Contenu du sommaire : À propos de Durkheim

Mohamed Cherkaoui : Socialization and Conflicts : Educational Systems and Their History according to Durkheim. The purpose of this article is to make a critical exposition of the key ideas of Durkheim's sociology of education, as basically drawn from "Education et sociologie" and "L'évolution pédagogique en France". Durkheim's thought has been arbitrarily reduced to a functionalist theory of socialization whereas, given its complexity and its conceptual and historical construction, it resists any such rudimentary classification. It is shown how Durkheim's recurrent, sometimes normative, reading of history allows him to discover specific characteristics as well as structural invariants of educational systems. We lay the stress especially on the category of conflict and its correlate, the concept of ideological struggle, which can explain the historical transformations of educational systems and simultaneously reveal the school's function as an instrument of struggle and a means of domination.

Bernard Lacroix: Emile Durkheim's Original Calling. By including Emile Durkheim among its ancestors, the sociological tradition fails to recognize the unique and specific nature of the initial object which this French « sociologist » investigated. Through a detailed examination of his first writings, this article proposes to show that politics constitute the heart of this author's inquiry, as evidenced by two strategic moments, namely just before and after his trip to Germany. In this sense, all this young philosophy professor's readings look like an attempt to figure out the French political situation of his day. His thoughts initially center around the triangle : State-cohesion-conflict. Later on, under the influence of German thinking, Durkheim sees the State's role reduced in this problematic; the theme of conflict is given up, and society is conceived thereafter as an interdependent system. Little by little, through these tentatives and inflections, the object of Durkheimian « sociology » becomes manifest: in its origins at least, it was only another (positive) way of practising the « political and moral » disciplines of its time.

Pierre Birnbaum : The Durkheimian Conception of the State : Apolitical Civil Servants. When examining the nature and functions of the State, Durkheim seems to have abandoned any sociological perspective in order to accept forthright an entirely Hegelian conception. For Durkheim, the State, a neutral and rational being that is, furthermore, independent of the large society, constitutes an organ for the rational management of society, even though the latter continued experiencing important social conflicts. This conception led Durkheim, contrary to Duguit, to oppose the unionization of civil servants who were supposed to identify with their functions and not have specific social interests. He thus shunned Jaurès who was attempting to show that the State's agents are workers similar to those in the larger society. For Durkheim, on the contrary, civil servants act in the general interest, identify with their functions and are duty-bound to remain publicly neutral about all issues, this neutrality preserving them from those social conflicts which agitate the larger society.

Jean-Claude Filloux : « Don't Forget that I'm the Son of a Rabbi ». Durkheim's sociological discourse involves revealing and teaching the « Law of the Group ». This must be related to the processes of identification and rupture with a father who was a rabbi descended from eight generations of rabbis. On the basis of psychoanalytical hypotheses, the author shows that analogies between the discourse of Durkheim and the Talmud, no less than the equation God-Father-Group which underlies Durkheim's image of society, allow us to state that the problem of the father is at the center of a sociology invested with a missionary desire, which was established very early. Religious and pedagogical obsessions, which form the picture of a sociologist who is a new Moses, mark this sociology.

Victor Karady : Durkheim, the Social Sciences and the University : Inventory of a Failure. This article tries to clarify, by means of socio-historical survey data, the circumstances and the limits of institutionalisation of sociology in the French university system. The story of how the first courses in the discipline were created shows the relationship between the academic reception of sociology and the reform movement of higher studies which allowed a number of social sciences to enter the faculties of letters (geography, social history, psychology, pedagogy) and of law (political economy, political science, statistics). These innovations, in terms of subjects taught, correspond in various manners to the social functions of the faculties. They rest upon the scientific, institutional and social legitimacy these sciences possess to different degrees allowing to oppose sociology to the other social sciences introduced into the faculties of letters on the one hand, and, on the other hand, to those belonging to the law schools. Though Durkheim's sociological school has acquired a dominant position in the field of social studies proper, it continues to be dominated in the academic system for failing to achieve professionalisation of sociological research (on the external market place) and to guarantee its complete autonomy in the faculties. Durkheim's failure is expressed by the decline or stagnation of sociological teaching and research till the 1950s as shown by empirical indicators.

Philippe Besnard : Anti-or Ante-Durkheimism ? A Contribution to the Debat about Official Statistics on Suicide. The publication of Jean Baechler's "Les Suicides" provides the opportunity for examining the arguments formulated, in particular by J. Douglas, against using official suicide statistics. Douglas's hypotheses, taken up and developed by Baechler, are in fact refuted by the data that Durkheim gathered as soon as effects of statistical interaction are considered. The evolution of suicide rates since the beginning of the century also contradicts them. Moreover, such arguments can justify a pre-Durkheimian usage of suicide statistics, as observed in Baechler's work. The last part of the article indicates research that must be undertaken in order to settle the debate about the dissimulation of suicides, which is undoubtedly much less frequent than generally asserted.