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In postcommunist Estonia, the topic of inequality was considered "embarrassing." The dominant popular assumption was that inequalities just happen naturally. Class and inequality discourse was effectively marginalized due to long-lasting success in focusing attention on nationalizing issues. A "transition culture" that lionized the capitalist future has also contributed to the marginalization of class discourse. Because of this marginalization, and the power of national/ethnic discourse and transitional culture, those most economically vulnerable were deprived of the cultural and discursive resources to resist the most extreme market-oriented policies. Sociologists did discuss inequality more seriously, but mostly according to a gradational and functional stratification paradigm: the central focus has been on individual attributes that divide people into classes. The analysis focusing on relations of exploitation and domination have been virtually absent in postcommunist Estonia. We conclude that the main challenge for Estonian social science is to incorporate concepts of power, exploitation, and domination perspective into study of inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we assess the general claim that Durkheimian sociology has reactionary, fascist, or totalitarian affinities, and the specific claim that Marcel Déat's Durkheimian background was a significant factor in his becoming a Nazi sympathizer. We do so by comparing the different trajectories of the interwar generation of young Durkheimians and find that only one, i.e. Déat, can be said to have become fascist. Indeed, what characterizes this generation of Durkheimians is the variety of the ways in which they responded to the crises of the interwar years, both politically and scientifically. Nonetheless, most remained on the political left, and during the war many younger members of the Durkheimian group either fled the country or were involved in the French Resistance. As the only personal link between the Durkheimian group and fascism, Déat's career is of particular interest. Instead of Déat's being an orthodox Durkheimian, his successive engagements embody the intellectual fragmentation and heterodoxy characteristic of the interwar generation. We outline Déat's career by foregrounding the conjunctural and dispositional factors that we believe point toward a more plausible explanation of Déat's transformation than does an internalist history-of-ideas approach according to which his political evolution can be explained by reference to an underlying intellectual continuity. Déat's fascism is better explained by the repeated frustration of his political and intellectual ambitions that ultimately led to a fateful accommodation with Nazi power than by any tendency inherent to Durkheimian sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Copyright of Historia y Politica: Ideas, Procesos y Movimientos Sociales is the property of Departamento De Historia del Pensamiento y de los Moviemientos Sociales y Politicos (Madrid) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article discusses the use of series by social scientist as well as within socialist doctrine in France, focusing particularly on the period of the 19th century during the Restoration and July Monarchy. Some of the subjects considered include the use of series in the book "Introduction à la science de l’histoire" by J. P. B. Buchez, social reform movements of the period, the idea of progress in sciences such as physiology, zoology and geology, and the introduction of the terms “sociology” by Auguste Comte and “socialism” by Pierre Leroux.

The article presents a discussion about the perception of economics as a scientific field with objective rules. It claims that societies' perception of themselves affects their view of truth and knowledge. Thus, the modern view that societies are predominantly governed by given economic rules is to be seen as part of a larger societal myth. The article focuses on King Louis XV's France and the release of the economist François Quesnay's "Tableau economique" as the first text which brought forth this development. The article explores the reasons to the establishment of these rules and it offers a critical examination of the way in which the Tableau transformed a political question into an economic one.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau's attack on the natural jurisprudence of Grotius, Hobbes and Pufendorf is well known. But what happened to modern natural jurisprudence after Rousseau not very well known. The aim of this article is to try to show how and why it turned into what Emmanuel-Joseph Sieyès called “social science” and the bearing that this Rousseau-inspired transformation has on making sense of ideology, or the moral and political thought of the late eighteenth-century French ideologues. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Analyzes the works of French sociologist Robert Hertz with reference to his memoir "Saint Besse. Étude d'un culte alpestre." Contribution of the memoir to the history of social sciences; Presentation of the memoir in the monographic form; Criticism of Hertz's work by other sociologists; Failure of Hertz to promote his works in the Durkheimian environment. INSETS: Robert Hertz (1881-1913).;L'enquête et ses sources..

Copyright of Sociologie & Sociétés is the property of Presses de l'Universite de Montreal and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Focuses on some aspects of the study of the mind between the 1920s and 1940s at the University of Paris in France. Role of the compromise between fixity and historical transformation in the representation of the discipline of history and philosophy of science; Factors influencing the study of mind; Psychoanalytical history of science by Gaston Bachelard.

The article focuses on the importance of historical analyses of organization in contemporary organizational science. It states that Max Weber, one of the forefathers of sociology and organizational theory, believed that understanding contemporary institutions came through studying their history. It mentions that modern organizational researchers have abandoned researching historical studies due to the professionalization of sociology and in finding its own identity independent from history and other disciplines. It examines the historical evolution of organizations and differences in work organizations in France and Germany. It mentions that some differences are due to the apprenticeship system of guilds that existed in Germany due to the lack of state-run schools in Germany.

Sociology of literature covers two very different types of research, bearing respectively on literature as a consumer product and as an integral part of social reality. With the help of the sociological concepts of her own time and of Montesquieus time, author Madame de Staël undertook to show the original characteristics of the ancient and modern literatures of the north and the south. This article deals with the situation in the U.S., the Federal Republic of Germany and France. The American production of sociological works comprises of numerous notes on literature. Germany has a philosophical and sociological tradition which is directed to a much greater extent towards the sociology of literature. In the "Theory of the Novel," author G. Lukács abandons his Kantian attitude and adopts a Hegelian approach. He regards the novel as the characteristic literary form of a world in which man never feels entirely a part. The part of author Th. W. Adornos's work deals with the sociology of literature which comprises of numerous short essays.

Introduces a series of articles published in the October 1996 issue of the "Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences." Interpretation of Durkheimian sociology in the historical context of philosophical currents; Discovery of the historical antecedents for Durkheim's social realism in the political and educational philosophy of Rousseau; Significance of the history of philosophy in France in understanding the intellectual and practical goals of sociologists.