New Philosophy of Social Science: Problems of Indeterminacy

Under the influence of postempiricism, the philosophy of science has changed enormously in recent years. New Philosophy of Social Science provides a clear and useful overview of the new synthesis that has taken place. Bohman argues for a theoretical and methodological pluralism grounded in an account of the nature of the objects of social theory, which are necessarily indeterminate and open ended: the new, postempiricist philosophy of social science "must find rigor within indeterminacy. "

Bohman's position, that you can start from actual practices in the social sciences, accept the fact that they will always contain indeterminacy and ambiguity, and yet be able to construct viable norms, is buttressed by a number of case studies. These include examples drawn from rational choice theory, ethnomethodology, and the theory of communicative action. In the process, Bohman describes the status of such issues as causality, rules, interpretation, holism, and social criticism. The argument is not tied to a specific theoretical point of view, although it takes the program of the Frankfurt School as an indication of the path toward a proper philosophy of the social sciences.

James Bohman is Associate Professor in the Department of Philosophy at St. Louis University.

Recent philosophy of science has concentrated on the practices and histories of scientific disciplines rather than focusing on confirming the validity of scientific knowledge. New Philosophy of Social Science examines how such an approach might be applied to the social sciences. Its starting point is three recent social science research programmes: rational choice theory, ethnomethodology, and the theory of communicative action.

The book considers many basic problems of the social sciences including the nature of causality, rules, interpretation, and social criticism and provides extensive discussion of current debates. Each problem is solved by reconstructing successful explanations within the research programs, and each reconstruction is presented as a 'pattern' of explanation.