Third ISA Forum of Sociology (July 10-14, 2016)

645

In What Ways Can Comparative–Historical Sociology Help to Improve the Workings of the Modern World?

WG02 Historical and Comparative Sociology (host committee)

Language: English

In its origins, sociology was comparative–historical sociology. It no longer is. In the modern neoliberal university, money flows to present-centred (or “hodiecentric”) research, which politicians, policy-makers and administrators believe to be useful – a belief which a large proportion of mainstream sociologists find it advantageous to share. Both sides may also share the common belief that, because the modern/postmodern/digital/globalised world is changing and is so new in character, studying the past is irrelevant: as Henry Ford put it so pithily at a pivotal stage in industrialisation, “History is bunk”.  
Contemporary data-accumulating research is not without value, but it is not sufficient: contributions are invited reflecting on how sound comparative-historical knowledge of human society has the capacity to improve the human means of orientation and possibly to improve political decision-making.  
A few well-known quotations may help to bring this question into focus:  
“To be ignorant of what occurred before you were born is to remain always a child.” (Cicero)  
“People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors.” (Edmund Burke)
“Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” (George Santayana)  
And finally, Tony Blair, the British politician responsible for some of the most catastrophic decisions of the early twentieth century, once said – with the advantage of hindsight on his career – that he wished he had read history rather than law at Oxford. Posters: