Volume 15
Written By Elizabeth Boyle
ARTICLES
T. A. Climo and P. G. A. Howells, “Possible Worlds in Historical Explanation," History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 1-20.
An examination of historical cases shows the failure of both a regularity analysis and a traditional counterfactual analysis of causation to handle the problems of distinguishing genuine causes from effects, epiphenomena, and pre-empted potential causes. For this reason, the suitability of either as a theory of causality is rejected. A counterfactual interpretation grounded in the logic of possible-world semantics is preferred and supported.
Ilse N. Bulhof, “Structure and Change in Wilhelm Dilthey's Philosophy of History," History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 21-32.
Dilthey's philosophy of history showed that in the same way that the individual's life is a structural coherence of the consciousness of present and past experiences, a period of history is a structurally unified whole, and history in general is a system of interlocking cultural structures. Structures rather than particulars are given in consciousness and the objectification of these is culture. The analogy between the psychic structure of the person and the collective mind of a culture extends also to the concept of development. The structure is influenced by circumstances but also forms its own character with potential for making some changes probable while precluding others. Dilthey's middle course between closed systems of development and pure contingency anticipates modern structural analysis and provides a resolution of the problem of assessing historical significance of events by making it a function of the cultural system being studied.
W. Paul Vogt, “The Uses of Studying Primitives: A Note on the Durkheimians, 1890-1940," History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 21-32.
This study of the Durkheimian school attempts to bridge the gap between so-called "external" and "internal" modes of analysis in the understanding of social-scientific thought. The Durkheimians' switch from the study of modern Europe to the study of primitives is considered from three angles. First, "internal," methodological and state-of-the-discipline factors are analyzed. Second, the relationship of this professional group to others in academe is described to add a further perspective on its needs and characteristics. Third, "external" factors such as contemporary ideology and political problem-solving goals of the group are examined to round out the character of the Durkheimians. The showing of the mutual interdependence and simultaneous significance of all these elements provides a greater measure of accuracy in the consideration of questions of this type.
Paul Hernadi, “Re-Presenting the Past: A Note on Narrative Historiography and Historical Drama," History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 45-51.
Narrative historiography and historical drama can be revealingly compared with respect to authorial perspective. Classical, Elizabethan, and modern drama are contrasted with narrative history in a consideration of the representation of the past "from within and without at the same time." The historian is expected to present envisioned action indirectly, while the playwright directly re-presents action. The content of historiographical narrative and the dialogue form of drama claim to offer unmediated insight into the past, while the form of the former and the content of the latter acknowledge the reproduction of represented events in a human mind. The playwright's retrospective attitude toward the represented action is considered historically. The narrative historian's dual vision of events from within and without is explored by an analysis of his use of verbal signs compared to that of the scientist and novelist.
REVIEW ESSAYS
Patrick Gardiner on Hegel's Philosophy of History by Burleigh Taylor Wilkins and Hegel on Reason and History. A Contemporary Interpretation by George Dennis O'Brien, History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 52-56.
Bari Watkins on Advocacy and Objectivity. A Crisis in the Professionalization of American Social Science, 1865-1905 by Mary O. Furner, History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 57-66.
Elizabeth A. R. Brown on Henri Pirenne. A Biographical and Intellectual Study by Bryce Lyon, History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 66-76.
Victor Gourevitch on Beobachtende Vernunft. Philosophie und Anthropologie in der Aufklärung by Sergio Moravia, Elisabeth Piras, History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 76-85.
David A. Hollinger on Changing Perspectives in the History of Science. Essays in Honour of Joseph Needham by Mikuláš Teich and Robert Young, History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 85-94.
Robert D. Schulzinger on Clio and the Doctors. Psycho-History, Quanto-History, and History by Jacques Barzun and Style in History by Peter Gay, History and Theory 15, no. 1 (1976), 94-103.
ARTICLES
James Miller, "Merleau-Ponty's Marxism: Between Phenomenology and the Hegelian Absolute," History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 109-132.
The development and changes in Merleau-Ponty's Marxism are analyzed by an examination of the relationship of his phenomenology to the rationalism and determinism of the Marxist dialectic. From Humanism and Terror (1947) to Adventures of the Dialectic (1955) Merleau-Ponty made explicit and worked out the philosophical dilemmas in his own Marxism and eventually abandoned the determinism of the Hegelian-Marxist autonomous dialectic of history. This rejection of a determinism "executed behind humanity's back" was the heart of Merleau-Ponty's social thought, and meant that the teleological meaning of history incarnate in the proletariat had to be criticized. Merleau-Ponty put the practical focus of the emancipatory social philosophy on the individual conceived concretely "as a potential participant in a universal history."
Mary Forrester, "Practical Reasoning and Historical Inquiry," History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 133-140.
Both the Hempelian and the Dravian models of historical explanation are inadequate. They are based on the belief that in some way action may be deduced from a given reason for it. The chief difficulty is in showing how reasons are logically related to actions. An act can never be shown deductively to be necessary for the achievement of an end. Rather, practical reasoning enables us to infer inductively that a particular act will result in the achievement of some goal. An act is explained not when it is inferred from a set of premises one of which states the reason for it, but instead where the end may be inferred from a set of premises one of which states that the action has been performed. Studying an agent's other actions and the actions of other people enables us to determine which ends are desired, which are not, and whether the agent was rational or irrational.
Harry J. Ausmus, "Schopenhauer's View of History: A Note," History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 141-145.
Schopenhauer's position on the nature of history did not change to be accommodated by his attacks on Hegel. Analysis of Volumes I and II of Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung shows that Schopenhauer's view of history was held before the charges of Hegel's "fraud." In Volume I he does not claim that history is strictly a science, like mathematics, and then go on in Volume 11 (to degrade it. Throughout, he understood history as having positive aspects. Schopenhauer did reject Hegelianism, particularly for its metaphysical justification of the idea of progress, but he saw value in the study of history for preserving rational self-consciousness and understanding the significance of human actions and motivations.
REVIEW OF REVIEWS
Jonathan M. Wiener on Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. Lord and Peasant in the Making of the Modern World by Barrington Moore, Jr., History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 146-175.
REVIEW ESSAYS
Frederick A. Olafson on Analytische Geschichtsphilosophie. Eine kritische Einführung by Karl Acham, History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 176-185.
Hayden V. White on Vico. A Study of the ‘New Science’ by Leon Pompa, History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 186-202.
Paul L. Ward on New Directions in European Historiography by Georg G. Iggers and Norman Baker, History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 202-212.
James J. Barnes on A Venture in History. The Production, Publication, and Sale of the Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft by Harry Clark, History and Theory 15, no. 2 (1976), 212-225.
ARTICLES
Harriet Gilliam, "The Dialectics of Realism and Idealism in Modern Historiographic Theory,'" History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 231-256.
Realism and idealism in modern historiographic theory share a common origin and their internal dialogue is a series of efforts to accommodate and reconcile the views of the two schools. Over the questions of the idea of fact, historical truth, the subject-object relationship, and history as narrative, the conceptual and methodological poles are not so extreme as they appear, and both schools borrow from each other as they become increasingly sophisticated. That they address the same issues and share epistemological presuppositions enables them to maintain an interreactive and interdependent relationship. The positions of Mandelbaum, Cassirer, Becker, Collingwood, Oakeshott, Dray, and others are shown to be less fundamentally opposed than generally believed. Although there is a significant concurrence between realist and idealist positions, their dialogue is crucial to understanding the nature of historical knowledge.
J. O. Wisdom, "General Explanation in History,'" History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 257-266.
The covering-law model of historical explanation works only for explanation of particulars by particulars, or narrative questions and person and action questions. Wisdom suggests three other explanatory theories that may be integral to historical explanation. What are called Challengeable-cover laws, Function-type laws, and Theoretical-type explanations are introduced and their ranges with respect to covering laws described. The first type are non-trivial generalizations the historian forms where existing covering laws are irrelevant or insufficient, for isolated aspects of their subject matter. Function-type explanatory laws are systemic and answer questions basic in the social sciences where they point beyond particulars to general functions of systems. Theory-type explanations, like Mary Douglas' explanation of taboos, involve theoretical entities or unobservables and operate analogously to theoretical explanations in the natural sciences. Historians often condense generalizations into concepts and treat them as particulars. History thus becomes generality-impregnated narrative.
Roy Enfield, "Marx and Historical Laws,'" History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 267-277.
Whether Marx indeed discovered a law of epochal transition requires an examination of his analysis of epochal change, as in the Grundrisse and Capital. Objections that Marx's theory of socioeconomic change is formally inconsistent can be dealt with through analysis of its content. Marx is shown to have formulated a schema for the understanding of social revolution in general, which can be properly understood only in terms of the increasing complexity of successive social formations.
Paul Merritt Bassett, "The Use of History in the Chronicon of Isidore of Seville,'" History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 278-292.
Modern criticisms of the historical works of Isidore of Seville have generally mistaken them for mere chronicle, and poor chronicle at that. Isidore saw biblical and secular history merging into a universal history moving toward "the divinely appointed consummation." This is a marked change from the emphasis of Augustine's Civitas Dei, and involves a different periodization of historical eras. Isidore's emphasis on social as well as temporal continuity is the result of a conscious effort toward universalism. He incorporates the literature and mythology of antiquity into a summation of history and an explanation of the origins of peoples and arts. Universal history is bound up with the history of the Universal Church. Isidore's works show the interaction of the historian and his "Sitz-im-Leben."
REVIEW ESSAYS
Vernon K. Dibble on The Sociologists of the Chair. A Radical Analysis of the Formative Years of North American Sociology (1883-1922) by Herman Schwendinger and Julia R. Schwendinger, History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 293-321.
Lance E. Davis on Late Nineteenth-Century American Development. A General Equilibrium History by Jeffrey G. Williamson, History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 322-328.
Joseph Hamburger on James and John Stuart Mill. Father and Son in the Nineteenth Century by Bruce Mazlish, History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 328-341.
Edmund Fryde on Historical Writing in England c. 550-c. 1307 by Antonia Gransden, History and Theory 15, no. 3 (1976), 341-346.
Augustin Thierry and Liberal Historiography
For Augustin Thierry, rewriting the story of the past was, until 1830, explicitly a way of making the future, and after 1830, implicitly a way of justifying the present. In subverting traditional historiography perceived as a legitimation of royal authority Thierry did not follow the Enlightenment strategy of opposing history and reason. Writing after 1789, he discovered reason in history. Constant and the Saint-Simonians had already distinguished two ages of history an age of conquest or violence, and an age, just beginning, of commerce and reason but these appeared as discontinuous. Thierry's aim, especially after 1830, was to reveal history as a continuous, providential unfolding of reason, culminating in the bourgeois nation state. The violence of history was thus to be subsumed by reason. Historiographically, narrative (the history of violence) and commentary (rational reflection on it) were not to be discontinuous, as in Enlightenment historiography; meaning was to emerge instead from the narrative itself. Correspondingly, the historian's role was to be construed as a mediating, not a constructive one. The historian is the mouthpiece of history, as the bourgeois, the true hero of history, uniting in himself conquered and conqueror, re-presents what in history was divided the nation. In neither case is control to be viewed as a mark of division or violence; historian and hero are alike agents or representatives of totality (reality, reason, the nation). Violence reasserts itself thematically, however, in the stark, unresolved opposition of conquered and conqueror, subject and lord, female and male, victim and executioner, which structures Thierry's most successful historical narratives.
Hayden V. White, “Introductory Comments," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 1-2.
Lionel Gossman, “Augustin Thierry and Liberal Historiography," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 3-6.
Lionel Gossman, “Liberal Politics and the Reform of Historiography," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 6-19.
Lionel Gossman, “The Privilege of Continuity: The Bourgeois as Mediator between Conquerors and Conquered," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 19-36.
Lionel Gossman, “The Privilege of Continuity: Bourgeois History as Mediator between Chronicle History and Philosophical History," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 37-61.
Lionel Gossman, “The Problem of Violence," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 61-77.
Lionel Gossman, “The Liberal Imagination: Benjamin Constant and Augustin Thierry," History and Theory, Beiheft 15 (1976), 77-83.
Cover image: “Polystyrene Planets,” by David Menidrey (24 September 2017)
