Irish University Review

Towards a Catholic SociologyAuthor(s): Jeremiah NewmanReviewed work(s):Source: University Review, Vol. 1, No. 4 (Spring, 1955), pp. 3-12Published by: Irish University ReviewStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25504298 .Accessed: 13/10/2012 04:21

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TOWARDS A CATHOLIC SOCIOLOGY By

REV. JEREMIAH NEWMAN

npHE study of society may very well be said to be as old as human society * itself. But, as was the case with all other studies? a considerable time

elapsed before it became characterised by anything like thoroughness.1 The earliest accounts of social life that have come down to us are contained

in descriptive passages of early historical literature. The histories of

Herodotus, Thucydides, Caesar and Tacitus contain a good deal of informa

tion about the customs of ancient peoples. During the Middle Ages a

similar function was performed by the writings of travellers, such as Marco

Polo, as well as of missionaries and merchants to the Far East. Then, from

the Renaissance on, the New World provided matter for more discoveries.

The letters of Jesuit missionaries and others, during this period, supplied new facts about primitive social phenomena.

Side by side with the descriptive writings of which we have been

speaking, a philosophical literature on social life was also developed. As

against the former, this latter tended to be normative rather than descrip tive; indeed to a large extent it dealt with the ideal type of human society. Such was the Republic of Plato and, though to a lesser extent, the Politics

of Aristotle. St. Augustine's City of God was in the same line. The high

point of this approach was reached in the Utopias, of More, Campanella and Bacon. More realistic, but nevertheless essentially normative, was the social philosophy of St. Thomas and the Scholastics. It is true that Aquinas took facts into account, at least to some extent, as the opusculum De

Regimine Principum shows clearly. But they were not regarded as interest

ing in themselves and are mentioned only as instrumental to the application of principles. The result was that the study of society, as conducted by the

Scholastics, was almost entirely the philosophical study of the ethical

principles that pertain to the realm of social behaviour. As far as the non

Scholastic writers, such as Hobbes and Rousseau, were concerned, the

speculative bent is equally noticeable.

All these writings?whether descriptive or philosophical?constituted what there was of social study before the 19th century. It will readily be seen that they properly belong to history or philosophy rather than to an

independent science of Sociology. Then, during this century, an intellectual current appeared which was to alter radically the nature and status of the

study of society. The Democratic Revolution and the Industrial Revolution

1 Cf. Gaston Bouthoiil, "

Histoire de la Sociologie," Paris, Presses Universitaires de France, 1950, Ch. l.

3 n

4 UNIVERSITY REVIEW

led to a heightened consciousness of the importance of the collectivity as

against the individual. And scholars began to turn their attention, more and

more, to the study of society as such. The intellectual climate that prevailed at the time ensured that this study would be conducted on the purely

positive plane. The 19th century was the heyday of empirical investigation; there was a tendency to replace speculation by observation, except alone in

the sphere of pure metaphysics. The methods of physical science came to

be applied, in so far as was possible, to fields of investigation that were

hitherto outside their ambit. Thus Politics came to be the study of the facts

and laws of political behaviour, Economics the study of the phenomena of commercial life. Psychology abandoned its previous theoretical leanings in favour of factual analysis and rigidly controlled experiment. It is not

surprising then that the nascent interest in the study of society should have

been dominated by the methods of empirical science. Their application to

this field was made all the more possible by the appearance of the new

science of Statistics. This had received its first development during the

previous century and had been named by Achenwall in 1759. But its

greatest possibilities were to be realised in the field of Sociology.

The name "

Sociology "

was first introduced by the positivist philoso

pher Auguste Comte (1798-1857). It should be clear from what we have

been saying that, though he did invent the name, he did not initiate the

trend towards the development of the positive science of social phenomena. But it is true that his very extreme positivism left an indelible stamp on

Sociology for a century. Comte not merely argued for the desirability of

the empirical study of social life; he was vehemently opposed to any other

approach to it. The upshot of his anti-philosophical and anti-theological bias was to divorce social studies altogether from normative principles.

Sociology became exclusively the observation and correlation of the facts

and laws of social phenomena. It became the study of social groupings such as they are, with no reference whatever to what they might be or

should be. It was divided into two great branches which, so it was thought, covered its matter quite adequately. Static Sociology dealt with the facts

of social life in themselves, while Dynamic Sociology sought the laws of

social evolution.

From the years which marked its general beginning until the close of

the 19th century, the supporters of Sociology were engaged in consolidating its position. This period produced little in the way of results from the new

science, but its scope and methods were being delineated and perfected. After the year 1900 the position began to change and the twentieth century has seen the gradual emergence of Sociology to an important place in

modern science.2 Investigators in different countries have concentrated on

different aspects of the study to the extent that different "

national "

schools

2 Cf. .Tacones Lederen. "

Introduction a la Sociologie," Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales, 1948. Ch. III.

TOWARDS A CATHOLIC SOCIOLOGY 5

have appeared. In France, Emile Durkheim, the true disciple of Comte, described the facts of society from a purely atheistic viewpoint, out of all relation to the existence of God, the spirituality of the soul or the dignity of the human person. He sought too the laws which were supposed to

govern social progress, leaving no room at all for the influence of human

liberty. To this end he and his collaborators paid particular attention to the study of primitive communities. In Germany, under the able leadership of Simmel and Vierkandt, similar studies were undertaken with typical thoroughness. In addition, Max Weber elaborated a historical sociology, his special interest being the influence of religion on the rise of Capitalism.

During the same period we find Italian sociologists developing Lombroso's studies in criminology into what to-day is known as criminal sociology.

But it was in America that Sociology was developed most, as a result

perhaps of the practical American turn of mind. American workers in the field have developed a host of special studies on the various facets of social

living. They include Social Psychology, Demography, Familial and Colonial

Sociology, Urban and Rural Sociology. To these, in recent years, has been added the Sociology of Religion, which had a simultaneous origin in Europe and in America. Lastly, Anthropology and Ethnology, in the strict sense, have continued to be extended and clarified.

To-day, then, it is clear that Sociology is very much a multiple science. As well as what is called General Sociology, which studies what is common to all social life, there are many kinds of special Sociology that are directed to the understanding of particular societies or particular kinds of social

phenomena. But one thing that they all have in common is a positive or

purely factual approach. As developed both in Europe and America, Sociology is essentially an empirical science. Not of course that it has

entirely succeeded in escaping the making of normative or value judgments. To deny or ignore a value of any particular kind is itself the assertion of a value judgment opposed to it. From this point of view Sociology cannot avoid values.5 It is compelled to assume some philosophical viewpoint. "From Comte to the present moment," says Dr. Kane of the University of Notre Dame,

" sociologists have persistently opposed value judgments?

and have just as persistently made them. Value judgments may be held in

abeyance as one attempts an objective analysis of what society is. But value

judgments are inevitable appendages for purposive action. They identify goals as desirable or undesirable and such identification is the function of social philosophy, not sociology. Unless sociology is to be a purely decora tive art or science, it must be ultimately joined with social philosophy for

application to society for purposes of social reform. The wide use of value

judgments by secular sociologists is tacit admission of this fact."4 The

5 Cf. E. F. O'Doherty, The Logic of the Social Sciences, in "

The Sociological Review," University of North Staffordshire, July, 1953. 4 John J. Kane. Christian Sociology, in

" Social Order," Institute of Social Order, St. Louis,

December, 1954.

6 UNIVERSITY REVIEW

Catholic objection to Sociology, as it has been developed up to the present, is, says Dr. Kane,

M that it is not Christian, or to put it more correctly,

the value judgments, those inevitable appendages to sociological conclu

sions, are based upon a secular philosophy of life. ... At that point where a sociologist begins to advocate a law, an attitude, a social practice, he is no longer a sociologist, but a social philosopher. Secular sociologists have been quite good sociologists. ... On the other hand they have been

poor social philosophers. When Catholics attack sociology as it is common

in the United States, they are really attacking philosophy as taught and

understood in the United States. It is secular philosphy, not sociology, which must be feared."

While a great deal of this is unquestionably true, it is scarcely a full

account of the situation. Apart from their errors on the occasions when

they leave their own field for that of social philosophy, the very methodology itself of the positive sociologists is radically and seriously vitiated. Dr. Kane

himself realises this when he says that "

contemporary positivist method

ology has trapped them within a system which is unable to integrate into a scientific system the non-empirical realities they cannot escape as radical

human beings." In a recent article in the Jesuit weekly America5, a writer under the pseudonym of Everett S. Graham emphasised the menace of this "value-free methodology." In the period following World War I, he

pointed out, sociologists became preoccupied with the problems of their methods. They were embarrassed by the fact that their science, dealing as

it does with human behaviour, had inevitably failed to yield results of

comparable accuracy to those of the natural sciences. They set out to

correct this failure through improved methods, a preoccupation which has

become even more intense since World War II. "

The fundamental issue

is epistemol?gica! : what can the human mind know for certain and how can

it arrive at such certainties? Social scientists without a religiously orientated

philosophy often adopt the philosophy of scientism. According to this

epistemology the only objects of human knowledge which deserve the name are those which can be reduced to quantitative relationships and can hence

be measured empirically. Current methodology in the social sciences there

fore has the effect of excluding all consideration of values, that is, philo

sophical and religious truths arrived at by other means of knowing, as

irrelevant to the social sciences. . . . According to the new methodology, value judgments have relevance in the social sciences only as facts, as

subjective and undemonstrable preferences. ... It pooh-poohs values

because they cannot be verified by the new methodology. Anyone who is

committed to such values is labelled unscientific."

There is little difficulty in finding evidence in contemporary textbooks

of Sociology of an exclusive concentration on this value-free methodology.

5 Everett S. Graham. Value-free Methodology, in "

America," 9th October. 1954.

TOWARDS A CATHOLIC SOCIOLOGY 7

Indeed, as we have seen before, it is by no means new but is as old as

Sociology itself. Take, for example, the treatise by Kingsley Davis, associate

director of Columbia's Bureau of Social Research. The only place which

it gives to the study of values is by way of their analysis as sociologically

significant phenomena. The author writes : "

In making scientific sense of

non-scientific belief and practice, in explaining religion, myth and ritual, there has been one trend of social theory more successful than the rest.

This is the functional-structural type of sociological analysis."6 This

analysis, which, as Professor Davis says, originated with Durkheim, treats

values simply as worthy of description as human beliefs. It represents the

general approach of current manuals of Sociology. Many of these are

keenly conscious of the very important r?le which belief in religion and

spiritual values plays in social cohesion. But they treat it solely as a natural

factor of unity. Such was the verdict of Professor Hobbs, of the Department of Sociology in the University of Pennsylvania, in a survey of fifty-four

modern textbooks.7 In these, he says, "

religion is re-defined in terms which

make it practically synonymous with social work.'* Indeed thirty-three of

them suggest that religious organisations should decrease their supernatural

appeals and moral doctrines and reorient themselves in the direction of

secularisation.

It would appear then that there is abundant proof?though he himself

did not adduce it?for the contention of Everett S. Graham. There are

signs too of an increasing uneasiness about the situation and of a desire, even amongst non-Catholics, to rectify it. Shortly after the appearance of the article to which we have referred, America carried a symposium of comments on it.8 This discussion, by representative sociologists?both Catholic and non-Catholic?can be said, on the whole, to have confirmed

its thesis. Some of the contributors, in addition, expressed their personal views on the need for including value judgments within the very framework of Sociology. The view of N. S. Timasheff, of Fordham University, is of

particular interest and merits quoting at some length. "

In the social

sciences, we have to distinguish three levels: theoretical, descriptive and normative. On the theoretical level, we want to gain knowledge of

regularities (uniformities) about actions and relations of men in society. A tentative statement about regularity may be verified or refuted, but a

value judgment about it is logically out of place, just as a mathematical formula would be out of place relative to the aesthetic value of a symphony.

On this level, the fallacy of positivism consists not in the denial of the

possibility of value judgments, but in the surreptitious introduction of false

epistemological and ontological premises which are presented as proposi tions warranted by empiric evidence. On the descriptive level, we want to

6 K. T?avis. "

Human Society,** New York. Macmillan. 1948. p. 518. 7A. H. Hoty)s.

" The Claims of Sociology?A Critique of Textbooks." Harrisburg. Stackpoole,

1951. 8 "America." 30th October, 1954.

8 UNIVERSITY REVIEW

produce exact and meaningfully integrated pictures of concrete situations

and processes. Such descriptions do not imply value judgments on the part

of the social scientists, but also do not preclude them. For example,

discussing the rise of the divorce rate or the bad effects of some methods of

dealing with juvenile offenders, the social scientist may express his dis

approval. Nothing is wrong with that provided?as Mr. Graham acknow

ledges?the value judgment is clearly distinguishable from the presentation of facts. On the normative level, we want to gain knowledge about the best

solutions to social problems. In problem solving, we cannot but have in

mind an '

ideal,' and every ideal implies a value judgment declaring it to

be good, or at least superior to other ideals. On this level, value judgments are unavoidable, but the social scientist must, make his value system

explicit."

The last annual convention of the American Sociological Society

showed that this view is coming to be accepted by many non-Catholics.

The convention included a session on value theory, in which, it is said,

considerable interest was manifested. Observers reported a growing dissatis

faction, particularly among the younger members, with the sheer positivism of the majority of sociologists. They are coming to realise the very

important truth that "

scientific method is not one but many . . . (that) there are as many scientific methods as there are separate sciences "9 and

that sociological method must necessarily include value judgments. These

signs are undoubtedly good and mark an important difference between

attitudes to-day and those of ten years ago. Nevertheless, it is still true

that the science of Sociology continues to confine itself?almost entirely? to the empirical level. Now it is very probably in an effort to provide a counterbalance to this that what is called Catholic Sociology has been so

preoccupied with values and principles. Indeed this preoccupation is so

great that it is difficult, if not impossible, to find any Catholic textbook

on Sociology proper. There are numerous excellent manuals of social

philosophy. But all of them have more or less failed to develop Sociology

adequately. Empirical facts are not as fully treated as ethical principles. Where will you get comprehensive Catholic studies of family facts and

marriage factors, of criminology, urban life and social change? Certainly, as far as America is concerned, one has to turn to secular Sociology when

in need of factual information in these domains. Amongst American

Catholics there would seem to have existed, in the past, a certain fear of

engaging in objective studies of what is. Concentration has been on what

society ought to be?on moral principles and norms of all kinds. On the

Continent of Europe the scene is slightly different. With the encouragement of such leaders as Professor Jacques Leclercq of the University of Louvain, an appreciable leeway in empirical studies has been made good. It is rather

9 P. J. McLaughlin, Sc;entific Method, in "

University Review," Autumn, 1954, p. 38.

TOWARDS A CATHOLIC SOCIOLOGY 9

unfortunate, however, that these factual investigations have, as yet, not been

sufficiently integrated with social ethics. In Ireland there has been prac

tically no attention at all given to factual studies; what are called socio

logical studies are usually expositions of social principles. This concentration on value judgments and normative principles is

very understandable in face of the position of secular Sociology. But we

should be careful to remember that no study is worthy of the name "

Sociology "

that does not give due place to empirical research and factual

data. Nor is it likely that Catholic manuals, which treat almost exclusively of social principles, will have the balancing effect on positivistic textbooks

which their authors desire. The fact is that they pertain to a different

domain from that of Sociology and will remain so until they succeed in

integrating facts with principles. A non-Catholic contributor to the America

symposium, already referred to, put the heart of the matter plainly and

concisely. "

If we non-Catholics are prepared to concede that a value free

methodology is essentially a sterile methodology, we are still not ready to

grant that the solution lies in any self-asserted dogmatism." In other words, a so-called

" Catholic Sociology

" that is merely an exposition of social

ethics, is quite insufficient to meet the needs of our time. It simply will not

do to seize on certain premisses derived from the natural ethical order and

proceed to deduce from them their logical implications. The result may be a fine example of logic in the domain of ethics but it is not, and should not

be called, Sociology. It is very much to be feared that a great deal of what is called Sociology by Catholics is really an excursion into social ethical

principles. The task lies before us of constructing a body of knowledge which can rightly receive the name

" Catholic Sociology."

This view is coming to be expressed ever more frequently, at the

present moment, by American Catholic sociologists. Thus : "

If American

sociology appears to be inevitably secularistic, it is largely because Catholics have not entered the field in adequate numbers either to question such

influences or to direct the stream of sociological thought in American

society."10 Again: "The trouble to-day is that, so far as this writer is

aware, we have no effective, widely accepted statement of the way in which

the methods of the social sciences can be harmonised with Catholic teaching. . . . Such a theory is urgently needed. It could do much, in the long run, to save the social sciences from being used as weapons to destroy men's adherence to the higher values."11 Or again: "Only those capable of

superior scientific work in social science can effectively combat the

unscientific anti-religion of their colleagues. . . . Catholic sociologists in

America can best serve the cause of religion by being outstanding scientific

sociologists. They will be quite clear both on the uses of the scientific method and its limitations. They alone can effectively, with an authority

10 John J. Kane, loc. cit. 11 Everett S. Graham, loc. cit.

10 UNIVERSITY REVIEW

born of their scientific prestige, point out those limits to their colleagues who are out of bounds."12 Lastly :

" With reference to us as sociologists,

the great problem of the Church is the lack of highly competent scholars,

and the lack of significant scholarship in the field of man's social relation

ships. The Church cannot escape the pressing social problems of our day, nor can she escape the need to relate her life to the dynamic changes taking

place in the societies of men. But if the Church approaches this task

without adequate knowledge, it will be the result of our failure to busy our

selves about providing for the Church the knowledge that is necessary."13 There should not then be any doubt about the need for an integration

of normative principles with factual studies. For one thing our social

principles would remain entirely in the air, if we lacked a knowledge of the

facts to which to apply them. Concrete empirical surveys alone will ensure

that such knowledge is available. We have a lot of work before us in this

domain. The doing of it will mean that eventually we will succeed in

producing a Sociology which, while incorporating all that is relevant of

factual investigation, will go beyond the barren confines of merely positive observation and link up the fruits of empirical social surveys with the unshakeable principles of Catholic social doctrine.

The absolute importance of having a grasp of the facts of a situation

in order to apply principles to it successfully should be clear to all and need

not delay us here.14 We will content ourselves with insisting on the desira

bility of having opportunities available for scientific training in social

surveys. University authorities in Catholic centres where such training is

insufficient, might well busy themselves in remedying the situation. A

sufficient number of students should be available immediately to provide the nucleus for the formation of a complete faculty. Civil service trainees,

particularly those destined for the statistics branch, would find the training offered a very welcome asset. And it is to be hoped too that many ecclesiastical students would avail themselves of it. Statistical procedures, however, should constitute only a portion of the course. There are many social phenomena that need To be examined by a qualitative rather than a quantitative analysis. Hence social enquiry methods by way of question naires, case histories and other techniques would form an integral part of the university course envisaged.15

The task of constructing a Sociology which will satisfactorily join facts with values is essentially one for the professors rather than the field-workers. In this respect it may be well to mention that Catholic sociologists should be able to make fruitful use of the findings of non-Catholic

12 Gordon George, Some Sociologists ouj, of Bounds, in "America." 15th January. 1955. 13 Joseph P. F;tzpafprk Catholics and the Scientific Knowledge of Society. Presidential Address

to the American Catholic Sociological Society, 1953, in "The American Catholic Sociological Review." March. 1954.

14 Cf, Ralph Lane. The Use of Empirical Research in Sociology, in "

Christus Rex," Maynooth, July. 1954.

15 Cf. Soc/ologrie et- formation sociolof?!oue au Service Social, in "

Service Social dans le Monde." Brussels. TTnion Catholiuue Iniernationale de Service Social Mar 1953.

TOWARDS A CATHOLIC SOCIOLOGY II

surveyors. For modern investigators, on the whole, unlike the positivists of the 19th century, have no atheistic axe to grind. Modern anthropologists, for example, unlike men like Tylor, Max M?ller or Fraser, are in no way interested in trying to explain away religion in terms of this or that natural science. Present-day scholars are more open-minded and scientific and we

may have every confidence in accepting their findings as objective. Their

studies afford the Catholic sociologist a valuable fund of factual matter with which to correlate his normative principles. The domain of anthro

pology, which we have mentioned, provides matter for much work of this kind. The universal consent of mankind, or universal human practice, is

generally regarded as a sound criterion of morality. Secondary it may be

and merely manifestive, but it is a good indication of what is right and

wrong. Now, if our social ethical principles are as valid as we contend they are, we should find an extensive confirmation of them in human practice.

Many of them, of course, apply only in modern industrial settings, of a kind

unknown to primitive peoples, ancient or modern. But many others concern

institutions like the family, property, law and the State, which are found

practically amongst all peoples at all times. Hence it would be an interest

ing and valuable task indeed to bring our modern knowledge of them into relation with Catholic social principles. It is to this work that I would give the name

" Catholic Sociology." It is neither an effort to make principles

conform to facts nor vice versa, but the careful relating of the latter to the former.

To take one or two matters by way of example. It is a fundamental

principle of Catholic social ethics that the State is a natural and necessary institution for man. It is a principle that can be proved by the analysis of

human nature. But how corroborating is the evidence of anthropologists that

" nowhere have we found a single family of parents and children living

on its own."16 Or again take the traditional Scholastic definition of law as an ordination of reason for the common good of the community. While, in

primitive communities, it has been found that most actions which come up for settlement are introduced by private persons in defence of sectional interests or in claiming restitution, it has also been noted that there are

always things "which are considered so injurious to communal interests that a collective action may follow a private accusation."17 Take, too, the

insistence of primitive tribes on exogamy. While the marriage of close

relatives was, of necessity, the normal thing in very early times, the great

majority of present-day primitive societies have an iron rule that "

a man

taust not marry inside a defined set of his own kin/'18 And while the

purpose of this may possibly be to lessen the family's enemies, by marriage ties, it may also be because promiscuity in the family might injure it.

16 Max Gliickman. Political Institutions, in "

The Institutions of Primitive Society," Oxford, Basil "Blackwell. 1954, p. 67.

17 J. G. Peristiany. Law. in "

The Instituions of Primitive Society," p. 44. 18 Gluckman, loc. cit. p. 68.

12 UNIVERSITY REVIEW

This last example shows that care must be exercised when bringing

empirical findings into relation with ethical norms. It would be bad ethics as well as poor sociology, for example, to argue that polygamy is unnatural

because it causes jealousy among the wives. No doubt it would do so in

the society with which we are acquainted, but in certain primitive societies

researchers have found that a wife may order her husband to acquire an

additional spouse. But such erroneous inferences can be avoided. And,

apart from anthropology, there are many other fields from which facts may be derived that can be integrated with principles. In the domain of industrial organisation, for instance, it could be shown that practice has confirmed the wisdom of the warnings against certain dangers which the

present Pontiff made concerning co-management. The findings of demo

graphy too could be availed of by the Catholic sociologist when treating of racism and inter-ethnic conflicts. There are recurrent patterns in the human

experience of migrations which would be of great service in a discussion of the factors which give rise to trouble. And so the list might go on, of ways and means whereby factual data could usefully be brought to bear on social philosophy.

A full account of the possibilities that are open to development along these lines must necessarily await the appearance of a Catholic Sociology.

Let us hope that the day of its coming is not too distant.