social theory and social action

8/12/2019 Social Theory and Social Action

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Social Theory and Social ActionAuthor(s): F. Stuart ChapinSource: American Sociological Review, Vol. 1, No. 1 (Feb., 1936), pp. 1-11Published by: American Sociological AssociationStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2083858.

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dlimericanSOCIOLOGIC L VI WVolume 1 FEBRUARY, 1936 Number 1

SOCIALTHEORY AND SOCIALACTION'F. STUART CHAPINUniversity of Minnesota

T THAT HASocial theoryto say aboutsocial action? Sincemendo not act on biological motivations of hunger, fear and sexalone, but are guided by their underlying philosophy of eco-nomic, political and social relations, it is worth while to inquire intothe connections between contemporary social theory and contem-porary social action.Clarification of thought about the complexities of contemporarysocial action may be promoted by the simplifying device of a two-fold division. We may mark off two different but over-lapping fieldsof social action. The first consists of planned social action directedtoward goals. This is the area of decisive leadership, of legalistic po-litical action in law-making and law enforcement, and of impulsivesocial reform movements. These forms of social action are interre-lated and from them emerge the more personal social forces. Thesecond field of social action consists of the unintended consequencesthat follow from the interrelationships among the personal socialforces. Let us consider a few illustrations of unplanned consequences.The unsettling effects upon the silver currencies of China andMexico of the present silver purchase policy of the United StatesGovernment is an unplanned result of the relations between plannedactions set up by the silver bloc in Congress and the plans of those

1 Presidential address, Thirtieth Annual Meeting, American Sociological Society, NewYork City, December 30, I935. The papers following this address in this number of theReview were all read at the same Annual Meeting, December 27-30, I935.I

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2 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICALREVIEWwho believe in a specialmonetarytheory. In this field we observethe unplannedresultsof the interrelationsof independentlyplannedsocial actions. Thusunplannedcombinationsof blocsof interrelatedhumanbehaviors et up impersonal ocialforcesnot intended by theauthorsof particularplans.But unplannedresultsflow alsofrom thecombinationsof individualacts. Thus we observe that a run on abank leads to its closing and this to the failure of a creditorof thebank. We see the phenomenaof hoardingcontributeto a govern-ment's decision to go off gold.These activities of hoardingor dishoardingof money are all theresults of innumerablendividualdecisions.But since thesedecisionsoccurin a society equippedwith a marvelouslyefficientnetworkofcommunicationagencies, the individual acts do not remain inde-pendent.They arecumulated,combinedandtransmittedwith ever-increasingpotential to remoteareas, and therethey may lead to re-sults that are unplanned.We note that the crowdpsychologyof apanicundermines he basisof essentiallysoundbusinessenterpriseslocatedin areasdistant fromthe crisis.

All these cases illustratehow impersonal ocial forcesmay be setin motionby the unplannedcombinationsof independent ndividualbehaviors.We call thesephenomenampersonal ocialforcesbecausethe chain of cause and effect may be so long and complicatedthatthe consequences annot be interpretedas the realizationof plansofparticularpersons.Furthermore, his type of phenomenon eems tobe both more extended and more intense today than ever before.Thereasonappears o befound n thechannelsof transmissionwhichareprovidedby modernmechanicalagenciesof communicationandtransportation.For centuries the interdependenceof different re-gions and differentnationswas expressed n the structureof slow-moving foreigncommerce.Today the telegraph, telephone,radio,newspaper,motionpicture,airplane,automobile,railwayandsteam-ship line radiate information n a flashor move articles with speed.Consequently heformerly tablestructureof socialinterdependenceis subjectto rudeshocks andsuddenpressures.This comesabout be-cause of the marvelouslyefficientnetwork over which informationandgoodsmay be collectedfromwidelyseparatedsourcesand thenmove with increasing orce throughchannelsthat convergeon im-portant centers.Let us consideranexampleof plannedandunplanned ocialactionin combination.The SocialSecurityAct representsa compromisebe-



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SOCIALTHEORY AND SOCIALACTION 3tween many forces each driving toward ends that different leadersregarded as socially-desirable goals. Experts on insurance, actuaries,economists, labor leaders and social workers, all led different fac-tions who disagreed about the means to attain the goal of socialsecurity for the masses. Then there was the pressureof the Townsendold-age pension movement. This impulsive social reform gatheredunto itself the spontaneous but unexpressed wish fantasies of thatbewildered generation, the contemporary aged. Its panacea spreadlike wild-fire through the dry grass of hopeless yearning for security.Modern communication agencies facilitated its organization into asocial movement. Congress and the executive were deluged with peti-tions. Political considerations of different sorts interfered with theSimon-pure expression of the plans of special groups and the SocialSecurity Act came as the most practicable compromise of conflictingviews. But out of the patch-work combination there may emerge cer-tain unplanned results. The consequences of investing the huge re-serves to be accumulated under the procedures of Federal Old-AgeBenefits seem not to have been fully considered by those who wereresponsible for the final formulation. If the reserves2 are to be in-vested in government bonds purchased during a boom period andhence stimulating to the investment market, what of the depreciat-ing effects from the sale of bonds during a depression? Is this sort ofinvestment of reserves not more likely to intensify the liquidationprocess at just the time when it needs checking?We may now ask the question: Is there in social theory any coun-terpart to this rough dichotomy of the field of social action? It seemsto me that there is. I would mark off an area to be called normativesocial theory from another area to be called non-normativesocialtheory. Actually there is some over-lap but the dichotomy is usefulbecause it leads to further distinctions, insights and meanings.Under normative social theory I would include all utopian ideolo-gies such as evangelical religious systems, the theory of social re-form, the theory of state socialism, the theory of the communisticdictatorship of the proletariat, the theory of the cooperative com-monwealth, etc. It is characteristic of all of these theories that theyare concerned with formulating the principles that should guide so-cial action in the use of appropriate means to the attainment of de-

2 The investment of unemployment reserves and business stability, Part IV, in A. H.Hansen, M. G. Murray, R. A. Stevenson, and B. M. Stewart, a Program or UnemploymentInsurance and Relief in the United States, University of Minnesota Press, I934, especiallypp. i84-i85, I94-I95.



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4 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICALREVIEWsired ends. In contrast, the non-normative theories include theoriesof interest, theories of profits, theories of monopoly, theories of busi-ness cycles, theories of crowd psychology, theories of the culture lag,theories of state functions, etc. It is a characteristic of these theoriesthat they are concerned with formulating the principles of relation-ship that seem to explain the-consequences that follow from certainsequences of social action. They occasionally try to do more thanstate how these occur; they sometimes attempt to explain why theseoccur.In the area of overlap between the normative and the non-norma-tive theories, there lie theories of sovereignty, theories of social prog-ress, theories of social control, theories of value, etc. All these areasinvolve opinions.In normative social theories we encounter value judgments thatstress differences in kind. In the non-normative social theories wemore frequently encounter quantity judgments that stress differ-ences in degree within each kind. As a result of these differences,normative social theory is able to explain planned social action bet-ter than it can explain the unplanned results of the interrelated butindependently planned social actions. The reason is that the mentalset of the normative theorist is to explain results by treating im-personal consequences as if they were ends or goals. On the otherhand, the non-normative social theorists are more successful in ex-plaining why certain unplanned results follow from the interrelationsof independently planned actions than they are in formulating thesocially acceptable procedures that should be followed to attain apopularly desired goal. The reason is that the mental set of the non-normative social theorist is to abstract impersonal principles fromsocial situations that were essentially personal in origin. This is partof his effort to be objective. But in so doing he may underweigh therole of human motivation, desire, mores, public opinion and valuejudgments. Out of these differences in mental set there arise thefamiliar controversies3that rage about the topic: What is the properscientific method in sociology? The generalizing and synthesizingtype tends to construct normative social theories and the analyticaland investigative type tends to construct non-normative social theo-ries. From the inter-play of criticisms between these two opposinggroups of students there arise clarified ideas about the possible rela-tionship of social theory to social action. In attempting to distinguish

3 Bernard,L. L. TheGreatControversy, ocial Forces, Vol. 14, No. i, pp. 64-72.



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SOCIALTHEORY AND SOCIALACTION 5these two different trends in thought, I have no desire to offer abasis of reconciliation between them. Far be it from me to attemptto resolve a conflict in views which continues to be socially useful,because it forces the two sides to restate and clarify their conceptsand theories.The field of unplanned social action has been greatly extended andintensified by modern technological devices in communication andin transportation. Consider the consequences of conflict among gov-ernment functions that follow when new government agencies areset up to attain ends described by utopian ideologies. Reflection uponthis situation indicates the need of adjusting normative social theoryto the facts of our mechanical age, so that we do not continue to plansocial action as if single goals could be simply attained without set-ting up dangerous social and economic reverberations. Here non-normative social theory needs reformulation, so that it can be usedto check expansive social action based upon inadequate theoreticalassumptions. Too often these assumptions ignore the clear implica-tions for social theory of the new mechanical devices of communica-tion, which make almost too easy the establishment of new socialstructures. Right here it seems clear to me that the chief implicationfor social theory is that non-normative explanations must receivemore consideration than hitherto, if we are to have a realistic socialtheory that squares with the expanding field of mass phenomena.The increase of mass phenomena of crowd psychology is greatlyfacilitated by machine communication used for propaganda; and themass phenomena of specialization of economic function by socialclasses is promoted by the use of power machinery for quantity com-modity production. Hence we need more widespread study of non-normative social theories. On the other hand, it is true that the ex-pansion of the functions of government, local, state and national,requires that the narrow type of non-normative social theory be ac-commodated to the facts of human behavior. For, as social action isdischarged through the social machinery of legalized political insti-tutions, the role of opinion, desire and emotion, must be reckonedwith.All social theory must rely heavily upon concepts. In the earlystages of formulation, purely verbal concepts that describe undisci-plined impressions naturally play a major role. But if social theoryis to advance beyond the dangers of verbalism of emotion and attainthe stability given by objective experience, it is necessary that a



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6 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICALREVIEWlarger and larger proportionof social concepts be operationallyde-fined. That is to say, social concepts should be more and more de-fined in terms of the operationsand processesused in attempts tomeasure them or to test them by experiment.Now the significanceof the operationaldefinitionof social concepts is only beginning tobe appreciated.There are tworeasons orthis. First, it wasnecessaryfor sufficient ime to elapse before the inadequacyof purelyspecula-tive socialtheorycouldbedemonstrated.And this has certainlybeendone in a most decisivefashionduringthe present depression.Sec-ond,it required imeandrepeatedexperiment o constructdependa-ble instrumentsof socialmeasurement. n fact, this latter develop-ment is very slow to come, due to the absenceof basic scientific rain-ing of young students in the social sciences, and due to the actualoppositionof socialscientistswith interests that were primarilyphil-osophicalor normative.Nevertheless, there are a few indicationsofa beginning at the operational definition of social concepts. Ex-amples of this development are the studies of public opinion byS. A. Rice and M. M. Willey, the more recent scales to measuresocial attitudes invented by C. Kirkpatrickand R. F. Sletto, themores scales of C. C. Peters, the social status scales of Mary J.McCormick,F. S. Chapinand Alice Leahy, the studies in the defini-tion of socialcontactor group contact by DorothyThomasand herassociates, and the experimental tudies of S. C. Dodd. In these wefind illustrationsof the operationaldefinitionof such social conceptsas public opinion, social attitudes, mores, social status, social con-tact, andsocialexperiment.So far as theseconceptsareinvolvedinthe formulationof social theory, operationaldefinitionsof them arenow at hand.The operational definition of the concepts of normative socialtheory,such as socialclass,wage slaves, proletariat,bourgeoise, o-cialite, aristocrat,plutocrat, etc., is difficult.On the otherhand, theconceptsof non-normative ocial theory,such as incomevelocity ofmoney, transactionvelocity of money, social change, invention, dif-fusion, social attitudes, social status and mores, are not so difficultto define operationally.Since the mores are among the most widely used of conceptsinsocial theory,let us examinemoreclosely the operationaldefinitionof moresdeveloped by C. C. Peters4 n his attempt to measuretheways in whichand the degree to whichmotion picture playsviolate

4 C. C. Peters,Motion Pictures and Standards of Morality, The MacmillanCo., I933



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SOCIAL THEORY AND SOCIALACTION 7the mores and thus perhaps undermine the morals of Americanyouth. Peters performed the following operations in the construc-tion of two of his many scales: one to measure the mores of sociallydemocratic attitudes, and one to measure the mores of parentaltreatment of children. Starting with the hypothesis that the extentof badness or goodness could be measured by the degree of shockindicated by the proportion of members of the group aroused to re-sentment by it, ' it was possible to get these intangible and elusivesocial phenomena into quantitative form so that they could be sub-jected to statistical investigation. Thus there were collected fromthe observation of motion-picture scenes, and other sources, a largenumber of fragments of conduct. These were carefully written upand classified by pattern to discover gaps and to fill them with newscenes. In this way 82 scenes were found for democratic attitudesand 78 scenes of the treatment of children by parents. Next, thesescenes were carefully calibrated, that is, given quantitative valuesfor degree of badness after having five different groups of personssort out the descriptions of movie-scene behavior into three piles.In one pile were those scenes felt intuitively to be more or less wrong,in another pile were those approved or admired, and an intermediatepile consisted of matter-of-course behavior. Thus the extent to whichthe scenes shocked members of society, and hence violated the mores,was indicated by the proportion of these readers in whom theyaroused resentment or admiration. It is evident that when mores aredefined in this way they are described in terms of the physical proc-esses of behavior actually performed. Hence, to paraphrase Bridg-man, the whole description reduces to an account of an actual physi-cal experience, and must have the same validity as that of all directobservation of physical fact. It relies on sensory responses to clarifyabstract thought. Moreover, such concepts, being framed in termsof operations actually performed in physical experience, must lead,at any stage of the research, to conclusions in which room is leftfor future refinements within the uncertainties and approximationsof our present physical operations. 'But before the importance of the operational definition of socialconcepts can be really understood, it is necessary to resolve a confu-sion in thought that is present in many discussions of the proceduresof experiment and of measurement. The opinion that experiment can

Ibid., p. 8.6 P. W. Bridgmann Scripta Mathematica, Vol.2, I934, P. I.



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8 AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICALREVIEWnot be used in social research s an erroneousudgment.It is wrongbecause t is basedupona misconception f the real natureof experi-mentin the physicalsciences.Now it is generallyagreedthat experi-ment is observationunderconditionsof control.This beingso, themisconception reeps n whencontrol is identifiedwith or limited tothe processesof physical manipulation.It is true,of course,that inthe physical aboratory he scientist obtainscontrolby manipulatingdevices that increaseor reduce air pressure,or which raiseor lowertemperature, tc., but the realessenceof this process s not the ma-nipulation,it is the readingon the pressuregauge andon the ther-mometerscale. If the scientist went to the top of Pike's Peak hecouldfindthere alreadyexisting in nature a loweredairpressureanda loweredtemperaturedentical with the laboratoryreadingson hispressuregauge and thermometer.As a matter of convenienceandefficiencyhe reproduces rtificially n the laboratorythe conditionswhich he could have foundin distant places, but the point is thatcontrol s attainedwhenthe measurements rethe same.In contrast to this advantageous aboratorysituation, the argu-ment runs that, because you can not physicallymanipulatehumanbeings as you do materials n the physicallaboratory, hereforeyoucan not have experiment n socialresearch.It is true that you cannot producean I.Q.of Soin the laboratoryby taking a normalpersonandsubjecting him to such a degreeof pressure hat he becomesanimbecile,or producea manic-depressive ase by heatingup a normalperson.But this is not the point of the problem.You cango out anddiscoverin society or in institutions individualswhoseI.Q.'s meas-ure 5o. No social scientistwants to obtain control by physicalma-nipulationof persons.He does not need to do this, for as soon as hehas a valid scale to measure ntelligence,socialstatus, public opin-ion, socialattitudes,etc., all that he has to do is to get measurementsof representativegroupsof populationon each of thesescales. Thenhe can controlntelligence, ocialstatus,social attitudes,etc., forpur-poses of experiment,byselecting controlgroupandanexperimentalgroupwhosemembershave the same distributionof measurementon these scales. Having securedcontrolby the device of selectingthoseindividualswho showthe samemeasurement n differentvari-ables, he may then proceed to the study of the way in which twouncontrolledvariables are related. Thus while identical measure-ments indicative of controlare obtainedin the naturalsciencesbyphysicalmanipulationof the things studied, in social researchthe



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SOCIALTHEORY AND SOCIALACTION 9similarmeasurements hat areindicativeof controlareobtainedbyselection.In the one casethere isphysicalmanipulation f materials,in the othercase thereis selection f materials,but in both cases thefinaltest of controlis in the identity or equivalence f measurements.This being the caseit is evident that the possibilityof measurementdetermines he possibilityof experiment,and the possibilityof bothmeasurementand experimentdeterminesthe possibility of gettingan operationaldefinitionof concepts. Now measurement s merelyquantitativedescriptionand is especiallydifficultto developin thestudy of social relations.Nevertheless, the scales mentioned illus-tratebeginningsandas timepassestherewill nodoubt beevidenceofadditionaladvancesof thissort.The most thoroughgoing llustrationof the experimentalmethodin sociology is the recentreportof S. C. Dodd7of an experiment nruralhygienein Syria. After some years of painstakingresearch npreparationand testing, he developeda scale to measurepersonalhygiene in terms of the behaviorof native Syrians. Two sampleswereselected for study: an experimentalvillagein which a hygieneprogramwasto be put on;and equatedcontrolvillages,without sucha program.Before the programwas put on in any of the villages,all were measured with the hygiene scale. After two years all thevillages wereagainmeasured.Differencesn thesecondscalepositionof the two sampleswastaken as a measureof the effectsof the pro-gram,other thingsbeingas nearlyas possible equal in termsof theprecautions aken.This reallyimportantstudy is not widelyknown.Most reviewersof the bookdisplayan astonishing gnoranceof sci-entificprocedures. n fact, theirreviewsarelittle morethan so manyexamplesof indecent intellectualexposure.Before eavingthis point, however,we may clarifyit a bit furtherby quoting a recent statement of Murchison. Perhapsthe chiefcharacteristicof experimentalscience is that its ideas are simplynamesfor certainseriesof operationsthat are highly reproducible.It is this qualityof reproducibilityhatsets theoperationsof experi-mental science apart from the generaloperationsof nature. 8What thenis atruesocialtheory?I have been careful o phrase hequestionin this way so that theremay be no doubt about the pointat issue.As phrased, the questionimpliesthat thereis a true social

7 S. C. Dodd, a ControlledExperiment on Rural Hygiene in Syria, American Press, Beirut,'934.

8 C. Murchison, Pareto and Experimental Social Psychology, journal of Social Philos-ophy, Vol. i, No. i, Oct. I935.



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Io AMERICAN SOCIOLOGICALREVIEWtheory which is evident in its finality, infallibility,or immutability.The question so phrasedis without scientificmeaning, because itimplies the possibilityof absoluteformulations o describeand ex-plainrelationalphenomena.We should,therefore,re-statethe ques-tion,What arethe criteriaof a good or a soundsocialtheory?Manyanswerscould be made to this question. J. F. Brown9has suggestedfourcriteriaof a good theory: (i) It shouldbe economical n thatit should be basedon the fewest and simplestpostulates,which willadequately ntegrate the experimentaldata. But economymust notbe purchasedat the priceof neglectof facts; the best theoriesof to-day are not those most easily understoodby sophomores. . . (2)The best theory should be the only possibletheory, i.e., the factswill not be as adequatelyexplainedby any other,and any otherwillcontaincontradictions.... (3)The best theory should be fruitful nthe sense of leading to an accumulationof integrated facts....(4) The theory must yield postulatesto which universalassent maybe obtained....The roughdichotomywe have drawnamong the patterns of socialsuggests a somewhat differentset of conditionsfor a sound socialtheory.We contend, therefore, hat soundsocial theoryavoidscon-notationsof any absolutisticcategories.Soundsocial theory needsto be relativisticin the sense of being a statement of probabilitiesin the situation. It utilizes the tentative formulationsof workinghypotheses.Nevertheless t doespostulate an arbitrarily electedbutexplicitlystated frameof reference o supplythe pointsof departurefor research.It utilizes concepts that are definedas far as possibleby the operationalmethod. That is, every social situation is to bedescribed n termsof conceptswhichthemselvesaredefined n termsof physicalprocessesof experimentand measurementactually per-formed.Thus the use of the operationalmethod to defineconceptsavoidsthe verbalismof emotionalattitude, whichembracesutopianideologiesthat are servingas unconsciousmechanismsof escapeorof personal identification,and it substitutes for these a verbalismthat is descriptiveof objectiveexperience.Then mathematicalequa-tions arefittedto observationsandnot used to symbolize new wordwhich is substituted for another word, which in turn merely ex-

J. F. Brown, The Mathematical Conceptions Underlying the Theory of Psychological andSocial Fields, Edwards Bros., I935, pp. 25-26. For an example of the use of mathematicalconceptions by implicit rather than explicit procedures and without the forbidding terminol-ogy of Brown, see F. Stuart Chapin's ContemporaryAmericanInstitutions, Harper and Bros.,I935, especiallypp.3I9-352.



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SOCIAL THEORY AND SOCIALACTION IIpresses emotional attitude. A sound theory constitutes a logical sys-tem of relations among concepts, postulates and hypotheses, all ofwhich taken singly are so many provisional tools used to interpretexperience in a meaningful manner. It scrutinizes the discrepanciesbetween levels of symbols: levels that begin with the more concretesymbolic substitutes for social reality and ascend to the more ab-stract symbolic substitutes. It examines such systems to insure thatthe transitions from evel to level are logically made and do not de-part from representations of reality to a degree that creates invali-dating errors.

In conclusion, how may this sound social theory be applied as aguide to social action? The first application of sound social theory isto examine critically all utopian ideologies that underlie planned so-cial action. The second application is to forecast consequences arisingout of the unplanned combinations of those social actions that areindependently planned. Hitherto the social scientist trained to dothis work with competence has not been able to bring his technicalknowledge to bear upon the problem in concrete cases. He has ex-pressed his views in articles of a scholarly sort which probably nevercome to the attention of the public administrator or the businessleader because they are tucked away in journals unknown to thepublic and couched in technical language unintelligible to most read-ers. He has been casually consulted, it is true, but in a purely chancecontact.But a change has come. State planning boards now exist as theneeded social machinery to implement the function of the technicaladviser. All projected legislation designed to achieve social and eco-nomic objectives by initiating changes in the existing structure ofsocial organization should be referred to such planning boards forcomment. There should be attached to such boards, as technical con-sultants, persons who are trained social scientists. Such personsshould be actually advisory in the sense of being consulted beforeand not after administrative decision is made. They should renderan expert opinion by stating the alternatives of social action and/orthe probable consequences, and submit this statement to the properpublic official or leader. Finally, this expert opinion should be con-sidered and studied by administrators before the decision is an-nounced publicly.

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