Contenu du sommaire : Est-Ouest : Vieux voyants, nouveaux aveugles

Pierre Lantz, Malaise in Politics What will happen in Eastern Europe is cause for reflection about the méthodes of political analysis that proved incapable of foreseeing recent developments in that part of the world. Belief in the efficacy of force, in competence and in self interest, common to the majority of specialists, explains this blindness. The phenomenon can be described in terms of the way it is expressed in language, of the policies it inspires, and of how it applies social motivations taken to be universal norms (such as aggressive and destructive pulsions). In the terms of this point of view, notions such as « civil society » and « State » are articulated and analyzed differently, and are not opposed. Invoking an economic rationality becoming less and less credible (whether « liberal » or « socialist »), an affectivity wrongly considered archaic seems to be blurring previously accepted distinctions.

Roland Lew, The East : What is being Done, and Undone There are several ways of understanding the changes that are occuring in the East. New personalities and strikingly dramatic events, such as the self-dissolution of actually existing socialism, can be referred to. In addition, the re-emergence of older cultural and social patterns such as cultural nationalism and religious sentiments is remarkable. There now is no choice but to call into question much received wisdom about existing socialism. The modernist pretentions of Stalinism enjoy no credibility and, more generally, much of what has been constructed in the East under existing socialism must be rejected. However, prudence requires a careful consideration of the bureaucratization of the whole of these societies, and of the negation real social groups. Equally, the long and complexe process of the reintegration of these societies into the logic of world capitalism must be analyzed. Further, the still mysterious relation between actually existing socialism and its socialist origins needs to be more adequately elucidated.

Monique Chemillier-Gendreau, The Apparent Triumph of Liberalism, or the Triumph of the Liberal Idea The difference between the triumph of liberalism and the triumph of the liberal idea illustrates the interplay between reality and values and their relevance to contemporary social change. The choice between the two formulations compels investigators to deal with the problem of scientific objectivity during a period when political liberties are equated with economic liberties. More than ever, the study of society necessitates an inter-disciplinary approach preceded by an epistemological debate.

Jean-Marie Vincent, Sociology in Counterpoint Sociology has diversified, and its field of study has enlarged as its methods have become more complex and numerous. Since innovations in the discipline of linguistics in the 1960s, sociology has certainly made progress in terms of assimilating influences from other disciplines and reconciling paradigms that were apparently contradictory. However, in order to orient themselves, sociologists need to critically reflect upon social changes. Such an endeavor requires a return to the sociology of Weber and Marx.

Claudie Weill, The Notion of Culture in Marxist Theories about the National Question Bourgeois culture and/or proletarian culture, national culture and/or international culture : these are the terms combined or rejected in marxist theories on the national question during the time of the Second Socialist International. An adequate treatment of this subject must include the question of whether national cultures exist, as « intransigent internationalists » (like Strasser, Pannekoek, Lenin, and Stalin) deny. Another important question is the future of national cultures. Will they develop within an international culture (as Bauer believes), or be absorbed by it (as expected by Kautsky and Rosa Luxemburg) ? The national programs adopted by the various parties to which the above theorists belong depend upon responses to these questions and upon whether the central notion is that of culture or territory.

Pierre Achard, Linguistics and the Social Sciences : Post-structuralism What role does linguistics have in the social and human sciences ? An initial response to this question was proposed around I960 by the structuralist movement, inspired by Claude Lévi-Strauss. Linguistics was considered a model, and the method of phonology was transposed to different fields. However, the lack of specificity proper to this method made it difficult to determine what was proper to language. Since that time, developments in linguistics have simultaneously worked to limit the application of methodologies borrowed from other fields and to stimulate the study of language as a part of social processes. Today, the social sciences are less interested in how the object of research functions as language, and more interested in how it functions with languages.

Norman Bowen, Profession and Power in the Social Sciences in the United States The professionalization of social science in the United States resulted in a utilitarian rather than a pure conception of science. University-based social scientists established knowledge claims based on positivist theories of science, but did so as part of a large strategy aimed at influencing progressive reform, gaining access to government and obtaining reliable independent sources of financial support. Science was indissociable from a belief in American democracy itself. Formalized ties to government research and private foundations allowed for expanded legitimacy and especially considerable influence over the process of the restructuring of the American state in the Twentieth Century. However, social science remained vulnerable to partisan attacks inherent in the American political process, especially periodic anti-communism, and generally defended itself with claims to scientific neutrality.

Domenico Losurdo, The Decline and Transfiguration of the West Heidegger and German Philosophy between the Wars Even after 1918 and the collapse of the Third Reich, the main themes of pro war sentiment continued to circulate in German culture. Germany continued to be considered the only country capable of successfully combatting the materialist massification coming from the East and the democratic and socialist nihilism which posed a fatal menace in the West. In this context, in 1936 Nietzsche appeared to Heidegger as the champion of the struggle against nihilism (and he recognized Mussolini and Hitler as having the merit of being influenced by the great philosopher). From 1939 until the defeat of Germany, each phase of the Second World War corresponded to a new stage in Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche. In the thought of Heidegger, as in that of Junger and Schmitt, the final condamnation of the Third Reich was absorbed in a brooders historical assessment that holds the revolutionary tradition responsible for its evolution and continues to call for the salvation of the West while transfiguring its authentic heritage.

Richard Wolin. The French Heidegger Debate Few events in recent memory have shaken the world of French letters as much as the appearance of Victor Farias's book, Heidegger et le Nazisme, Farias deserves credit for having ignited a long overdue debate about the taboo theme of the political dimension of Heidegger's book. But his argument about Heidegger's Nazi ties is so brazenly tendentious that, ironically, he ends up undermining his own case. Also, the book is extremely weak from a philosophical standpoint, which made it easier for the Heidegger partisans to attack it. Unlike the vulgar Heidegger apologists (Fedier, Aubenque, Cresella), the leading French Heideggerians, Jacques Derrida and Philippe Lacoue- Labarthe tried to confront the issues raised by Heidegger's Nazi past. But their interpretation, trying to distinguish the post-humanist Heidegger (after 1940) from the early one, still saturated with metaphysical residues, is only a more sophisticated strategy of denial. It leads to the illogical conclusion that it was a surfeit of humanism (later abandoned) that drove Heidegger into the Nazi camp...