The social Theory of Georg Simmel

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1024612627

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-166627

Document type:: Monograph

Author:: Spykman, Nicholas J. http://d-nb.info/gnd/124229867

Title:: The social Theory of Georg Simmel

Place of publication:: Chicago

Publisher:: Univ. of Chicago Press.

Year of publication:: 1925

Scope:: XXIX, 297 S

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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lity sile ices ical tific ted. iza- ob- na ron- on- be- in- ree- tific liza- hod, Zero. con- sug- 2) be. im- rom The kept ss to ap- lina- dif- yme- 1s of roh- PREFACE + K lems of a special and limited science instead of problems requiring a co-ordination of the knowledge available from all social sciences. Within the fields of theoretic inquiry there is no sharp distinction between the philosophic and the scientific meth- od. Philosophy is still rampant in the so-called social sci- ences. Economics has been dominated for a century by speculations about values and by mental gymnastics with the concepts of land, labor, and capital which are compara- ble only to the scholastic antics with the true, the good, and the beautiful. Political science is still trying to emerge from its wrappings, is still trying to free itself from the metaphysical doctrines which have carefully protected it from crude contacts with the harsh world of actuality. Jurisprudence is only beginning to discover that there is something more to law than a logically coherent system of legal “ought” concepts. The light is dawning, and the social sciences are begin- ning to make some progress toward a scientific methodolo- gy, but the goal is yet far off. Psychological obstacles pre- vent a speedy journey. There is still in every social scientist an irresistible urge to become a social philosopher and to interpret the whole of social life in terms of his own specific interest as its ulti- mate category. This tendency to interpret society in terms of a single category is induced by the laudable motive to see life whole. But it leads to trouble if the philosophic re- sults are taken for science. Every time a new science comes into being or an existing inquiry makes rapid progress, there follows an effort to interpret society in terms of the fundamental category of that special inquiry. After the first development of jurisprudence, society was discovered to be a contract. After the growth of the new metaphysics, society was discovered to be an idea. After the develop-

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