Dear Friends, No.1

Hi,

My name is Dr. Seyed Javad. I am working on a project about the 
historiography of sociology. I would like to get critical feed-back from 
those who would like to debate in this regard. I am going to post my 
discussions in section form and each section is about one aspect of social 
theory and its history as I see it. Hope you will enjoy the article and I 
hope I will enjoy your critical and constructive comments. Here you go:

In defence of the sociological canon
or
For fencing of the sociological canon


At the heart of every intellectual activity, one would soon or later find 
some 'gifted' people who are regarded by their posterity as founding fathers 
or mothers in this or that regard.  Sociology is no exception in this 
regard.  During late ninties, there arose a hot debate between those who 
defended the traditional integrity (rather one would say, dignity) of 
sociological canon against those who were, and still are, perceived as 
day-dreamers or everything-goes-prophets ( a la Feyerabend), better known as 
postmodernists.

One could definitely trace the roots of these recent debates back to the 
emerging days of formations of modernity and the very moment of 
institutionalization of the discipline.  However, my concern here in this 
section is about the re-emergence of this debate in current literature, and 
I would deepen this discussion along the way of this chapter which is mainly 
related to Classics and Canonicity.

In current debate on canonicity two names have become as sine qua non of the




debate. One is Nicos Mouzelis and the other one is David Parker.  Of course, 
the range of debates is larger than what these two thinkers talk about but 
these two would provide us with a neat point of departure.

Put it very simply, Parker is not happy with the traditional frame of 
narration in sociology and would like to surpass the current impasse within 
the discipline. In other words, he can not feel at home with an orthodox 
narrative which is enshrined in teaching practices by a move from founders 
to classics, a mapping of persons to texts, short circuiting historicization 
and inventing a canonical tradition of quasi-sacred writings, most of which 
were written between 1840 and 1920. ( Parker:1977, 124)
He rightly wants to enlarge the sociological imagination but as Mouzelis 
acutely notes ( Mouzelis: 1997, 244), he drops some few essential 
sociological, one would rather say intellectual, tools.  The former rightly 
asks about the substantial accuracy of orthodox organiztion of sociology 
which wrongly is focused on a handful of European authors' oeuvre which  
supposedly  constitute the sociological body of knowledge and would, if 
properly understood, stimulate the sociological imagination. In my view, his 
critique of the canon ( Parker: 1997, 131) is right in 'intention' but he 
does not hit the point, and his multicultural sociology ( Parker: 1997, 133) 
loses its consistency and logical rigor.  Actually, it is here and at this 
point which one can make sense of Mouzelis's arguments against Parker.  
Nonetheless, there are some substantial problems with the lines of argument 
presented by Mouzelis against Parkerians.  On



broadening the sociological canon, he rightly poses some logical criteria ( 
Mouzelis: 1997, 245) which have nothing to do with the gender, ethnic 
origins, sexual preferences, or skin colour etc.  So far so good.  The 
problem is not as simple as he wants the audience to believe.  He offers a 
two-fold conceptual tool in order to address the classicality issues.  He 
argues that Marx-Weber-Durkheim offer a) a set of highly sophisticated and 
powerful conceptual tools, and b) their conceptual frameworks as well as 
their more substantive theories are superior to other writings in terms of 
cognitive potency, analytical acuity, power of synthesis, imaginative reach 
and originality. ( 1997, 246) Further he argues that the whole process of 
canonization is not a matter of imposition but sole intellectual choice.  
Besides, if one just sees in the pantheon of sociology thinkers from the 
West and no one from the Rest it should not come as a suprise or shock, 
because their exclusion is solely based on (a) and (b).  If you don't see 
any Eastern Europeans or Russians, let alone Orientals, Muslims, Africans, 
Catholics, Latin Americans or alike, for example, be sure, Mouzelis assures 
us, that it has nothing to do with external issues except (a) and (b).  The 
various aspects of this naivity is going to be tackled along this chapter 
but here I am going to address some issues which arose directly from this 
debate.

To be sure, there are some interesting points in Parker but as Mouzelis 
notes there are, at the same time, some unaddressed theoretical problems in 
his discussion, i.e. what makes a discipline so theoretically coherent 
before bing fashionable or popular?  McLennan has embarked on this path and 
his recent intellectual endeavours should



be viewed in this light. ( McLennan: 1995a, 1995b, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000).  
Following the argument put forward by Mouzelis, it seems there is an 
incomplete logic of argument which ignores the substantial points of 
Parker's proposals. ( This aspect has been the focal point of some American 
sociologists who are sceptical about the factual classicality of classics.  
One could mention R. W. Connell who has criticized the so-called foundation 
stories within mainstream sociology.)  I agree with the Mouzelisian argument 
that some intrinsic criteria should be the norm for assessing and/or 
rejecting a theorist, but outright to denounce everyone else is not a 
theoretical matter.  On the contrary is an empirical task.  Take for 
example, imperialism or neo-colonialism in sociology.  Very few 
Male-White-Europeans who have been so acute in other teoretical aspects have 
rigorously addressed this issue-on the contrary, the mainstream never 
formulated this as a problem in the first place but as a  progressive march 
of Europeanization and then Modernization in the evolutionary scheme of 
human societal fabric- in length, except, first Communists and 
Third-Worldists. ( Connell: 1997, 1511)

Anyhow, I think Parker should be credited on the points he makes.  On the 
other hand, the discredition by Mouzelis is dogmatic and hasty.  Because 
this burning issue ( Imperialism or Neo-Colonialism) has worldwide 
consequences which could be termed as World-Systemic drama which affects 
both the infrastructers of core and periphery, and shapes the social life of 
everyone of us.  By just applying the Mouzelisian logic ( a and b) one will 
soon find out how poor and inadequate the



Western sociological imagination has been so far, not vice versa.  On the 
contrary, the Third-Worldist theorists have been on lead and theoretically, 
one would rather emphasis the praxiological dimension of their thoughts, 
more rigour and acute.  In this sense one should mention Che Guevara and his 
ideas on the transformation of Latin America through revolution which has 
been discarded by some Latin American leftist theoreticians-calling 
themselves 'realists'- who in recent years relegated the Che's legacy in the 
name of 'Utopia Disarmed'.  This is the title of one of Jorge Castaneda's 
recent book (1993).  Ironically, the same author, due to the crude realities 
of his own native country i.e. Mexico and the impracticality of 
neo-liberalism, has recently begun to ask whether it is really possible to 
use non-revolutionary methods to take wealth and power out of the hands of 
rich and powerful elite, thus transforming the long-standing social 
structures of Latin America.  He admits, in other words, that Che Guevara 
had a point after all. (1997) In other words, there is more to the 
canonicity than Mouzelis comprehends.

However, Parker should be taken at the points he makes and rightly, as 
Mouzelis remarks, rejected at the conclusions he wants to lead us at.  The 
second point which Mouzelis forgets about the classics, and it should be 
clear if one takes the aforementioned contrast between guevarismo and 
neo-liberals in Latin America seriously, is what I call the Range of 
Problematics which have been of any substantial weight for the orthodox 
classics.  In other words, in contrast to Mouzelis, it is not just the 
importance of conceptual tools which their writings provide us with but



the problems which have been tackled in their frame of theory.  If one takes 
this point to its logical end, then it would be evident that there have been 
some problematics which are or can be socio-logical but have been 
systematically, in contrast to what Mouzelis holds about the canonicality 
and its prevalence (1997: 246), ignored by the European Classics.

One is the modernity and its effect on the social fabric.  Most Classics 
have talked about how it transforms the social fabric of feudalism through 
capitalism towards socialism. Very few or none have mentioned how modernity 
or those who run it can impose a non-modernity on other human societies and 
the range of social problems born out of this.  Is it really modernity in 
terms of human intellectual maturity which poses problems for non-modern 
societies, or the sum of human aggressions in terms of Colonialism which 
imposes unique problems?

The sociology of underdevelopment or poverty does not address these issues 
in depth and does not give their theoretical due.  Because sociologists do 
not work with the right materials.  The raw materials needed for an accurate 
estimation of the non-modern rest cannot be found in the works of 
Orientalists or Anthropologists.  Most probably, one should look at ' 
security studies', 'strategic research', geo-political studies' or the 
political biographies.  On the other side, one should note that, there have 
been others who have been engaged in these debates along with the 
sophisticated Europeans.  They, nontheless, have been neglected or termed 
wrongly



by Western scholars as fundamentalists, neo-fundamentalists or alike. 
(Connell: 1997, 1526; and Ghamari-Tabrizi: 1994)  But these people actually 
have conceptualized the other half of modernity which I rather call imposed 
non-modernity.  If the issues raised by, say, Afghani and alike and the 
problems formulated by, say, Iqbal become central, provided the external 
straitjacket put on them by Orientalists removed from their body of thought, 
then those who talked about these modern issues first will join the club of 
Classics.  But why they have not joined the Classics' club we should ask 
Mouzelis not Parker.  In other words, what Mouzelis calls defence is 
actually a fence erected before the holy land of Classics.  He does not make 
any favor to the socio-logical enterprise by fencing off others by denying 
the universality of human reason in confining it to few White Male Western 
Europeans.  This would lead us to the topic of next sections.






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