Chapter I The Nature of Social Thought

Man faces a world of social problems. As a result he is perplexed beyond description; his thinking often ends in confusion. Inasmuch as the average citizen, for the first time in the world’s history, is beginning to attack social problems, he is entitled to all the aid that can be made available. Upon the success of the average person in mastering the intricacies of social thinking, the cause of democracy depends.

A large proportion of the analyses of social questions has been academic. These discussions have often terminated in quibbles or erudite generalizations. Insofar as social theories have been correct they have unfortunately been reserved for the theorists alone. The people themselves have not understood the nature of social thought; they have not benefited; and hence, they have held social thought in contempt. Sound social thought needs to be democratized, that is, to be made available for all people.

In thinking about social problems, the so-called practical person has proceeded in his own way. He has had personal experience—and that to him has been sufficient. He has been motivated by a sense of injustice, and stung into fervid thought by circumstances which seemed to him unfair; he has concocted a make-shift remedy, or impulsively accepted a ready-made program. Perhaps he has urged a single cause for all social ills and prescribed a single remedy for all social diseases. Usually, he has been very limited in his observations, untrained in making proper inductions, and hence, narrow and intolerant in his conclusions. He has been entirely baffled, or else he has felt cock-sure.

The practicalist is often a poor theorist. He may be even the most dangerous type of theorist. He has scoffed at theory and then fallen into the pit of incorrect theory. He has failed to see, for example, that a good bridge does not project itself across a chasm, but that a correct bridge-building theory is essential. With social practicalists and theorists calling each other names, instead of co-operating and unselfishly giving the world of people the benefit of their combined points of view, the world has floundered and its social problems have piled up, mountains high.

Another difficulty in the pathway of sound social thinking is found in an absence of proper backgrounds. People are prone to offer solutions for social questions without first equipping themselves with a knowledge of foundational elements. Moreover, they are often unwilling to acquaint themselves with these necessary factors. It is only by accident, however, that current social movements can be understood unless the historical sequences of social cause and effect are perceived. Nearly all social problems are essentially the outcroppings of tendencies which have had a long human history. A current social maladjustment is generally indicative of a long line of antecedent factors. A knowledge of societary fundamentals is essential to sound thinking about present-day evils. A history of social thought furnishes a minimum social background for the understanding of current social processes and problems.

Social thought, as distinguished from individual thought, treats of the welfare of one’s associates and of groups. It may be very simple, merely observational, the result of daily experience, or it may be a scientific study of social processes. Sociology as an organized science has developed only during the past few decades. Inasmuch as sociology has simply begun its work of formulating the principles of societary progress, a large proportion of the thinking that has thus far been done in human history about the welfare of socii or associates is either individual or social, rather than sociological. A history of social thought, therefore, includes the larger social field as well as the more specific one of recent development, namely, the sociological. The time is hardly ripe for a history of distinctly sociological thought.

Social thought, as here used, is a synthesis of the observations of individuals about the welfare of other individuals, considered as individuals or as groups. The focus of social thought is not the welfare of the ego but of the alter, not of the self but of others, not of the individual but of the class, group, organization, or process. Social thought draws from the thought-life of persons who have done unselfish thinking and who have focalized their attention upon the nature and principles of associative activities. It tests group progress by the degree in which human personalities secure constructive, co-operative expression. It measures the individual in his relationships to the social whole, whether that unit be the family, school, church, state, or the world society. It rates the individual in terms of a functioning unit in group life. It evaluates the group both in regard to the quality of the personalities which it produces in its membership, and to the loyalty which it manifests as a unit of a larger group, even of human society itself.

Social thought is both concrete and abstract. Concrete thinking rarely goes deep. It asks few questions, raises few doubts, and perceives few connections. Abstract thinking seeks causal explanations, classifies concretenesses, penetrates relationships, and proposes well-balanced procedures. The distinction, however, is largely one of degree. Concrete thinking is characteristic of every normal person, but abstract perceptions are uncommon. The ability to do abstract thinking, to get at the deeper meanings of phenomena, to penetrate the mysteries of life, is rare. Concrete thinking constitutes the major sector of the thought-life of every person, nearly all the time.

Here and there, however, in human history we find individuals who have been freed or who have freed themselves from the daily struggle for a living, from the race to make money, or from the selfish enticements of life-long loafing, and have joined the world of scholars, seeking to know the truth, the truth which makes men and women free—free to develop useful personalities in a vast, changing complex of human living. When man, having leisure to think abstractly, has set himself to the task of thought research, his mind has ventured along at least five pathways.

(1) Man has given considerable attention to his relation to the universe. Primitive man conceived of a personal universe, peopled with spirits. Throughout human history man has been a religious being, trying to solve the problems of a universe ruled by spirits and gods or by one supreme God. This type of thought has produced polytheisms, monotheisms, theocracies. It has formulated theological creeds and led to bitter ecclesiastical controversies. It has created fears, hopes, faiths, social ideals, and sacrificial standards.

(2) Irrespective of religious needs, man has endeavored to discover proper relations to his universe. He has philosophized. He has tried to reduce to terms of thought this baffling, intangible, universal environment. He has searched for a specific ground for explaining the universe. He has sought unity in change and monism in multiplicity. He has proclaimed that change itself is Lord of the universe, or perhaps he has found solace in a creative evolution. At any rate, he has sought ultimate meanings in as unbiased an interpretation of the universe as is humanly possible.

(3) From the far-flung horizons of religious and philosophic theory, man has turned his thought in an opposite direction—he has directed his thought upon itself. He has maneuvered his thought processes introspectively. He has puzzled over the structure and functions of his own mind. These series of studies have led on the one hand to treatises such as the Critique of Pure Reason, and on the other hand to the current expressions of behavioristic psychology or of psychoanalysis.

(4) Man has sought to fathom the material secrets of the earth. Since the Industrial Revolution in England, inquiring minds have focussed tremendous energies upon attempts to master the physical elements. Rocks and strata of rocks have been caused to yield a wealth of ores, and subterranean caverns have been made to pour forth reservoirs of gas and oil. Modern transportation has been made possible by the use of steam, gasoline, electricity. Mechanical inventions have followed one another in unanticipated fashion, paying awe-inspiring tribute to the genius of man. Abstract thinking has given man a marvelous degree of control over the material side of life.

(5) Recently, the problem of man’s adjustment and responsibility to his fellowmen is being accorded a worthy hearing at the bar of scientific thought. For millenniums man has pondered hard over his relations and obligations to his God and to his universe, over the nature of his mind and spirit, over ways and means of acquiring individual success through a manipulation of the material resources of the earth. Incomprehensible as it may seem, it is true, however, that man has neglected almost wholly, until recently, the very heart of all successful living, namely, his relations and obligations to his fellow men and to society. Social thought, the center of all sound thinking, has been ignored. Consequently, the world, beneath its load of social ills, has slipped backward nearly as often as it has advanced.

In the present age, however, the world is making unprecedented demands upon social thought, long before social thought is adequately prepared for its gigantic tasks. Religion is seeking re-vitalization through socialized thinking. In its modern endeavor to win the world, Christianity is making tremendous demands upon applied sociology.

After many vain searches among false theories and impersonal ends, philosophy is seeking to find itself in a social universe. Psychology, likewise, is no longer individual, structural, and formal; it is now trying to interpret itself in terms of human behavior. Group processes are being searched for the origins of stimuli that will explain individual conduct.

Economic thought, too, has reached a stage where it is endeavoring to re-define its concepts in the light of sociological knowledge. The material resources of the earth as well as industrial and business enterprises, in fact all economic values, are being measured, and re-valued in terms of their societary significance. The meaning of industrial democracy is being sought in sociological terms.

In the distinctively associative life enormous demands are being made upon sociology. It is invited to formulate the criteria by which the worth of an educational system may be determined. Groups are trying to provide for the use of the leisure time of their members by methods that are socially valuable. Many attempts are being made for restoring to the family its fundamental prerogatives as a social institution.

The history of social thought rises out of the beginnings of human life on earth and with jagged edges extends along the full sweep of the changing historical horizon. It finds expression through some of the world’s best minds. Our quest will bring us in contact with the most vital moments of the world’s most valuable thinkers.