, the academy and ecology. Finally, we discuss the debates within the environmental movement between the deep and social ecologists as to the nature and underlying causes of the environmental crisis. Readings are from T. Kuhn, M. Berman, H. Braverman, E. A. Burtt, M. Horkheimer, C. Lasch, F. Capra and M. Bookchin. Prerequisite: 100-level sociology course.

This course examines the development of classical social theory in the 19th and early 20th centuries. First, we explore the philosophical and intellectual foundations of classical theory in the works of Descartes, Hobbes, Locke, Hume, Kant and Hegel. We will examine how social theory integrated modern philosophy, classical political science (law) and historical political economy in the formation of a new discipline. Distinguishing itself from the other social sciences as an ethical science, classical sociology, for the most part, rejected the Enlightenment view of positivism and natural science as the foundation for social science as it turned instead to German idealism and existentialism for guidance. It also rejected the Enlightenment view of liberal individualism and utilitarian economics, and in the process united the ancient ideals of ethics and politics (Aristotle) with the modern (neo-Kantian) concern for empirical and historical research. Next, we examine the classical analysis of the historical origins of Western society in the structures and culture of alienation (Marx), rationalization and disenchantment (Weber), and anomie and division of labor (Durkheim). At the methodological level, we study the three different views of classical science: critical science and the dialectical method (Marx), interpretive science and the historical method of understanding and value relevance (Weber), and positivistic science and the explanatory method of naturalism and realism (Durkheim). This counts toward the theory requirement for the major. Prerequisite: SOCY 262 or permission of instructor.