Toward a reflexive sociology |
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Authors: | Bernard S Phillips |
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Institution: | (1) the Department of Sociology, Boston University, 100 Cummington Street, 02215 Boston, MA |
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Abstract: | Gouldner’s call for a “reflexive sociology” in 1970 remains a largely unexamined idea, yet with the breakdown of functionalism’s
begemony and the present ferment in theory its time may finally have come. In attempting to clarify and reconstruct Gouldner’s
idea, I begin with his concepts “background assumptions” and “domain assumptions,” linking them with Kubn’s ideas. Employing
levels of abstraction to approach Gouldner’s material systematically, I proceed to develop and illustrate two contrasting
background assumptions or world hypotheses: “stratification” and “interaction.” Finally, I examine some methodological implications
of these world views, centering on defining problems, ratio scales and images of measurement, sampling and multivariate-analysis
procedures.
Introduced to sociology by C. Wright Mills, Bernard Phillips studied with Robin N. Williams, Jr. and taught at the University
of North Carolina and the University of Illinois (where he overlapped with Alvin W. Gouldner for a year) before coming to
Boston University. A cofounder of the ASA section, Sociological Practice, Phillips’ interests are in Societal Change, Theory
and Methods. |
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Keywords: | |
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