Cosmology and Society: Developing a Bourdieusian Perspective

Abstract

Contemporary sociology has paid very little attention to cosmology. But, like all forms of intellectual endeavour, cosmology is a product of society. Using insights from Bourdieu's social theory, this paper shows how cosmologies are invested in by owners of economic capital seeking power and social status. There are also important dialectical relations between economic patronage and cosmology, cosmologies resonating in different ways with the economic interests patronising them. These assertions are made using three case studies: Renaissance Europe, 17th century England and 20th century U.S.A. The selection of these case studies has been based on two connected criteria. First, as Arrighi (2010) outlines, there has been ‘a recurrent pattern of historical capitalism’ whereby phases of stable growth based on technological innovation alternate with periods of crisis and the rise of a new economic, social and technological regime. The case-study areas examined here have been made the nodal-points of these cycles of accumulation and financial investment. Local elites, business organisations and governments have organised the expansion and restructuring of their economy and have used regional economic expansion to promote and display their power and cultural capital. This brings us to the second reason for choosing the particular case studies examined here. Advances in scientific capital (including astronomy and cosmology) have often corresponded with these macrosocial changes and investments. A macro-perspective such as that of Arrighi does little to show how ‘economic capital’ is used by particular people and institutions in particular regions to enhance their power and prestige. But a Bourdieusian perspective can show which elites (owners of economic, social and symbolic capital) control, and are controlled by, these global economic shocks.