History of Western Social Thought

Author: Yu Hai
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-01-01
Features: Since 1998, I have taught two courses annually for the Sociology Department at Fudan University—one titled "History of Western Social Thought" and the other "Modern Western Sociological Theory." In fact, in my teaching syllabus and practice, they have never been two separate series but rather different stages of a coherent and unified history of Western sociological thought, discussed within the broader context of Western intellectual and cultural traditions and the grand narrative of Western social change. This has led to the present work, a history of social thought spanning from ancient Greek city-state sociology to contemporary American post-industrial society theory. It is not a simple concatenation of the two aforementioned topics—such a result would both truncate history and sacrifice thought, which is the worst fate for a work of intellectual history; nor was it created out of a desire to be deliberately unconventional. In Hegel's Lectures on the Philosophy of History and Schumpeter's The Theory of Economic Development, we have already seen works that combined a broad historical perspective, profound philosophical insight, and extensive specialized knowledge on a grand scale. Their analyses were exhaustive, tracing Greek thought from its origins to contemporary schools of thought. Their work set an undeniable precedent for the discipline of intellectual history, and this book owes much to their writings, as well as other works on the history of disciplines (such as Sakai's history of sociology, Sabine's history of political thought, Russell's history of philosophy, and Murphy's works on the history of psychology, among others).
My undergraduate major was history, and the Department of History at Beijing Normal University, where I studied, was home to a group of outstanding historians in China, such as Bai Shouyi, He Ziquan, Gong Shuduo, and Liu Jiahe. Their mentorship cultivated my sensitivity and awareness of history. Additionally, the "History of Chinese Thought" course taught by Mr. Qiu Hansheng and Mr. Lin Ying was one of the most enriching courses I took during my university years.
My graduate major was the history of Western philosophy. The training I received from the philosophy faculty at Fudan University inspired and honed my philosophical inclinations and ultimately solidified my academic direction toward the study of intellectual history. My academic training and intellectual background have shaped my goal of making intellectual history research embody both "the rationality of thought and the rhythm of history." I am not entirely sure how much of this requirement is reflected in the present work, but I can confidently say that it falls far short of my subjective aspirations, which leaves me deeply humbled and ashamed.