Totalitarian experience and knowledge production : sociology in Central and Eastern Europe 1945-1989 / by Svetla Koleva ; translated by Vladimir Vladov.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Koleva, Svetla, author.

Series:

Post-Western social sciences and global knowledge ; volume 2.

Post-Western social sciences and global knowledge ; volume 2

Language:

Bulgarian

English

Subjects (All):

Sociology--Europe, Central--History--20th century.

Sociology.

Sociology--Europe, Eastern--History--20th century.

History.

Central Europe.

Eastern Europe.

Genre:

History.

Physical Description:

xvii, 298 pages ; 25 cm.

Place of Publication:

Leiden ; Boston : Brill, [2018]

Summary:

Totalitarian Experience and Knowledge Production examines, in a comparative perspective, sociology as practiced in six European Communist countries marked by various forms of totalitarianism in the period 1945-1989. In contrast to normative sociology's view that such coexistence is essentially impossible, the author argues that sociology could function in these undemocratic societies insofar as sociologists succeeded in establishing relatively autonomous institutional and cognitive zones. Based on the self-reflection of scholars who had practiced their profession during that period, the book reveals the tribulations of the scientific identity of sociology under the specific social-political conditions of totalitarian societies. It becomes evident that the basic principle that made sociological knowledge possible was freedom of thought in search for scientific truth despite the 'truth' imposed by political authority. Book jacket.

Contents:

Part 1 Methodological Notes

1 Following the Traces of the Past: The Methodological Pitfalls of Timc 13

2 The Object of Sociology vs. Sociology as an Object of Research: The Theoretical Pitfalls of the Conception of Totalitarianism 23

3 Sociology Grappling With Itself: The Conceptual Pitfalls of the Single-variant Disciplinary Self-referentiality 33

4 Conceptual Framework of the Analysis 42

Part 2 Institutional Cycles of Sociology in Central and Eastern Europe, 1945-1989

5 From Historical Chronology to Institutional Cyclicity 57

6 Institutional Reanimation of Sociology: 1944-1948/49 65

7 Institutional Mimicry 1: 1948/49-1956 74

8 Institutional Expansion I: 1956-1968 89

8.1 Sociology and Politics: Limits of(In)Compatibility 89

8.2 Toward Institutional Expansion: The General and the Specific 96

8.3 Paradoxes in Institutional Expansion 102

8.3.1 Professional Associations Without Sociologists 102

8.3.2 Research Structures Without Educational Structures 106

8.3.3 Conducting Sociological Research Without Professional Experience 112

8.3.4 The Self-Constructing Sociological Public: Inside and Outside the Official Space 115

8.4 Intermediate Recapitulation 117

9 Institutional Mimicry 11:1968-1980 120

9.1 It All Began With Czechoslovak Sociology 122

9.2 And then the National Sociologies of Poland and USSR Followed 128

9.3 Atypical Cases: Bulgarian and Hungarian Sociology 135

9.4 Intermediate Recapitulation 141

10 Institutional Expansion II: 1980-1989 144

10.1 It Started With Polish Sociology 146

10.2 "Seedbeds of Experience" in Other National Sociologies 148

10.3 Official Institutional Structures, Old and New, and Their Strategies 152

10.4 Intermediate Recapitulation 158

11 Intitutional Cycles: General Conclusion 161

Part 3 Disciplinary Construction of Sociology: Processes and Modalities

12 A New Context, a New Object of Research: What Kind of Sociology? 167

13 From a New Deontological to a New Epistemological Model of Social Science Cognition 172

14 Multifaceted Sociology: Modalities of Knowledge Production 183

14.1 Sociological Practice Between Theory Deficit and Methodological Rigor 186

14.1.1 From- Marxist to Post-Marxist Sociology: The Gradual Cognitive Diversification and Professionalization of Sociological Practice 188

14.1.2 "Empirical" Sociology: From Methodological Rigor to Theoretic Eclecticism 202

14.1.3 From Theoretical Escapes to Conceptual Innovations; From Loaned Methodologies to Methodological Creativity 214

14.2 Sociological Practice in the Continuity of Engagements-Detachments 232

14.2.1 From the Political Project of Socialism as a Goal and Ideal of Society, to the Empirical Reality of Socialism 234

14.2.2 From Studying the Empirical Reality of Socialism to Doubting the System of Socialism 238

15 Summing-up. Production of Scientific Knowledge about the 'Socialist Society': Surmounting the Paradoxes 241.

Notes:

Translated from the Bulgarian.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

ISBN:

9789004322325

9004322329

OCLC:

1007508061