Theories of Social Change: A Critical Appraisal

259 Pages·1986·45.34 MB·English

by  Raymond Boudon

Raymond Boudon
THEORIES
SOCIAL
CHANGE
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Theories of Social Change
A Critical Appraisal
By Raymond Boudon
Raymond Boudon is one of the best known
European writers in social theory today
and is also celebrated for his extensive
contributions to empirical sociology.
Theories of Social Change is a classic
statement of the position he advocates. In
this work Boudon provides a wide-ranging
and incisive critique of the existing
theories of social change in sociology,
documenting his ideas with empirical
illustrations. He also adds bis own distinct
and original contribution to the analysis
of social change. In his view, social life is
in a fundamental sense marked by
disorder." Boudon contends that not only
are there no laws of social life, but
patterns of social change continually
' U l V W r g t e ' ' w > M U4' b iv -VAIIXXVII.V.. ••.Jii.-J- i « J.
actors attempt to achieve
Theories of Social Change is concise, clear
and accessible; at the same lime its level of
analysis is highly sophisticated, and its
arguments persuasively and impressively
documented.
"IBoudonl goes far beyond a simple
discussion of'social change' and proposes
questions and answers that many social
scientists will find 'disturbing' <in a
positive sense) and stimulating."
—Phillipe Desan, The University of
Chicago
Theories of Social Change
A Critical Appraisal
RAYMOND BOUDON
Translated by J. C. Whitehouse
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles
T h is Of
SPC7-0J0-8S
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First published in the United States by the University of California Press, 1986.
Original edition © Presses Universitaires de France, 1984. This English translation
© Polity Press, 1986.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Boudon, Raymond
Theories of social change.
Translation of: La place du desordre.
1. Social change. I. Title.
HM101.B66413 1986 303.4 86-40186
ISBN 0-520-05759-7 (alk. paper)
Phototypeset by Dobbie Typesetting Service, Plymouth
Printed in Great Britain by
T. J. Press, Padstow
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Contents
Foreword _A
1 Theories of Social Change 5
A programme: theories of social change 9
An illusion? 77
Three responses 25
2 Individual Action, Aggregation Effects and
Social Change 29
The Weberian paradigm 32
The psychology of the social sciences 43
The notion of rationality 46
The notion of individualism 51
The aggregation of individual behaviour 56
3 The Laws Governing Change:
the Nomological Bias 61
Conditional laws in general 62
Models and laws 67
The laws of mobilization 70
The laws of development and modernization 77
The anatomy of a theory of social change 80
4 Structures and Change: the Structuralist Bias 90
Structure as 'type' 90
Structure as 'essential characteristics' Q2
'Structural' laws 93
Structure and ideologies 94
The coherence of structures in the face of change 101
Structural and non-structural elements 110
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5 The Search for the Prime Mover: the Ontological
Bias_ 121
The part played by conflicts 126
The part played by ideas and values (which is
sometimes greater than we imagine) 134
The pan played by ideas and values (which is
sometimes smaller than we imagine) 145
Exogenous or endogenous change? 150
6 A Well-Tempered Determinism 154
Open and closed processes 158
Innovation and social change 166
Chance and the part it plays 173
7 Giving Disorder its Due 180
Postulates and observations 180
Demarcations 1Q0
Variations on a theme of Simmel 197
Rejecting disorder 207
A note on the notion of validity 211
Knowledge, interests and interpretations of social
change 213
Epilogue: the Snare of Realism 218
Notes 228
General Index 239
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Foreword
Between 1950 and 1980 the social sciences - sociology, economics
and political science - produced a considerable number of'theories
of social change'. Since they did not constitute a homogeneous unity,
one of our first tasks is to establish and clarify their aims and indicate
their major types.
The general impression prevailing in much current writing is
that such theories have failed. Most of the predictions based on
them have been proved false by reality. They have generated
representations of social systems which are not only simplified -
which is legitimate - but simplistic. And most of the macroscopic
regularities which they put forward as generally valid now seem only
locally so.
It is therefore quite understandable that they have ultimately given
rise to scepticism. But this scepticism, though widespread, is far from
unanimous, and theories of'change', 'dependence', 'modernization'
or 'development' are still put forward. The old law of the vicious
circle of poverty, for example, has recently been brought out of its
temporary obscurity, dusted off and polished up by Galbraith.1 We
also still believe - no doubt as a result of giving undue general validity
to a proposition put forward by de Tocqueville and T. H. Marshall
amongst others - that the evolution of societies implies a higher degree
of participation in political life by the general run of citizens, but
do not perceive that this development may well go hand in hand
with greater despotism. At the same time, there are others who seek
to prove, for instance, that social conflicts in 'post-industrial' societies
are bound to bring into conflict very specific classes competing for
control of the way history is to go. As a final example, we could
consider the by no means negligible number of historians, sociologists
1
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and economists who currently accept the false proposition that Third-
World countries are underdeveloped because they are dependent.
So it may well be time to take a critical look at theories of social
change. By this I mean that we should try to establish exactly what
questions they are trying to answer and under what conditions such
questions can be answered in a potentially valid way.
Karl Popper set himself very much the same kind of task as that
contemplated here in his The Poverty of Historicism,2 That book was
a critical work in the rigorously Kantian sense of the word: Popper
tried to show that certain propositions and theories relating to social
change must be seen as scientific and others as metaphysical, that
certain questions are formulated in such a way as to be unanswerable,
while others admit of answers whose validity can be rigorously tested.
Popper's debt to Kant is so clear in this work that it is even evident
in the way he sets out his case. Like Kant before him, he develops
his arguments with practically no recourse to examples of any kind.
There are two reasons why we should now take another look at
the questions Popper raised. The first is that in the meantime a
substantial corpus of theories concerning social change has appeared
which, like those Popper criticized without naming them, are not
susceptible to verifiable answers. The second is that a critical analysis
of such theories makes it possible to refine and sharpen Popper's
diagnosis and in particular to modify his famous distinction between
metaphysical and scientific theories.
It may seem surprising to find a 'professional sociologist' interested
in reflecting on matters that have more to do with the philosophy
of the social sciences. I believe, however, that critical reflection is
the path that has to be taken if there is to be any scientific progress.
The sense of failure of theories of social change felt by many observers
is a fact, and analysing it is more than merely speculative interest.
Going beyond mere scepticism and trying to understand the reasons
for that failure more clearly means being in a position to make more
sense of what stands in the way of knowledge. Rather as investigating
an accident gives a better understanding of traffic conditions,
investigating failures in the scientific field can contribute to the
progress of knowledge. Such investigations may be regarded as part
of both the methodology and the philosophy of science. Moreover
the philosophical questions I have raised in this book seem to me
important not only from a philosophical and scientific, but also from
a political point of view, since a good number of theories of social
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J. VI C W%JI L-t
change, such as those of development or dependence, have had
practical consequences precisely because they enjoy or have enjoyed
scientific authority. For, even though strictly speaking they are not
false, these theories claim a logical status they are not really entitled
to and hence give rise to interpretations and beliefs that are not
logically implied by them. That is one more reason for attempting
to understand the criticism to which they have been subjected.
Finally, I should like to mention a more general reason. The various
philosophies of science seldom concern themselves with the social
sciences. Like physics or biology, however, the social sciences can
throw some light on the way knowledge advances. The fact that the
debates in the social sciences are more visible, the consensus more
fragile and the questions they raise of a more 'public' nature is
perhaps an advantage from the point of view of the philosophy of
knowledge.
As will already be apparent, my aim here is in no way to draw
up a balance sheet or an inventory of theories of social change, but
simply to point out certain methodological and epistemological
features.
The ideas I put forward here were first presented in a preliminary
form in lectures at Mannheim (1979), Geneva (1979), London
(Hobhouse Lecture, 1982, London School of Economics) and New
York (Lazarsfield Lecture, 1983, Columbia University).
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1
Theories of Social Change
Some years ago the historian of the social sciences, Robert Nisbet,
brought out a book called Social Change and History which sparked
off an old argument once more.1 The sense of the title really hinges
on the word 'and', which in fact means 'as opposed to' or 'versus',
and calling the work History versus Social Change or For History and
against Social Change would have given a clearer idea of what it was
about. In summary, and hence in a simplified form, Nisbet's main
thesis was that there can be no reflection on, theory of, or
investigation into social change which is in any major way
distinguishable from the intellectual activity we normally call history.
This thesis caused considerable controversy. As long as the social
sciences have existed (institutionally speaking, of course, since
intellectually speaking they have existed for a very long time and
perhaps even since the very earliest ages), they have seen social
exchange as one of their basic concerns, although, of course, it has
had different names at different times. Today, we can no more
imagine a textbook or treatise in the social sciences without a chapter
on social change than a book on statistics without a chapter on the
traditional distributions. The notion of social change has now come
to mean, if not a speciality of the social sciences, at least an activity
and an orientation of research and fundamental reflection. This
activity, which has been seen as both legitimate and essential, has
been very productive: we now have a whole range of results that
can be described as theories of social change.
But Nisbet challenged its legitimacy, taking to task one or two
outstanding people, Parsons in particular. Through them, however,
he was really attacking a whole line of research. In his view, the
theories of social change put forward by sociologists and political
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