Abstract

A comprehensive philosophy of social science will include an analysis of concepts used by social scientists in their work; a viewpoint on the interpretation by social scientists of the facts which they uncover, or on their theories about the findings; and a discussion of the value judgments which social scientists erect. Some essays in the present volume concern the first of these domains, namely, the analysis of concepts; for example, essays on the concept of human rights, on the meaning of human dignity, and on power as an organizing concept in social science. Others deal with the second sphere, social scientists' interpretations or theories relating to factual findings; for example, essays on the theory of social classes and on the materialist view of the role of ideas in society. Valuational propositions of social scientists, constituting the third category, are the subject of essays included here on values in political science and on ideological aspects of our view of human nature. The essays in a fourth group span more than one of these departments of investigation, covering the interrelations of concepts, theories, and values; for example, an essay on the concept of levels in social theory.