The following is a dialogue between myself and Geoff Schneider
which may be of interest. It's pretty abstract and long. Feel
free to erase without any tinge of guilt. (It's my last message
until August 20.)
He wrote: >>What you described as essentialism comes very close to what I
consider to be a 'practical' version of Wolfnick methodology.<<
I wonder if their theory and practice are in sync (and I happen to
think it's good to have them in sync if one can).
I said >"Essentialism" for me simply means having a theory which
points to the most important factors (not necessarily a single
factor) determining the changes in the phenomenon under study,
looking for the _essence_ of what in heck is going on rather than
simply describing it.<
>>Isn't this what we all do?! [yup] I think the point W&R are trying to make
is that neoclassical economics and certain Marxists are OVERLY essentialist:
they posit that certain relationships are immutable. In a social science I
would question whether one can ever establish immutable relationships (which
makes your choice of the immutable laws of physics inapplicable).<<
If W&R are criticizing people for being overly essentialist, I'd
agree with them in many cases (it depends on the case), though
some analyses aren't essentialist enough but simply talk about a
large number of different factors. But "relative essentialism"
makes their theory much mushier.
I agree with the point about physics. But there are some
immutable laws even in economics, such as that production
requires people, tools or machines, and raw materials. (more
specifically, see section 1 of ch. 7 of CAPITAL, vol I) Okay,
economics itself isn't immutable, since it didn't apply before
sentient creatures appeared on earth (assuming that they have
done so), but that's immutable enough. BTW, I like how Marx goes
from the immutable in section 1 to the specifically social in
section 2 of that chapter.
BTW, I like Terry McD's distinction between different types of
causes (which goes back to Aristotle, BTW). That is definitely
better than my somewhat vague distinction in terms of levels of
importance.
>I don't see how looking for the most important factors can hinder
understanding. It's _integral to_ understanding; it's what meant
by "understanding" (as opposed to merely describing). On the
other hand, to simply say that everything depends on everything
else doesn't give us much understanding at all. At most, it's a
starting point for a more essentialist effort.<
>>Again, you get no argument from me on this: this is what all
scientists do. In this realm I use W&R as a caution against ever
believing you have captured everything. But practically
speaking, I think even W&R approach social science in this way.<<
Again, is there a conflict between W&R's theory & their practice?
>I would have summarized your [Blair's] criticism of O'Connor as
simply tht he left something important out of his analysis. That's
a very old style of criticism, akin to Marx's view that certain
theories (e.g., Ricardo's) though scientific and having something
valid to say, were "one-sided," incomplete visions of the nature
of capitalism.<
>>This is exactly what overdeterminism is all about: when you reduce a
relationship to its essence you almost always leave something important out.
That doesn't prevent you from finding the most important factors!<<
Of course you have to leave something out: abstration is part of
social and physical science. Otherwise you can't say anything. But as
I said, the necessity of abstraction also means that we have to avoid
dogmatism.
>Actually, if the R/M theory is consistent, there is no essence to
it. The R/M vision is a totality in which all of the parts
overdetermine all of the other parts and to deign to summarize it
as saying some parts (e.g., overdetermination) are more important
than others would be to slander it. There is no way to summarize
it; all that we can do is broadcast the whole thing over -- i.e.,
all of the books and articles -- over pen-l. (Summaries wouldn't
do, since that would be essentialist.) And even that still
wouldn't be enough, since the other authors of the school and
their oral tradition (not to mention body language) are just as
much part of the totality of R/M thought as are the published
texts. On top of that, the vision keeps on changing, so by the
time tht all of this had been broadcast on pen-l, it would be
obsolete. Even if some parts are more important than others at
one point in time, this configuration would change over time, so
an accurate description can easily turn into a slur. <
>>I suppose you could arrive at this view if you took
overdeterminism to extremes [as I was, deliberately and in the
end, as a satire]. But in practically applying overdeterminist
ideas, doesn't the absurdity which you describe above actually
contains things which one should keep in mind when studying a
community of scholars? Summarizing a discipline serves a
purpose, but to truly understand it you would want to know the
people participating, the oral tradition, etc. But as is obvious
from my attempt to summarize W&R, I have no such worries about
essences and the like, because I simply think that attributing
relative weights to various explanatory factors is an inevitable
part of social science.<<
which is what I was saying. (BTW, I'm not interested in
knowing everything about W&R's community of scholars. I'd like
to know the essence of thier work -- or the "top ten ideas.")
>It's very important to separate (a) the epistemological vision
that we can never really _know_ absolute truth from (b) the
ontological vision that there _is no_ absolute truth, no
objective reality, independent of our perception. Realists such
as myself reject (b) but accept (a). I believe, though I am sure
that someone will correct me, that Wolf & Resnick confuse (a) and
(b). It's that confusion that (as far as I can tell) prevents
them from saying much -- unless they are inconsistent with their
own method. <
>>Your first point is exactly right, and you have hit upon the major
philosophical distinction between realists and relativists. But Wolff and
REsnick do not confuse the two, they are avowed proponents of relativism, so
not only do they believe we can never know absolute truth, they believe that
we cannot separate objective reality from our perceptions of reality. Which
is why they pay particular attention to all the other processes which
influence society besides class processes.<<
the last is not unique: Albert & Hahnel put a big emphasis on other social
processes besides class (i.e., gender, race, etc.) without embracing
overdeterminationism.
>>Again, as a practical matter, I think relativism is probably correct
but to me this is not a useful distinction. Beyond acknowledging the
influences on our psyche, I still want to have a conversation about what
constitutes reality, or what people 'think' constitutes reality, and it
doesn't really matter to me which one we're talking about. All I get out of
relativism (a la Rorty and W&R) is a caution not to disregard certain
influences on our thought processes and other idiosyncratic biases.<<
then we agree. I also think that a realist like Bhaskar would agree.
>But we have to recognize that this knowledge is _of something
real_, something that exists independent of our perception.<
>>Why does it matter if it IS real or if we THINK it is real? Something
could be absolutely real to a realist, and a relativist could believe
something was real given the influences on her/his psyche, and they could
both have an interesting discussion.<<
we think it is real and there is no way of "proving" that it is
(and philosophers have stopped asking questions like "is reality
real or not?" because they're fruitless). However, to make any
kind of progress (in fact, to live in the world), we have to
_assume_ that it's real. Else one gets into nihilism or confusion.
>The fact that we don't know for sure is not a reason
not to look, not to try to find the "essence" that lies under the
appearances, our perceptions. <
>>Here I think you miss the point -- W&R are definitely 'looking' for
answers, but what they are unwilling to attribute any relationship to an
immutable essence. I still think what you do and what they do are very
close together, given that your idea of essence stated above.<<
Essences need not be immutable. It depends on what one means by
"essence." Marx saw the self-expansion of capital as being the
"essence" of capitalism (though I don't know if he used that
word). But it's quite mutable (i.e., capitalism can be
abolished). And the details of capitalism can change: the
appearance this "essence" has on the surface of society depends
on a lot of other factors, such as how much of other kinds of
modes of production persist in our social formation, how well the
working class is organized, the role of patriarchy and systems of
racial dominance, etc.
I think that one difference between my social science and that of
W&R concerns levels of abstraction. I think that at the low level
of abstraction of the realm of appearances, the overdeterminist
perspective is absolutely right. Empirical reality is definitely
the result of a large number of different processes that interact
and affect each other. However, some are more important than
others, specifically over the long run. In our society, the laws
of motion of capitalism are determinant "in the last instance," to
coin a phrase. ;-) Now I don't think that these laws of motion are
totally deterministic, but they do determine the options
available. E.g., see the early part of my article in the 1994
issue of RESEARCH IN POLITICAL ECONOMY on the origins of the Great
Depression: even though crises are inevitable, the actual form of
the crisis is not predetermined.
>This adds an additional point ("essentialist" is not the same
thing as "static"), that perceived reality is always changing or
that actual reality is always changing. Both are true, as far as
I know. (In fact, as a working hypothesis, I'd say that part of
the essence of reality is that it, and our perceptions of it, are
always changing.)<
>>As I understand it, W&R define "essentialist" as basically static,
implying that certain relationships always hold. So a theory which is
based in history and posits relationships based on particular historical
relations and processes is not essentialist since it doesnt say that those
relationships are the same for all time.<<
well, then why do W&R denounce so many Marxist theories (which are
cognizant of historical contingency) as "essentialist" and see that as
a fatal blow to those theories?
BTW, I get the feeling that though W&R talk a lot about processes, their
theory does not use a historical conception of time. I can't prove that off
hand, since I don't have my copy of their KNOWLEDGE & CLASS here.
>But there are also some things -- some aspects of reality -- that
don't change (as far as we know), such as the phenomenon of
overdetermination in society or the laws of physics (at least within
a relevant time frame). Reality combines constancy and change, as do
our perceptions.<
>>Here I think you would get disagreement from them, at least in
regard to social science.<<
But don't they see overdetermination as a constant aspect (may I call
it an "essence") of society's history?
in pen-l solidarity,
Jim Devine [EMAIL PROTECTED]
<74267,[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Econ. Dept., Loyola Marymount Univ.
7900 Loyola Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90045-8410 USA
310/338-2948 (daytime, during workweek); FAX: 310/338-1950
"It takes a busload of faith to get by." -- Lou Reed.
Geoffrey Schneider
Assistant Professor of Economics
Bucknell University
Lewisburg, PA 17837
Phone: (717) 524-3446
Fax: (717) 524-3451
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
