History and Sociology: The Lost Synthesis

Abstract

One might have predicted that “as sociology meets history” (Tilly 1981), there would arise a demand for synthesis, for a history-as-social-science that would combine the best of both disciplines. A few voices, chief among them the late Philip Abrams (1982), issued that call. But the synthesis has not arrived. Today the relation between history and sociology is that of parents from differing backgrounds whose adolescent children have contracted a friendship at school. There is a pleasant but empty cordiality between the elders. Although the adolescents have an acrimonious rivalry, they close ranks against parental orthodoxies of either sort. One hopes that the young people will cooperatively transform the social attitudes of their parents, but unthinking loyalties ultimately prevent this transformation. So the synthesis of history and sociology, or more broadly of history and social science, has not arrived. Today, the most synthetic call we hear is for each (sub)discipline to keep the other honest (e.g., Roy 1987b).