1. WATERGATE AND SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY.
- Author
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Mankoff, Milton
- Subjects
- *
WATERGATE Affair, 1972-1974 , *SOCIAL sciences , *DEMOCRACY , *DESPOTISM , *CAPITALISM - Abstract
The article focuses on the prediction of social behavior and American history based on a sociological theory with reference to Watergate Affair. The problems of the U.S. administration at the time of President Richard Nixon to the present time is discussed. The revelations confirm the dismal record of sociology when confronted with history. By eschewing examination of the structure, dynamics and social concomitants of the capitalist mode of production in general, and its specific historical evolution in the United States, the sociology of American society is inherently limited. In understanding a phenomenon such as Watergate one must recognize that it is an understandable outgrowth of the long-term trend toward de facto political absolutism in the executive branch of the United States government. The outgrowths like Watergate and absolutism in government are related to the contradiction in the nature of capitalism including inequality, unequal development and lack of powerful external and internal interferences. Under these circumstances the U.S. administration cracked down. The need is that the elites in power and sociologists to address themselves to resolution of the Watergate Affair. The article concludes by asserting that outcome of Watergate will have a profound impact upon the direction of public policy in the U.S.
- Published
- 1974
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