Abstract
Economic sociology was re-invented in the 1970s based on the idea of exploring how and why social factors matter in modern economy. The chapter presents the initial research program of new economic sociology and asks how to develop it further. Starting from the observation that many newcomers from other backgrounds have stepped into the research field recently, the chapter discusses how the initial core could be developed. In light of this, principles, tools, and aims of the core research program are reconstructed, assuming that this will help choose partners for, and investigate further ways of development. It is highlighted that most new economic sociologists have been working on causal models that explain how network patterns reduce uncertainty. So, improving, widening, and organizing such causal models is the best way to continue forward. For this, the background, goals, and forms of the broader framework of action-based explanations are outlined. Then, new economic sociology is interpreted as a special variant of explanatory sociology and compared to other proponents of this program such as the analytical mechanism concept. Based on the reconstruction of essential principles and tools, it is possible to investigate ways and collaborators to develop new economic sociology in the wider sense of the modern explanatory social science approach.
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Notes
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The modern social science approach, as it was introduced by proponents of the European Enlightenment such as David Hume, Adam Smith, or John Locke assumes structural patterns in social reality which can be explained and reorganized by humans because of their ability to think logically, to sense empirically, and to act reasonably. Max Weber later defined sociology as a social science offering causal explanations based on the assumption that humans set meaning to the world and could act meaningfully. So, social scientists can construct explanations by exploring the meaning of the individuals in a real context. For evidence reasons starting with the simple version of means-end rationality works as guideline (Weber 1949). This kind of rational analyses was re-considered and has been developed from the 1980s on (Maurer 2016b; for a more detailed description see Sect. 3).
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As is well-known, sociology covers different methodological premises and is therefore multi-paradigmatic working with a huge variety of concepts and dualisms such as micro versus macro, grand theory versus middle range concepts, ideal versus materialistic, explanatory versus critical or understanding and so on. (Giddens and Turner 1987; Smelser 1988). Nowadays, we find proponents of nearly all the different sociological programs using a variety of concepts in the field of economic sociology. So, reconstructing and outlining the backgrounds, aims, and tools is an important task to organize the field and to decipher how the different approaches could be developed by working together or separately.
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Early proponents of new economic sociology as well as those of the micro-macro movement, were linked to Harvard University and became more skeptical about Parsonianism, Structural-Functionalism, variable sociology, and survey research due to the writings of Robert K. Merton and Harrison White (see for an overview Swedberg 1990; see also Chap. 3).
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For general overviews of network analyses, theories, and methods see Lin (2001).
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- 8.
For the classical criticism on pure macro perspectives such as functional analyses and evolutionary theories see Max Weber (2019, chap. 1).
- 9.
Sociological classics Max Weber and Emile Durkheim established sociology as a social science that explicitly aimed to explain real social phenomena. Weber emphasized using action models or types to take meanings of individuals and empirical context into account. This has been essential for action-based explanations using situational analyses that explore the social reality from the viewpoint of intentional or rational actors.
- 10.
If rational choice theory is used as a micro-foundation the guideline is interpreting different social situations in light of the intentions—and most of all context-related interests—of individuals. Cognitive abilities matter only if they are important for defining expected costs and benefits of actions.
- 11.
The term mechanism is often and widely used in sciences Mayntz (2004) and with a special focus on sociology Maurer (2016b). It gained a precise understanding within analytical sociology which uses mechanisms as a metaphor for abstract causal explanations (Hedström 2005; Hedström and Ylikoski 2010); therefore the term analytical mechanism approach is used when refering to this approach.
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Maurer, A. (2021). Social Factors in the Economy: New Economic Sociology and the Mechanism Approach. In: Maurer, A. (eds) Handbook of Economic Sociology for the 21st Century. Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-61619-9_4
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